Rich Morris' Comics - YAFGC and The ComixBlog

I'm gonna "strongly suggest" that this conversation go elsewhere. I'm happy to leave the original question here for those who'd like to continue discussion, but commentary on forum posts and style thereof should be moved to Tangents, beginning now.

k?

k.

*A helmet on the end of a stick slowly rises up from a hole in one of the caverns of the Black Mountains. The helmet is jangled around on the end of the stick, then a pair of eyes peers out from under the helmet. A Drow Slave slowly climbs down the stick to stand upright in the cavern.

Ahem. Hello all! Now that the dust has settled, and I've thought long upon my original topic, I now know I was wrong on a few points.

I never really researched the Drow, which is not a good platform from which to make statements regarding their behavior. So I went back to square one with my OP and looked at it in a new light... er... dark.

First, Queenie (Alzaer-bith) no doubt as a Drow Queen has done her share of double-dealing, back-stabbing, and in general merciless behavior. So, it is probably just her chickens coming home to roost to be put in a hanging cage, then taken down for torture, put back up, then finally taken down to begin her reign as Royal Court Jester. The Court Jester thing could have been Arachne's doing since she has some input on what goes on with her prisoners.

Second, Arachne is as Arachne does. As Rich tried to tell me, Arachne is EVIL! Perhaps with some insanity as well. Not a good combo when you wake up strapped down nude on a rack in her dungeon. So torturing Alzaer-bith for information is second nature to her. Also, a heck of a lot of fun.

Last, of course not all Drow are openly evil. As the old saying goes, keep your friends close, and your enemies even closer. Queen Nephilia looks to be quite a wonderful Drow Queen. Charming, engaging, and embracing of the different cultures of monsters in the caverns. For now, anyway. Whether she stays this way is up to Lolth and Rich to foretell. ( Or, as I used to tell my D&D players when I was a GM, 'as fate and me would have it'. )

Anyway, what I'm trying to say is I'm sorry for causing the drama with my original post. I never should have opened my big mouth without having the proper info on what being a Drow is really all about. But I am getting into some stories on the subject and finding them quite entertaining and rather... provocative... *sweat*.

Looking forward to continuing to enjoy the best webcomic on the net and making many friends here. Excelsior!

And, being a proper DrowSlave, I now hit the...

SUBMIT button...

Glad to see cooler heads are prevailing. And your situation has actually popped up before. We tend to forget that most of the protagonist in this series are evil creatures and we get a little shocked sometimes when they do something that is *gasp* evil. Drow society is cutthroat to say the least and I'll agree with you that 'bith did get put through the ringer but in the end she seemed to be embracing her new role. So maybe not the happiest of endings for her but it still beats being kobold chow.

Technically, the story does not have a protagonist since Rich refuses to focus on just one person.

Forgot to add the s to the end. My bad.

That could just be because I need a new lenses for my glasses, though.

sounds expensive for beholders

Am i the only one who thoroughly enjoyed Bith's predicament? Not in a vengeful kind of way (she was far from the worst of the bunch), just enjoyed it as a sequence of events normal to the fall of an unpopular monarch in an evil society. I liked seeing what she went through, on the one hand because it made perfect sense for the society and story and also because it was very well executed. IFurthermore i enjoyed her attitude, first time she impressed me.

Should i ask my therapist? Take pills? Be locked up for my own good?

Nah. I went back and re-read the sequence and came away with a similar impression that you had. I enjoyed the sequence unlike the first time around in which I had pity for 'Bith. In RL, the first thing that happens to deposed monarchs is removal of the head from the shoulders. Like I said, the more I looked upon it from a purely Drow point of view, she's lucky to still have breathing privileges. And that is due to Arachne, so evil she may be, she still spared Alzaer-bith's life. A Drow with a heart of gold? Maybe.

So no, my Dear Morgana, no need to ask your therapist, take pills, or be locked up. You're fine. If being locked up is going to happen to anyone, it'll be me, in one of Arachne's hanging cages, looking down upon the poor souls being tortured and contemplating my fate. *gulp*

Alzaer'Bith did go through quite a lot. But I think that she kind of found a measure of happiness in strip 2189. Suddenly all of these Orcs are eating out of the palm of her hand, and all Alzaer'Bith has to do is, well, be herself. No more scheming, no more looking over her shoulder all the time, no more stress... Instead it's drinking and dancing and singing and the occasional tirade (to the delight of the crowd). And if she stayed with the Orcs a while longer than perhaps she should have, and kept them entertained for a bit when the rest of the Drow went home, who would care?

I must admit that the Coup D'Drow was the first time I had felt...uncomfortable during the whole series since I started following it back in 2009. It's funny but out of all the acts of evil and cruelty this one stood out.

Of course, I actually think this is a good thing. Let me explain. We're so used to the protagonists of the story being on 'our side' as readers that it's a little unnerving to come across some who are evil, yet the main characters we are being shown. That is an example of good storytelling.

Had Rich softened Arachne by making her be kind to the Queen it would not have had the same impact, and would have devalued Arachne's character.

All things considered, I consider the Coup plot one of the highlights of the whole comic run.

It is fascinating to see the controversy that comes up whenever the evil characters (and the Drow in particular) are featured for any length of time. I've seen people love Arachne, be indifferent to Arachne, hate Arachne, start off hating Arachne and learn to love her, start off loving Arachne and suddenly hating her, and some going through all these feelings and back again.

When this comic gets unapologetic is when the hackles raise and the tides turn. Clover being recaptured in the desert and returned to Arachne's dungeon, Bob eating a Harpy, the Umbil party kill the Naga, Wolf seduces Cadugan disguised as a Drow, Wolf performs with an unwilling Glon for the Hyeesha, Caelin allows himself to be seduced by Ator, the execution of the Royal Flind family, Glon and Wolf getting their hands chopped off, Lewie chooses a new servant from Arachne's dungeon, etc etc.

It might be interesting for some to note that over the years there were actually a couple of places that I refused to go. And some places that I did but didn't publish.

Yeah, me too. At first I thought that was too much of a stretch for her to actually hobnob with the gobnobs *tee-hyuk*, but, like I said, why the heck not? I was a GM a loooong time ago, and I never left any doors closed where a plot might develop. Alzaer'Bith has lost her throne and crown, but has actually gained in popularity because of it. And, she doesn't have to worry about back-stabbing and the problems of being a Queen entails. Rich is witty, smart, and gifted in his storylines ( stroke, stroke ). It's just sometimes it takes a bit of time for me to appreciate them, but that's on me.



Of the examples given above, I only had a prob with Clover being seemingly unable to escape Arachne's dungeon. But as I've said before, I'm seeing Arachne in a different light ( mostly grey ), and Rich was kind enough to provide a spectacularly happy ending for Clover. Was that the intent all along? I won't worry my pretty little Drow head and just enjoy reading.

All the other scenes described above went from hilarious to unexpectedly erotic ( Why did Cadugan in Drow disguise with Wolf turn me on [ strip 959 Dark Blue] ? I mean, he was a male turned into a female. Is that fair game? Does that mean it's ok to... er... um... he did have not only the physical but the mental state of a female Drow, so he could... uh, you know... eh... and Cadugan was a different kind of Ranger who seemed to... ah... want to... ahem. Ah, forget it ).

I'm still a project in the works here, and will go back time and again and re-read the strips 'cause they're just that good. Rich is right. He writes wittily, and draws well, but he's still a GM, and his rules is his rules!* But now I have to wonder, what did he write but not publish? Hmmm....

*Anyone know the name of the movie where I paraphrased that remark?