Brave Ulysses
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Science Fiction, Action/Adventure
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Throughout the trillions of miles of space holding a wide-strewn interplanetary civilization, law and order is maintained by the men and women of the IEA: the Interplanetary Enforcement Agencies. A young man by the name of Ulysses Q. Halifax proudly counts himself among the members of the IEA's Administration and Transport Authority, the agency responsible for maintaining smooth operation of all IEA business across the vast expanse of the galaxy. Halifax's life, though, is tedious; he's a station-cop, an administrator, and the most excitement he's bound to see in a day is a heated argument over filing procedure; but he's possessed of an adventurer's heart, and for years has followed with excitement the exploits of his heroes in the IEA's Marshals Service. In Brave Ulysses, we tell the tale of Mr. Halifax; how opportunity knocked, how Ulysses answered, and how his humdrum life was forever set on its ear after he stepped aboard the space-cruiser, Briarea.
Wonderful style!
good effort
Just pulled the trigger for Brave Ulysses, Laemeur. Hope the eleventh hour vote helps with the ranking. Again, great looking strip.
Perhaps some. I admire Windsor-Smith very much, though I've never consciously tried to emulate his style.
In looking at this again, as well as the deviant art stuff- any Barry Windsor-Smith influence?
You've done a really great job here and gotten my vote for this month. Good luck!
Agreed, Sam. This is a stellar (no pun intended) work.
I read it again. It's still great. This should be ranked in the top two darn it.
ntholden & infernalbbg: Are they advertising Zuda more heavily in the UK than over here, or am I just pulling all the Dan Dare fans out of the wood-work? ;) Either way, glad to have some supporters from that green and pleasant land.
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And to everyone else, thanks for the support. It's very encouraging to see that a space-opera comic DOES, in fact, seem to have some kind of audience on the web.
Really good.
Worthy of Heavy Metal.
His expression on the last panel of Page 1 is priceless! Like a kid in a candy store.
This is the best work I've seen since following zuda beginning in February. I love Melody, too, and it's a deserving winner, but Brave Ulysses works for me in styles of art, story, and setting. I really want to see more, and it's frustrating to see it ranked so low...the visible numbers don't add up for me, but I don't know all the rules. Anyhow, terrific work and good luck. Hope you get the chance to continue this somewhere if not here.
It's really a shame that this is #6 right now. This comic is amazing. It has some of the best art I've ever seen on Zuda, if not the best. It's pro all around.
Really is the toughest month to vote yet. However this story sneaks it for me. The art reminds me of my childhoold reading The Eagle and Battle comics and the story moves along at a speed that works for me. Good luck with the overall competition.
Spectacular bro, easily the best here. The great script combined with enjoyable and well-professional art reminicent (in all the good ways) of old-school Dan Dare shite (yeah, I'm THAT old) puts this easily a cut above the rest of the stuff in this competition. It's a frickin' crime you're not first in the ranking, this is the only comic in the comp I think is already professional enough to see in print. I know I'd buy it...well, would if I wasn't such a cheap c**t. :)
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Again, I'm a huge fan so keep writing this and if you do, make sure you drop me a line and let me know where you post it! Do that and I'll scribble you a piece of fan art... how's that for a slurpy arse-kiss.
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P.S. That's an unfortunate choice of thumbnail for your story by the way, I had no idea the high quality of art judging from that alone.
Good luck!
I've reviewed your comic on my blog:
http://contentdigital.wordpress.com/2008/04/21/content-review-zudas-brave-ulysses/
Illinest is pretty much right-on about why the narrative trudges along right through the whole seven pages; it's a not-quite-verbatim arrest report, and the visuals are all in Ulysses' mind's eye. I will concede that it's quite clunky in spots, though. I was drawing heavily from the older, dense-narration style that newspaper adventure strips used to favor, and it didn't come off all that well, but I'd say it's not too bad for a first attempt.
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I won't, however, concede to RKB's opinion that the narration "hurt the art badly". I think I found a very reasonable balance between the volume of text and visuals, given the narrative nature of the strip. Unless you're just talking about that godawful peach colour I chose for Manley's narrative, which, really... I only chose because it seemed a reasonably neutral colour at the time, and it was different than the corn-yellow used for the omniscient narrative. ;)
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And, J.W., thanks for the kudos on the hand-lettering. It's really not that great, certainly not the best I've done (used a much-too-fine pen for it -- won't make that mistake twice) but I really do believe that hand-lettering is an important part of the comics tradition, so... sorry for the folks that don't like it, but that's just part of my shtick.
I should clarify, I wouldn't call what Laemuer did a mistake. I should have said, It's not the way I would have approached it, but I understand why it was done. For me, captions like the one in panel 1, screen 6 are unnecessary, because the panel and the one after tell me he sabotaged something.
I will also add that this has my vote. The fact that this is setting at 6 is hard proof that marketing wins out over talent. It should be no lower than 3.
kid i understand what you're saying but given the only aspect that i feel is a true mistake (not featuring ulysses in the adventure) I think that if he'd dropped the narrative it would've been doubly confusing when he went back to ulysses at the end. That would've made yet another POV.
You have a narrator voicing over Ulysses, then you have Ulysses speaking, then you have a narrator speaking for Manley, and if that narration were dropped you'd be in direct Manley speak for awhile before going back again to the narrator over Ulysses.
As is I think the limits have been stretched enough. It took a slightly clunky recap at the end to keep the impression of a planned story. Would you have the direct Manley pov segue directly into the Ulysses narration again or would you reintroduce the Manley narration after 4 pages without it?
This comic skates the edge of common sense, but in a good way. I really like it.
I understand why the comic is "wordy" and what Laemeur was going for in doing it. But once the feel and effect are established, it's not necessary to be redundant. If you're showing it in the art, there is no need to say it in a caption. The reader will understand that they are still in the secondhand narrative.
I think Ill is right about the choice for wordiness, but I think it was too much, and hurt the art badly.
If I may field this one... the story features a written account of Manley's latest adventure. As such, the format of the comic provides an excuse to write the narrative in a manner reminiscent of said written account.
I believe that if you took every line of Manley's narrative and combined them together in a text document it would read exactly as you'd expect the official business of a high ranking marshal, especially one who might be just a little bit 'full of himself'.
For this reason I do not think that you can call the decision to be wordy a 'bad' decision.
That's not to say that it can't be a turn-off, but I feel that there is ample proof in these eight pages that the wordiness is a design choice rather than 'just a mistake'.
I like the sci-fi nature. The plot seems like it could be something. Definitely needs to be higher up. But I must agree that it is too wordy; not saying the words are not important, but it looks like there are just too many places where there are too many words.
Find your $10,000 words.
It's pretty obvious to me that more people love this comic and see it's genius than any other strip submitted. What I have issue with is the fact that marketing gets inferior products to the table.
It's same thing with music. The bigger the machine behind you the bigger your audience...
For those of you reading this that are of the Zuda genealogy, head our words and understand we do not believe this man is getting his fair share of accurate representation.
I for one smell a rat. If you know a damn thing about art, you know that Laemeur deserves far more than his current share in the rankings.
It's sad but true....
Marketing is everything these days and talent has fallen by the wayside...
*sniffle*
officially jaded,
Warmer
How on planet Earth can this comic be in the sixth place?!?!
Marketing, huh? Well, I don't see what buying groceries is going to do for my ranking, but... having a well-stocked larder is always a good thing, I guess. Off to the mega-mart!!
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For those of you who aren't offended by cartoon boobs, you should maybe pop on over to my deviantART page (http://laemeur.deviantart.com) to see a humorous take on Brave Ulysses which addresses some of your criticisms. ;)
Hey, Laemeur——for me, this is the best looking strip since Crooked Man. Your figure drawing is excellent, storytelling is solid. Heck, I even admire the hand lettering——not exactly John Workman level (and I think you know that), but it's an impressive thing to take on with fonts so readily available these days. I like your basic setup, but many of the captions seem unnecessary, and I think you could streamline the strip by cutting some, like the last caption on screen 4 where the same information is basically repeated in the character's dialog. I know the main character is listening to this tale and the captions serve to remind us of that, but once we get the basic conceit of the story within the story, we don't really need them. That said, I agree with Illinest--why a solid, entertaining effort like this isn't in the top three is beyond me.
The art's fine, but too many text boxes for me, to really get past them. I still think it covers up the art too much, and crowds out the panels.
The art is really nice with a late 70s mainstream feel. The inking is crisp, clean, and not over done. There's a few spots of stiffness in faces and action, but they're not overly distracting.
I only wish the writing was as economical and clean. It's a bit fat with words. Trimmed up a bit, it would be solid throughout.
That said, you may still get my vote.
word, scad. fuggin WORD.
this has winner written all over it. BUST OUT THE MARKETING ALREADY, LAEMEUR! YOU GOTTA WANT IT!!
How the hell is this at number 6?!!?!?!!
Zuda's voting system is so broken.
I'm willing to forgive the fact that the titular character drops out of it after page one, because surely H.B. Manley will figure largely into the plot, and perhaps his pitch perfect career will offer some interesting paralells to Ulysses. In short, I trust the writer and I'm sure it is relevant. I haven't read the synopsis though... Maybe I should do that.
It's a shame that you're currently so low in the standings, but I predict you'll be the Sam and Lilah of this round (i.e. picked up by another "publisher") so hold your head high! You've got some amazing, classic artwork here and the story is top-notch sci-fi! Great work!
Also, we'll be talking about the April contest over on the Digital Strips (www.digitalstrips.com) site this week, so check in and pay close attention for some love from yours truly!
Brave Ulysses indeed! Frank loves his pulp fiction and has cast his vote at the tribal council! Best of luck in the competition, Brave Ulysses, and Godspeed!
Nice panels, decent artwork, an always popular premise, and wow, a synopsis that manages to peek interest. It's just too bad that the work highlights narration more than visual storytelling. I would have liked to see this in better placement, but eight pages on a dream, dunno... Science fiction always lends itself to possibly great designs and visuals; I would love to see where you’d take this. Too bad there aren’t more sci-fi/pulp fans!
How is it that this comic is in sixth place? Where's the outrage?
Wow, I really like this comic! Great narration and dialogue and excellent storytelling... The only thing that didn't grab me were the colors- I'm going to echo RKB and say it's the text box colors that bug me the most, they have this peachy-fleshy color that doesn't sit well with me. But seriously- these are minor flaws and overall this is a great comic! I'd love to read more of it!
-Becky
SUSANO thinks that this is pretty frik'n rad!
SUSANO also thinks that a more pasty-"top-shelfy" color job would have pushed out the inks.
My vote's on this one (looks like my earlier attempt at posting to this thread didn't stick) but I'm only one lonely voter here - I implore the creator to get out there and stump, pitch, and otherwise spread the word on this project - it's not going to win itself!
If you do win could you use another color for those text boxes besides yellow, I know it might sound like I'm suggesting a radical change, but-just-think-about-it...
I tried to stay focused but couldn't. I gave it three stars because I can easily tell many will like this...but it wasn't for me.
wait what? not in the top 3?!?
okay, fake indignation. i'm no longer surprised by stuff like this.
hopefully you'll be able to make a bit of a comeback.
I agree with gph. There are some very strong contenders this month, I love the pulp sci-fi feel of Brave Ulysses. It has my vote.
Beautiful spaceships, very Syd Mead. Props
This is an amazing piece. I was blown away by the composition, and some of the angle choices were spectacular. Page 7, in particular was amazing work. I like the art style, especially the inking. The heavy narrative fits the impression that this is an older work... hearkening back to old sci-fi pulp material. Although I think there are some strong candidates this month, "Brave Ulysses" has my vote.
Gabe
Very ambitious story telling. You packed a lot into 8 pages, and I really enjoyed the detail of the art. Good luck!
man the art for this was amazing but the story was real dense and became abit of a chore to read. Im not saying a packed story is a bad thing but the flow of it didnt engage me all that much.
Good effort though
I love the retro look and the commitment to telling a true sci-fi story. Nice work.
You could probably guess I was going to like the artwork on this one! Really nice. Not totally consistent, but still really really nice. A terrific sense of space (pun intended) and place with some great detail reminding me of all sorts of things I really like. Nice shading too (and although that's usually an insult coming from me – it isn't this time). Perhaps a little clunky on page 4 with some of the figures but so what, page 1 and most of the others were ... what's that word ... awesome (urgh!).
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Now the story ... the story ... what was the story again? I feel like I missed something! Brave Ulysses ... who's he? What's going on! Either I'm thick or you haven't nailed the plot to the floor ... I'm erring towards the latter, but I may be wrong. Seriously, I think you've miscalculated – the plot is dull dull dull – where are the fantastic death rays, the weird alien lifeforms, the sickening violence, the space chase, the sexy womenThe climatic scene reminds me of a million dull things – despite the praise below you really needed an explosion or something (anything) to set the pulse racing. That's where I feel you've slipped up – could've been another 'Crooked Man' contender. “so I gave the order to stun.” - yeah, that's nice ... that's polite ... fair ... reasonable even - but I gave the order to kick him in the nuts and blast his skinny ass out the nearest available airlock – even Dan Dare wasn't this by-the-book!
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I can see from the synopsis and the other comments you are building to something, but too late, too late, you should all know by now you haven't the time to build - you have to grab first - then build! Sorry, but it's true.
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Nice muted colours. Terrible lettering. Unnecessary footnotes. In the end though, I liked it because I'm a sucker for anything retro – Jeff Hawke lives on (but he could do with some new nuts). Best of luck - second place at least I should think!
What I appreciate in this is how you added a dimension by overlapping the past and present. Yes, I am willing to work in order to appreciate...invest some thought into what I am reading. And the effortless humor...so natural - well done I must say!