Genuinely love this comic! Always important to believe you can change the future. I hardcore relate to this deer.
this post was submitted on 08 Jan 2024
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Anthro Comics
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Sequential art featuring talking animals.
Doesn't have to be super furry necessarily
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Yeah, this is basically the therapy that my 20yo self needed.
I'm so glad anybody read it, it has been worth it :)
I have to confess I'm a bit curious what happens next. Does the deer try to fight back ("punch the tiger and run") now that his mind has been changed? Does he escape? Was that the tiger's plan all along? Is he secretly a vegetarian that likes reminding the proletariat that they can vote and protest and stuff and they have nothing to lose but their chains, and then giving them their first taste of success by pretending to chase them down? Or does he tell the deer he was never actually going to eat him and then let him back onto the street?
Does the tiger appreciate the challenge of prey fighting back for once and ultimately hunt the deer down? Was that his plan all along? Does he bring home broken down prey and put a bit of fight in them so he can feel like he earned the kill, and if they escape, they escape?
Or does the deer just go quietly with the tiger after being reminded it's not polite to back out of letting yourself be eaten?
Or does he almost just go with the tiger until the tiger says "wow, you guys are too easy. I just spent 2 pages reminding you you can fight against situations you don't like, and I'm literally about to kill you, and you already forgot"?
Whether or not you ever plan to draw it I'd still like to know :P
The reality is that, once i uploaded the images, this kind of interpretation is out of my hands. The only value of what i have to say is the insight of what I was thinking while writing this.
In my mind, the deer definitely starts resisting, but it's too late because he willingly let himself get locked behind a padded door, he dies anyway. I just didn't think it was necessary to show it since it's basically guaranteed.
I imagine the tiger is a semi-pro hunter and butcher who supplies local predators and has been doing it for years. I cut dialogue that implied it's even a generational occupation. The reason the tiger is more optimistic about the future and a little generous with his victim is that he's the only one having a good time, he has a job that fulfills his love of killing people, and he's been having it easy with the rise of nihilism and individualism in prey animals. If anything, the fact that he feels a lack of challenge and excitement can be seen as suffering from success.
But again, what i have to say only has value insofar as that's what was on my mind while making it. The reality of what it is can be different, and what you make of it in your own mind is something else again. There can be a twist and/or reveal, that's more than fine
Nothing ever has been or ever will be perfect. Maybe it seems odd to feel pride for ya, I dunno, but feeling some accomplishment for creating a short story and sharing it with the world is a good thing! I enjoyed my time with your comic, it's a great parallel to hopelessness in the face of all those who wish to oppress us, and inaction only benifiting the oppressors. Change feels so slow when you're living in it, compared to the sanitized footnotes of history. Perhaps it's easy to feel like it's the worst its ever been, irredeemable, or insurmountable, but that stems from only knowing our own prespective. If we do what we can, when we can, where we can control, things do improve. Maybe not as fast as we'd like, but we can't let perfect be the enemy of good.
Yeah i'm that kind of guy, i have grandiose ideas that are way beyond my means so i end up never making anything. Making this comic was an exercise in modesty, where i took a simple concept (still ended up being 10 pages which is not nothing) and, for the first time, brought it into reality. And that's the thing, it can be the greatest story idea ever, but it has no merit as long as it's a dream, bringing it into reality is what makes it matter - and, not coincidentally, it's also the hard part.
Going forward i have to 1. lower my standards and 2. increase my capabilities, and if they meet in the middle then something can happen.
Also i didn't even mention that making this comic is how i found out i have aphantasia. I figured it wasn't normal to find sketching this hard so i looked into it, and i found out that being unable at all to picture images in my head is not normal. For my next project i'm using Blender as a crutch. I've already finished a page, it looks a heckuva lot better than the above, it was a lot easier, a lot more pleasant, and it took not even a quarter as much time.