Annotated 33-15
This is definitely a “Flo moment,” here (or, if you prefer, a “flow moment”). I would definitely have combined this page with the next.
Once again, I find I don’t have a lot to say about this next set of pages. They’re not as sedate as the back half of Chapter 32, and they’re a necessary bridge between the founding of the Adventurer’s Guild and Byron’s final reckoning with the Cultists. We needed to show Byron as Guild authority. So it’s fine in that regard… I just don’t have a lot to add to it.
It’s funny to see myself type that. In my early career, I was fairly obsessed with oratory and speechmaking scenes; rehearsed speech had been the one arena in my teenage years where my stutter had melted away. My first major protagonist, Rikk Oberf, was noted for his ability to give good speech. But times change, we change, and I was minimizing or making fun of Rikk’s speech scenes by the end of our time together.
Casting around for stuff to put here instead, I realized that I haven’t yet shared my single best Guilded Age (nonfiction) story in these pages. Some of you may’ve seen it elsewhere (I shared it on a comics-coverage site that I worked for briefly, and in my Shortbox memoir), but these notes would not be complete without it. Look for that starting tomorrow.
NGL, I don’t even get what this scene is supposed to evoke. Like, maybe I kinda do but only intellectually I guess it’s supposed to be contemplative? I kinda just shrug and skip over it to the next page.
I don’t think pages like this really work in comics, at least not for me. Time is too indeterminate in the medium, and how long each panel is supposed to take in world-time is too important for the mood.
FWIW, the intent was basically this:
Byron takes a quiet moment in his quarters before addressing the crowd. Knowing that he does not want them all to see his worries, he practices looking confident, straightening up and forcing a smile. Unconvinced by his own act, he goes back to worrying.