Episode 546 - The bad-arse dandy!
Aug 30, 2021
Why aren't there more prettyboy bad-ass characters? Pretty girl bad-asses too! This character type is often a hall-mark of Japanese and Korean fiction more than anything else though it DOES show up in Western media occasionally. There is no age-limit to the type, what distinguishes it is that the character is tough and a very good fighter while also being very obviously concerned about their appearance and looking good- they don't just look good and fashionable naturally, they actively work at it.
Topics and Show Notes
They're most usually shown as being villains but there are examples of them being heroic too. In Western Media James Bond is on the edge of the trope, The Saint (famously played by Roger Moore) is definitely a pretty boy bad-ass, as is Jason King. There's Vega from Street Fighter 2, Space Dandy, Spike from Cowboy Bebop… As for women, the ladies of Charly's Angles, especially the Cameron Diaz movies are a great example.
The popularity of the trope in Japan could come from a samurai tradition that emphasised a study of “softer” arts along with the more lethal ones, manifesting in flower arranging, poetry writing, painting, calligraphy etc. While many Samurai would look ultra masculine and shaggy, still others were exquisitely groomed, wearing hair ornaments, fine silks and makeup. In the west at times we've had something similar with dandy fencers in the 17th and 18th century, hussars dressed in extravagant uniforms covered in gold or silver braid, furs and rows of shiny buttons. There were the famous Landsknechts, German mercenaries who specialised in using gigantic greatswords and dressed in amazing outfits of slashed, puffy, brightly coloured silk and huge hats bedecked with feathers.
So prettyboy badarse characters are not alien to our culture, they're just not that popular right now. Let's bring them back! What are your fave pretty boy or pretty girl badasses?
This week Gunwallace has given us a theme to The Anaether - Running over the darkened plane, legs pumping, feet eating up the distance, dust flying, pounding on into the dimness, escaping, leaving everything behind… This electronic tune is scene-setting and atmospheric, suggesting speed and distance with its relentless rhythm.
Topics and shownotes
Links
Tantz's prettyboy badass newspost - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2021/aug/13/pretty-boy-badass/
Featured comic:
The War Below Us - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2021/aug/24/featured-comic-the-war-below-us/
Featured music:
The Anaether - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/The_Anaether/ - by Lizbeth490021, rated A.
Special thanks to:
Gunwallace - http://www.virtuallycomics.com
Tantz Aerine - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Tantz_Aerine/
Ozoneocean - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/ozoneocean
Pitface - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/PIT_FACE/
Kawaiidaigakusei - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/kawaiidaigakusei/
Banes - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Banes/
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Episode 543 - Men writing women writing men writing hilariously badly
Aug 9, 2021
Angela frowned in disappointment. Her boobs seemed to grimace in displeasure, nipples pulsing with abject fury. As she walked the heaviness of their bounce echoed her anger. She sat down at her desk, opened the document she had been working on and began to type. She was halfway through her romance novel, “Pirates of pleasure”. Her boobs swelled and seemed to glow, echoing her happy mood as she worked. She typed…
Episode 541 - Masks
Jul 26, 2021
No, not surgical masks, this is about the kind superheros wear, also gimps, masquerades, villains and robbers! Inspired by Pitface and her deep and abiding love of gimp masks. We talk about how common it is to find masks in comics and how comic characters probably wear masks more than in any other media. And most media where characters wear masks is based on comics anyway. What are your fave masks?
Episode 537 - Historicity
Jun 28, 2021
We have a chat about historicity in this Quackcast. What IS historicity? It's historical authenticity basically but a nicer way of saying it! It's pretty important for a lot of reasons to make the best effort you can with historical authenticity- it increases immersion of the audience, gives you a better understanding of the story and the world you're looking at (because things will make sense), and leads you to better understanding of your own history and where we came from. BUT, that doesn't mean you always have to be strict. As long as you as a creator properly understand historical context then you've got a lot more leeway to play without creating something stupid. Playing fast and loose with history is ok as long as you know what you're doing, not just being a moron and faking it (hey, many of us are guilty of that). Historical fantasy, myth, classics, fiction, biography etc are all different classes of story where it's more or less forgiveable to mess around.
Episode 536 - #heroesdon'tdothat
Jun 21, 2021
There was ALL sorts of kerfuffle on the internet centred around the phrase “Heroes don't do that”. It began with an interview of two people involved in the production of the Harley Quinn TV animated series. According to them there was a sex scene between Batman and Cat Woman, including a scene of cunnalingus. They claim that a representative from DC told them to cut that scene, saying “Heroes don't do that”... But what is the REAL story?
Episode 529 - Time loops!
May 2, 2021
Time loops in stories are a lot of fun, they can be really complicated and interesting. Groundhog day is the most famous version of this trope. Banes tells me it's a “trope codifier”. In a time loop story characters are caught reliving the same events over and over with the main character being the only one who's really aware of it, Sometimes the loop happens only once or a couple of times, or many, many times as in Groundhog Day and Palm Springs. We chat about some of the different time loop stories, their characteristics and why we like them.
Episode 528 - How tall are your characters?
Apr 26, 2021
Character height is not something we think about too much but it's actually a fairly big deal: in terms of what the height means, what it means contextually, how the character fits into their world, how they relate to others around them, and how it's like to draw them! A character can loom, they can shrink down, they can appear bigger than they are due to force of personality or smaller due to being shy and retiring, Largeness can equal power and strength, stupid docility, threat, potential, or it can be used to highlight the strength of a much smaller character that beats them as in many animes.
Episode 527 - Evil superheroes unneeded
Apr 19, 2021
Evil superheroes are a stupid fad, that's my contention. My opinion. They've been around for a long time but now they're so popular it's becoming a bit of a fad and might turn into its own genre. I suppose Marvel and others have saturated the superhero market so to stay relevant other companies are doing “twists” on that traditional genre, hence the evil superheroes.
