rikun: hmm theres a lot about ABI's critique I think I have to agree with.... its a bit formulaic . i think you need to try writing more stories where you dont rely on outside characters to be the instigation. I liked your Vs may Wu comics best where it was just the three major characters and Itami was the villain of her own story. shes got no depth in this one. im sure theres other ways to introduce Hiemium as a plot element, like... maybe Itami starts getting mixed up with it herself? or something but like ABI said, Genie could have replaced by anybody and thats not particularly entertaining. ok like... i think youre too worried about making Itami look good all the time. you need to let her get dirty. Hurt people, make mistakes, let Itami be a fuck-up once in a while. thats what makes compelling character drama. Meanwhile, visually, I think its a bit stiff. I can see youre trying to do a faster, rougher style so hopefully you can find a balance soon between fast and good. i dunno i think they seem kinda... weightless i guess? I think the lines are too staright and you would do better to push your curves to add more contrast. karma i saw that you had trouble with yours since you spilled tea on it, im sorry to hear that, i would have liked to read a full comic! your characters are cute with a lot of appeal! i really like the playfulness of the second panel! i agree it would help you to back up the camera a bit sometimes for a little breathing room, especially during the fight scene. Story-wise its pretty standard. havent seen genie around in a while though, hope to see her in more comics soon!

I'm a little disappointed that neither comic was fully polished and finished within the three week deadline, but I trust the both of you know what went wrong, and I'd like to urge you both to plan better for next time. Now, onto critiques: RIKUN: I'll start by pointing out the obvious: this is literally the same plot from nearly every other Itami comic. Characters meet in a night club, some third party starts trouble, Itami and opponent team up and become friends afterwards. It's practically a formula, and a sign that you aren't really taking any risks or covering new ground with your character. You've mentioned that you wanted to introduce the Hiemium dust as a new plot element, but if that was your intention then that should have been the focus of the plot rather than tacking it onto your formula like an afterthought. If you really want to change up your pace and write new material, then you need to take more risks; start putting Itami into situations where she struggles or where circumstances are out of her control, and don't rely on a convenient teamup with your opponent as your solution for everything. Also try giving your opponents more value to your story other than being Itami's eventual new tag-team partner; you could have replaced Genie in this comic with LITERALLY ANYONE and nothing would have changed, so maybe try considering your opponents' plots and circumstances to build a conflict or plot from rather than plugging them into a template plot. I'll end by reiterating the bullet points of my critique: "Take more risks", "Stop relying on your formula plot". KARMA: I'm actually astonished at how closely this plot resembles Rikun's. I wouldn't go as far as to say they are the exact same, but I will say that I felt yours was resolved a little better, by using dialogue during the fight ("You're just using stolen moves!") to justify how the random asshole was defeated. I feel like your pages would benefit from wider shots, everything feels very cramped and the panels start to feel samey. You've got some good shot variety, so I feel like varying up your panels will give you room to control your pacing with a bit more finesse and create some cool focus shots.

It's such a pity about your accident KarmaCharma, your poses and facial expressions on your characters are very animated and looking at your previous work it's a huge shame you weren't able to apply your colouring talents here. Your intro story for Genie is brilliant!

Submitted. Let's see how this goes!

Uploaded, and I feel I owe an explaination. orz My comic was originally 7 pages and I was on track to get it all inked on time. Then a spill happened, tea ruined my inks and two of my pencils as well, but there wasn't really time to start over. So I cleaned up my remaining pencils as best I could to make it still readable, changed a little dialogue to make the missing scene between pages 1 and two a little less missing, and in short, I owe you 200% effort if we ever have a rematch Rikun because I definitely could have redone those pages if I didn't cut it so close to the deadline. Sorryyy. umu;

anticipation~~~~

looking forward to this!

Good luck! Havent seen Genie in a while, this should be fun!