I wont touch on the subject matter of the comic, but I will say your arts really nice in this! I really like the posses you gave Amelia and how you drew them!

Jerome is 30. The fifty four years line is supposed to tell the audience how long Amelia spent alone in her abandoned home. Jerome himself was only 7 or 8 when he saw Amelia for the first time. Sorry about the confusion.

Your arts looks pretty slick here, not just the clean inks, but the body language and facial expressions are a noticeable step up. As for the comic itself, We're just sort of thrust into the scene- subject matter aside visually there needed to be some kind of establishing shot to act as a buffer/ tell us where we are. In terms of writing, I wouldn't repeat past crits, but I have some extra notes~ [spoiler]1) Based on everything I know about this character, I don't think your intentions are to make her arrogant- however, in this comic she calls herself a "bombshell" she states that she's "cute, successful and respected" all within 3 pages. It's just a very strange unnatural way to hear someone talk about themselves- even if they're supposed to be confident! 2) I was really struck by the line "I can't just like Men, I need to be complicated" That's SUCH a loaded sentence, I'm sitting here still trying to unpack what you want me to take away from this as a reader...I know it's based on your experiences...but without proper context & being said by a trans woman with a lot of life experience, who's *also* an LGBT+ advocate, it felt so out of place. I struggle to believe her reaction to bi-curiosity would be so extremely damaging...maybe I'm missing something? [/spoiler] Keep going Diz, good luck tackling these tricky themes, I think with proper research Amelia could become an interesting character. side note- Also, How old is Jerome?? Because he doesn't look 60+ to me, I'm guessing some kind of magic is involved? xD

Also yes there's a bunch of trans folk on here and some of us *wink* will tell you way more than you wanted to hear if you just ask :p

I had to read this a few times before I felt comfortable responding to it. My knee-jerk response was extreme dislike of the statement that her entire identity is wrapped up in being trans, because it felt reductionist, but I can also understand the general sentiment here. It reminds me of a video ContraPoints did about coming out as gay and how she had to come to terms with the idea that being attracted to women didn't negate being trans. So I think my problem here isn't that Amelia's feelings wouldn't resonate with real life trans people, and more that we just don't have the context or buildup to really make this story hit right. You've stated that Amelia is a very well-known LGBTQIA+ activist, as well as being a successful personal assistant of a rich CEO in charge of a really powerful and do-gooder type of company. This comic takes away all of those other things and just focuses purely on her queer identity. I think it would have communicated better if you could have shown the contrast between her confident outward persona and the personal struggles that snuck up on her despite being the kind of person who should know better than to have these thoughts. As someone who regularly struggles with Impostor Syndrome, I can 100% relate to Amelia feeling like she got off easy and that that somehow devalues her struggles as a trans woman. I want to see more of that story. But I also want to see more of her being a complete person outside of this particular struggle. I guess the TL;DR is just that I would have liked to see more here. More of Amelia's usual confident queer icon persona, more of the subtlety of having feelings she probably mentally knows aren't things she should worry about, and more of how her ghastly past self relates to this struggle. As it is, this comic just communicates in rapid succession that Amelia's entire identity is centered on being trans, that she's experiencing newfound bi panic, and that she was once a scary ghost who haunted Jerome. I hope part 2 will help clarify how that last point connects with the first two, and I hope we can see more of her being a confident queer icon despite these vulnerable moments of doubt.

Hm. What the other peeps said is imprtant, but also we kinda relate to the sentiments expressed. In our experience it's even pretty common things to think, so it felt true ebough to us. Still, be aware of who tells the stories, and where they come from. The pacing is lacking though. It would need to be more... fleshed out :B

Much of what I have to say has been said by Arts and Snowy. Subject matter like this, when put front and center, should be handled with a lot of care. The actual comic feels like it's missing a beginning. We've never seen Amelia express these kinds of concerns for her identity before and it would have been better to show some sort of inciting incident. There's never been anything in her comics before to really establish this.

Points taken. I am very sorry. Thank you for the constructive criticism. I did not do enough research on such a sensitive topic and for that I really do sincerely apologize. I will continue to strive to do better but as it stands I do not believe there will be a “The Importance of Being Honest: Part 2” because clearly I think I am writing out of my depth. Again, sincerest apologies for any offense I have caused. All I can do is try to do better in the future. Thank you.

I think your art is improving a great deal, and I like that you have changed up the kinds of angles and expressions you have in your comics. It's very interesting seeing how Amelia looks when she's emotionally stable and when she isn't. I don't really like how you've approached the subject, I'll be honest, and I agree with Arts on what they have mentioned about it. It feels very insensitive and tone deaf. Please research and ask people who have experienced these struggles.

So the art is fine but my main crit is about the writing and subject matter and how as a nonbinary individual i don't quite like it. The start is really abrupt and feels like it's in the middle of a conversation as opposed to the start. I want to know what set off Amelia to cause her to have this reaction. the line "My whole identity is tied up in being trans" rubs me the wrong way. when writing by a Cis person it reads as Amelia being a one note character and that one note is being trans. Being trans is important to trans characters but they have a lot more to their characterization than just that. We need to know more about Amelia than her transness and even with the transness you only bring it up in the vaguest of strokes. You should have more explanation for their transness, their could be a lot of interesting storytelling in the fact she has to will her body to the way she wants and realizing that as she's changing her body it's the body she wants. You don't need to bring up gender dysphoria for it, it could just be you exploring a moment of gender euphoria for Amelia. On page 3 when jerome says how it wasn't easy is just bad. He is a cis male, he doesn't have the authority to tell any trans person was is or isn't easy about their transition process. There's also the part where you bring up "trans prejudices or struggles". I'm split on this, on the one hand it comes off as you not doing research and not truly knowing what those prejudices or struggles are. On the other hand getting more explicitly about that stuff could come off as explorative and a cis person just using trans' people's struggles to make your own stories. this community has a good amount of nonbinary individuals and trans individuals so you can try asking some others for advice since this is a thing that requires LOTS OF STUDYING AND RESEARCH. which is what I would highly recommend you do a bunch more of, not just asking others but looking up research on your own.

Hey Cy, thanks for the comment! The reason this was submitted as a part one is because the deadline came before I was finished. I overestimated my abilities and thought I could get more pages done in a week than I ended up doing. So I decided to submit what I had and post the rest of it as part two when it is finished. I’m aware it’s not ideal, but I didn’t know how much time I would have needed on an extension, so it made the most sense to me at the time. I’m not going to defend my tackling of the subject. You have the right to be uncertain about a cis man handling Amelia’s feelings. And I completely and wholly will accept any criticism levied at that take and attempt to learn from it. All I will say is that Amelia’s feelings mirror my own feelings about my own sexuality. I’m aware this is not a one for one comparison, and I hope that the audience does not think I conflate the two. I am still learning, and I want to be better.

Your art has improved a lottt since you first joined. I love that shot of Amelia you’ve used for your thumbnails. I also notice you’re swinging the camera around a bit more for more interesting shots, like the ones on the last page looking down on baby Jerome! Great job! I agree with Heathen in that you need to push your backgrounds more though, and the writing here... felt somewhat off. I’m not sure why you couldn’t have finished the comic instead of doing multiple parts, since this is really short and finishes pretty abruptly. I’m also really not sure how I feel about you tackling this subject, I think I’ll have to wait till part 2 to see.

I like the sort of newspaper strip feel of this. You should consider arranging the panels on a single page and doing some texture effects to present these short ongoing strips like Sunday paper funnies. I really like how "I hated my body" is juxtaposed with her looking happy and confident. Really good cartooning all around. I would have liked to see a nice wide establishing shot of the room she's in, and where Jerome is in relation to her, and something more interesting than the flat gray in the last three panels. Your character art is coming along great, though.

This has improved greatly from your first comic, I really want to see more from you Diz, keep up the good work, I tip my hat to you.

This was great, Diz! Keep it up, I want to know if Amelia figures herself out :3c

Part one of a mini scene inspired by events in the roleplay server. Part two incoming shortly, just work got ahead of me on this one ????

Hey Diz, its nice to see you're coming back to make another comic, I can't wait to see what you have in store for Amelia Fey next.