No, I haven't changed my mind on the hybrid format already -- but it occurred to me, about halfway through wrestling with this page, that while a lot of the scenes I write benefit from big lumps of prose, some just work better as comics. And, you know, it's my story. I make the rules.

(This is not a particularly surprising realization, I just would have expected it to happen with a more action-y scene. Ah well, we take the insights where we find 'em.)

Belated, day-after news clarification: what Murdoch's talking about on the 'signing papers' is Julia's business liscense getting revoked. Here is Murdoch talking about fixing it with a trip to l'rue, and way the hell back here is Nash asking Harvey to put the fix in.

My comic is too long and too complicated and everything takes forever, including even me finding these references.

Thank you guys for the kind words. I'm not wedded to this new format yet... but I will say it makes exchanges like this, where I'm mostly having people move about a little and talk a lot, much more doable. We'll see!

Annnnd page!

So as mentioned, I'll be experimenting with a new hybrid format for this storyline. Illustrated... storycomic, I guess? The important part from my end is that it's getting more material per page and is taking considerably less effort for the art -- and I'm pretty sure most of y'all are not here for the art, anyhow.

Very much a work in progress though so if you have a question or a comment or complaint, feel free! I have a pretty iron ego, and I want to share this story in a way you guys enjoy as well as in a way that helps me finish. Comments that help me see how to do both will be gratefully taken on board, comments that don't help me will be just as gratefully but firmly jettisoned without prejudice, because even I can't tell the difference until I hear 'em.

I am hoping to get through this in my previous usual fashion of updating to a graceful break point and then taking a week or two pause while I catch up, but I was also hoping to hire at least one more person at the day job this year annnnnd that didn't happen. So I'll just say I'll do my best not to vanish for years again.

FIVE GODDAMN YEARS LATER

So... yeah. Hi?

I'm not going to cover at length why the comic vanished for so long. Call it a combination of health issues, mental health issues, burnout, the really... interesting way family and work troubles compound each other when you work for and with your family, and uh, you know. The fascism.

I also cannot promise it's fully back, and to the extent it is back, it's not going to be quite the same. The art is one of the biggest roadblocks, both because it takes the most time and because I'm not all that good at it; the last time I made a major try at restarting the comic, I decided (with the support and encouragement of my lovely Patreons) to test out something more like an illustrated story format. So for at least the length of this storyline, that's what you'll be getting, and after that -- well, we'll see.

I've had a lot of false starts and I'm hesitant to commit to much, lest the universe hear and start lining up the bowling ball, but I am hoping to have something more than this page by March. But at the very least, I've put up the page that's been half-finished since everything went to hell in 2021.

If you're reading this... thank you for not giving up. I haven't either, not quite yet.