Archive for annotated-interlude-2

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Annotated Interlude 2 Page 15

Jun27
by Erin Ptah on June 27, 2022 at 12:01 AM

Star Wars screenshot: 'Wipe them out. All of them.'Those first-panel Giant Accent Flowers are tiger lilies, because who needs subtlety?

Timothy and Lily were from the cult in Pennsylvania; this is from a cult in Argentina, which believed the Four Living Creatures described in the Book of Revelation were the final forms of Beings. And since there’s only 4, the best way for Walker to guarantee Blake a spot is to eliminate all but 3 of the others.

It shouldn’t be any surprise she’s the villain, but that last row drops it on you like an anvil anyway, because, again, who needs subtlety.

And this completely wraps up the annotations for Volume 1 of the BICP Master’s Edition! (Which means I’m writing this back in April 2021, shortly before I send it off to get a proof copy.)

A year and a half of updates; 1/3 of the pages covered. This party don’t stop until 2025.

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Annotated Interlude 2 Page 14

Jun24
by Erin Ptah on June 24, 2022 at 12:01 AM

Powered-off TV, labeled 'if atheism is a religion, then off is a TV channel.'Okay, here’s a phrase where I had no worries about the translation, experts have spent centuries analyzing it to hell and back. (*rimshot*)

לַ֭מְנַצֵּחַ עַל־אַיֶּ֥לֶת הַשַּׁ֗חַר מִזְמֹ֥ור לְדָוִֽד

(“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me, so far from my cries of anguish?”)

(Pentacle: Fourth Mercury — the one last seen in-universe on Cohen’s lobby hall carpet)

The rest of the dialogue on the page, though, got revised a lot, as I wavered on how early in his life Cohen should get hit with the fact of “God is literally dead, sorry.”

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Annotated Interlude 2 Page 13

Jun23
by Erin Ptah on June 23, 2022 at 12:01 AM

Garfield and NermalI feel like there’s a lot of people in my generation whose primary association with Abu Dhabi is still “that place Garfield kept trying to send Nermal.”

So the orange cat had to go somewhere new in his world travels, and I figured I’d make it here. (Archive interiors look awfully similar no matter where you go, but there’s a public-domain photo of the Abu Dhabi skyline in the last few panels.)

…Wonder how many people would’ve noticed if I’d put in a background shelf of archival boxes, and wrote “NERMAL” on one of the labels.

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Annotated Interlude 2 Page 12

Jun22
by Erin Ptah on June 22, 2022 at 12:01 AM

Mark and June after bad sex in Don't Trust The B in Apt 23Miranda is born in the early ’90s, which means either she’s been conceived as of this page, or she will be soon. Either way, Cohen and Jessica Lake have been an on-and-off thing for a while.

So this was a handy way to establish some more background: (1) Cohen and Lake aren’t exclusive, and he’s not just pining while they’re apart, he’s having casual sex and it’s fine; (2) Walker may or may not be having sex with her Being at this point, but she has an active sex life with other humans, and her disability doesn’t get in the way of that; (3) there is no Unresolved Sexual Tension between these two. Because it’s been resolved. And the resolution was “nope.”

The fact that it’s probably the funniest page in the chapter was just icing on the cake.

Best comment on the original: “Too bad. They missed their chance to do it when they first met in the ’70s, when Disco Stu was a young and impressionable college student and Ann was still years away from menopause.”

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Annotated Interlude 2 Page 11

Jun21
by Erin Ptah on June 21, 2022 at 12:01 AM

Human with tiger eyesTo reiterate the notes from when this was originally posted:

I don’t cheat with the Being/human dialogue fonts in long-running characters, honest. Just this once, just enough to keep you guessing through the night. (Or, in the case of print-edition readers, through the page-turn.)

Drawing the weird sci-fi playground of McKeldin Fountain was a lot more fun than drawing the regular buildings of downtown Baltimore. Can you tell?

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Annotated Interlude 2 Page 10

Jun20
by Erin Ptah on June 20, 2022 at 12:01 AM

McKeldin FountainWalker and Cohen are meeting at McKeldin Fountain, an extremely weird structure. Abstract Brutalist concrete shapes make an ominous frame for a bunch of soothing waterfalls.

It was built near the Baltimore Convention Center, so you might see it in the background of some Otakon photoshoots. It’s otherworldly enough to bring a Cool Anime/Sci-Fi Vibe to the staging, while abstract/generic enough not to overshadow your hard-built costumes.

…and although you still could’ve gone to see it when this page was originally posted, the whole thing was demolished in 2017. To make way for (so far, as of this writing) nothing. Just a generic field of grass. Except the part they shaved off to make more traffic lanes.

The sarcastic “it’s a bypass! you’ve got to build bypasses!” jokes write themselves.

What an absolute loss.

(I would add some notes about the language/etymology used in today’s page, but let’s be real, Cohen has it covered.)

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Annotated Interlude 2 Page 9

Jun17
by Erin Ptah on June 17, 2022 at 12:01 AM

Business Cat, captioned 'I clawed my way to the top'Walker: “what do you mean I have COMPETITION”

To be fair, it did take Cohen 15-20ish years to get from “plucky young kid with a relevant hobby” to “a challenger has appeared.” Don’t panic, Ann. (Yet.)

I figured this was a small-enough timeskip that I didn’t need to have her renovate her boardroom. Although it does get fresh flowers.

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Annotated Interlude 2 Page 7

Jun15
by Erin Ptah on June 15, 2022 at 12:01 AM

Results of an image search for 'fit young man'Check it out, Blake was the photographer whose eyes you couldn’t see on the previous page.

Before now, they’ve mostly taken “non-threatening girl/young woman” forms. (Walker had a lot of pre-existing experience, shall we say, using that to her advantage.) This is the innovation of their “extremely fit young man” form. Walker ends up deciding this has advantages too, and putting it into Blake’s regular rotation.

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Annotated Interlude 2 Page 6

Jun14
by Erin Ptah on June 14, 2022 at 12:01 AM

1980s suit patternPlease enjoy 40-something Karen Park in her giant patterned 1980s power suit.

All my early drawings of Cub in bear form were, carelessly, referenced off of brown bears. Some quick research tells me that polar bears are their closest relative, but the proportions are pretty distinct.

So here’s the hastily-pasted-on excuse. There are dozens of slightly-varying brown bear populations that may or may not count as subspecies (“grizzly bears” are one of those), and my official Canon Ruling is that Cub can turn into any of these. Even the American ones, because they overlap so closely with the European ones that the differences are immaterial. But none of the visibly-different bear species.

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Annotated Interlude 2 Page 5

Jun13
by Erin Ptah on June 13, 2022 at 12:01 AM

Young Jon StewartI had worked in an actual university archive by this point. Hopefully it paid off in the meticulous detail on this equipment and these storage boxes. Right down to the formatting of the labels.

Timeline has skipped another 10-ish years into the future. Walker in her late 30s or early 40s, Cohen a fresh-faced early-20something. Don’t you just want to ruffle his hair?

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