It'll be interesting to see how long this lasts if both myself and Bird are here. teh.
Now, in my least humble opinion, there is a lot of work to be done here. that's good though, it gives us room to work with. Warning though, this isn't going to make you feels good. this post, no matter how you may feel while reading it, is not meant to be an attack in anyway. It is constructive feedback and or criticism. It is what you are going to need to develop you comic into something worth reading. It can be blunt, and as many here will testify, I am a
very blunt person. Shall we proceed?
Lets start with the basic facts. First and for most, I think it is rather sad that you wish to have someone do this for you, instead of developing the art skills on your own in pursuit of a fantasy world that only you in your mind can fully comprehend and see. It shows a lack of commitment in my eyes, and also shows that you want to do this. So at least you have drive. This is just in my first observation, lets continue.
JMBCHIEF wrote:
I didn't want to resort to this, but I am going to tell the first chapter of the comic I'm written form
This isn't a bad thing, despite what you think. Nor is it a last resort. Writing this does first as you indicated, it gets you work out there. Some publicity never hurts. Wait, I better warn you about this next part, because it is going to happen to you for your own good. People will point out errors, mistakes, and interesting things that may make sense for you, but doesn't to the reader. Its going to be feedback. Pay attention to it. Because trust me, we all have better things to be doing.
So reasons why this is a good step.
1: Gets you're work out there. (While this is good, it is better too if you get an avatar and become an active member in the community in Snafu. Nobody is going to pay much attention to you if they don't know who you are.)
2: Criticisms are going to refine your talent and make you better. This is a lot like working out. We are your weights and trainers. Its pretty stupid to get mad at those things wile working out. Seriously, we have better things to be doing, get too pissed off at us, and we'll probably go do the dishes instead of reading this.
JMBCHIEF wrote:
It is told from Buttercup D's perspective, and is set after the defeat of the main antagonists of PPGD
Question though, why her perspective in the first person? You could still have it be in the third person and have the focus be on her, which I assume is your favorite PpG. I mean if she wasn't, why would she be here? You want your main character, whoever it is to be the center of attention. The best way to do this is in the third person, Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Hunger Games, etc. All of them use the third person. Why? Because it is the most flexible of all of the ranges of Narrative.
Quote:
Third-person narration provides the greatest flexibility to the author and thus is the most commonly used narrative mode in literature. In the third-person narrative mode, each and every character is referred to by the narrator as "he", "she", "it", or "they", but never as "I" or "we" (first-person), or "you" (second-person). In third-person narrative, it is obvious that the narrator be merely an unspecified entity or uninvolved person that conveys the story, but not a character of any kind within the story being told[citation needed]. Third-person singular (he/she) is overwhelmingly the most common type of third-person narrative, before there have been successful uses of the third-person plural (they). Even more common, however, is to see singular and plural used together in one story, at different times, depending upon the number of people being referred to at a given moment in the plot. In third-person narratives, a character never would refer to himself in the third-person e.g., "(Character name) would like to come with you".[citation needed]
If the narrator of the story is not present or is present but not a protagonist and a story told by someone else and not his own, the story is narrated by He/She perspective.[5]
The third-person modes are usually categorized along two axes. The first is the subjectivity/objectivity axis, with "subjective" narration describing one or more character's feelings and thoughts, while "objective" narration does not describe the feelings or thoughts of any characters. The second axis is between "omniscient" and "limited", a distinction that refers to the knowledge available to the narrator. An omniscient narrator has omniscient knowledge of time, people, places and events; a limited narrator, in contrast, may know absolutely everything about a single character and every piece of knowledge in that character's mind, but it is "limited" to that character — that is, it cannot describe things unknown to the focal character.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narrative_mode So I would change my tone from this limiting first person, to third person. If you want I can take this, change it to the third person narrative to show you what I am talking about. I'll even extend my services to you as an editor. In third person its going to be easier to read, and more enjoyable to the readers themselves.
JMBCHIEF wrote:
Did you ever wonder what the multiverse was?
Not really. Is that the place Necromongers wanted to go in the Chronicals of Riddick? No? Hmm...
JMBCHIEF wrote:
Did you ever wonder what the multiverse was? You probably have. But the truth is not a pleasant one.
Let me tell you my story, and how I went from a hotheaded yet good meaning superhero, to the woman I am now.
Is it Buttercup? Is she the Multiverse?
Oh, hey. Lookie right thar. Confusion. The unsure smile is going to help me here. Its going to mark the point where a terrible transition point occurred Between idea number one, and idea number two.
First you introduced this "Multiverse" thing, which is somewhat self explanatory if someone knows your character line up such as myself. However, you aren't suppose to yet. So there is this thing that you bring up, and then suddenly abandoned it like a scared child getting chased by a buffalo. We don't know what it is. If it is going to be explained latter, I wouldn't even mention it then, and would focus more on introdusing Buttercup as a matured woman. You could say something like this-
"Years ago, I thought my life to be simple. It was me, and my sisters in Megaville, and some of their dorky friends, like that Dexter kid who had a crush on Blossom. We had our good share of adventures, you know, the normal monster, evil scientist, bad guy. It was fun, even those times with Bell and the Dark Star Council. Those times... they didn't end well.
We thought we had seen everything, well, almost anything as we grew older. The next series of events though, really changed my life, and made me into the woman that I am now. It became an event known as the Multiverse-"
Then you can lead into the story. An interesting idea if you want to keep the First person comments in. I love this, but I haven't seen too many books that do it. The first is an example in the Starcraft book called "Liberty's Crusade" Its all told by a news reporter named Micheal Liberty. He is narrating his experience that he spent with the Sons of Kohal as they defeated the Terran Confederacy in a nes report after it had all happened, kinda like you are doing. At the beginning of each chapter, there is a good sized paragraph from his "news/report" thing, talking about the chapter. Either hinting at what is going to happen, or explaining some background detail, or expounding on transitions between the chapters. THEN when you read the rest of the chapter it goes back to third person. The second example is present in the Star Wars series "Legacy of the Force", this is more evident in the books that Karen Travis wrote, as the series was written by three authors. But there was a set of text before the beginning of each chapter that opened up the story more. Such things appears as journal entries of characters, news reports, and other kinds of messages.
JMBCHIEF wrote:
bastard
JMBCHIEF wrote:
the god damn room.
"What...the...fuck?
Now I brought these out here for some continuity flaws. The adult Buttercup would probably use this language, however the PpGD Buttercup wouldn't use it, or at least wouldn't be so free to use it. With her using it, it becomes harder to picture this being Buttercup with such a class of words. We all know Buttercup to be a punk, and a badass. It wouldn't suprise us if she said "dammit" or some other minor word every so often, but not wit a frequency like this. Curse words are only impressive when used right. Not all the time. See Punisher Warzone, and you'll know what I am talking about.
Now if this is the adult Buttercup, then you need to transition the memory into a present day field, no one wants to read some recite a flashback for a book. That's why transition between first and third would work so well. Moving on...
JMBCHIEF wrote:
Everyone in the beginning must evacuate immediately!
I agree. Everyone in the beginning needs to evacuate... wait. Oh, you mean building, yeah man, they are two totally different things.
I still agree with it though.
JMBCHIEF wrote:
I still didn't understand exactly what was going on.
Neither do I Buttercup. I do wonder though, how long you've been planning this. It was quick, there is little detail.
JMBCHIEF wrote:
"What the hell is going on here? People found dead just now in the lunch room?" Yelled Jack.
K. this isn't Jack. He is a noble warrior, he doesn't curse. Never has.
JMBCHIEF wrote:
After about 5 minutes of observing the massacre
Why were they in there for so long after having such violent reactions. why didn't the officers com in with them? Also odd to have exactly 20.
Another problem, you want to stick to spelling numbers out ( 20 = twenty ), and leave the numerical display for named items, such as M16. It keeps it neat a tidy.
JMBCHIEF wrote:
the 20 officers who were in the room with us were demanding for the killer to show themselves. When the officers stopped yelling
Not very policeman-ish. Out of character.
JMBCHIEF wrote:
the lights flashed off very fast and after 2 seconds they turned back on. All the officers were all dead
That is a silly amount of time to kill 20 people. There is no way in fuck, four guys could do that, I don't care how much they look like a Samurai, or can teleport. I want you to get five of your friends, spread them out like police would, and try to touch them all in two seconds, and get to a point away from them that is established as a door, and the post that on Youtube. Then I will believe it is possible. But for now, it isn't. Its going against what people would envision police, especially how SWAT officers would position themselves and act.
JMBCHIEF wrote:
dead. And
You need a comma instead of a period. I take it that English class isn't a strong suit?
JMBCHIEF wrote:
The 4 men stood in a row. At the left end of the row was a man in a large purple coat with his hood up. He seemed to be the smallest of the 4. Next to him was a man in the same coat but black. He was the second to smallest of the group. Next to him was a man whose attire looked identical to the previous man, though he was a bit more taller and muscular. The last man was entirely different from the others. He was in a robotic samurai like suit. His most notable feature was his large claw on his wrist. He was the largest of the men.
Your description here is really terrible. As an artist myself, I could not draw these guys with what you have given me. Why the hell are they standing in a row for? Creativity is very poor, and you displayed you bad guys in a terrible stick figure way. I can already imagine the PpGD Buttercup, but you're bad guys not really, and that is a huge problem.
The bad guys must be the most memorable part of your story. They are crucial in any field of drama. They are the archetypes that make your story flare, and you need to design your characters yo be cool and as unforgettable as possible. Why? Because interesting villains make for interesting stories, the more interesting they are the greater the pull. The actions of the vilian are going to drive your story. The hero just as to react.
"The more successful the villain, the more successful the picture." - Alfred Hitchcock
Darth Vader, and Star Wars.
JMBCHIEF wrote:
3 years to fight in a war. This was only the very beginning of a nightmare that seemed endless. We explained everything that occurred to the the world, and it had massive media coverage. Because our father was kidnapped, we had to stay with Jack, who was appointed as our legal Guardian. But we did what we were told, and trained every single day until our 14th birthday. The training was excruciatingly hard and painful. But we needed it like that, or else there was no chance we would have survived in the war. But our birthday neared, and we were ready.
So the Multiverse was a war. that would have been better in the beginning to say "Let me tell you about the Multiverse War".
Biggest problem with your ending, (which did have some redemption to it... not really) is the three years. THREE YEARS. The problem isn't that it lasted that long, but that you did nothing in that time period, and just made it pass like bad gas. There is an incredible amount of potential you have in those years. Character development is the main one, continued adventures would be another. You expect me to believe that the villains they usually fought saw the girls training and decided not to bother them? You could do a minimum of three books or arcs here, each one detailing what the girls did in the individual years to train and to improve.
Experiment time
One year for each book or arc. They could still be exploring the Multiverse as well, or at least have Dexter doing that, and every book or arc could be a break through where they would go to a different universe as the plot for that book or arc. You could even throw in times when they and someone one else fight the Guardian at that time. Those three years are going to be your story, and the War is going to be your final master piece, the apex where everything lead up to it. Like Harry Potter. All of those bull shit adventures and things lead up to one event, Harry vs Voldemort. You can do that here, and it would be met with a lot of success.
JMBCHIEF wrote:
of course it would be alot smoother in comic form.
I would hope so.
TL;DR
Its terrible, and needs to be redone. There are major grammatical, and story development errors. If I were to take this and correctly review it, I would be rewriting it, and hoping to still keep the idea that you had. I don't have the time and the patience to be that nit-picky.
You need an editor, and not just someone that rereads your work to make sure its nice, but to bounce ideas off. In fact, get a few people.
Now its midnight for me, and I have to pull the back end of a semi-truck off tomorrow and hope that it isn't busted up all to hell. So I'm going to bed.
