Far Out There

I STILL want to find a way to have Phillip Freeman turn up in the main comic as a tree-obsessed kook, but it’s one of the many, many things I just can’t seem to get around to.

So, most of the designs on this page is obviously taken from another Voting Incentive, but THIS time I did give in and change a bit. Avatar and Tax weren’t originally any kind of a reference to anything, just… I dunno, kind of Generic Luchador Mask no. 52078924. Of course, that’s a little insulting to the rich history of lucha libre, especially when nearly everybody ELSE in this series is some kind of reference to actual wrestlers. And thus, Lil’ Lucha turned into a neon dayglow tribute to Psicosis and Juventud Guerrera.

As for Layla and Tabitha, well, they were already basically the Hart Foundation with less fancy jackets… though now that I think about it, “Rebel Rockers” sounds like a name that should belong to some kind of Fabulous Freebirds knock-off. But hey, I already altered ONE design this page, two would be pushing it. Incorporating Bridget and Alphonse was a bit of a happy accident, though. I was trying to think of two-person managers or stooges they could be, and the Singh Brothers were the obvious reference. It wasn’t until later that I noticed how this common name derived from the Sanskrit word for “lion” just HAPPENS to sound exactly like the English word for the vocal activity one enrages in while performing music such as rock. Thanks, India!

On a less convenient note, I spent the better part of a day making background elements for everything last month, just so I wouldn’t have to re-draw the ring from scratch every page. And now we’re less than a week into this thing, and there’s ALREADY been a page where the angle meant I had to draw the whole thing anyway. Sometimes I don’t know why I even bother trying to make things easier on myself…

(Historical Notes: …and just to add to Past Me’s frustration, that use of background blur makes it all but impossible to go back and fix any of those background details.)