@Lightrail - I didn't have time to tell you during the singups but... I love Sheila. I love her design, I love her attitude and I LOVE her personality! She is so damn relatable! My only problem is, I was way more invested in her troubles that I was on ShiZana and their whole confrontation of the criminals and all. By the way your pages were so great, so much quailty in so little time!

@Rhimwill - omg your art was amazing and the story kept me really engaged... I felt so sad at the end! Also I absolutely love panel 4 page 5, it is not much but it is so well drawn! Speaking of pages, I am amazed you managed to fit such a compelling story in only 5 pages! Amazing pacing!

This was such a close match, for both! So difficult to vote on! And I wanna battle both (uhm, the three?) characters someday! Great work, both of you!

This was another great match up for this tournament. You two both have equal skill in comic making ability and had equally compelling stories. Oooh, I love it when the votiing is this conflicted! Gives us mob a challenge to see who ends up on top.

LIGHTRAIL- Simply beautiful pages. You have a great sense of form and action that's evident from the first page as you set the scene for this who-dun-it story. Right off the bat, Sheila had me smiling. I'm thrilled she isn't as serious as I expected her to be. She's a total kook and I'm all about more comic relief up in void city. Spotlighting your opponent and using their queer little symbiotic business as the backdrop to your murder mystery was a clever touch. Too often you get paired up with such weird opponents, folks tend to forget these comics aren't insular and some people just wont understand why people are ignoring the odd noseless character with the bug on its back.  Your set up allows for you to explain whats going on with the bug and give us a better understanding of oyur opponent. Smart!
Being as these pages are so beautiful, its up to the rest of us to try and find something to nitpick to make our critiques halfway helpful, lol! That said, overall I think these pages are a bit on the light side. Adding some nice spot blacks would've really broken up your scenes and pushed your characters forward so they didnt get lost in your background elements. Granted, there ARE moments where you do give us a taste (like the murder's bug in the bottom panel of page 3), which just leaves me wanting more of that. I'd keep an eye on your special effects as well. The BAM impact on the bottom of page 4 feels kinda lackluster. It most likely is your choice of font. Try different looks to really get across that knuckle sandwich power. Also your speed lines are looking all kindsa anti aliased. Smooth out those jaggies as it kind of stands out amidst your high res smooth linework,

RHIMWILL- Your work had the loose, flowing feel was lacking in Lightrails. You added backgrounds when you needed to, but how you added them was really aesthetically pleasing. You allow for this sorta fade out effect where you offer aspects of the background, but don't fully finish it, so it feels more like a motif, or set design. Granted, I suppose people could like that or not, but I personally love it. Definitely a technique I wanna emulate. I adored the fact that Zana uses Shi's arms for gesticulation. I was actually hoping they would! That 'shh!' motion with Shi's fingers was super cute. I felt such a wave of nostalgia reading through your comic and couldn't quite place it until it hit me. Darkwing duck comics. Or really, just Disney comics in general. Your style has a rubbery, ,kid-friendly vibe to it- even where your villain henchmen are concerned.
I know you were pressed for time with such a quick deadline, but if there's one thing I'd keep an eye on its your sequence of action being in sync to the environment. To go from telling everybody to get out, to the teleporter exploding should've had both Sheila and Zana flying into the wall. I mean they WERE running back towards the aliens they rescued and if previous panels are correct, they had a wall behind them. Just something to keep in mind. Still, of the two, I think your story is the one leaving me most piqued for interest. I gotta know what happens next!

both of you are so many levels above me. I really admire both of your work.

Lightrail, your story wrapped up really nice and clean which was great. I didn't feel like anything was left unsaid that needed to be said.

Rhimwill, for five pages you fit a ton of content in. really concise and the soft cliffhanger at the end is just fantastic! I want to read the next installment!

How do you both have such clean, complete looking work in a week? I'm so jealous! And you both have this fun, expressive approach! You need to team up (if you weren't already?)!

Would it be too weird if I critiqued the text? Lightrail's comic could use a different font and bigger size, and I feel like Rhimwill's text and balloon lines need just a touch more weight to go easier on the eyes.

GOD THIS WAS A HARD ONE TO JUDGE ugh. In the Void discord/chat, I kept telling others about how hard it was to judge this, because y'all are KILLING IT

Lightrail: first off, let me say I appreciate you using another member of Shizana's species as a villain, because this shows a lot of commitment to showing your opponent's character!

I screenshotted the "I AM SO TIRED!!!" panel because it spoke to me on a deeply personal level.

The only points of improvement I can think of would be more backgrounds, but considering this is your first void round, that's an extremely good nitpick to have!

Rhimwill: I'm upset bc SAVE THE CHILDREN
but also, this is a very excellent comic; I really enjoyed the dynamic you wrote, and your inking is great!!
Still mortified by the fact Zana has a massive insect embedded in her back but I'll get over it [eventually...............]

GREAT amazing work, both of you!

@Lightrail: Man, your inking is top notch! And I'm impressed by how much attention you gave your backgrounds, too! I'm having a hard time finding something to critique art-wise, so For you I'd recommend working on making your characters' motivations more clear and your dialogue and plot more natural. A lot of your comic felt like "this plot point happened because it needed to" rather than coming from a natural progression based on the characters' personalities and motives. I'm also a bit confused by how you portrayed Sheila. In her bio, she sounds like a fairly adequate PI, but in this comic she seems like an incompetent police detective. Maybe it's just a matter of you understanding your character better than me (which obviously should be the case), but it was just confusing to me. Hopefully, as you make more comics we'll get to understand Sheila better and I won't be so confused.

@Rhimwill: Oh wow, I thought I was still on Lightrail's comic when I first opened yours hahah. Funny how two similar styles got matched up on the first round. But this isn't about comparing you to other VOIDers. Honestly, I don't even know what to critique on this! Your lineart is solid, your characters are well-defined and interesting, and your backgrounds do a great job of setting the scene. I do think the brother and sister getting separated felt a little cliché; I think it would have felt a little more natural if we had seen more emotion from the brother after they got separated and if they hadn't shouted "Brother!" and "Sister!" at each other like they don't refer to each other by name. Not a huge deal, but just a little cliché. Overall, I was super impressed with your comic and can't wait for more!

These two make a great team, and I love how they have basically the same jacket XD

lightrail:

-polished, I love it i love it! The background are amazing! and some of the linework and drawings are cute!

rhimwill:

-also polished! really good quality battle here methinks
-you gave me the feels Now I want to know how you finish the next story

both of you, i think did pro job <3 <3 <3 keep up the good work!

Wow. WOW. I've got to say of what I've read so far you two have some of my favorite comics in the entire tournament and I really wish both of you could go to the next round.

@Lightrail; You've got some really nice linework in this and the character interactions between Sheila and Shizana made me crack up and I defiantly feel that your story was very strong. I'm a big fan of the scenes with the black and white contrast and wished I could have seen a little bit more of them.

@Rhimwill; Your comic felt much longer than it was in the best way possible I was completely engrossed by it. Your backgrounds felt real and well done and your plot was stunning. I do agree with Karma there were some scenes where Sheila's face felt a bit off.

You guys are both awesome!!!!! I want to see this duo alot more.

Ahhh this is one of my favorite matchups of the round! They're both fun stories that really make use of both of the characters involved without making either one feel just pinned on for the sake of the battle.

Lightrail: This is probably going to be the most bizarre critique I've given but I noticed your character's boobs change size a lot through out the comic.  I don't know if there were other anatomy inconsistencies, but that really stuck out (hah) to me because she goes from DD to flat on a couple of pages and it can look a little odd. Other than that, your story here was really strong and I hadn't expected you to make use of your opponents' character worldbuilding, and it really worked to your advantage!

Rhimwill: Yours was a little shorter so it didn't have quite the same pacing as the other, but it does leave open room for you to continue the story, which I really hope you do! It's a compelling one and it's hard not to root for Shizana when they're so clearly a hero! As for visual critique, I'd say maybe work on your facial consistency. I don't know if it's something you did on purpose, but your opponent's character is the only one in the comic with a human face, and she seems to change a lot, and go pretty bug eyed in a couple of shots. Other than that, great work! This one's a toughie to choose between!

I love catgirls and I love aliens. Rooting for both of you!!!