Comic Report #118 - Patftermath (Patreon)

Okay so, here's the thing:  I've got this whole scene written up where Pat's heroic reputation lands him in a bad spot and so he needs to make a decision without anyone else coming to his rescue, and that decision has been to clonk his Gravekeeper handler upside the head with a crowbar.  He felt justified in that moment, but in the immediate aftermath of his action he realized the weight of what he'd just done, and had himself a little panic moment.  For the next page I want to write up a little moment where Pat can kinda soak in the ramifications of his heroism, and I want to get that drawn sooner than later so I'm starting it a bit earlier this month.  I don't want people to have to wait a long time for a page without much dialogue on it so this week I'm sharing an early hack-in block-in phase with you.  I'd hoped to have a bit more done but the heat this week had me conserving energy so, it is what it is.

This one's probably an easy write-up, but I have a bit of an execution puzzle to solve for myself.  The gist of the page is pretty straightforward:  Pat had just klonked a member of the town's cool-guy task force team, the Mayor's personal problem-fixers, the group Pat had aspired to join himself.  He's out, there's no explaining or writing off what happened, Pat is out and he knows it.  But also: there's a bunch of these guys and they come up with all these convoluted ways to disappear people who are problematic, and that now includes himself.  He's screwed.  He's toast!  He's in deep deep trouble, and now he's just taking a moment to grapple with that fact.

Pat's journey is one of star-eyed heroism.  He'd believed if he could prove his bravery he'd be lauded and rewarded, but in pursuing his own glory he finds that nothing is super easy and so he lands in over his head in trouble.  Any sort of conflict, confrontations like this, it's not something people take to lightly, it's a massive anxiety spike, it's unpleasant, it's not glamorous at all, and here comes Pat discovering this all for himself.  His tummy hurts and he 100% has to throw up in one of the flowerpots on the rooftop garden.  He's in a panic and he doesn't know what to do next, but he knows a lady or two who might.  

The end half of this comic is a bit of a puzzle for me to solve.  I want to convey Pat running off-camera, pausing, running back, picking up the head in a bag and then running off camera again.  I need to figure out a way to do this with wide panel shots, maybe something staggered so I can do it in five instead of three, but I haven't been able to cook up a solution to this closing part of the scene just yet, I'm trying not to melt in the heat.  I'll get it this weekend I'm sure, but for now you kinda get the idea.  It's Patrick's Panic Page!

As mentioned, I'm gonna try to get this page done sooner than later just because it's not a super weighty page so I don't think it merits being a wait-y kind of update.  I do have another gamedev update ready to share after this one is up so games friends keep an eye out for that soon.  I'll have more progress on the layout next week so until then, keep cool and have a nice weekend!