It took a while to find all the loose files that make up this comic, originally published at the end of 2001. But now this quirky little parable is back online.
I remember being influenced by Scott McCloud’s “trails,” used to great visual effect in his early comic Porphyria’s Lover. Many of the Halycon comics feature these same visual cues. They seem sort of silly now, but their intention was to help the story take a breath every once in a while. They were a new way to expand comic’s temporal nature. A big swirly trail would hopefully add a little beat to the narrative as you followed along. The panels are so close together though, that the trails dont seem to offer much (especially on today’s monitors which have 3 or 4 times the real estate that they did in 2001)
It also has a narrative symmetry that seems to show up in later Halcyons (and most of my subsequent work.) The idea that we follow to the end of a story, but in some ways end up where we started. A strong resolution occurs, and you’re hopefully entertained a bit by the experience. I think it was used more effectively in Set-up, (Beat) Punchline.
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