Soup the Comic Strip by Alun Clewe
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Comic strip for December 17 2023.
PANEL ONE: A wide shot of the inside of a tavern. PANEL TWO: Erlak's champion sits at the bar. A woman comes up behind him. CHAMPION: *SIGH* PANEL THREE: The champion looks up at the woman. WOMAN: What's wrong? PANEL FOUR: The champion talks to the woman. CHAMPION: It's kind of a long story... Well, see, I'd kind of always dreamed of becoming a divine champion... PANEL FIVE: Close on the champion. CHAMPION: And now I am one... which should be great and all, except that I'm a champion of a god of soup... it's... kind of humiliating... PANEL SIX: Close on the woman and the champion in profile, facing each other. WOMAN: Oh, you've got nothing to be ashamed of. Do you have any idea what your god has done in earlier days? CHAMPION: Um... apparently not. PANEL SEVEN: Close on the woman. WOMAN: Well, he may seem to be the god of something unimportant, and even silly, but he's done a lot. PANEL EIGHT: Focus on the champion's face; the woman is in the foreground in 3/4 rear view. WOMAN: He, almost alone, brought together the warring tribes of the Alkami civilization, and formed them into the great Empire of the Twelve Hills. PANEL NINE: Extreme close-up on the woman. WOMAN: He was instrumental in the defeat of the renegade goddess Nehema, and her imprisonment in her current form. PANEL TEN: 3/4 front view of the woman, with the champion in the foreground in 3/4 rear view. WOMAN: He helped save the entire continent of Wotakea from an invasion of demons. PANEL ELEVEN: Close on the champion, his eyebrows raised in surprise. CHAMPION: Really? Erlak, god of soup, did all that? PANEL TWELVE: The woman gets up to leave. The champion slumps down at the bar. WOMAN: SOUP!? I thought you said SOAP! Sorry. My mistake. CHAMPION: *SIGH*...
December 17 2023

Eh... okay, while I've said that I wasn't going to make serious revisions to earlier strips beyond the lettering, this is another case where I'm making an exception, because I was always dissatisfied with this strip. I wanted to rush to get this strip up, though in retrospect goodness knows why, since I'm pretty sure by this time I was running badly behind schedule and updating the comic very sporadically, so I don't know why I thought another day or two would make a difference, but maybe there are circumstances I'm forgetting (again, this was more than twenty years ago). Anyway, because I was in such a rush, I skimped on the backgrounds; I drew detailed backgrounds for the first two panels, and wanted to also show the bar behind the characters in at least some of the other panels, but instead in the interests of time I just filled the backgrounds of the other panels with random gradients or colored scribbles. I think I always kind of intended to go back and put in some more detailed backgrounds at some point, though.

And okay, I admit that at the time this strip went up in its current run... I still hadn't, mostly because I'd forgotten this was the next strip in line and I got home from work too late to get it done before midnight. So if you're reading this text (which you almost certainly aren't, since I haven't been advertising this comic and am not likely to have any readers), know that by this afternoon I'm going to replace it with a version with more detailed backgrounds. (Whereupon I will also replace this second paragraph of text. It will be our little secret.)