The Webcomics Weekly #148: Webcomics From Another Planet (8/03/2021 Edition)

The Webcomics Weekly is back in your life! This week we bring you webcomics from another world or well “Earthlings from another Planet” at least. As well as “The Shard of Sun” to brighten up your day, though it being summer those days are probably brite enough as it is. We also have continuing coverage of “Lavender Jack” and “Within”.

Outcasts often make for excellent heroes. The arch of growth from lovable misfit into chosen one is a compelling trajectory to follow in literature and pop culture. Harry Potter was mistreated by the Muggle Dursleys and forced to live in a closet under the stairs. Peter Parker was originally a dweeby teenager who was picked on by popular kid Flash Thompson and was always unlucky in love (at least for the first few years). Moses overcame a stutter to be the mouthpiece of God. Stephen Daedalus the hero of A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man was a nebbish, awkward kid, bullied by his classmates, psychologically hamstringed by the terrors of a hellfire and brimstone preacher. There is precedent in literature and popular culture for the hero who is an outcast and who overcomes great adversity to be the person of the hour. All these examples I gave are coming of age stories. The Germans even have a fancy word for this “Bildungsroman.” They have a word for everything. Many stories are examples of Bildungsroman from Jane Eyre to Frank Herbert’s Dune. The undiscovered gem of a webcomic on WEBTOON “Earthlings from Another Planet” by Nadine Buckley certainly qualifies as a quirky Bildungsroman.

The action of the story begins on a planet at the edge of the Milky Way called Zar-One. It is lavender planet with Saturn-like rings around it. The technologically advanced citizens of Zar-One are invaded by the barbaric green, three-eyed impish creatures the Aquinnas. Fortunate for the Zar-Onians a brave engineer Professor Cameeron harnesses the power of a comet and manages to repel the Aquinnas for several years. The Vulcan-like Zar-Onians are a logical race, not motivated by emotions, the opposite of the choleric temperamental Aquinnas. Into this world Deenie is born, the product of a secret union between her Zar-Onian mother and Aquinnan father. The design of all the characters is superb, but Deenie’s design is a special treat for the eyes. As a mix between the two races she has purple skin with neon grin spots, Zar-Onian floppy ears and the three eyes of a Aquinnan.

Outcasted Deenie’s sole connection is to her precocious five-year-old sister Deedee. Deenie’s teachers and classmates all conspire against her and the only person in her corner is Deedee. As Deenie and Deedee ride around on their hoverboards watching from afar is the conniving Marlo whose spaceship has the words “Intergalactic Buyer and Seller of Legally Obtained Items.” If that’s not an advertisement for his duplicitous nature, I don’t know what is. He immediately discloses his plan to steal the famed comet Professor Cameeron used to defeat the Aquinnas. When Deenie rebuffs his proposition to hire her to steal it he kidnaps Deedee, the her only confidant and champion. He uses the universes single cutest dog, Jupiter, to do so. At first it seems to be a successful heist, due to some expert slight of hand by Deenie. But then shit goes sideways when the power of the comet is activated, creating a wormhole that transports Deenie and Cameeran to Earth. The trip through the wormhole is illustrated, well, trippy. This is where artist Nadine Buckley puts on a clinic. Halfway through episode 8, the art turns into picturesque watercolors that at least have the appearance of being hand painted, of the Luciferian nosedive into Earth as they are hurled headlong into our home planet.

In many places the is the smoothest most seamless transition between panels. Much of the action bleeds together in the WEBTOON equivalent of a splash page. The art is dazzling with great attention to detail. The backgrounds of this alien world are intricate and exhaustive, but not exhausting. The Zar-Onian race is not monolithic, it is ethically diverse in its own right with many shades of color and other distinguishing features. This is something that I never understood about most visual depictions of alien races, which tend to display very little ethnic diversity or variation among a single people. Klingons all tend to look the same. Toydarians in Star Wars, (such as the Watto the Shylock analog who held Anakin Skywalker as as slave) all look almost identical. This is not the case in this comic.

Another distinct feature of this comic is the lettering. Lettering is not something you usually pay much attention to unless it is really good or plain pitiful. This lettering falls into the former category. It is crisp and properly proportioned in the bubbles, but it’s distinct feature is that the bubbles are different colors for different races of people. The coloring of the whole first batch of episodes is vibrant and full of life. The rich, bright colors help sufficiently suspend disbelief that we are not really on an alien planet. Another thing worth noting is that there is very little wasted space in this comic. White spaces are used, but their use is sparing and deft.

This batch of strips are all leading to yet another showdown with the Black Note, episode 67 ending on “en garde” even. It is a surprisingly fast movement, the real build to the showdown begins in earnest in episode 66. Compare that against the build to the initial debate attack and the tempo is clearly going up. It is also getting decidedly more deadly with the missing 9 city workers who have been talked about in the background of the strip for some time show up dead at the bottom of episode 65.

That sense of tempo though isn’t initially felt when reading the strips. Episode 65 is mostly centered around Crabb tailing boxer turned teacher Tom Broadfoot. While these panels of Crabb trailing Broadfoot do not actively play with the shifting perspective afforded to moving the webstrip up and down the same way something like “1000” did in its early episodes, the willingness to play with perspective and give everything a long view iss enhanced by shifting the image. There is one panel during that sequence that has you bring Tom Broadfoot into the foreground that affectively tells you that he knows he is being followed. The interesting bit about that sequence is how it is at once so rooted in Crabb’s perspective with her internal monologue guiding the reader along and yet divorced from it artistically.

It turns out Tom Broadfoot isn’t entirely an ex-boxer as he partakes in an underground boxing match. The sequence echoes the introduction of formerly-Lord Hawthorne but more accurately forms a mirror. The Lord Hawthorne sequence was all about putting over his raw fighting ability, lots of pinup figure work as he dismantled his opponent. When the fight is going on the perspective shifts to Crabb’s commentary and to a degree Broadfoot’s opponent the reader is denied sans a climatic punch a consistent spectacular view of Broadfoot. It helps to sell the idea that he was just blowing off steam as opposed to trying to be seen.

Episode 66 opens en medias res without realizing it. The class critique comes into play again with the Black Note set to attack the children of the rich and famous hangout and ironically named: Prosperity Bridge. Though with the way class, especially the upper upper class, are portrayed maybe the in-world thinking wasn’t ironic. By going nonlinear in these next to episodes the strip is able to boil down the exposition/plot justification for everything – again with helpful characters and important info backlighting – and build tension for what is happening in the present.

Our detective club seem to have their first concrete suspect for the Black Note, Johnny Summers. This seems like a red herring, but the use of lettering and Schakde’s figure work sell the idea that the Note was both surprised and out of breath when they got to their orchestra pit … of doom. With the way time is represented in that strip it’s an effective use of the sound cross cutting seen throughout to heavily imply something. I’ve never been good at these sorts of mysteries so I still have no real clue.

I love when a series wears its influences on its sleeve. It signals to me that I may like the series based on my familiarity with the original work and, if done correctly, can serve as a handy shorthand, allowing for the creator to more quickly assemble a new world. Obviously this is a double-edged sword, where homage can quickly devolve into crude derivation and familiarity can invite unflattering comparisons. Thankfully, “The Shard of the Sun” manages to fall on the former side. While clearly inspired by the likes of “Dragon Ball,” Chrono Trigger and The Secret of Mana, “The Shard of the Sun” is quickly paving its own path and doing so with gusto.

I love Edshard’s art style. It feels like a mash-up of Akira Toriyama and Ed Piskor filtered through the color scheme of a late 80s OVA, though maybe not leaning quite so hard into the cel-shaded neons as those. There are some places where the art can be improved, like in the backgrounds and during action scenes for sure. I noticed this most at the start of chapter three, where if you look too closely at the establishing panel you can see the lack of depth and shakiness of the linework or when the goons in ‘Blue Girl’ suddenly get noodle arms. Sometimes, like in the final panel of ‘Tough Luck,’ the cross-hatching meant to convey speed is sloppy, blending into the ones for shadows and muddying the intent.

That said, Edshard’s sequentials are excellent. Like, they’re seriously on-point. The conveyance of motion between panels and the clever ways actions start in one and finish in another or purposefully draw your attention to a different entry point into a panel is a highlight of each page. The art is also always clear with a story that refuses to dawdle on moving forward, be that by introducing characters or complicating Kiwi’s journey to rescue the Professor. The plot may be very familiar but the execution is stellar, there’s enough of a twist to make it feel unique, and the characters are endearing yet still flawed. They’ve yet to really get a lot of depth but we’re only two and change chapters in, and with the skill Edshard’s displayed thus far, I can see this story being something very special in the chapters to come.

“Within” is back to the main story after a brief break for bonus pages and it’s fallout time. As in, Redhead is facing major fallout in his real-life for decisions he made in Chapter 8. I wrote at the time that quitting his job as a hitman wouldn’t be as simple as opening a door in a dream (though that certainly wasn’t a simple process, either), and I was definitely right. But let’s back up and start at the beginning.

In addition to quitting his job as a hitman-slash-gun deliveryman by just … not doing it, Redhead finally had the chance to meet his neighbor, a woman with an oxygen tank that has appeared in the comic several times but never spoken before. She shows him a video of two very shady-looking people who showed up at Redhead’s apartment while he wasn’t there. The glimpses we get inside the sick woman’s apartment are another example of the color symbolism used in “Within.” Even though she’s clearly very ill, her apartment is colored a cheery pink, which contrasts with the blues and greens that permeate Redhead’s world.

After taking his helpful nosy neighbor to the hospital, Redhead sees wisps of blue flower petals – or are they tendrils of smoke? – appearing in cracks, the same way he used to as he wandered around halfway stuck in dreams. It seems to warn him that something is wrong, and it definitely is. Redhead goes back home only to confront the people who were sent to kill him. The next few pages turn “Within” from a sleepy psychological drama back into an action comic, and the contrast is dramatic. I’ve said before it’s easy to forget how ruthless Redhead can be since he’s such a quiet, thoughtful person most of the time. But in chapter 8, he kills two people, shooting them both in self-defense. The pages are intense and fast-paced, which is unusual in this comic, but no less effective than the sleepy surrealism of the rest of the story. The pages in which Redhead kills the assassins are violent and though the blood is stylized, it’s still clearly blood.

Redhead flees the murder scene and ends up on a hill overlooking the city, which we learn is called “Remfield.” Whether this is a play on “REM” sleep or a reference to a real town, I’m not sure, but the artwork in the double-page spread that ends this section of the story is beautiful. We’ve caught up to the current page of “Within,” and I’m not sure what the future holds for Redhead. Will he get away with murder? Literally? Or will he return and face up to his past, including and up to the point where he did some truly awful things? I’ll have to wait for more updates to find out!