WC POLL#77 : Silent Comic

[tudore]

Bartolomé early twenties, fit and lean but not defined, short, pony tail, almost shoulder length hair, still wearing braces, limited body hair
JP young, buzz cut, stocky but not fat, clean uniform
Agnes The intersection between “maternal” and “cherub”: curvy, wide hips, wider smile, gapped teeth, full dimpled cheeks; curly blond hair, pony tail; wears crocs

Page 1

P1Pn1 Night: a New England highway passes through a wooded and rocky area. Bartolomé is leaning on guard rail with one hand, waving toward oncoming traffic with the other. We don’t see the car, just Bartolomé covered in light up to his waist. He is half naked and barefoot, wearing only scrub pants. His hospital ID is clipped to his waist, and he’s got a few scratches from stumbling through the woods.


P1Pn2 A patrol car has stopped next to him.


P1Pn3 The police officer, JP, has come out of the car and is walking around the front of the vehicle. He has his flashlight in this left hand, and is shining it towards Bartolomé, who is trying to stand up. He has dried vomit trailing down his torso from his mouth.


P1Pn4 Bartolomé stumbles toward the ground; he’s arms are limp, so extremely disoriented and out of it he can’t react to protect himself.


P1Pn5 [inset] His forehead almost touching the ground, his fall is stopped.


P1Pn6 JP caught him, and is now holding him up [Pietà.]

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Page 2


P2Pn1 The patrol car has its sirens flashing as it pulls into the ER lane of the Hospital.


P2Pn2 JP starts to pull Bartolomé of the backseat. (The grate that separates the front and rear seats is casting a shadow over the men.)


P2Pn3 [inset] Bartolomé jerks away.


P2Pn4 Bartolomé is crouched back into the car: his eyes are clearly panicked, but his jaw is slack. He is slurring his words fairly badly.


P2Pn5 JP squats down in front of the open door.


P2Pn6 [inset] The officer’s speaking. His face is calm, his eyes serious but not angry.


P2Pn7 [inset] His hand is outstretched toward the man inside the car.


P2Pn8 Bartolomé takes his hand.

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Page 3


P3Pn1 Inside the hospital, JP, and Agnes are laying Bartolomé on a gurney.


P3Pn2 [inset] Agnes’ gloved hands are filling a syringe


P3Pn3 JP is holding on to the side of the gurney.


P3Pn4 Bartolomé grabs the officer’s wrist.

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Page 4


P4Pn1 The trio, viewed from above, are riding in the elevator.


P4Pn2 [inset] Bartolomé's hand has a loose grip on JP’s


P4Pn3 [inset] The hand slackens completely, and falls


P4Pn4 The doors of the elevator open, light floods in.


P4Pn5 JP lifts his hand up to protect his eyes


P4Pn6 [inset] Bartolomé’s pupils have contracted, his brow drips with sweat. He’s paralyzed, but conscious.


P4Pn7 JP’s face: his hand has drifted down, his jaw has fallen open, eyes are wide.

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Page 5


P5Pn1 Doctors and med students crowd around a woman with leg in vacuum tube. Her hands are desperately gripping the sheets of her bed. The tube is dark.


P5Pn2 [inset] The subject's leg is hosting a variety of fungi; a colony of ants has been founded, and a few of its members are crawling on the interior surface of the vacuum tube.


P5Pn3 Researchers are monitoring the vital stats of a skinless man, suspended in a tank filled with unknown fluids. Straps hold up his arms, and keep his legs apart [Vitruvian man.]


P5Pn4 JP walks toward the man in the tank.


P5Pn5 [inset] The officer taps the glass.


P5Pn6 [inset] The subject suffers a violent paroxysm in response to the stimuli. The head jerks, attempting to escape the vibrations.


P5Pn7 The officer turns back to Agnes, laughing.


P5Pn8 Tears are streaming from Bartolomé’s eyes.

[cbikle]

I'm going to try and give C&C's for all the entries, but because of time they'll be a bit rushed.


A debt repaid by Zepster

Nice story, the swordplay and facial descriptions really lend themselves to a narration and dialogue-free story. No real crits, nice job.

[cbikle]

Fish in the Sea by Shaun

Weird story but I liked it - At first I thought Pirannie and Dan were going to become a romantic couple and I'm glad that the story didn't go in that direction. Not sure what, but the story feels as though as it's missing something, almost like their should be some final twist, but maybe that's just because of the absence of dialogue.

[Shaun]

Fish in the Sea by Shaun

Weird story but I liked it - At first I thought Pirannie and Dan were going to become a romantic couple and I'm glad that the story didn't go in that direction. Not sure what, but the story feels as though as it's missing something, almost like their should be some final twist, but maybe that's just because of the absence of dialogue.

Interesting that you felt it was missing a twist, I had hoped him proposing might accomplish that. But I agree with Tudore that it felt rushed. This was more a problem of the page limit than the lack of dialogue. Still, it was a fun challenge. It makes me want to use less words in future scripts.

[cbikle]

SATELLITE 46218 by Ale Tolosana.

Although I liked the visuals of this story, I didn't feel there was anything really new in a type of story that we've read before and it doesn't read as though Captain Frost has any real role other than being a final witness of the AI's decision. It feels like Frost should serve as some sort of catalyst in this story but he isn't as the AI had made its decision prior to Frost's arrival.

[cbikle]

Untitled by Insomniac Pillz

I like the premise of this and the look of the killer, but I think there needed to be more to the story to make it stand out.

Also, the actions in the panels were a little off to me, almost like there were too many actions in each one. I think with more panels/pages, I think that could be remedied easily enough.

[Inkspot]

Zepster - A Debt Repaid
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Other than a few spelling errors and some difficulty following the timing/choreography on the fourth page, including what I read as multiple actions in the same panels, there isn't really anything wrong with this. I'd personally save the blood on the portrait for the last panel, as the retainer was slain across the room, and how his blood splattered the front of something that was faced in the opposite direction could be a challenge to explain. These kinds of stories aren't really my thing, and the worst I could say is that it seems generic. Like I've read or seen it before in Blade of the Immortal or any number of samurai films. Technically, it's fine. Personally, it doesn't hold much interest.


Shaun - Fish In The Sea
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Excellent use of eminata! While I like the struggle between Dan and Pirannie, the gore of it does strike me as incongruent with the light-hearted and, dare I repeat previous critiques, Looney Tunes-esque nature of the story. I'd rather have seen her stick the ring on her antenna (otherwise known as the esca or illicium, according to Wikipedia), and have Dan maneuver so she bites her own light source to get the ring off than have him violently rip out one of her teeth and impale her with it. Must be going soft. I feel bad for the poor sewer-dwelling ladyfish-monster. Besides that and the odd technical impossibility of the, presumably, gold and diamond ring floating, this was one of my favorites, even if the protagonist comes out looking a little morally grey. It's got heartbreak, twice, action, new love, and leaves us with hope for Dan's future. Good work.


Ale Tolosana - Satellite 46218
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While I agree with other critiques that dictating cinematography/layout can get obnoxious, and should usually be left to the artist, if you have a reason for it, I can understand. Despite my not knowing the difference between what you refer to as "page-wide" versus occupying "the width of the page", it seems that you're going for a specific, widescreen cinema look. Not exactly the most visually thrilling, but I get it. There's also not much to differentiate written text and spoken dialogue in a comic, particularly coming from a computer, and I really dislike that the AI uses contractions and says "about 0.58 seconds" instead of "approximately 0.58 seconds" or "exactly 0.58 seconds", but that may just be a personal grievance. The environmental message, … whatever. Frost's timing does seem to be pretty fortuitous, though, since he's off-world as Earth is destroyed. This was going somewhere really interesting, and then fell apart on the last half of the last page. Still, I liked it, and could definitely see the visuals working well with a lot of high-contrast black and white, interrupted by colors from the alien technology.


InsomniacPillz - "Untitled"
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I can see why you might want to use the first page to set a mood, or introduce your killer, or as a space to throw up credits, but there's got to be more going on here. Just having the girl quickly dodging into one of the rooms would be a way to build some tension, and introduce the concept that she's been running for a while. For the rest of the house, a structural map or blueprint might do you some good. They were in the bedroom, killer stalking towards the closet she's hiding in, which he opens to find empty, and she's sneaking down the hall? Then he turns the light on in an adjacent room while she's downstairs in the kitchen? And, as hokey as it might be, I like the idea of her picking up an older phone, only to see the cord's been cut. It helps to cement the late 80's/early 90's slasher flick homage, but that's really all there is to this. Sadly enough, inventive dialogue or narration could actually help this rise above what's here, but that defeats the purpose of the challenge. Another entry that has nothing that outright does not work, but also has nothing that makes it stand out for me, either.


My Name Is Tommy - Silence
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To contradict your preamble, and some other critiques, I think some of these things could have used a few more panels. Insets are your friend, especially for minute details, and there are a lot of subtle jokes in this. My biggest question would be how you would want to portray the invisible items in the art. Dotted lines, or just nothing? Depending on the artist, that could make a huge difference. This could be a really great comic to read, but it also feels like it would lend itself better to animation. Maybe a Pixar-style short.

[Inkspot]

Barrytown83 - The Unity Parade
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When I first read this, I assumed the woman on the street throwing the can down and the woman on the roof were two separate people. It made me wonder what happened to the woman on the roof's partner. As a storytelling device, having the cyborg look off the roof at the end, only to see a second, uh, … terrorist, … in the crowd, smirking with a detonator in hand, would make for a victorious ending as opposed to the, "Huh, well, I guess it's over, …" ending that exists now. If you planned to continue the story, it would also establish a decent rivalry. Other than that, I've got no complaints besides, … what kind of drink was the bomb disguised in? Seems like an important detail that you could have a lot of fun with. "Thermite Cola - Now with lime!"


Chris2.0 - What Makes A Man, …
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First, I am sick to death of people being stabbed through the chest in comics. I'm fairly certain that was an edict of DC's New 52 because every single book has had it happen at least once. It's no fault of yours, but it actually made me curse when I read it in your script. I would have much preferred him losing an arm. Besides that, there's a lot going on that is sort of superfluous. The flashbacks are fine, and they give me the impression that I'm watching Frank Castle fight Predators. That's a good thing. The text on the scopes and the squidbots and all of that, while also pretty good, are not really essential. Even without knowing what power level his gun is at, Matt is clearly a guy fighting for survival. The only thing that truly bugs me about the script is that he piles robot pieces directly on the graves? Seems disrespectful. Why not a big pile behind the graves? Have him crouched down in front, throw the bag of parts behind the graves, and as he walks away, reveal an enormous pile of all the squidbots he's destroyed? Just a thought.


CBikle - Molly's Adventure: The Kidnapping
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There are a few sudden transitions sprinkled throughout that might have the been the result of "trimming the fat", but I'd argue that, with a non-human protagonist, those little moments are really important. You need a shot of Molly waking up when the door is kicked in to having her attack the thugs, and her passing out when grazed to waking up beside the mother and the ransom note to show that she was on guard, and that some time had passed before the mother rushed in. It could be a potential moment for the mother to show Molly affection, further spurring her into action. The highway sign, no matter how important the child, also reeks of that moment in fiction when protagonists need to know something important, turn on the radio or television, and instantly hear or see a news broadcast describing the very thing they needed to know. That space may be better used to show a transition from a suburban town to the city. "Thanks for visiting <Insert Town Here>!" along with "Now Entering <Insert City Here>". I also had an issue with the ending. It's understood that you wanted to wrap things up nicely, but the family being there with the police and an ambulance with two body bags may just be a little much. A silhouette of Zach and Molly in the doorway with the two collapsed thugs on the floor would have been just as effective, if not more so, for me.


JWall - Lost, But Not Forgotten
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It feels like there's a big chunk of story missing here, but I'm not entirely sure what it is. Motivation for her diving after the ship? Confirmation that her oxygen tank level is completely depleted and this is her mind's way of accepting death? The absent details, like the name of the ship, are compounded with what seems like a lot of panels crammed into these pages. I've read comics that take place primarily underwater before, and they benefitted from having large expanses of page to play with the visuals. Another pass to fill in some of the gaps, and a few extra pages, and this would be a very engaging, if not somewhat somber, read.


Tudore - Nothing Is With Thee
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This is a great setup for something. I have no idea what that something might be, but I want to read more and find out. Stories where science has advanced slightly faster than perhaps it should, and the effect it has on those subjected to things like the described "medical procedures" in the name of said science are particularly interesting to me. It's also an effective way of forcing people to look at the current state of things happening medically, culturally, etc. Whatever is going on here, it needs to continue, but you have to make sure you have something to say.

[Chris2.0]

Hiya InkSpot - thanks for the C&C!

Chris2.0 - What Makes A Man, …
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First, I am sick to death of people being stabbed through the chest in comics. I'm fairly certain that was an edict of DC's New 52 because every single book has had it happen at least once. It's no fault of yours, but it actually made me curse when I read it in your script. I would have much preferred him losing an arm.

Heh-heh - interesting that you mention it, the original ending was that it was his arm being severed! And then the reveal on P5 is that his arm was robotic & he was half-cyborg... But changed that to all cyborg afterwards! And curse you DC for ripping off yet another of my ideas!

Besides that, there's a lot going on that is sort of superfluous. The flashbacks are fine, and they give me the impression that I'm watching Frank Castle fight Predators. That's a good thing.

Strange that you mention Punisher! I actually wrote the outline for a 4 part Frank Castle vs Terminator comic back in the 90's, but never finished it!

The text on the scopes and the squidbots and all of that, while also pretty good, are not really essential. Even without knowing what power level his gun is at, Matt is clearly a guy fighting for survival. The only thing that truly bugs me about the script is that he piles robot pieces directly on the graves? Seems disrespectful. Why not a big pile behind the graves? Have him crouched down in front, throw the bag of parts behind the graves, and as he walks away, reveal an enormous pile of all the squidbots he's destroyed? Just a thought.

Yeah, the final scripted image does not sit well with me as well... For some reason I imagined the CP/AI units asif they were on necklaces, so that he draped them over the graves in my short pre-script rough draft, but I didn't bring it into the script...

Thanks for the catches, will update the story with your & everyone's C&C before I get it pencilled!

[cbikle]

Silence by MyNameIsTommy

Nice simple story, well-told and no real crits, but still think there could have been more to it.