Aug 31, 2014
KOHT#7
Aug 27, 2014
The Villain: Part 2
There are however some stories that do well with their villain. Though these are fewer in number they are generally some of the best. There are a couple different approaches that can give you a good villain, and they vary widely between the two. interestingly, there doesn't seem to be much in the way of a bridge between different extremes. Perhaps the issue of time is more important to a good characterization then anything else.
I have found that more than anything these "success stories" could be grouped up into four categories, although there are other villains that work without being any of these categories, most of the ones that do work are part of one of these four groups.
The Sympathetic/Admirable Villain: (ex: Magneto)
Perhaps the least memorable of the villain types, if only because in your mind they're not really villains. The sympathetic villain will be found opposing your main character, but not generally because they have some evil scheme in mind, generally their motives are benign enough, it is most often their methods that put them into conflict with the hero. Sometimes the villain's goal is selfish, but nevertheless one that we sympathize with. (the best example for this being Barbosa in Pirates of the Caribbean. Tell me you didn't feel bad for him when the apple rolled out of his sleeve.)
The Unknowable Villain: (ex: Sauron)
The opposite of the sympathetic villain, the Unknowable villain is very much evil. They're just not in the picture. Their perspective is removed and relatively unimportant to the actual meat of the story. Often the characters will not directly interact with this kind of villain, they will encounter the villain's minions, or otherwise feel the villain's influence, but will be unlikely to actually meet the villain face to face. (WARNING: this type of villain only works if he remains removed for the entirety of the story. many villains of this category lose steam once they enter into the actual workings of the plot, as they turn out to be generic evil people.)
The Eccentric Villain: (ex: Cruella De Vil)
A little bit of a strange choice, but some of the best villains are completely crazy. This only works if the villain is overdone and really rather haywire. this kind of villain will not even attempt to be normal and is apt tor get sidetracked at least once during their villainous monologue (oh but that's a story for another time) and is really pretty bonkers. It's hard to have a villain like this in a serious story, but they work quite effectively as comedic villains, and can be if nothing else, Memorable, which is a key trait for determining where they stand.
The Intriguing Villain: (ex: Darth Vader)
Lastly, the Intriguing villain is the most basic, but perhaps the most difficult villain to create. Yes, your villain is evil. Yes they are evil without real reasons. Yes they will treat all their allies like crap and Yes they are never happy.
But they sure are fun. If your villain has enough personality and general "coolness" that they can be a general jerk to everyone, and people will love it. Most Star Wars villains fall (or attempt to fall) into this category, as do the villains of Avatar: the last Airbender or BBC's Sherlock.
The villain is one of the most important parts of a story, and too often they are just another egomaniacal world conqueror. but if you can get it right, your story will often be greatly improved. (although you may get "the villain is more fun than the hero" syndrome, so shape up your main character too.) A Hero is defined by their Villain. and when a villain is special, the whole story benefits for it. a last parting bit of advice, if your ever find your villain saying:
"after I get ABCD, I will be UNSTOPPABLE! HA! HA! HA!" to a hero who may or may not actually be in danger.
You've missed your mark.
NEXT TIME: I actually don't know how long it'll be until I do another one of these posts, I leave for college tomorrow, and have really no idea how much free time I will or won't have. Also topic-wise nothing is currently jumping at me. I will continue to upload comics however (to the whole five people who read them.) so stay tuned!
I have found that more than anything these "success stories" could be grouped up into four categories, although there are other villains that work without being any of these categories, most of the ones that do work are part of one of these four groups.
The Sympathetic/Admirable Villain: (ex: Magneto)
Perhaps the least memorable of the villain types, if only because in your mind they're not really villains. The sympathetic villain will be found opposing your main character, but not generally because they have some evil scheme in mind, generally their motives are benign enough, it is most often their methods that put them into conflict with the hero. Sometimes the villain's goal is selfish, but nevertheless one that we sympathize with. (the best example for this being Barbosa in Pirates of the Caribbean. Tell me you didn't feel bad for him when the apple rolled out of his sleeve.)
The Unknowable Villain: (ex: Sauron)
The opposite of the sympathetic villain, the Unknowable villain is very much evil. They're just not in the picture. Their perspective is removed and relatively unimportant to the actual meat of the story. Often the characters will not directly interact with this kind of villain, they will encounter the villain's minions, or otherwise feel the villain's influence, but will be unlikely to actually meet the villain face to face. (WARNING: this type of villain only works if he remains removed for the entirety of the story. many villains of this category lose steam once they enter into the actual workings of the plot, as they turn out to be generic evil people.)
The Eccentric Villain: (ex: Cruella De Vil)
A little bit of a strange choice, but some of the best villains are completely crazy. This only works if the villain is overdone and really rather haywire. this kind of villain will not even attempt to be normal and is apt tor get sidetracked at least once during their villainous monologue (oh but that's a story for another time) and is really pretty bonkers. It's hard to have a villain like this in a serious story, but they work quite effectively as comedic villains, and can be if nothing else, Memorable, which is a key trait for determining where they stand.
The Intriguing Villain: (ex: Darth Vader)
Lastly, the Intriguing villain is the most basic, but perhaps the most difficult villain to create. Yes, your villain is evil. Yes they are evil without real reasons. Yes they will treat all their allies like crap and Yes they are never happy.
But they sure are fun. If your villain has enough personality and general "coolness" that they can be a general jerk to everyone, and people will love it. Most Star Wars villains fall (or attempt to fall) into this category, as do the villains of Avatar: the last Airbender or BBC's Sherlock.
The villain is one of the most important parts of a story, and too often they are just another egomaniacal world conqueror. but if you can get it right, your story will often be greatly improved. (although you may get "the villain is more fun than the hero" syndrome, so shape up your main character too.) A Hero is defined by their Villain. and when a villain is special, the whole story benefits for it. a last parting bit of advice, if your ever find your villain saying:
"after I get ABCD, I will be UNSTOPPABLE! HA! HA! HA!" to a hero who may or may not actually be in danger.
You've missed your mark.
NEXT TIME: I actually don't know how long it'll be until I do another one of these posts, I leave for college tomorrow, and have really no idea how much free time I will or won't have. Also topic-wise nothing is currently jumping at me. I will continue to upload comics however (to the whole five people who read them.) so stay tuned!
KOHT#6.5
Okay... so maybe I wasn't sure where to go with the whole portal appears storyline......
Aug 26, 2014
#2 You Pro-conformity or something?
Few things are as sacred as the fantasy cliché. Every fantasy story must have it's dwarven brawler, its Halfling/Hobbit who doesn't really fight, and it's graceful elf. Unless of course, people try to be different.
Guess which kind of story this is.
Aug 25, 2014
the Villian: part 1
The Villain of a story is one of (if not THE) most integral parts to formulating a successful tale. Yet at the same time, the villain is also one of the most squandered opportunities that any story represents. Too often the villain of a story opposes the hero for very meaningless or even fake reasons (I'm looking at you pretty much every comic book villain ever.) and this is a prime example of the oversimplification that stories are so prone to doing. If the hero of the story can be a complex and three dimensional character with their own, why should their opposition be any less complex, any less thoughtful. In truth, the best villains are every bit as admirable as the heroes they oppose. some of the most satisfying conflicts occur when both sides have an admirable goal.
The idea of a villain who was still an admirable individual is not a new idea by any sense. even Homer, who's principle audience would have been the descendants of the Greek invaders, painted Hector, eldest son of Priam and the most powerful of the Trojan heroes as an honorable individual, who refuses to sell out his less-than-penitent younger brother, despite the fact that the odds are against both him and his city. Likewise pretty much every pantheon of gods has at least one "evil" deity who is associated with death or strife or mischief, but will still stand by the other gods at various points in the mythology
The other form of ancient story is the kind that has no villain. both The Odyssey and Beowulf, although featuring people and creatures that oppose the hero, do not really have villains. Yes there are foes, (Cersei, and Grendel, Polyphemus and the Dragon) but the actions of these foes do not dictate the course of the story, in the same way that The Joker orchestrates the occurrences of The Dark Knight or how Darth Vader affects the course of the Star wars trilogy. Ancient stories were focused on the hero, and him alone.
Which is why everything is King Arthur's fault.
King Arthur is the one who started the trend of illogical villainy that plagues some other wise brilliant stories (such as Ronin in Guardians of the Galaxy, and numerous unnecessary characters in Game of Thrones) Morgan le Fay and her sisters will do anything in their power to ensnare and oppose Arthur and his knights, without Arthur himself having done anything to them. (they are venting their rather legitimate frustration at Arthur's father, by opposing his son.)
But King Arthur is not the only legend to have illogical villains. Robin hood also has to regularly deal with Prince John, Guy of Guisborne and the Sheriff of Nottingham, all of whom have really no redeeming characteristics and are just greedy brutes.
And that doesn't mean you can't have a greedy brute who likes hurting people as your villain. But it does mean that no one cares about your villain. If your villain is the generic vileness that is found in so many stories (which is really Disney's fault but...) then it should be the hero that drives the plot, not that villain. Because in truth, the hero of your story is really only as good as the villain(or obstacle) they overcome.
There has been a growing trend in modern stories to have chapters from the villain's perspective, both to change up the points of view AND to establish the villain as dangerous by having him be evil to either some unlucky nobody or an inept minion. this rather generic scene can be found in almost any movie (it even snuck it's way into The Hobbit) and will always end with the villain dispatching whoever is groveling before them.
Oh, aren't they so evil!!!
Next Time: The Villain, part two: the ones that got it right
The idea of a villain who was still an admirable individual is not a new idea by any sense. even Homer, who's principle audience would have been the descendants of the Greek invaders, painted Hector, eldest son of Priam and the most powerful of the Trojan heroes as an honorable individual, who refuses to sell out his less-than-penitent younger brother, despite the fact that the odds are against both him and his city. Likewise pretty much every pantheon of gods has at least one "evil" deity who is associated with death or strife or mischief, but will still stand by the other gods at various points in the mythology
The other form of ancient story is the kind that has no villain. both The Odyssey and Beowulf, although featuring people and creatures that oppose the hero, do not really have villains. Yes there are foes, (Cersei, and Grendel, Polyphemus and the Dragon) but the actions of these foes do not dictate the course of the story, in the same way that The Joker orchestrates the occurrences of The Dark Knight or how Darth Vader affects the course of the Star wars trilogy. Ancient stories were focused on the hero, and him alone.
Which is why everything is King Arthur's fault.
King Arthur is the one who started the trend of illogical villainy that plagues some other wise brilliant stories (such as Ronin in Guardians of the Galaxy, and numerous unnecessary characters in Game of Thrones) Morgan le Fay and her sisters will do anything in their power to ensnare and oppose Arthur and his knights, without Arthur himself having done anything to them. (they are venting their rather legitimate frustration at Arthur's father, by opposing his son.)
But King Arthur is not the only legend to have illogical villains. Robin hood also has to regularly deal with Prince John, Guy of Guisborne and the Sheriff of Nottingham, all of whom have really no redeeming characteristics and are just greedy brutes.
And that doesn't mean you can't have a greedy brute who likes hurting people as your villain. But it does mean that no one cares about your villain. If your villain is the generic vileness that is found in so many stories (which is really Disney's fault but...) then it should be the hero that drives the plot, not that villain. Because in truth, the hero of your story is really only as good as the villain(or obstacle) they overcome.
There has been a growing trend in modern stories to have chapters from the villain's perspective, both to change up the points of view AND to establish the villain as dangerous by having him be evil to either some unlucky nobody or an inept minion. this rather generic scene can be found in almost any movie (it even snuck it's way into The Hobbit) and will always end with the villain dispatching whoever is groveling before them.
Oh, aren't they so evil!!!
Next Time: The Villain, part two: the ones that got it right
KOHT#6.28318
Okay, I have just come to the conclusion that there are no good jokes to make about the mathematical constants. fortunately there aren't any more that people really know about so I may be off the hook.
Side Note: Tau, which is equal to 2pi, is in my opinion, the mathematical constant in the most need of promotion. it is far superior to pi as a means for circular measurement and I believe we need to increase its usage.
Lastly, I leave for College this week, so I'm going to get as many posts posted this week as I can, on the off chance that I have to slow down once college starts. (what? college takes time?)
Aug 24, 2014
KOHT#6
I'm going to level with you. This will not be the only time that people in this medieval timeline are somehow familiar with modern terms or inventions (and I doubt that I'll even keep them this disguised) There's just too many chances for humor to limit myself to the past.
Aug 21, 2014
#1 Ideal Launch Conditions
These upload a lot less nicely (for the moment I have to do it in chunks so my apologies for those who zoom in)
Aug 17, 2014
Aug 15, 2014
KOHT#4
Kudos to everyone who got the Star Wars reference!
If only real business executives were able to be convinced this easily.
Aug 14, 2014
KOHT#3.14159
BONUS! pi is the mathematical constant that everyone is most familiar with, so I definitely couldn't skip it, but to be honest, there aren't really that many jokes to do with it. so to avoid another bad pun comic I just decided to ignore pi completely. (note: the yellow in the second to last panel has the number thirty-seven written sideways in it)
Also, I thought it worth mentioning that this trick with the number 37 is actually true, and works for any of the numbers (111,222,333 and so on)
Aug 13, 2014
First post!
So this is the first post I have NOT to include a comic or cartoon of some nature. Eventually I will group these general opinion-giving posts in one place, but for now I think they're just going to be scattered randomly throughout.
I think it is fairly obvious from my comics that I am something of a geek...or is it nerd? once upon a time they were mostly the same thing. The brainy kids at school who were mostly ignored but everyone. But with the current uptick in popular interest into what were once "nerdy"/"geeky" areas. (science-fiction films, Dystopias and Fantasy worlds in particular) there has formed a real but rather fuzzy distinction between the two terms. What is it that constitutes that division?
Looking in an online dictionary (merriam-webster for those who like details) makes the very slight distinction in that nerds are obsessed with more technical or academic fields, while the geek can be obsessed with mostly anything, so long as they seem socially awkward and not generally popular.
I feel that this is somewhat outdated in it's view, but nevertheless, the distinction between academic and hobby is one worth noting, but is that the only division? I feel there may be something of a slight superiority by those listed in the nerd category, as they feel the avid pursuit of Physics or Computer Programming is more important then the pursuit of the latest Star Wars rumors (which is, in my opinion, debatable) there is however some truth that the nerd category is a more cohesive whole, many of it's major fields (Science, Math and Computer Sci.) dovetail nicely together, while the geek category, though far larger, is split up into several smaller groups.
e.g. two stereotypical nerds meet at a party, and get into a discussion. one is a Chemistry buff, and the other is into Computer Graphics, they could find a mutually interesting topic to discuss with, in my opinion relative ease.
Two stereotypical geeks meet at a party and get into a discussion. One is obsessed with World of Warcraft (Man are you that out of date? WoW is pretty much done by now.) and the other wears a Starfleet insignia whenever they leave their house. I think that there is little common ground for these two, and while they may be able to find some it would be harder than the previous example.
"Well that's not quite fair." you say "you picked geeks from far corners of their genres, no wonder they didn't mesh well." and while I concur with you I would argue that it doesn't really change anything, as another large blow to geek unity is their firm support for their favorite _____ as the best. If a guy with a brown robe and a padawan's braid runs into a guy in a fez, they will start to argue about the clear similarities between their respective weapons of choice, and the idiosyncrasies of each. (yes, yes, the sonic screwdriver isn't a weapon technically, but with the way it's being used lately I think my claim isn't too far-fetched.) likewise the Millennium Falcon has been pitted against the USS Enterprise many a time. And this competitive nature is not confined to the sci-fi, it plagues Fantasy fans as well, it's just that the Lord of the Rings is some much better then anything else that nothing can manage to stand up to it. (cue disagreement from Game of Thrones and Harry Potter geeks.)
The truth is, Geeks are not concerted in their beliefs. While Nerds are willing to admit the value of other subjects, many geeks will outright dismiss things as rip-offs.
Anyway, all in all, the distinction is certainly there, and is I think only likely to grow more pronounced with time. So I felt it was a good idea to help everyone (myself included) to better understand what exactly divides the two. I'm sure others will think differently and I would welcome your thoughts on the matter. (though I would ask people to be respectful)
NEXT TIME: The Evolution of the Villain, and why they needed to change.
I think it is fairly obvious from my comics that I am something of a geek...or is it nerd? once upon a time they were mostly the same thing. The brainy kids at school who were mostly ignored but everyone. But with the current uptick in popular interest into what were once "nerdy"/"geeky" areas. (science-fiction films, Dystopias and Fantasy worlds in particular) there has formed a real but rather fuzzy distinction between the two terms. What is it that constitutes that division?
Looking in an online dictionary (merriam-webster for those who like details) makes the very slight distinction in that nerds are obsessed with more technical or academic fields, while the geek can be obsessed with mostly anything, so long as they seem socially awkward and not generally popular.
I feel that this is somewhat outdated in it's view, but nevertheless, the distinction between academic and hobby is one worth noting, but is that the only division? I feel there may be something of a slight superiority by those listed in the nerd category, as they feel the avid pursuit of Physics or Computer Programming is more important then the pursuit of the latest Star Wars rumors (which is, in my opinion, debatable) there is however some truth that the nerd category is a more cohesive whole, many of it's major fields (Science, Math and Computer Sci.) dovetail nicely together, while the geek category, though far larger, is split up into several smaller groups.
e.g. two stereotypical nerds meet at a party, and get into a discussion. one is a Chemistry buff, and the other is into Computer Graphics, they could find a mutually interesting topic to discuss with, in my opinion relative ease.
Two stereotypical geeks meet at a party and get into a discussion. One is obsessed with World of Warcraft (Man are you that out of date? WoW is pretty much done by now.) and the other wears a Starfleet insignia whenever they leave their house. I think that there is little common ground for these two, and while they may be able to find some it would be harder than the previous example.
"Well that's not quite fair." you say "you picked geeks from far corners of their genres, no wonder they didn't mesh well." and while I concur with you I would argue that it doesn't really change anything, as another large blow to geek unity is their firm support for their favorite _____ as the best. If a guy with a brown robe and a padawan's braid runs into a guy in a fez, they will start to argue about the clear similarities between their respective weapons of choice, and the idiosyncrasies of each. (yes, yes, the sonic screwdriver isn't a weapon technically, but with the way it's being used lately I think my claim isn't too far-fetched.) likewise the Millennium Falcon has been pitted against the USS Enterprise many a time. And this competitive nature is not confined to the sci-fi, it plagues Fantasy fans as well, it's just that the Lord of the Rings is some much better then anything else that nothing can manage to stand up to it. (cue disagreement from Game of Thrones and Harry Potter geeks.)
The truth is, Geeks are not concerted in their beliefs. While Nerds are willing to admit the value of other subjects, many geeks will outright dismiss things as rip-offs.
Anyway, all in all, the distinction is certainly there, and is I think only likely to grow more pronounced with time. So I felt it was a good idea to help everyone (myself included) to better understand what exactly divides the two. I'm sure others will think differently and I would welcome your thoughts on the matter. (though I would ask people to be respectful)
NEXT TIME: The Evolution of the Villain, and why they needed to change.
Aug 11, 2014
KOHT#3
KOHT#2.71828
BONUS! one cannot just ignore such an important number as the mathematical constant e (at least anyone who has taken calculus cannot ignore it) even when there's no inspiration, you have to at least try.
KOHT#2
KOHT #1
This comic went through numerous re-writes before I felt it was good enough to post, but it was one of my first comics, so I felt like it deserved to be there.
KOHT #0
Next Comic
I thought I'd give a bit more explanation of what's going on in the world. (also I think starting with number zero firmly puts me in the programmer category, oh well. )
I thought I'd give a bit more explanation of what's going on in the world. (also I think starting with number zero firmly puts me in the programmer category, oh well. )
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