Bootlegs Part 35
I’ll admit that this wasn’t the original fate I had planned for the clones. Initially, I thought I’d write them out by having them go off on a deep space mission, then one day have them inevitably return to cause more problems for the real Galanos and Schwartz. But then a couple things changed my mind. The first was that the Best-Lock ships fall apart if you as much as exhale on them, and photographing them was an immeasurably frustrating experience. There was no way I wanted to shoot another story with those ships (as cool as they looked), let alone try to keep them assembled in storage or go through the frustration of trying to build them again. I suppose my annoyance with the ships came out in what happened to them in the story, which is meant to be a darkly humorous meta moment. The other factor, perhaps more important, was the fact that the clones were intended as a slightly distorted but still recognizable reflection of our heroes, an alternate take on the paths they could take. And the idea of experiencing the death of your clones (perhaps akin to experiencing the death of a twin in the real world?) eerily hits too close to home.
Anyway, that’s the end of “Bootlegs,” the longest story I’ve ever done. Geez, it lasted five months?! I’ll probably try to keep the stories a little shorter in the future, but no promises. 😉 I did make an effort to include a lot of characters and locations in this one so it felt a little more varied than other longer stories I’ve told. Next up is a short visit with the Space Police, and then we begin “The Search.”
– This is not an official LEGO comic. This is a tribute. Nor is it related to Best-Lock.
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Bravo. Bootlegs was awesome. And I think the Clones actually had a very fitting end.
Thanks, Louise. It means a lot to hear you say that. I wasn’t sure how the ending was going to go over.
I think they should’ve had their ships confiscated on the grounds of unusually high amounts of lead contamination…before being Dash’d.
Oh man, that would have been great! Awesome idea. Of course, I wouldn’t want Best-Lock to come after me for suggesting their products have lead contamination. Saying their sets fall apart pretty easily, well, they can’t really argue that, can they? 😉
Wow! That was a shockingly dark and abrupt ending to a storyline that was so full of laughs! But a darkly funny resolution at the same time. Poor Captains Schwartz and Galanos. Really emotional twist how you built the rivalry between the clones and the real Schwartz and Galanos only to have them be stunned and devastated when then clones die. “Bootlegs” was epic!
Also, glad to see Schwartz shares my opinion on angel hair pasta. I rant about that all the time! Seems like a lot of the time it retains more water from cooking than other pastas, too. So not only does it not hold sauce well, it actually waters it down.
That was the only way you could end a story about “Best” Lock. It reminds me of the time my friend tried to build a megabloks Halo set. He gave up halfway through.
Well dude, with this last page here I can say that despite prior concerns from you this whole storyline was indeed ‘Epic’. : D
First off, Schwartz and Galanos- what started off as regular ‘wacky’ antics ended up turning into some very thoughtful character development for the duo. This is one of the reasons I love this comic, and I can’t wait to see more of it.
Another excellent thing was the treatment of the clones- too often clones of characters are played off as flat disposable villains or vehicles for lots of angsty speeches. Here, their character was played quite realistically IMO- once they figured out they were clones, they accepted it and moved on, much like I imagine people their age would take learning they’re adopted, for instance. (And yes, while they weren’t quite likeable, they did have many redeeming qualities to ’em.) Their death is much more respectable in that it has nothing to do with the fact alone that they’re clones, but rather the composition of their ships as established in the first few comics (and indeed their out-of-comic reputation holds). With that final fate of theirs, I bet this won’t be the last we’ll see of these two.
Speaking of that, it’s the return of Captain Dash! I wonder if he’s still sentient (?) enough to realize that his most recent, er, ‘acquisitions’ aren’t like the rest of his ‘collection’.
Awesome, awesome job- can’t wait to see how ‘The Search’ plays out!
I didn’t expect it at all, but this end worked very well for me; properly dramatic – especially with Captain Dash in the last panel. I also agree with Canticleer Blues about the clones themselves: Well
done!
And hooray for long story arcs!
(Is angel hair pasta Spaghetti? I don’t perceive it as the default over here, but despite the mentioned sauce-drawback it’s my favourite!)
Angel hair is long, stringy pasta. Maybe it varies by region, but I see it a lot.
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