Strip 36: An Unregistered Product

It’s funny, the backstory for Roger Sykes and his PPA completely changed just a couple of months ago, after we’d already begun Part 1, and now I can’t imagine it being anything else. The original backstory was much more convoluted and tied into Dy-Gar’s own past in a really contrived way. That whole plot thread was kind of embarrassing, and I have since destroyed all evidence of its existence. The cybernetic smuggler aspect is new, and it seems absolutely essential to his character now. I love the idea that Dy-Gar has finally found a robot companion, but he’s the worst possible companion he could have found. Not only is he physically dependent on organics, but he was actually responsible for perpetuating the system that Dy-Gar hates so much, and he’s just fine with it. Hell, he’s even proud of it!

Because the PPA is essentially pushing all of Dy-Gar’s buttons at once here, we ended up with another late-game change, this time on Evan’s end. Dy-Gar was originally going to facepalm in the second-to-last panel, but he felt (rightly) that the PPA would really piss him off in this scene, so Evan drew Dy-Gar picking up the poor guy and shaking him. In the end, we got something that was both more exciting to look at and more genuine to the character. This is what I love about the creative process - if you let an idea germinate, and if you can keep an open mind to external input (either from your fellow creators or the world around you), all the elements of your story will sooner or later come together, as if magnetized, to create something that feels right, and not entirely man-made.

- J.S. Conner

December 6th 2013