Annotated 44-31
Working on Traveler has been a real roller-coaster ride. You may remember that the series only came into existence because I said it would probably never happen on these very annotations—which were read by Tyler Beckett, longtime reader and then a new Webtoon editor.
The series still had to be pitched to a team of reviewers and then developed. Nothing I’d done before, not even Guilded Age, had involved as much pre-launch preparation. I wrote the first episode in ten different styles, trying to be sure of myself as I assigned the series a voice. (Some of those styles were just loosening-up exercises. I didn’t seriously expect to write the series as a set of rap battles, but it sure was fun to try.)
Jason and John Waltrip were drawing the whole thing and colored the first couple of episodes, but as I realized they were on a seven-day week trying to get all this done, I brought in Monica Marier to do the colors. (My wife and I had known her for years beforehand. In time, Monica would get some help as well, but that’s for episodes that haven’t gone live yet.)
The first few episodes, especially, represent a lot of back-and-forth between me, the team, Tyler, and other Webtoon staffers. Tyler saw to it that there was a lot more “spooky action” at the start than what I had in my notes. The discussion of Navy SEALs, a fictional TV series best described as “like G.I. Joe but more for the post-9/11 years,” was redrawn and edited down to essentials. The installments up to when Trevor, the main character, gets his powers feature more WandaVision-esque glitches in reality than were in my outline. The Waltrips and I adjusted already-drawn layouts to make better use of the phone format. I tweaked some early references to brands (and added some references to other Webtoon features I admired). We expanded the opening space sequence to immerse the reader as much as possible. (I loved the idea of taking infinite canvas and using it in an agoraphobic way. I don’t think I’ve seen that done before.)
It was about a year from the series’ original conception to its launch, but by launch day, we were all as confident as we could be. We didn’t expect to be a #1 feature on Webtoon’s internal rankings or anything—there’s a lot of competition—but we thought we’d do well enough. I’d expanded my plan for the series from a two-year run to a three-year one, then a four-year one…
…And after we saw what the audience numbers were doing, I adjusted it right back down to a one-year plan.
So…yeah. Ouch. What happened? And what’s next?
(Concluded tomorrow…and sorry this one went up a bit late.)
FB:
No, n-no, no, you and I, I, I
We ain’t gonna sleep tonigh-igh-ight
Oh baby, no, n-no, no, you and I, I, I
We ain’t gonna sleep tonight
Well, at least you ain’t ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ
I like how Auragu has partially curled up and allowed Weo to uze him as a pillow. Seems like something my dog would’ve done.
Also, Auragu is the one most on board with the idea of a slumber party. Seems in-character for him.
SPOON!
GRAVEDUST: (inner monologue) “If either of these two strumpets start dry humping me in their sleep, there WILL be hell to pay!”
“I hope neither of these floozies figure out who goddamned ripped I am under this robe.”
This is easily my favourite page of the entire comic, bar none.
And the last frame is my favourite frame of the entire comic.
Was Webtoons your primary marketing channel?
I haven’t read much there and when I look at the top list there is predominantly comics featuring a certain look. Now, I am no art critic but if I try to describe it, it’s kind of manga inspired pretty boys. According to Wikipedia the US audience on Webtoons are primarily young women. Not that there is anything wrong with, but unless that is your target audience, maybe you won’t have much growth in the pre existing audience on Webtoons., But I guess you could still bring in an audience from outside, however webcomics audiences are built. You don’t have any newsletter or similar to bring in your old audiences? Apart from this rental run of course.
Last sentence should have “re run” not “rental run”. Stupid autocorrect.
Sad to say that this is a factor that must be mentioned. Webtoon is primarily a Korean website and the breakthrough series that allowed it to flourish in the West had, inevitably, that manwha style (Solo Leveling, Tower of God, etc) that informed both the demographics of western fans and their expectations. I’m not saying that it is impossible for a Western, non-manga/manwha comic to succeed (Lore Olympus is a clear proof of this) but a sort of stylistic match is necessary in order to stand toe to toe with the other offerings of the platform.
As much as I love the Waltrips’ art, it is not a match for the platform, I’m sorry to say. I think Hiveworks would be a much stronger match.
I concur with Hiveworks being a stronger match. The first comic I was reading on Webtoons was Cupid’s Arrows by Thomas Zahler. It is a great comic with great character development both with the two main characters and with each plot’s characters. This was the second comic the writer had on Webtoons and out of nowhere, it was canceled. On a major cliffhanger! I am disappointed in the apparent lack of artistic freedom I see on the site. It almost sounds like a comic by a committee.
I apparently read a few comics “published by” Hiveworks — including this one! — without having really heard of Hiveworks. I’m pretty curious about how webcomics economics works now.
Looking through the thumbnails of a bunch of comics, my thoughts were that Traveler’s style is really standing out from most of them.
But then the Traveller thumbnail looks almost like the others because apparently they all use almost the same arrangement … was wondering if that might hurt discoverability.