Mr. Fir actually found out about Kelly way way back at the beginning of the strip! It was his first appearance, actually. I’d kind of banked on everyone forgetting about this.

Oh, and the winter-themed romance that Chilliam Faulkner mentioned today? That also happened, way back in the murky era of comic strip antiquity.

You don’t really need to know these things to make sense of current goings-on (I still consider everything before the World 1 arc to be 100% optional), but I love making little connections like that. My hope is that when you go back and read through the archives, it feels a little more like a continuous, interconnected story and less like some scattershot Beetle Bailey anthology.

Speaking of stories (MASTERFUL SEGUE), we are getting very very close to the end of this one and the conclusion to the World 2 arc! About another week ought to do it. Still a lot of ground left to cover, though… stay tuned!

-CC

(P.S. note the alt text of that winter strip I linked to. DREAMS DO COME TRUE)

To commemorate the season, I offer you these ULTRA-HIP licensed Badnix Valentine’s Day cards! Pass these out to that “special someone”, kids! (NOTE: you should probably not pass these out to anyone, particularly if they are in any way special to you)

Love,
-CC

So, um… Monday’s comic. Yeah. That did happen. (No, it wasn’t a decoy this time.)

Drawing so much of Hud recently, I started thinking a little about his origins. Hud’s pretty unique in the cast in that he’s based pretty heavily on a character design that existed quite a while before Badnix – specifically, a boss character in an aborted RPG game I was working on as a teenager.

There was going to be a quest in the game involving a town held captive by a powerful, reaper-like Lich, who was exacting bizarre tributes of yarn and tuna fish from the townsfolk. When your party confronted the Lich, you would knock the hood from his head and reveal that an ordinary cat had somehow set up camp inside of his skull and was working him like a puppet.

Years later, when I was splicing together elements from annoying sidekick characters to come up with Hud’s design, I tried blending a little of Tails the fox with Kazooie – and I arrived back at this idea of a tiny orange cat, peering over the shoulder of this giant bruiser, quietly pulling the strings.

My “art style” (if I had one) used to be a lot more sharp and geometric, which is probably reflected in the way he’s structured. The one new element I added for Badnix was the pinched, sloping eyes. It’s subtle, but I think it added kind of a ghoulish quality to Hud even when he was at his most innocuous.

Hud’s definitely been one of my favorite characters to work with, and rest assured that there is a LOT left to find out about him. Regardless of his current fate, he’s going to cast a long shadow on the comics to come.

-CC

My brother surprised me with this little guy over Christmas – a 3D printed Rog figurine!

How cool is that? I’m not sure it photographs super-well due to it being monochrome, but it’s pretty spot-on – even the stubby little feet look exactly like how I draw them.

I’ve never given too much thought to Badnix merchandise – my feeling is that until you guys start demanding a book or shirts or whatever else, I have no reason to shove them down your throats – but man, holding this thing just makes me want to go crazy and start a whole toyline. Alas, for the sound of tiny, plastic tomato-feet, scampering through the home…

-CC