Gulch wins at Zuda!

(Warning: I'm still on pain meds, so some of this might not come out right.)

Heh! You hit the nail on the head, Forest. Blue's the badass of the group, and sometimes he has to be taken down a notch or be hit over the head with a two by four before he gets the point. He's kind of like me in that respect.

(Forest, being one of my closest friends, already knows this and what follows, but for everyone else I want to go on record, as saying that even though I'm boringly straight, I don't think anyone could ever accuse me of being homophobic, so that is one thing Blue and I do NOT have in common.)

Part of what I wanted to do here (in case the theme was lost on anyone despite my sledgehammer approach to it--and again, I already know that Forest gets it) was show that honestly good people can sometimes have stupid hangups, and that they can and should get over them, although sometimes it DOES take thwapping them upside the head (metaphorically speaking). Since Crash and Kit are bi, and they're in a triad with Blue, he was the best one to use in order to illustrate the hypocrisy of those with "selective homophobia." ALL homophobia is bad, but it is especially galling from someone who thinks two of the opposite sex together is hot while freaking out about gay members of his/her OWN sex.

SinisterMarmelade (I love that user name!) does have a point, though. I haven't really shown the girls--especially Crash--giving Blue the respect he deserves, and while he will remain the butt of many jokes as a result of his and the other characters' comic perspectives, I've been thinking for a while now that it would be good to show a little more often that the respect and affection IS actually there, and that much of the teasing is a way of showing that.

"What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls a butterfly."

I'd like to add on to Wereferret's response, in that if Blue wasn't the butt of tons of jokes and such, he would have a mental breakdown. Without the others poking fun at him, he wouldn't get nearly as much attention as he needs to survive. If a comic chapter was done in which Blue wasn't made fun of, he'd probably be begging to be made fun of by the end of it.

"Why worry about life? Death is much more interesting..."
--Kael the Necromancer

Heh! Off-topic is cool. Hell, I have trouble staying on-topic in real life, let alone on forums.
:-D

And you know, I've been thinking--Each character, I think, gets dissed by the others at certain points. Crash less than the other two because she's the most stable, serious one. Going back and thinking of the original character concepts reminded me of some of the reasons I made the choices I did.

I don't know if you're familiar with it, but there is actually something loosely termed "comic theory," which is not so much to do about actual comics as comedy in general.

The entire thing would take far too long to go into here, but I can cover a COUPLE of the basics that show why various characters are the brunts of sometimes more than their fair share of jokes. Keep in mind that there is a LOT more--I'm just trying to cover ONE aspect of comedy writing in VERY broad strokes.

Essentially, in any ensemble-cast, character-driven comedy (including sitcoms), one of the many things we deal with is comic perspective. Most of the humor depends upon clashes of comic perspectives between and within characters.

A character's comic perspective is essentially some distorted view of reality--usually an exaggeration of a more "normal" perspective.

For instance, there are people who are obsessively neat and clean, and who believe there is a right and a wrong way to do everything. Adrian Monk, on the other hand, takes this to the extreme. He goes so far as to sterilize his toothbrush between strokes, washes his hands 100 times a day, and has his assistant carry wet wipes for him to use IMMEDIATELY upon shaking hands with someone! The world, to him, is a dangerous place, full of germs and dangerous untidiness, all of which is unacceptable, and all of which he MUST fix. This is his comic perspective.

His assisitant, on the other hand, plays what is commonly known as the "straight man," role. It her character's job to emphasize Monk's eccentricities by providing contrast of a fairly "normal" person. The clash of perspectives between Monk, his assistant, and indeed, the rest of the world, is the basis for most of the comedy of the show.

In BCK, Crash is the smart, sensible, organized one. The exaggeration of this which makes it a comic perspective is that she does things like organizing the sock drawers by the color of socks. Come to think of it, I'd like to play up her comic perspective a bit more.

One of her main strengths, though, is that she's an excellent "straight man;" a foil for Kit and Blue's wackiness. For instance, "armadillo hockey bowling," is funnier when the more "normal" character, instead of being surprised, simply takes it in stride and reminds Blue and Kit that they're not suposed to be playing that game in the house.

Kit is fun-loving, quirky, mischeivous, and impulsive. What takes these things from being mere character traits and makes them into a comic perspective is that she considers all of life a game, and anything that sounds like it could be fun--no matter how dangerous and ill-advised--is preferable to boredom. She rarely considers the consequences of her actions until it is too late.

Blue is a macho tough guy, but not too bright. What makes this a comic perspective is that not only is he a tough guy; he has to be the TOUGHEST guy in the world, and the MOST into "guy things." He takes this to such an extreme that, for example, when Seth made him a flying harness, one of the first uses to which he put it was to peek down women's tops.

There are obvious character clashes here based on comic perspective, and I think you can see why some characters are more often the brunt of the joke than others. There are also, of course, internal clashes--For instance, tough guy Blue likes to rock out to Abba when no one is looking.

And you know, I think I have rambled enough.
;-)

"What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls a butterfly."

Looks like Melvin may be feeling a little lonely though. This sort of thing is very very common!

-Seth

Visit the BiBP webcomic - www.bibp.com

I agree. I couldn't have put it better myself.

Deludedian

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