NEW VOTING INCENTIVE! Follow along as I work on the cover for Puck Volume 1!!!
I’m slowly but surely generating the cover for Puck Volume 1, and you can watch the progress by voting on TWC. I’m updating the image at least once a week, so be sure to check back!
CLICK HERE TO VOTE FOR PUCK!!! IT’S SATISFYING LIKE LEMONADE!
And as for this comic…
Coming up with the character design for Colin’s sister was actually really easy. I just took his face, narrowed it slightly, removed the beard and added lipstick and eyelashes. I was surprised by how well it worked.
Where is an acid-tongued teenager when you need one? Or someone with such a naive, sincere and bubbling personality that insults would just bounce right off her, infuriating the insulter? Oh, right, getting grossed out by her father.
See? I actually plan this stuff out sometimes!
… Isn’t the fact the Puck is Puck, Ancient Fairy of Lore supposed to be kinda secret?
Uh, not … really? Maybe? I just think that no one ever bothers to put two and two together. She goes by Puck or Robin pretty interchangeably. It’s not like a secret identity for her.
To be fair, Puck is male in the play. So people would probably see Puck as some nick name not really the actual name of our female Puck we all love and fear.
By the way, I want that jersey. I know it’s a reference to the movie, but my nick name at work is Troll because I’m big, muscular, get hurt and simply shake it off to the point where everyone thinks I have Wolverine’s healing factor, and am constantly playing pranks on my coworkers.
Daphne wore that shirt way back a few years ago. It was one of my favourites. In this image, though, you can’t really see the big ‘2’ right beneath the ‘TROLL’, which makes it a movie parody. It would work if it just said ‘Troll’ though, too.
I have to confess, I’m surprised EG.
Last week I asked if we should learn his parents name, to which you said it probably won’t happen.
…And we right at once learn the name of his sister.
Meh. I don’t complain. It’s more fun that way. ~_~
While not a Canadian, had someone said that my kitchen was ‘very Hamilton’, I’d probably just stare at him/her and say ‘what the heck does that mean?’ before resuming whatever I was doing prior to that.
As for how she looks, the instance I saw her, I honestly thought “…she’s going to be a complete and utter b****”.
And THAT was the look I was going for. Glad I achieved it.
From her comment (very Hamilton), I’m guessing she comes from T.O…. Also, if Colin’s sister design is based on Colin himself, are the two of them actually twins?
Colin’s family is actually from Calgary, but I’m guessing she’s visited Hamilton a few times due to her brother and has formed a dim view of it. They’re not twins. She’s older by about a year. I was more going for the whole sibling resemblance thing.
No name, just evil.
Huh? Colin says in panel 2 that her name is Heather.
Forget what I said. Problems squinting at the screen—again, and besides that, not being able to think of anything funny to say that’s on a par with the strip.
Gack! =_=; Heather’s worse than what’s-her-face, the devil’s P.R.-agent. She may even be worse than Phoebe’s dad…
She’s about on par with what’s-her-face in the evil department. I think she (and Tracee) are both a touch more evil than Phoebe’s dad. He wants to be evil more than evil being an inherent part of him.
I thought his goofiness-related lesser degree of evil was a sign of extreme age-related befuddlement. o_o
Could be. Could be. He was probably on his A-game back in New Testament times.
Surely you mean his D-game. 😉
By the way, sorry for calling Tracee what’s-her-face. I was stumped as to her name for a moment and too lazy to go back in the archives to find her name. ^^;
Dude, I can NEVER remember the names of minor characters in other people’s webcomics, so I do the same thing.
Ahh. Alrighty, then. ^^
I regularly watch movies and/or TV shows and never remember a single characters’ name.
I only remember the name of the titular character. “Next time… on MACGYVER!!!” I remembered his name.
That’s about what it takes for me, too!
You have to hit me with a 2×4 with the names.
And with this comic, everyone gets lost, because I have two characters, Phoebe and Daphne, with very Greek, vaguely similar names. So even if they remember the name, they might not remember the right one. Oh well. I should have named Daphne ‘Jo-Beth’ or something.
Don’t fret, Tracee dear. That Heather cannot compare to your pulchritude !
(and Tracee, sweetie, if you ever get tired of Money, Power, and Looks, …. Aww, that’ll never happen. -sniffle)
Ah HAH !
This thread confirms, to me, what I have long suspected: this Satan is NOT the Supreme Master of Evil in our entire Universe.
He’s just the Satan of Canada.
Explains a lot….
That may actually explain a lot, really.
Panics puck is technically medieval, this might be a good time to go medieval on her arse.
Not usually a good call to seriously maim an in-law, but hey, it’s happened.
I’m not normally a violent person (I’ve had LOTS of practice quelling the impulse), but I’d be mighty tempted to forget this one’s gender.
I’m rather surprised she managed to walk away from Puck with that remark without making a detour to the nearest trauma center.
Well, that’s the problem with intimidation: it’s … intimidating.
In panel 3, looks like Colin is worried about Puck’s reaction.
People, people, please settle down! There’s no need for violence!
…
As long as Puck cooks, she can turn Heather’s world into a tiny, squirming ball of misery without having to lift a finger against her. 😉
I’m sure Heather would have some weird dietary requirements that would mean she wouldn’t eat any food in the house. She’s the type.
She still needs to drink fluids. 😉 And if all else fails, if she showers in the house, Puck could ‘augment’ her shampoo.
You’re crafty!
I read a lot. ^^
I’m not really sure what I was going for there. I wanted to express vague anxiety, which is generally the feeling I have whenever negotiating a meeting between my wife and my family.
Heather’s remark about Colin’s beard says she and Colin haven’t seen each other in a while.
Well gosh, why wouldn’t someone want to keep in touch with a fine, loving sister like her? (tongue FIRMLY embedded in cheek)
Heather and Colin remind me me faintly of a brother and sister from another comic strip by Charles Shultz. I think being compared to such a wonderful classic says a lot about the quality of your comic.
Keep up the excellent work.
I don’t know about you, but I’d keep in touch to make sure I knew where she was at all times — so I could keep away from her and could dissuade her from ever visiting. 😉
Me, every time I saw her I would give her a big friendly hug. A hug that lifts her off the air and swings her about to remind her that I could crush her ribs with ease and everyone else thinks it’s just too adorable.
It sounds like you’ve had experience.
There’s some parallel there. Colin’s kind of Linus-like. I see that.
Something tells me Heather would be a MEAN DRUNK.
Something tells me you’re right.
I’m looking forward to a Tracee-Heather brawl myself.
I must admit, that does sound appealing. >:-)
You called it. I’d give you a fiver but I’m fresh out.
Yeah, but can you draw the fight scene? 😛
Maybe.
I wonder what Colin’s parents and sister will do to keep from being bored if they’re visiting.
I dunno. There’s not a lot to do in Hamilton.
I see after the original “tuque debacle”, you explain your “canadian-isms” in the alt text. 🙂
It’s more a localism than anything else. Hamilton is a lot like Pittsburgh before Pittsburgh pulled itself out of its slump. Actually, Hamilton has really started to pull itself out of its slump too now, but people in Canada refuse to believe that, so they still think Hamilton is a steeltown hole of poverty of crime.
So…Hamilton is like the area I live?
Which is?
I initially regretted saying that, but I realized that it doesn’t matter, since I linked this to my google+ account, which says where I am anyway.
Youngstown, OH is where I live. The closing of Youngstown Sheet and Tube on September 19,1977, known as Black Monday around here, began five years of decline as other mills around here began to close, and hit the city so hard that, even 37 years later, it has yet to completely recover.
Today, Youngstown is still a steel town, though not producing nearly as much steel up to 1977, but most of the jobs around here are at Youngstown State University.
Though the most interesting thing is that Schwebel’s bakery was both started here and is headquartered here. And you know what Schwebel’s produces? Cinnabon Cinamon Bread.
In fact, it’s just easier for me to link to the city’s wikipedia page.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Youngstown,_Ohio
EXACTLY like Youngstown. Hamilton’s bread and butter was steel, but that’s been a slow decline until one of the two big mills closed down for good last year. At that time it only had a skeleton staff left, so it didn’t hit the economy in one big blow. But like Youngstown, our biggest employer is now the university, along with the advanced medical facilities tied to it. (McMaster is primarily a medical school.)
It’s your typical rust belt town, but Canada really has few rust belt towns compared to the States. Hamilton’s sort of unique. Oh, and there’s Windsor, which is across the river from Detroit. Enough said.
At least my city has a song written about it by Bruce Springsteen about the rise and fall the steel industry here. 🙂
The fact that we have major trade routes going through here helped keep the city afloat; Interstate 80, which goes from New York to San Francisco goes through here, as does the Mahoning River, which eventually leads into the Ohio River.
I just checked the alt-text. (Sorry, I’ve been away for a couple of weeks as life has been crazy). I must say that going to Kamloops is oddly enough on the bucket list. But that’s just because I want to drive the Coquihalla Highway since I was just right across the border when it opened, and every time I set a day aside to drive it, something would happen.
Someday I will make it to Kamloops, though. Someday.
My brother lives in Kamloops. The fact that my brother lives in Kamloops makes the trip worthwhile for me, but I’m not sure I’d say that if he weren’t there. It’s a pleasant place, a bit on the rough side, but it’s super far from anything else. It’s also one of the few areas in Canada that qualify as a desert, so the terrain is oddly southwest. You do see the odd tumbleweed.
*I* live in Kamloops.
I have no idea what “so Kamloops” would mean. I have never heard the expression.
Kamloops is not desert though it is rather arid. There is a bit by Osoyoos that gets promoted as being the only desert in Canada, but I read something else stating that it is not quite.
I just threw in Kamloops because it’s near and dear to my heart. My brother lives there. It’s a little rough around the edges but uniquely charming. But from the perspective of an outsider, man, it’s pretty desert-like. The only time I’ve ever seen tumbleweed in my life was in Kamloops. I know it technically is the ‘just slightly wetter than desert’, but ‘arid’ is a good word.
My brother recently came back to Ontario for a visit, and the wet, humid Ontario air almost killed him after years of dry Kamloops. Where I live, the air’s so thick with moisture, you can cut yourself a slice and save some for later.
Since Heather is Colin’s sister she’s Miranda’s aunt by blood.
Who knew that Phoebe had a twin, tailless sister…. dun dun dunnnnnnnnnn
She’s clearly much closer related to Tracee.
I’d second that.
No relation. Maybe a bit of a similarity in facial shape and style. Different nose, though.
Are Colin and his sis twins? Facially, their looks are dead-on.
Her body of course, is another matter.
I don’t get the Canadian joke on Hamilton. Just the obvious regional prejudices every other country on the map has?
Yeah, Hamilton is not thought of highly in Canada. It’s actually (in my opinion) a really nice city with a lot going for it, but if you ask most Canadians, they think it’s a Detroit-like hole of despondency and crime and poverty. Colin’s sister hails from Calgary, which is one of the most monied cities in the country. It’s a boom town, and the money is all connected to oil. It’s a really nice city, but it’s a place that likes stuff new and shiny and rich.
Oh, okay then. That makes sense. Shame, I always wanted to take in a Tiger Cats/ Eskimos game one day soon…
So in Heather’s eyes, she sees Puck’s kitchen as rather “plebian” for lack of a better word.
I’ve got relatives like this lol
Rather plebian is a great description. And if you watch a CFL game, then you potentially qualify as a better Canadian than me.
A word like “Plebian”, in an American Classroom, would leave 1/3 of the Class glassy-eyed due to a total lack of understanding, 1/3 oblivious – as their eyes are continually glued to their iPhones, and the final third snickering a la Bemis & Butthead, figuring it must be female anatomy.
Hopefully the situation is not as dire North of the Border – which I imagine as kind of a Time-Warp that mimics the USA fifty years past.
Canada is more like an alternate reality United States where various dark decisions never really occurred. Though the previous Federal administration tried to make up for that by cramming fifty years of mistakes into a single term, we might actually pull out of that nosedive.
I have a friend who could break Heather’s composure… then we’d have the violence everyone seems to want relating to Heather.
Unfortunately, she’d be attempting to inflict it.
Everyone seems to ignore the fact that violence against family members usually has longstanding ramifications, however. These things need to be handled delicately… Craftily…
There are ramifications for cold-cocking doctors in the performance of their duties, but that didn’t stop Puck.
Of course, he earned the honor.
I wonder what would happen if Puck was to sic Serpentor on Heather.
Oh man this is going to be sooo good! I am quite surprise his sister commented the house and not the crackhouse riddle neighborhood in which they dwell. But as I have noticed grandparents have a laser like focus when it comes to children. As for Heather… it will amuse me to see just how long her patience lasts before she force feeds Heather her Manolo Blances!
It’s bound to be bloodsport of the best variety.
Serpentor was created by Cobra in both the G.I.Joe cartoon and comic book series from DNA gathered from the greatest military minds of History. A living source of DNA was also used in both the comic book series and the cartoon. The living DNA source was Storm Shadow in the comic book series and Sgt.Slaughter in the cartoon.
I am enjoying seeing the cast of characters expand a little bit. Great strip this week man.
Thanks! I’m not going to have Colin’s family become regular players in the comic, but it’s fun for a little interlude. I’m not a big fan of comics that have a cast of 25 critical characters. I want to keep the focus on the four main characters, with some additional support from the secondary batch.
I wonder if Puck and company have ever read Dracula by Bram Stoker.Dracula is modeled after Vlad the Impaler a cruel 15th century ruler who murdered hundreds and thousands of people.
I heard that Dracula was modeled more after Elizabeth Bathory: A Transylvanian countess who murdered thousands of virgin girls and then drank and bathed in their blood because she thought it would make her younger. Apparently she was so cruel that it became illegal to say her name in Hungary for a while after she died
Both, actually. The name and history of the character were taken from Vlad of house Drăculești, where the vampiric tendencies were taken from the legends of ecsedi Báthory Erzsébet, (the hungarian form of Elizabeth Bathory’s name).
Amusingly, both are heavily used in vampire stories.
To be fair to Vlad, most of the people he impaled were Turks, who were INVADING his country. And would have very likely to do the same to Vlad and his subjects.
So what you’re saying here is that if Colin wanted to be a drag queen it would be very easy for him? You should put that as the next vote incentive, sans beard, but with eyebrows.
I don’t think I’d get many takers.
I know how to deal with such insults… “you really think so? THANK YOU! That was EXACTLY what I was going for! You’ve no idea how hard…” well you get the idea.
It’s much easier than how I used to deal with people like that. What with the drop cloths, bleach, H2O2 (used to get a bulk discount) not to mention the cost of gas and time spent driving to the wilderness.
I like your new method better.
” it’s a Detroit-like hole of despondency and crime and poverty. ”
Not to mention it is right next to Hogtown(Taranta)…
And never the twain shall meet.
Anyway, I’ll take Windsor over Detroit anytime, I never fell in great danger of stopping bullets in Windsor like you do in Detroit getting off that big bridge and winding into these narrow streets of Motor City…
Hi. I’ve finished my Archive Trawl after the TWC review, bought my Super Pack (which doesn’t have the Daphne mini comic *sob*), set up my RSS feed and will look forward to continuing instalments.
Thanks for everything, man. I appreciate. I sent you an email with the link to the Daphne comic too.
His sister has a very Leonard’s Mother feel and look about her.
Same class. They all look the same.
Getting grossed out by Dirty Old Men, to BEING one, is pretty much inevitable for heterosexual males.
I think we just met Satan’s on-the-side. LOL.
Well, I think she’s a bit MORE evil than Satan, really. Satan’s small-time here.
Well, I was trying to be nice. If she ain’t his mistress, she’s GOT to be his wife AND he probably cows every time she gives him that look. LOL.
Possibly? Though he’s got his hands full already…
You know, since you said she’s a bit more evil than Satan, she has to be an EX-wife. LOL.
O.K., she and Phoebe have to meet and she and Satan do too.
Phoebe, yes. That will happen. Satan, not yet. Maybe eventually….
I’ve just got to that part. It was awesome!
Poor Phoebs. She had no idea what hit her.
Well, at least Heather didn’t call Puck’s kitchen “Hamiltonissimo.” 😉
At least.