I think this is a problem that especially bedevils web-comics, principally because many webcomics are not plotted out in advance within a well considered setting.
I suspect that lots of your readers may bring their reactions to more extemporaneous works and assume that an unexpected development in yours is an example either of a mistake, or at least of an artist’s vision shifting during the course of a long form story.
In a way this is always going to be a problem with works published in serial form. A novelist will produce an entire work, every comma and dash, and can make drastic alterations and re-writes, before publishing. A comic writer (unless they do the entire thing in advance) must either have no doubts about the course of their story, or put up with decisions they later reconsider… or change things on the fly.
You can’t blame your poor readers for wondering if an unexpected development is the last of these :)
I wonder if the ‘No rest for the wicked’ comment means “You weren’t wicked. You can rest now.” Validation and benediction, rather than a promise of resurrection.
Who knows? The author. Will he let us know? I look forward to finding out :)
I feel that the great achievement of this imaginary incident is how well it shows that two people, with different attitudes and expectations, can reach utterly different conclusions, even if both are motivated by compassion and grief.
Whether we feel Flask was right, or Holly, we can at least respect their motives, while still disagreeing with their decisions.
Sometimes, in real life, we forget to respect the people we disagree with. My admiration goes to Aaron for highlighting this, and for (so far) refusing to declare that there is a ‘right’ thing to do in a situation as dreadful as this – and, through his allegory, in the similarly awful situations real life sometimes confronts us with.
I think this is a problem that especially bedevils web-comics, principally because many webcomics are not plotted out in advance within a well considered setting.
I suspect that lots of your readers may bring their reactions to more extemporaneous works and assume that an unexpected development in yours is an example either of a mistake, or at least of an artist’s vision shifting during the course of a long form story.
In a way this is always going to be a problem with works published in serial form. A novelist will produce an entire work, every comma and dash, and can make drastic alterations and re-writes, before publishing. A comic writer (unless they do the entire thing in advance) must either have no doubts about the course of their story, or put up with decisions they later reconsider… or change things on the fly.
You can’t blame your poor readers for wondering if an unexpected development is the last of these :)