Gary the Alchemist

Author notes

Gary the Alchemist Sketchbook - Part 4

Xiam

on July 30, 2011

"But Xiam/Andy/Author Guy, what the heck is this?"
Way back when I was first planning Gary the Alchemist, I'd decided that I wanted the series to take place in realtime (more or less).  That is, the week you read a story is the same week in which it is occurring.
So, I thought, it'd be best to schedule it all out so I know what's going on in terms of school, events, holidays, and publishing dates.  So I came up with a massive four-column schedule of weeks throughout Gary's high school years, and scribbled in a loose explanation of what I planned to do for that week.
Some of these are pretty straightforward, and even lent to titles for comics in those weeks, but some have been shifted around or outright rejected (for instance, Gary was originally supposed to be introduced to Founding Fathers by way of an animated series, and the comic would have only first appeared this year.  Each year would have a different way of presenting the series).
You can see a number of things I changed, in particular with Edy.  She was originally going to be a fairly extroverted Manic Pixie Dreamgirl sort, who would have already introduced Gary to her family by April.
(Hm… I seem to have wanted another Founding Fathers comic in April.  That's weird.)
You'll notice I also have a large gap in this summer's space.  I uh… I had no idea what to do, so as with a number of other gaps, I figured "Hey, I'll wing it."  Plus I dragged the beach idea from my plans to do it in Summer 2012 over to this summer.  Which I guess will give more of a chance to do Olympics comics next year, woo!
"Xiam/Andy/Author Guy, I have another question!  Where is the other half?"
I cropped it out of course.  No sense in spoiling the fun.