Air Raid Robertson

Author notes

The Men In The High Tower Part 7

Air Raid Robertson

on July 14, 2010

As you can guess, this is the climax to the current storyline. It's also the penultimate strip. The next one will tie up a couple of the loose ends while also revealing the identity of the villain who made the clones. After that we'll get into some utility strips.

For an adventure strip, Air Raid Robertson doesn't have much in the way of action. This isn't because I don't like elaborate fight scenes. The number of kung-fu movies and old Steve Ditko issues of Spider-Man I possess will attest to the contrary.

However, I do feel the need to put as much narrative "meat" into a single page as I can. Every page requires a quick recap, enough plot and dialogue to move the story forward a bit, and a teaser for the next chapter. This forces me to avoid artistic indulgences such as splash panels and elongated sequences of people whumpin' each other.

These touches are fine for a decompressed story that one finds in manga and most American comic books. My goal, on the other hand, is to tell a compressed story that one can conceivably pick up on even if you show up late to the party. This requires a bit of sacrifice when it comes to certain things.

Still, I really wanted to do a solid job with the clone fight. It took a lot of wiggling, but I managed to cram four non-linear panels of asskicking onto this page while also saying everything that I felt needed to be said.

On a side note, I was recently the subject of an interview conducted in the interview forum. (An appropriate a place as any) I answered a set of questions about my upbringing, my artistic influences, and which cast member of Air Raid Robertson I'd prefer to be stuck on as island with. If you absolutely need to know what my favorite ice cream flavor is, you can now discover it for yourself.