Episode 737 - Why take over the world?
Apr 28, 2025
People in stories, especially bad guys in stories usually want to take over the world, but why? What's really to gain? Even in reality it's a complex question. That's what we're talking about here.
Topics and Show Notes
What's the real reason to want to be the boss of everything? Money isn't the objective because when you become the leader of everything money is irrelevant, you control all standards and commerce. Is greed a motivation? Well no because being the boss of everything eliminates the motivation for greed. Power is the only true objective: being the ultimate boss means you can control everything. It's a crap load of responsibility and work though.
On a smaller scale, why do you want to be the leader, the CEO, the king, the boss, the emperor? It could be because you have an overinflated ego and you think you deserve it so you can show off to others (Trump). It could be that you want power and control over others. Maybe it's the only way to can achieve safety and security, by getting to the top and being in charge of everyone else? Or maybe you have a vision for the future or a passion for something and being the leader is the only way to can enact your vision or preserve it?
A very small scale example: I rose up on this site and became its leader. I started out as a comicer like everyone else, joining in 2003, positing my comic in 2004. Dylan Squires, creator of the site (known as Volte6), was always the leader then. I became more involved in the community and was made a moderator. I was passionate about the site and wanted things to run well and do right by the community. Eventually I was made an administrator with power to run the site. I was part of a small group of fellow admins. As time passed they all left and it was just me in charge. Through negotiation I took control of the site from the owner at Wowio. I later established my own team to help me run things. Through all that my only motivation was to make sure the site stayed running so that people could post their comics as usual and get comments and engagement. I'd love if someone else could be in charge instead of me though but it's a very complex and expensive process.
Why do you think people want to take over the whole world? Especially bad guys in stories?
This week Gunwallace has given us a theme inspired by Degrengolada - Creepy, brooding, building, exciting, evocative. Something exciting and interesting is about to begin! This is a slow, measured dance that’s leading to something big!
Topics and shownotes
Links
Featured comic:
OLYMPIAN HEIGHTS - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/apr/21/featured-comic-olympian-heights/
Featured music:
Degrengolada - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Degrengolada/ - by Paulie Blade, rated A.
Special thanks to:
Gunwallace - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Gunwallace/
Tantz Aerine - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Tantz_Aerine/
Ozoneocean - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/ozoneocean
Banes - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Banes/
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Episode 712 - Guncast
Nov 4, 2024
This week we're talking the development of weapons, tactics and armour over the millennia. This is a fun little overview of everything from ancient stone weapons, to bronze, to iron, steel, guns, tanks, and jet-fighters and all the interesting stuff in between. Comic stories often involve literal conflict whether set in the past, the present, future, or fantasy and Scifi, so overviews are always good.
Episode 711 - Lost Boys
Oct 28, 2024
Halloween is on the way and we always do something different for it. This time we're doing a commentary for the 1987 vampire movie The Lost Boys! We even dressed in Lost Boys themed outfits for the Patreon vid which we will make available to ALL Patrons (even free ones), as a treat.
Episode 707 - Fight Choreography
Sep 30, 2024
Fight choreography is tricky. We have it in comics, plays, movies and TV. When it's in full motion the trick is that you cant usually show things connecting so you have to work around the safety aspects in various ways. In comics you can show things connecting but how do you make the movement and the narrative believable and exciting just by using still images? It takes a lot of skill! Animation has to be the easiest way to depict fights because you can show the results of hits AND you can easily make moment believable but there are always challenges.
Episode 701 - Faces come out in the rain...
Aug 19, 2024
Drawing faces is one of the most natural things for us to do, and they're very easy for people to see that they're faces because animals are evolved especially to be able to see faces- people mistakenly think this is just a human thing but it's clearly something that happened much earlier. We're so good at seeing faces we see them where they don't exist (paradolia). So drawing them for comics should be super simple, should it? Well it is and it isn't.
Episode 698 - the Haircast
Jul 29, 2024
Hair is a weird thing isn't it? It's just a bunch of thin filaments that stand out and hang from the body, most visibly from the head. Everyone is bald as an egg underneath this coating of head-fur, but the floof on top takes on a life, body, and shape of its own even though the truth is that it's just thin threads all buffed up with a lot of air. Hairstyles can indicate class, status, wealth, occupation, style, coolness, lack of cool, age, date, and any number of other factors about a person and where and when they fit in society. We also have strong reactions to hair: love, hate, revulsion, or disgust. It can indicate whether a person belongs to a community, a society, a religion or a sect.
Episode 694 - Consistency
Jul 1, 2024
Is your work consistent? It's hard to maintain consistency but it does pay off: consistency in art work, style, character, writing, humour, updates and every other factor. To aid consistency in commercial works they come up with a “bible” which has drawings of character from all angles, all their colour swatches, their outfits, accessories, weapons, vehicles, floor plans of buildings, etc, as well as descriptions of their characters and the story style. That sort of thing is a huge help and especially useful when you have teams of people working on the project and need to hand over to other people.
Episode 690 - Mister V, Dozer Manifesto
Jun 3, 2024
Mister V, aka Arborcides is our guest today, doing an interview with us about his huge project “Dozer Manifesto”, now finally completed! You can read the entire thing here on DD. It's about a fellow called Marv Heemeyer, resident of the Colorado town of Granby, and his decent into craziness, resulting in him creating an armour-plated, armed bulldozer, designed to be invulnerable, so he could crush the town and destroy his enemies with impunity. You might have heard of it being call the “killdozer”.
