Can we do an experiment
It’s a long time since I last sat on a bean bag. I had one that consolidated the beans from two bean bags. You got a really commanding view. I wish I had never let it go.
Bad Machinery
New comics by John Allison
It’s a long time since I last sat on a bean bag. I had one that consolidated the beans from two bean bags. You got a really commanding view. I wish I had never let it go.
Now this is storytelling! Ambiguity with intention! It’s about what we don’t see as much as what we do see. The space between panels. It sounds like I’m being sarcastic but this is a sincere compliment!
It’s jazz comics!
Of course! Jack’s been sent back in time to avert that most tragic of historical errors: Shelley’s Dave Hill fringe.
I’m glad the Fringe is an eternal brick joke
“Are you… a time-traveling extraterrestrial vampire spy who got burned and thinks I should get a fringe?”
That’s the Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, and no to the fringe.
Haruhi does have something of a fringe. I almost forgot about that show and how much i enjoyed it.
I remember enjoying watching Suzumiya Haruhi no Yuuutsu, and recently I started getting into the light novel series. But then I got distracted with getting used to it being the pre-Haruhi nineties.
Only two more pages?! I want more!
So do I!
You got to hand it to Shelley, she’s incredibly thoughtful when it comes to coming up with the right questions for unexplained phenomenon. That’s true Tackleford for you.
New thought; Given the propensity for strange things happening in Tredregyn and Tackleford, is Sheffield the only UK locale that’s relatively normal?
*in the Bobbinsverse that is?
I seem to recall Giant Days featuring a weird cult that almost got Esther. Also ghosts.
And very batty happenings during the snooker finals.
Apparently English weather is very grey. So clearly he can’t be a spy who got sunburned.
Does bleeding a mysterious black liquid from one’s body count as “body language”?
“I have been trained in reading microexpressions and facial icks”
“You mean facial tics?”
“…I said what I said”
I love how Shelley doesn’t consider being an extraterrestrial or being a time traveler as crazy ideas.
NFT.
Everything she suggests is something she’ll encounter (or become!) later.
I believe Shelley was a zombie, not a vampire.
She and Amy did encounter a flock of vampires while on holiday in Bulgaria, though. Perhaps she thinks it’s a crazy idea because she knows they’re not native to Britane.
It’s hard to believe now that Shelley died in what I think was her third appearance in Scary Go Round. She spent some time as a zombie before being lightning’ed back to life.
What wonderful pade, full of close-ups of Shelley! She asked him if he was a time traveler, but Jack’s reaction here almost seems to follow the vampire question.
We only see his face after the vampire question. The black liquid could easily have been still there from the previous question.
What is going on in panel 7?
Jack’s body is reacting to Shelley’s questions. Given that panel sixes precede panel sevens in most traditional media, it’s fair to assume that that means Jack is a vampire.
Nah, the vampire test is the negative control question for the experiment, posed after seeing him exuding black ink as a result of the penultimate question (I don’t count the fringe question as the ultimate question).
Less black ink exudation! More Tortus Dortuldang! More Fengus Bartleby Beng-Bop!
We all have a regrettable giant beanbag in our past. Mine was the colour of a button mushroom. Unattractive, but extremely comfortable, and only sacrificed when two cats joined the household.
If not a bean bag then inflatable furniture.
No. No. Inflatable Beans for the Beanbag Chair!!! Eureka! I’m RICH!
My bb chair was dark blue w/white stars all over, but that was the early ’70s, not the ’90s.
The only thing I regret about it is getting rid of it.
What’s that thing smoking on a plate in the first panel?
Incense. A joss stick.
Jeez, should have known that. Thanks. Whatever next, Kombucha?
Mine was the Patchouli era.
Y’know, seeing all the close-ups of Shelley’s face on this page… Could the “mystery face” on the previous page be… Shelley?
No it couldn’t! It looks nothing like her!!! I’m in stitches, I think this pilot has revealed the limits of the visual ambiguity of my art style
Please don’t be bothered by our guesses. I, for one, always guess wrong at this sort of thing. My best guess is the Mystery Face is someone at the school that Jack is supposed to be attending in the present. And since the mystery kids have apparently all gone their separate ways, it’s someone we’ve never seen before.
Yeah, but it can be fun to speculate like this, even if you know full well that it’s almost certainly someone we’ve never seen before. And “small nose, big eyes” is at least a SLIGHT resemblance, right?
It’s all a dream – Jack wakes up in the shower and JR hasn’t been shot…
No, wait, I may have that confused with Red Dwarf
Wasn’t JR shot somewhere in the late 70s / early 80s? My timeline might be a little off since I never watched Dallas, but it should still be a far cry away from the current 90s. Though I seem to recall an episode of Red Dwarf that aired in the 90s, where they stopped JFK from being shot in Dallas…
I posit that The Wendigo is involved!
Also, TLDR:not enough Des
I have just been to see Ash, so I really feel like it’s the 90s!
The body language in the last panel is pretty clear. Shelley should get that one.