An Apple a Day... #71 and 72

Robot
Parts XXXV and XXXVI

  Some notes on Parts XXXV and XXXVI:

• When I began writing Robot, I didn't have any intentions of killing Apple. However, as the story progressed, and Edward became more unhinged, I figured it was a good way to try and snap him back to reality.
  


• Part XXXVI is the first time Apple has been mortally harmed since An Apple a Day... #18


• I feel like the blood splatter on Robot's face was an overall improvement to his character design.


• These two Parts in particular really punch up the drama for the story. Initially, I didn't want the tone of the story to get so heavy, but it didn't feel right to arbitrarily wrap things up without any consequence or meaning. Besides, this opens up an avenue for me to explore slightly deeper themes in the forthcoming stories.

An Apple a Day... #67 and 68

Robot
Parts XXXI and XXXII
   Some notes on Parts XXXI and XXXII:

• By this point, Edward has clearly gone off the deep end, fulfilling his role as the main antagonist of the story.


• I really like the panel of the Dragonzord and Robot looking at each other in Part XXXI. It really helps bring a bit of calm to all the action that was happening over the course of the past few parts.


• By the time I got to Part XXXII, I had the end of the story planned and was at the point where I needed to start wrapping things up. Hence, the use of, my favorite literary tool, deus ex machina.


• Seriously, there is no reason whatsoever for Apple to assume Robot has a growth ray outside of "I just know you do." (Lazy writing sure, but it's not like I'm planning on winning any awards with this stuff.) Apple probably just saw some crummy Sci-Fi movie on tv and assumes all robots have growth rays.


• Lazy writing aside, the growth ray bit was a way for me to avoid introducing Rita Repulsa and further convoluting the character relationships already present up to this point.


• There's some real nice depictions of dead yogurt people here. One of my favorite things to do during the production of these two parts was finding ways to scatter the yogurty remains around the panels. My favorite is the one with his face smashed into the rubble in the foreground of the standoff panels.


• Part XXXII reenforces my belief that ANYONE who knew the Power Rangers in their personal lives (unbeknownst to them, of course) should had been able to figure out the Rangers' identities based on their, surprisingly, unmuffled voices and body language alone. Apple, is clearly a good, attentive friend (unlike everyone in Angel Grove).

An Apple a Day... #65 and 66

Robot
Parts XXIX and XXX

  Some notes on Parts XXIX and XXX:

• Part XXIX solidifies Edward as this story's main antagonist. (Clearly, the robot is not thrilled.)


• Part XXX features some of the last visual killing of yogurt people for the story.


• I really, really liked killing the yogurt people.


• The splash of red orange in Part XXX was thrown in so that the last panel would be easier to read (without it, the line work began to blend together).

An Apple a Day... #63 and 64

Robot
Parts XXVII and XXVIII
  Some notes on Parts XXVII and XXVIII:

• Since these two parts feature Apple's return, it was a logical place to begin Act III, The Consequences. Originally, they were the last two parts of Act II, but I felt that Act II was already running too long.


• Part XXVII is the first comic to not feature any color in quite some time (since AAAD... 18 I believe).


• It was incredibly fun killing the yogurt people in Part XXVIII. I'm not sure how this will play to District's content guidelines, so I hid most of the death in the explosions.


• The news anchor is a different banana from earlier. There's a bit of backstory that links the two bananas as the only news anchors in the area, who also happen to be twins. (I haven't explored that yet, however.)


• Apple's final line in Part XXVIII will most certainly have to be edited for the District release. I think that it sums up exactly what Apple is feeling at that moment, after seeing Edward making a huge mess of things.


• The fact that Apple could guess that the Green Ranger was Edward so quickly is more do to his voice, not his actions. I never understood why NO ONE knew who the Power Rangers were when they spoke to their friends when in costume. It's like, c'mon people, don't you know the sound of your friends' voices?

An Apple a Day... #61 and 62

Robot
Parts XXV and XXVI
  Thus, we've arrived at the end of Act Two, The Solution. I think it's only fitting to have an update to celebrate the supposed Mayan apocalypse since Robot started production on the previous doomsday (Rapture Day, 5/21/2011).

Act Two clearly shifted the focus of the story (and, by extension, the comic series as a whole) from Apple to Edward. It really, sort of, tries to do a lot of things at once, in terms of story progression and character development, while attempting to keep the overall feeling of the story light and humorous. Act Two's production began August 26, 2011 and went until August 31, 2011. This was the quickest turn around in terms of writing and artwork because I was pretty jazzed about the story progression. Around this point, I had begun to formulate my end goal with this story, and eventually knew how it was going to end. However, the school year began and Robot was put on hold, indefinitely. During the hiatus, I kept brainstorming how to move on from Act Two into Act Three, which left me dead stumped for a few months. Around the start of January 2012, I began to clean up Robot so that I felt like I was making some progress. I cleaned all the way to Part XIV and sent it off to District by the end of February, where it began its run in April. Around this time, I had finally figured out how to move the story forward.

Production picked back up on April 25, 2012 with Part XVIII. From there, it continued relatively uninterrupted until Act Two's completion on May 5, 2012.

Some notes on Act Two overall:

• As previously stated, Act Two shifted focus of the comic series away from the titular character in order to focus on Edward's personal development. By the end of Act Two, I was getting seriously concerned about how I would bring the story back to Apple.


• I made the decision to make Edward a Power Ranger, and effectively change the course of the story, when I was watching the first season of Mighty Morphin Power Rangers on Netflix during the summer of 2011. When the idea was planted in my head, it made me giggle with excitement and I knew that I was on the right track.


• The reason why I hit a road block after Part XVII, was because I wasn't sure about how to go about showing the Green Ranger leaping into battle. In the end, I decided to just use a jump cut sort of transition that was used pretty often in the show.


• There are a few instances of symbolism floating around Act Two. However, they don't become apparent or get explained until the end of Act Three.


• On the whole, I feel like Act Two flows better than Act One.

 

An Apple a Day... #59 and 60

Robot
Parts XXIII and XXIV

Some notes on Parts XXIII and XXIV:

• These are two of my favorite parts from the entire story. 


• I really strived to make these two parts more cinematic in presentation than any of the previous parts.


• Part XXIII's panels are a meticulous recreation of the actual Dragonzord summoning sequence from the Power Rangers television show.


• The "DOOM DOOM DOOM" sound effect used in the last panel of Part XXIV is indicative of what's in store for the remainder of the story. (It's also my poor attempt at subtle foreshadowing.)

An Apple a Day... #57 and 58

Robot
Parts XXI and XXII

Some notes on Parts XXI and XXII:

• Part XXI is one final attempt, on my part, to underscore the ridiculous nature of Edward and Zordon's response to the robot's perceived "menace."


• Part XXII represents the beginning in a shift in tone for the story as Act II begins to wind down.

An Apple a Day... #55 and 56

Robot
Parts XVIX and XX

  Some notes on Parts XVIX and XX:

• These two parts represent my attempt at slowing down the pacing of the story by using less panels per page. It works to a certain extent.


• Part XVIX shows my attempt at playing with panel placement by using an insert panel. I like it but think the panel sort of gets lost in the details of the larger panel. (The rough versions of these two parts were in full color and the panel insert reads much better in color.)


• There is something vaguely dirty about the way Robot is hugging Edward in Part XX. It was not intentional.


• Part XX is the last time I reenforce the fact that Robot only wants a hug and is not, outwardly dangerous.

An Apple a Day... #53 and 54

Robot
Parts XVII and XVIII

  Some notes on Parts XVII and XVIII:

• Right off the bat, the color of these two pages seems a bit weird despite them being the same hues I've been using all along. Or maybe it's just me, I don't know. The amount of time that passed since cleaning up XVI (something like 8 months) could probably be a contributing factor here.


• I had really high hopes for that Zelda joke. Unfortunately, it never really gets properly implemented in later parts of the story (as we'll see soon enough).


• Part XVIII features yet another Robot redesign.


• I was pretty happy I could bring back the VS split from Moustache. It also serves as a nod to the previous story (much like Edward's off hand mention of a bet in Moustache was a reference to The Bet.)


• Boy, those yogurt bastards sure are dramatic aren't they? (Yes, Edward and his ilk are yogurt. Recently I read something which called him a stack of talking rocks with moss. It was kind of refreshing after years of hearing Edward being referred to as poop.)

 

 

An Apple a Day... #51 and 52

Robot
Parts XV and XVI

  Some notes on Parts XV and XVI:

• I had originally intended for the robot to talk. In fact, Part XV was completed with Robot's dialogue intact. It made him sound like a needy creeper, and I felt like it wasn't in keeping with his characterization up to this point. (He went from being a scary, brooding, shadow-cloaked menace to a needy, creepy, hug-demanding pervert. Trust me, it wasn't good.) I felt that keeping the robot a pantomime character would benefit his overall portrayal in the comic (after all, it's very easy to misread someone's action's when they cannot explain themselves (i.e. babies, animals, etc)).


• Part XVI features two of my favorite renderings of Zordon. The first is when he has that smug smile on his face as the lightning bolt drops. The second is in the sixth panel.


• Part XVI also has the distinction of being a page that I feel looked better as a rough drawing. Some of the energy of the panels gets lost in translation from rough to cleanup but, for what ever reason, it's much more noticeable in this Part.


• I still don't know what the hell is going on with Edward's hair.

 

 

An Apple a Day... #49 and 50

Robot
Parts XIII and XIV

  Some notes on parts XIII and XIV:

• By the time part XIII was finished, I had realized that Zordon had become pretty repetitive in his description of "the power." It was something I noticed about the way Zordon would explain concepts to the Power Rangers in the tv show. He would constantly over-explain simple concepts (typical in a kid's show but, I mean, come on, man, get to the point!) So, I decided to have Edward call him out on it in part XIV.


• The last panel of part XIII is, in my opinion, the best drawing of the command center I had done. It's success won't be replicated and, speaking with the blessing of foreknowledge, represents the point where many of my background drawings start to look like poo. (Not ALL of them, mind you. There are still some cracker jacks coming, just you wait.)


• The purple text box bit in panel four of part XIV is a direct and shameless reference to the Legend of Zelda.


• I'm not sure what's going on with Edward's hair in some of these panels. It's really all over the place. Also, the green coloring isn't very consistant from page to page (I think I eventually standardized it, but, who knows.)

 

 

An Apple a Day... #47 and 48

Robot
Parts XI and XII

  Some notes on Parts XI and XII:

• Part XI marks the beginning of Robot's second, The Solution.


• The backgrounds in this act were some of my favorites to draw (despite there really only being, like, 6, different ones total).


• The colorization of Edward's hair and eyes is symbolic for two reasons. The first is the obvious call out to his ranger color (much like how the Power Rangers would wear clothes that denote their ranger color when they were at school). The second reason will be revealed after the conclusion of Act Three.


• Zordon is really fun to draw. He's basically a blob with a face.


• I chose green to be Edward's ranger color because the Green Ranger was my favorite ranger as a kid.