Of course there’s a “system”, because it drags people into it! I was digging through my notes on my desk, and saw a good, short story that I can run through that is relatively unencumbered. Just a few quick gags with no heavy character growth.

I had originally planned to have a server rack in the last panel, and had written it various ways, but I found it visually distracting in the thumbnails and it put too much importance on something I wasn’t really planning on revisiting. So, I tweaked it to be just another conspiracy theory.

And this wraps up the BiteyFish storyline. Just about everyone got a piece of the action in this one, which is pretty satisfying. It took forever to finish, but you can’t win them all.

Middle management is not a fate I would wish on anyone, but if there’s a character capable of bending the world to her will it’s Mary. Well, the female lead does a pretty good job at it, too, but she was already there five years ago. That story happened before the strip ever started.

I have a few stories I want to fire off in rapid succession, but I’m not sure exactly how I’ll do it yet. I’ll have to figure it out soon, though, because I don’t want to waste time on interstitials if I can avoid it. I enjoy doing them, but I want to keep the head of steam rolling for a while longer. All I can promise is that there will be more comics.

Ted looks confused as to what’s happening here. I think I am, too. It looks like the Lobster can be a good guy when he wants to, but don’t be confused: he hasn’t forgotten his grudge. He’s working behind the scenes so far for both Mary and the main character, so it’s safe to say he’s pretty well integrated into the family at this point.

I’m not sure the disguise is fooling Ted, though.

This comic took me a bit of time to clean up. There’s a fair amount of corrective fluid and some stray marks on the original. It’s a very interesting original from a process perspective. Lots to compare.

Here, the MC finally gets it. Appearances never fooled his boss. This is the first time he’s confronted Ted without a tie on, and finally it’s sunk in. We’ll see if the MC can finally get his act together, though, and grow up. If so, most of that can be glossed over.  Acting like an adult is boring, soul-crushing work and not worthy of comic space.

I don’t know. Seriously, sometimes I just don’t know. Go with your gut.

I’m not a big believer in failure. Well, that’s not fair. I believe in it. I just believe that people may be using the wrong metric too often. The progress of humanity is marked with failures, way more failures than successes. But it’s often what we learn from the failures that pushes us forward. This part is my more pessimistic side talking, obviously. Either I think failure is overused, or that failure is an acceptable thing.

Ted is an interesting character to me. As I was coloring this, I realized there’s many ways the last panel could be taken. I see him as saying that he failed to live up to his dream, that as his company grew it became unmanageable. When he let the main character get hired, he knew he was smart. But smart does not equal motivated. Maybe that’s part of his failure, too. He wanted the MC to succeed. I think he’s more disappointed than anyone about the situation.

In a way, I understand. I have seen people locked into positions that they were too important to promote, even though they had a wealth of skills going to waste. Usually the same thing happens in the end, they realize they have to leave and go on to do great things for another organization. It’s kind of sad, but that’s the world we live in.

I have a few more comics I want to do to set the mood, but we’ll be back to gag-a-day and wacky hijinks before you know it!

Sorry, guys, sometimes I just have stories to tell. I promise not to do it too often.

I think Mary’s still waiting to see if it sinks in.