The Drunk Duck Quackcast

We start off with a bit of a satirical interview where Banes and Tantz attempt to interrogate me over the slowness of the updates to the site. Banes asks the easy questions and Tantz hits me with a far more adversarial approach, I counter with all sorts of deflections like an annoying modern politician in order to show how people handle conflict. Here's Banes' explanation for his idea for the topic: I'll just say that the original idea was more standard conversation about how characters handle issues and how it shows their personalities and their nature - It would also go into how the way they handle conflict or problems changes in some stories as characters develop (if they develop), or as their hidden selves come out. American Beauty is all about that, with every character putting up a false front or performance to get through life, before all that stuff underneath comes out. Cast Away has a more subtle thing to it, where Tom Hanks can't handle his discomfort about his coworker's sick wife at the beginning, and is kind but sort of guarded – but at the end of the movie, he is able to connect and be more open with the guy. We also use our own comic characters to explore the idea and examine how THEY cope with conflict. How do your characters cope with conflict? This week Gunwallace has given us a featured theme to - Lavender - A chill, reflective, and somewhat triumphant piano heavy tune that slowly builds up and up into a positive resolve, like an explosion of water in a beautiful fountain. Topics and shownotes Links Featured comic: OCEANOGRONAUTS - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/oct/14/featured-comic-oceanogronauts/ Featured music: Lavender - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/LAVENDER/ - by DanG, rated T. Special thanks to: Gunwallace - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Gunwallace/ Tantz Aerine - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Tantz_Aerine/ Kawaiidaigakusei - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/kawaiidaigakusei Ozoneocean - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/ozoneocean Banes - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Banes/ Comics mentioned: Brave Resistance - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Brave_Resistance/ Wolf - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Wolf/ Typical Strange - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Typical_Strange/ Kaiju Valentine - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Kaiju_Valentine/ Bottomless Waitress - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Bottomless_Waitress/ Pinky TA - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Pinky_TA/ VIDEO exclusive! Become a subscriber on the $5 level and up to see our weekly Patreon video and get our advertising perks! - https://www.patreon.com/DrunkDuck Even at $1 you get your name with a link on the front page and a mention in the weekend newsposts! Join us on Discord - https://discordapp.com/invite/7NpJ8GS

In this Quackcast we're chatting about the massively overblown impression that forensic science has in modern pop-culture media and how that can even affect reality when unscrupulous prosecutors use the public's misguided faith in "expert witnesses" and TV influenced ideas of the infallibility of forensic science to influence and sway juries when they shouldn't. Our perspectives (the Quackcasters), on this are fallible and limited because none of us are legal experts or forensic scientists of course, so we tried to focus on the pop culture stuff rather than real world examples too much. Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes was really responsible for massively popularising the importance of forensic science in popular culture. The search icon that is EVERYWHERE is the magnifying glass which has zero to do with "searching", it's only in use because it comes from the image of Sherlock Holmes and his use of that device to look for forensic evidence in the form of fingerprints among other things. These days there are so many shows where forensic science is the main driving factor in all criminal investigations: Handwriting examination, bullet striations, DNA, Blood splatter patterns, wound examination, bone injuries, facial reconstruction of skulls, voice pattern recognition, polygraph tests, fingerprints, blood type, body language and facial expression examination, traces of hair and fibres, and so on and so on. What they don't tell you is that many of those things have a massive failure rate, some are completely unreliable, and some don't even work at all, but according to popular media all of them are absolutely infallible. In reality not even eye witnesses are completely reliable and all these methods (the ones that actually work), are only used in conjunction with many others as prompts to further investigation, NOT to prove guilt on their own as they're often shown in pop-culture. They don't really even build a case, they just tell you where you should probably look so you can put together a timeline, establish where a person was, discover new people to talk to and establish the veracity of their story. Do you know any examples of silly, overblown use of forensic science in pop-culture? Or examples in the real world even? I remember when I went back to university to do post grad studies in the early 2000s, forensic science was ALL the rage because of its profile in so many popular TV shows that many people, mainly women, were getting degrees in it, because the degree had recently been created to cash in on that popularity. I had to wonder how many of them thought they'd really be able to get jobs on that field since Perth (where I am) didn't need hundreds of new forensic pathologists and Australia in general didn't really either…? Another best-off from Gunwallace and this week it's - Fox Academy - Mysterious detective music. That's all I had written from when it was first aired! Haha! It's pretty much that though and it fits with our subject this week. Reissue from 218, 10th of May 2015   Topics and shownotes Links Featured comic: The corkscrew maze - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/oct/07/featured-comic-the-corkscrew-maze/ Featured music: Fox Academy The New Breed - http://www.theduckwebcomics.com/FOX_Academy_The_New_Breed - by Dikran O, rated M 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/ VIDEO exclusive! Become a subscriber on the $5 level and up to see our weekly Patreon video and get our advertising perks! - https://www.patreon.com/DrunkDuck Even at $1 you get your name with a link on the front page and a mention in the weekend newsposts! Join us on Discord - https://discordapp.com/invite/7NpJ8GS

It's October and so it's time to talk about horror again! Not may fave genre but there are decent things that make it up and Banes, Tantz and I chat about some of them. Recently I enjoyed the anime DanDaDan and the American adult animated show Haunted Hotel, both on Netflix. They're both horror themed silly comedies that have a bit of parody of the genre and I really appreciate that. The horror comic I most recently enjoyed was DemiMon Hollow Town Syndrome, which I also recently featured. We brought up a lot of different horror themed work on DD and you can check that out in our links bellow. What are your fave horror themed things that you've seen recently? Fave horror comics on DD? This week another special from Gunwallace - Pestilent - thoughtful, haunting, reminds me a little of a classic horror film soundtrack. Pretty scary! - Originally from Quackcast 285, 22nd of August 2016. Topics and shownotes Links Tantz's horror discussion thread - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/forum/topic/180101/ Mentioned horror comics DemiMon Hollow Town Syndrome by DemiMon - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/DemiMon_Hollow_Town_Syndrome/ Trevor by JCorrachComics - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/TREVOR/ THE GLOAMING by hansrickheit - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/THE_GLOAMING/ Mortify by PitFace - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Mortify/ Elmwych by Ironscarf - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Elmwych/ Charby the Vampirate by Amelius - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Charby_the_Vampirate/ Carl and The Lost Shadow by Jazzy - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Carl_and_The_Lost_Shadow/ Key of Dreams - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Key_of_Dreams/ Cover image from Tantz's Verdant - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Verdant/ Featured comic: Tales of Rosemary Middle School - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/sep/30/featured-comic-tales-of-rosemary-middle-school/ Featured music: Pestilent - http://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Pestilent/ - by Internecinevisuals, rated M. 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 Kawaiidaigakusei - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/kawaiidaigakusei Banes - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Banes/ VIDEO exclusive! Become a subscriber on the $5 level and up to see our weekly Patreon video and get our advertising perks! - https://www.patreon.com/DrunkDuck Even at $1 you get your name with a link on the front page and a mention in the weekend newsposts! Join us on Discord - https://discordapp.com/invite/7NpJ8GS

Police themed stuff is a popular genre! It's full of tropes and stylised aspects and generally very different from the reality, both from the actual police perspective and the perspective of those that deal with them, and I think I prefer it that way because the reality is usually pretty sad and ugly for all involved. So today we're talking about police theme things, set in the present, past, and future! One of the tropes we covered is the savant cop. It's a character that's based on Sherlock homes, they're not always officially police, in fact like him they're often private detectives or "consultants" is the popular thing these days. Sherlock Holmes was basically just a super genius but these days it's fashionable to make the expertise pathological, even stuff that's based directly ON Sherlock. They often NEED to be neurodivergent, from Monk, to High Potential, to Patience, The Finder, Bones etc, Though not always, like The Mentalist and White Collar. Then there's Law and order (and it's spin-offs). This highly venerable show made its mark by doing what most cop shows never do: showing what happens AFTER an investigation. You actually always got too see the trial. Other shows sometimes did that but for Law and Order it was solidly part of the format and that was pretty cool. It's not realistic because everything happens way too fast and orderly but it was good to see anyway. My fave manga/Anime cop themed stuff is Dominion Tank Police and Ghost in the Shell. They cover things from the police perspective and they're amazing. They envisage how police would work in a future world, one with tanks that can tackle even the most severe aspects of crime in an exaggerated and comical way, and one that has expertise hacking and taking a more black-ops, specialised military approach to their work. Patlabor is like Tank Police in that they use heavy vehicles but in their case it's mecha instead of tanks and the approach isn't comical. There are good sci-fi approaches in Star Trek Deep Space Nine, Babylon 5, and even Galaxy Rangers. Stuff set in the past is fun too, we have the Sherif of Nottingham in Robinhood as a very bad fellow, there's The Name of The Rose and Cadfael with actual monks acting as investigative policemen during the time of the crusades, then Tombstone and a host of other cowboy shows and movies that cover all aspects of the law in the late 19th century American West. Rush was one of my faves, it was about a policeman in Australia during the gold Rush in the mid 19th century, that was a very unique view and a great theme song! Almost as good as the theme song for the original 1970s version of Van Der Valk, a British show about a Dutch police investigator in the Netherlands. I would say my faves are Miami Vice due to the style, The Mentalist due to the cleverness of the main character without resorting to supernatural or neurodivergent abilities as well as having a woman in charge of the team and the way they generally had a non-adversarial relationship with their captain, Dominion Tank Police, Ghost in the Shell Stand Alone Complex, and The Bill- but only the early seasons of it before it turned into a ridiculous soap opera- It began as a very procedural cop show showing every aspect of policing from the most minor crimes to more serious stuff in a very realistic way without flashy fights and car chases or constant gristly murders, nothing else did that. So what are your faves? Do you like copshows? Would you prefer them to be more realistic? Do you like the fantasy/historical/Sci-Fi stuff or do you prefer them to be set in the present day? Another best-off from Gunwallace and this week it's - Grey Sky Blue Moon - I'm tempted to write a bad early 80s rap for this, but I won't torture people that way. This tune is remarkably 1980s in style: rap, dance style music, exactly like you'd get from a big budget movie from 1984 or '85. Think Beverly Hills Cop or Police Academy. It's perfect! It's a great match for the crazy light night hi-jinks that the girls of Grey Sky Blue Moon get up too! Originally Quackcast 462 4th January 2020 - the start of Covid! Topics and shownotes Links Featured comic: LAVENDER - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/sep/23/featured-comic-lavender/ Featured music: Grey Sky Blue Moon - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Grey_Sky_Blue_Moon/ - by xailenrath, rated M. 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/ VIDEO exclusive! Become a subscriber on the $5 level and up to see our weekly Patreon video and get our advertising perks! - https://www.patreon.com/DrunkDuck Even at $1 you get your name with a link on the front page and a mention in the weekend newsposts! Join us on Discord - https://discordapp.com/invite/7NpJ8GS

Confidence is key! Confidence can make very attractive protagonists and villains and it can make almost any character sexy because confidence is compelling. Main characters and villains never have to be confident, but if you want your audience to be drawn to them it's a great technique. To make a sexy, compelling character confidence works was better than skin tight clothes, lingerie, big muscles or bouncing boobies. What is confidence? It's self possession, being comfortable in yourself, being sure of yourself and your decisions, positivity, an air of competence, command, and even control. All these things can work together to become confidence. But there are ways of faking it too: Being arch, arrogant, superior, being an arsehole, entitled, bossing people about, relying on a higher rank or superior job title etc. these things are easy to mistake for confidence and many people tend to imitate or strive for these traits thinking it will make them attractive and popular, but it never quite works. A character doesn't have to start out with confidence or be confident all the time. Many achieve it on their journey over the course of a story. For some it's only in specific contexts, like when they're experts at something. Some start out confident and lose it in the story in order for them to be rebuilt. The mousey girl with glasses and the ponytail doesn't suddenly become sexy because she takes off the glasses and lets down her hair, rather it's because she becomes more confident and those things are symbols of that. Who're some of your fave confident characters in fiction? For me: The Dread Pirate Roberts is a great example, Lord Blackadder in Blackadder 2, lord Flashheart and Captain Flashheart from Blackadder 2 and 4 respectively is a massively confident and attractive character, Elvira Mistress of the Dark is a woman with so much confidence she's a sex-symbol for the ages, Gomez Adams as played by John Astin is supremely confident, Alan Rickman's Sherif of Nottingham stole the whole movie because of the character's confidence. This week Gunwallace was is back an in perfect form, he gave us a second take on a theme to Curse of the Office Werewoman - Creepy, driving, compelling, official… HR is sending you directives you simply CANNOT ignore! Get to it, obey like a good office drone and shake dat ass on the dance-floor! The first version was live in Quackcast 683 - 16th of April 2024. Topics and shownotes Links Featured comic: Critical M4ss - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/sep/16/featured-comic-critical-m4ss/ Featured music: Curse of the Office Werewoman - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Curse_of_the_Office_Werewoman/. - by CorneliusCool, rated T. 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 Kawaiidaigakusei - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/kawaiidaigakusei Banes - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Banes/ VIDEO exclusive! Become a subscriber on the $5 level and up to see our weekly Patreon video and get our advertising perks! - https://www.patreon.com/DrunkDuck Even at $1 you get your name with a link on the front page and a mention in the weekend newsposts! Join us on Discord - https://discordapp.com/invite/7NpJ8GS

Mortality is a heavy, heavy subject. It was brought up in the forums a while ago so we're chatting about it now. We talk about death in popculture, how we treat death in our comics and our growing awareness of mortality as adults. You become increasingly aware of mortality as you age, mainly because you witness more and more of it in action; pets, celebrities that you loved, public figures that you're aware of, grandparents, family friends, parents, friends, and eventually even you have health scares. It's a cumulative thing, but eventually you move from being young and immortal to having the spectre of death ever-present. The ultimate goal of ALL life is immortality, it's what it always strives for in various ways; the two main ones being longevity and reproduction. Life is amazing in that it's a self sustaining bunch of chemical reactions and processes that have an inbuilt goal to keep on going forever however that can be accomplished. There are almost immortal things in our world like the earth and our sun that are billions of years old but even they die eventually and they have no way, will, or mechanism to prevent that, unlike life. But even though we as humans have relatively long lives compared to most other living things and we reproduce quite well, we as individuals certainly are NOT immortal and we have to deal with that in many ways. Our cultures traditionally separate death from normal life, we venerate it through religious practice, explain it and mythologise it. In the modern day we're separated from the realities of death more than ever before because childhood mortality is super low, we all live longer than ever before and when we reach the end of life we're hidden away in retirement homes and hospitals. Most people live in cities and don't experience the same close relationship with death that those on farms and fishing communities constantly dealt with. But it never goes away. As time moves on it always draws nearer, like a slowly creeping shadow. Which is a great analogy because light seems so bright and active, warm and enveloping, it seems ever-present and forever lasting- our sun is four and a half billion years old. But the end will come for that too eventually and things will return to darkness. Darkness and non-life are the natural state of things, life is only a brief glow, an aberration, momentary. The idea that life and death, dark and light are equal, different sides of the same coin and in balance is total and complete nonsense: Darkness and death are the normal, ordinary, basic, state of things- it's ubiquitous and universal, whereas life like light is unusual, precious, singular and special. Never forget that. This week Gunwallace was still recovering from his hospital stay so another best off: Life and Death - Light hearted lyrics and classical vaudevillian comical ukulele mixed with synth in the best tradition of flight of the Conchords… but this is Gunwallace !Originally 20th Feb 2017 in Quackcast 311 Topics and shownotes Links Mortality thread - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/forum/topic/180089/ Featured comic: DemiMon Hollow Town Syndrome - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/sep/08/featured-comic-demimon-hollow-town-syndrome/ Featured music: Life and Death - http://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Life_and_Death/, by Joff, rated E. 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/ VIDEO exclusive! Become a subscriber on the $5 level and up to see our weekly Patreon video and get our advertising perks! - https://www.patreon.com/DrunkDuck Even at $1 you get your name with a link on the front page and a mention in the weekend newsposts! Join us on Discord - https://discordapp.com/invite/7NpJ8GS

Today we're chatting about things that are ostensibly superficially straightforward, but are actually quite clever and layered in many ways. The two prime examples are Paul Verhoven's Robocop and Starship Troopers. They can both be taken as simply dumb, hyper-violent action films, but both are also good, solid, basic satirical critiques of society. Robocop is a critique of over-corporatism and commercialism, where the myth that "private enterprise does it better" is taken to an extreme. A company takes over the police and the governance of the city of Detroit. Policeman, officer Murphy is killed on the job, only to be revived as a cyborg and we find that the corporation owns him even after he's dead. He becomes their mindless robot slave. The whole film can be taken either as a violent action movie about a super robot cop blasting his way to justice, or as the story of a literal corporate slave on a journey to regain his own humanity and freedom and in doing so he has to murder the CEO of the corporation to free himself. Which is a very symbolic act for an American film where CEOs are seen as demigods. Starship Troopers can be taken as a simple story of brave solders flying into space and fighting back on a crusade against disgusting bug aliens that threaten earth. But we learn that the aliens were only after earth because humans threatened them first, and rather than being the underdogs, the humans are actually massively superior and the aliens are afraid… rather than fighting for our existence we're actually committing genocide (or xenocide), which was also the point of Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card. With that little bit of extra info all the testosterone, gun firing, soldier camaraderie, patriotism and support for the troops takes on a sinister edge. If we look at it with the right angle we see that they were Nazis all along. I really appreciate stories with those sort of simple layers that can be taken in two completely different ways. It can be very easy to fail at though when the audience doesn't see your other layer at all or your "clever" message isn't very clever or well delivered. Stories certainly do not need to have layers and alternate reading to be good. I appreciate simple straightforward stories that are as they appear to be. But these ones with single extra layer which means things have a very different and obvious reading are fun. Fight-club is famously that sort of story, when we find that Tyler Durden was imaginary all along and it changes your reading of the story, you can still just take it as it seemed in the beginning though. I think the Life of Brian qualifies as well: at the beginning we think it's a satirical version of the life of the messiah, directly making fun of Christ and the bible stories, but at the end we learn that Brian really was just a simple normal guy all along like he and his mum claimed and it changes to a story NOT making fun of Christ but rather the mindless populace who never really cared about Brian at all, they just overlayed a symbol on him and worshipped that instead which took away all his control and killed him in the end. Still, look on the bright side…. Do you like these sorts of stories? This week Gunwallace was in hospital so wa unable to give us a tune so the betst off this week is Gumshoe - Groove on into this black and white world of cool. Lazy coiling blue smoke floats out and leads the way down to this underground world of jazz and sophisticated glitz. Let the bass walk you through, take a twirl with the glittering piano keys, high-five those highhats, and take your place at the bar in the coffee lounge. Make yours black, no sugar. You're staying up all night for this one! From Quackcast 491, 10th August 2020. Topics and shownotes Links Featured comic: Cafe Menagerie Blues - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/sep/02/featured-comic-cafe-menagerie-blues/ Featured music: Gumshoe - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Gumshoe/ - by Pencilz, rated T 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 Kawaiidaigakusei - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/kawaiidaigakusei Banes - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Banes/ VIDEO exclusive! Become a subscriber on the $5 level and up to see our weekly Patreon video and get our advertising perks! - https://www.patreon.com/DrunkDuck Even at $1 you get your name with a link on the front page and a mention in the weekend newsposts! Join us on Discord - https://discordapp.com/invite/7NpJ8GS

What happens if an author makes a massively popular story but takes ages and ages to finish that last part of it, and people are waiting breathlessly for years and years for them to end it? Would you support the idea of others taking it off their hands and finishing it FOR them? After all if the IP is popular enough and they've already sold it for tv shows and movies, the public feels they have a sort of ownership over it (Game of Thrones/A song of Fire and Ice)… This was the idea behind Tantz's newspost last week and we wanted to talk it out more. We on the Quackcast all say "NO", mainly because that's not the right thing to do but also because as a reader it always feels "off" when its not the voice of the actual author. The example I go back to isn't George RR Martin, but Robert E Howard- A big strapping lad from a small town in Texas and a very talented writer for the pulps in the 1930s. He created many amazing characters but most famous among them was Conan the Cimmerian, thief, warrior, and king. The final Conan story by Howard was "Red Nails" and many people regard it was one of his best. Those people are wrong and they are idiots. Red Nails is a reworking of The Slithering Shadow (which I wrongly called "the hidden City" on the Quackcast), the main thing you can tell about Red Nails is that it wasn't written by Howard, it's just not at all in his style, apart from the things it takes from the story it's based on. The Slithering Shadow is a perfect example of a Conan story: it's short, very tightly written, and it expresses all the themes a good Conan story always does- the power of the individual and their will to overcome any challenge, even unknowable supernatural horror, and the contrast between the wild barbarian man who knows himself and the decadent, soft city dwellers who cling to a decaying society built on inequity and evil. The Red Nails on the other hand copies those aspects without understanding them, Conan is a mere side character doing his own thing while pirate Queen Valeria is the main character from who's perspective we see. It's novel and great to have a female character perspective from Howard but he just didn't ever do that. The details and action in this long and sprawling uneven story are paper thin and rushed over without thought which again is something Howard never did. It also includes a great big graphic portion about a woman being captured, whipped and spanked in a very lurid exploitative way, which Howard just didn't do, especially not in his Conan stories. It's an obvious fake that freaks hold up as the best Howard Conan story but I say it's crap and something taken out of the hands of the author and finished by someone else. When Robert E Howard died by suicide in the 1930s the legacy of his writing continued on. Author Lin Carter rather scurrilously repurposed a lot of Howard's other fiction and rewrote them as Conan pastiches, at first claiming they were original Conan stories by Howard, and Red Nails is possibly a good example of that sort of thing. Later on other authors like L. Sprague de Camp and Robert Jordan took on the mantel and continued with the character and he later made his way into comics and movies, the same as James bond, Batman, Superman and a hundred thousand other pop culture and comic characters that are part of the broader cultural landscape now, for better or worse. As a fan, you DO start to feel you have a sort of ownership over characters and sometimes even feel you have a better understanding of them than the original author… So would you ever consider taking over the work of someone else, not in a fan fiction way, but becoming the author of official works? Or could you see that happening with your own work? In many respects I would hate it, but in others I'd be intrigued and interested. This week Gunwallace gives us a lovely musical theme to Wings Of Daera - Welcome to the Star-chamber, prepare to be judged by the super sci-fi, scary arbiters with their laser eye attachments. But you escape into the underground passages and then out into the vast windswept, toxic wasteland beyond, driving fast in your turbo boosted future car to stay ahead of the cannibal mutants that hunt out there after nightfall… Topics and shownotes Links Inspired by the newspost by Tantz - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/aug/22/the-ending-is-always-yours/ Featured comic: Blighted The Odyssey - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/aug/25/featured-comic-blighted-the-odyssey/ Featured music: Wings Of Daera - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Wings_Of_Daera/ - by Ardihel, rated M. 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/ VIDEO exclusive! Become a subscriber on the $5 level and up to see our weekly Patreon video and get our advertising perks! - https://www.patreon.com/DrunkDuck Even at $1 you get your name with a link on the front page and a mention in the weekend newsposts! Join us on Discord - https://discordapp.com/invite/7NpJ8GS

Dialogue is used for more than just simple speech, it moves the story forward, it indicates what characters want, what they feel, what they want others to feel and more. But it's used a bit differently across different media. Comics have their own particular ways of doing things and it's quite interesting! We thank Banes for coming up with this topic! In pure prose the world is all relayed in text so dialogue is king there, characters can talk and talk forever and everything can be relayed through their speech if the author wants. Radio plays are much like prose, but actors help out with their performances, SFX has a role, and time is a factor. Plays are a different thing, settings, scenes and props are limited so a LOT of work has to be taken up by the dialogue, but it's all governed by linear, limited time, so once something is said it's gone, you can't linger on it or go back over it, so it has to do its job in the moment (this isn't a disadvantage though), but the actors can do all the work of showing expressions, tone, emotions, humour, physicality and many other things. Movies, TV, and games are different again, they're also limited by time (though you can go back if you like), the actors can do a lot of the work and massive amounts of work can be done with the visuals. Lastly we have comics where like prose they are not limited by linear time, and like film visuals can do a huge amount of the work. Dialogue in comics can work very well when there's a symbiosis between the visuals and what is written in the speech bubbles. Like film you can offload a lot of work of the dialogue to the visuals. When I do a page I write out what the text should be but I don't finalise it till I have the page art done, though I know what the characters need to say and how the story should go. When the page is done then I whittle down the text to make it work with the visuals, so a character might just say a single word, but because of the art it can be like a full paragraph of meaning. When I work with a pre-written script like in Bottomless waitress or The Key of Dreams I can't change the dialogue so I make sure the way I draw the scene and the characters delivering it enhances what's said and even helps it say much much more. I also letter things in such a way that it tweaks the delivery of the dialogue, so the characters are "acting" it out in a specific way, like giving each sentence its own bubble and placing them in specific ways, closer together or massively spread out, making them different sizes, colours, or shapes etc. How do you approach dialogue in comics? And how do you prefer to see it as a reader? Next week we're tacking "endings", mainly when fans or IP owners demand an author get around to ending their work and suggest other to take over that role. This week Gunwallace has given us a musical theme inspired by Stiletto - The coolest of the coo. Step into the warm, cozy, underground lounge and sip an espresso martini. The bass thrumbs a tune out of dark wood, the piano does the tango, the guitar floats on a sunny, serene pool, and the percussion sneaks into a corner to be alone and snuggle. Topics and shownotes Links Featured comic: Orcs Company - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/aug/19/featured-comic-orcs-company/ Featured music: Stiletto - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Stiletto/ - by VinoMas, rated T. 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 Kawaiidaigakusei - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/kawaiidaigakusei Banes - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Banes/ VIDEO exclusive! Become a subscriber on the $5 level and up to see our weekly Patreon video and get our advertising perks! - https://www.patreon.com/DrunkDuck Even at $1 you get your name with a link on the front page and a mention in the weekend newsposts! Join us on Discord - https://discordapp.com/invite/7NpJ8GS

Banes was the brains behind the Quackcast this week! His idea is that a character's internal struggle and how that conflicts with the realities they face can be a great driver for a story. -cribbed from listening to Vince Gilligan of Breaking Bad fame. Banes is a much better story writer than me so I can't explain it as well, but a good example is Walter White from Breaking Bad who starts off as a mild mannered dad and struggling chemistry teacher who moonlights at a car-wash to make ends meet- his internal struggle is that he actually sees himself as an unrecognised genius and someone who was unfairly wronged in life and so never reached his full potential. With his cancer diagnoses, the debits and worries that introduces into his life and the opportunity to fix everything by breaking the law, that interacts with his internal conflict to turn him into a drug kingpin/mafia boss/evil villain. It's a very interesting way to do character development! It can really inform how you change and craft your characters in interesting ways. Unfortunately I had taken a strong painkiller for toothache before the cast so I was not mentally able to understand the topic correctly haha! Part of the Quackcast I talk about how internal struggles are not needed for all characters and that James Bond is a good example of that- he's better when he as no conflict between his internal struggle and an external conflict and he's just supremely confident. Examples of Bond where he does have internal struggles are weaker versions of the character. Have you given your characters internal struggles to help them develop and change the story when that internal struggle conflicts with the challenges they face? Or can you look at your stories and see that in your characters?   This week Gunwallace gives us a lovely musical theme to The Art of Running Away - A thoughtful early morning cup of coffee in a cold, empty room, alone. Contemplations on life, mortality, and the dancing motes of dust in a stray beam of sun, illuminating a disk of warm light on the floor, occupied by a single, happy cat. Topics and shownotes Links Featured comic: The Light Thief - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/aug/11/featured-comic-the-light-thief/ Featured music: The Art of Running Away - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/The_Art_of_Running_Away - by Portocor, rated M. 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/ VIDEO exclusive! Become a subscriber on the $5 level and up to see our weekly Patreon video and get our advertising perks! - https://www.patreon.com/DrunkDuck Even at $1 you get your name with a link on the front page and a mention in the weekend newsposts! Join us on Discord - https://discordapp.com/invite/7NpJ8GS

This is the 3rd and final part of our censorship trilogy, you'll be glad to know! We tackled censorship past in the first one, then censorship present in the second, and now it's time for censorship future… as it applies to us, sticking our money where our mouth is. How do we tackle "censorship" on our comic hosting site? Spammers get their accounts deleted right away, people who steal art and claim it as their own are not welcome either, posting illegal adult content is a no-no, making accounts to harass other members, encouraging hate or violence against other groups, or posting real images of violence or death against humans or animals is also not welcome. We have an old TOS (terms of service) that you agree to when you join the site, plus our old site etiquette document that both ask people to behave nicely on the site and warn that things that aren't appropriate can be deleted. Apart from all that we're actually very open, one of the most open and accepting comic hosts online. We don't police your political or religious views and adult content is fine here. Showing genitals, using harsh language, fair use parody and satire etc. is all OK and we welcome them! We like to think of ourselves a objective and culturally agnostic. Apart from that our main concern above everything else is the health of the community and the preservation of our website, because if there's no community or no site to host it then there's no point to anything, is there? My small team and I have struggled for YEARS to keep this site going, I have personally paid thousands of dollars of my own money and our community have also paid thousands to keep us going through our Patreon and our other community drives. We have put love, many thousands of hours of constant work and vigilance week, after week, after week after week for over two decades to keep the site running and to keep it as a place you can always come back to where your hard work is safe. If something or someone jeopardises that we have to take it very seriously because it's so easy for the site to be damaged now that the internet is so limited by companies like Apple, Google, Amazon, and Meta. By the same token those who make snap decisions about our entire site based on the momentary and ephemeral actions of some miscreant who has temporarily fallen through the cracks and posted inappropriate content, and ignore the struggle, the work, the money, the compromises, the effort, the vigilance, the pain, and everything that goes into keeping this oldest of the free comic hosting website communities running are almost as bad as those miscreants who create the problems in the first place unfortunately. This week Gunwallace has given us a musical theme inspired by Mister Man Eater - a magically expressive carillon. Warm yellow and pink light sparkles as it flows from one side of the room to the other in a mystical swirl. Topics and shownotes Links DD forum topic on the subject - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/forum/topic/180055/?page=1 DD TOS (Terms of Use) - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/terms/ DD Site Etiquette - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/etiquette/ Featured comic: Le French Ninja A True Story -https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/aug/05/featured-comic-le-french-ninja-a-true-story/ Featured music: Mister Man Eater - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Mister_Man_Eater/ - by Jiie, rated M. 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 Kawaiidaigakusei - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/kawaiidaigakusei Banes - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Banes/ VIDEO exclusive! Become a subscriber on the $5 level and up to see our weekly Patreon video and get our advertising perks! - https://www.patreon.com/DrunkDuck Even at $1 you get your name with a link on the front page and a mention in the weekend newsposts! Join us on Discord - https://discordapp.com/invite/7NpJ8GS 

Last time we talked about old fashioned censorship, NOW we're talking about how it's used these days! Back in the day there were limited pathways for you to disseminate information: newspapers, radio, TV, public speaking, posters, books, film, pamphlets, ads… They were all easy for governments to shut down in various ways. But then along came the internet and suddenly it was a free for all! Anyone could easily make a website and info was freely shared for good or ill, and it was almost impossible to stop. Then Google made things easier than ever to find. Youtube meant we could share videos. Along came social media where it was easy to connect with others and get info out, Twitter users were even described as "citizen journalists". Smartphones from Apple and Google made it even simpler to share stuff. But little did we know the seeds had been sown for a return to the bad old days… Monopolies are usually a bad thing and now the internet is divided among a small cadre of huge monopolies. The massive success of social media at connecting us, Google search, Youtube for videos, and Apple and Google at managing our phones and online lives has narrowed us all down and made us far more vulnerable. It's still possible to skirt them all and use other services, but their reach, versatility, utility, ubiquity and user-bases means you're sacrificing a hell of a LOT if you do. Governments are still ineffective at censoring these but they can ban and restrict them which means the media companies that own these services introduce there own forms of restrictions and censorship as a way to try and avoid that and the loss of revue it would mean. The impact of those restrictions are massive since so much of our lives are online now. They can have all your online accounts deleted, it can affect access to all the photos you've taken of your kids, your phones and tablets can become useless, work contacts and friends can be lost, years of work at building an online client base or fans can be wiped out in seconds with no way to get it back, and that's just a small sample. There are REAL costs involved too, these media companies like Meta can steal your money from you and you have zero recourse- the building of those fanbases and connections, online galleries, video production etc has REAL monetary value FAR in excess of the service they provide you (especially since their ads and data mining pay for it), but they treat you and your work as a free resource. Corporate censorship is THE worst issue facing us now in this context, because of its power, reach, arbitrariness, and total lack of any accountability. With a simple change of their Terms of Service, new policies, the AI bots they're using to police stuff suddenly for no reason you can find yourself in peril. Lastly there is the idea of "cancel culture", which has been quite exaggerated because it's seen as left wing and therefore scary. The truth is it's always been around and practised equally by right wing, left wing, and centrist people. The internet HAS given it more reach and made it a bit easier to "cancel" people because you can more easily find out info about them and what they've done and you can also easily make up things and spread campaigns to attack people whether they're based on truth or lies. What is "cancel culture"? Basically it's a kind of mob justice with all the issues and problems mob justice always has: people are stupider in groups, there is no presumption of innocence or context, and there's no possible limit to the "justice" enacted. For every righteously cancelled person there will be many more who it was done to maliciously. And ALWAYS remember when you support stuff like this, if it can be done to others then it can be done to you. We like to think that these things are only done to "bad" people, but reality doesn't work that way, anyone can see you as bad at any time. Out of it all though, corporate censorship is by far the worst, as the official Drunk Duck Instagram can attest. In an ironic twist it was taken down and deleted by Meta after this Quackcast was recorded. Drunk Duck has had itself "censored" repeatedly by Google because their system downgrades us on its search engine for their own silly reasons, like lack of a mobile site option, putting social media results ahead, we got downgraded for lack of HTTP even though it's not needed at all on our site because accounts contain nothing sensitive and don't deal with money, so we had to pay money to get that up and running to retain our visibility… Have you been the victim of any form of censorship? Even as a viewer? I know many people who've suffered losses and issues do to corporate censorship. Gunwallace wasn't able to do a theme this week so instead we have a reprise of Tales from Two Tiny Tittybars - Bouncing boobs in DA CLUB! This was originally from 6 Nov, 2017 in Quackcast 228. Topics and shownotes Links Previous Quackcast on censorship - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/quackcast/episode-750-censorshipping Forum post about censorship issues - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/forum/topic/180046/ Another forum post on censorship problems - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/forum/topic/180048/ Twitter is made of bots - https://mashable.com/article/x-twitter-elon-musk-bots-fake-traffic Featured comic: Mister Man Eater - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/jul/28/featured-comic-mister-man-eater/ Featured music: Tales from Two Tiny Tittybars - http://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Tales_from_Two_Tiny_Tittybars/ - By Moneko, rated M. 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/ VIDEO exclusive! Become a subscriber on the $5 level and up to see our weekly Patreon video and get our advertising perks! - https://www.patreon.com/DrunkDuck Even at $1 you get your name with a link on the front page and a mention in the weekend newsposts! Join us on Discord - https://discordapp.com/invite/7NpJ8GS

Hey ho! We thought we'd address the topic of censorship again on the Quackcast! Today we're covering the topic in a rather general sense: The need for censorship; how it can be wrongly used; free speech and its limits; how free speech isn't equal around the world; slander and defamation; how censorship used to be applied to media and how that has changed since the internet and more. Next week we'll chat about how free speech and censorship works now on the internet the way it is now, but for now it's a bit of a rambling overview because it's a gigantic topic! With "free speech" and censorship people always imagine that it's something very basic and black and white but when you look into it the complexities and complications are pretty huge, not to mention there are NO universal global "free speech" rules and that is a big issue with the internet and instantaneous unregulated communication which bypasses national borders. Basically "free speech" usually means that governments aren't allowed to restrict the political expression of individuals because that is essential for preserving free democracies. We expand that to "free expression" in a more general sense because we don't want governments restricting what we can say or do (within certain limits). But that's just about preventing governments fining or jailing or killing us for what we say, it's not about people or businesses restricting us… Then there's the issue of using "free speech" to advocate for violence or persecution, or lying about catastrophes in order to cause mass panic, THEN you can face government limits. Or what if your way of expressing yourself is to defame people and accuse them of made up issues? Then you can face them in court for things like libel or defamation and that is unfairly weighted towards people who have more money so they can get away with lying about you in public and they can also get away with claiming the TRUE things you said about them were libel too… And that's just a taste of how complex it gets. Not to mention copyright issues, fair use, obscenity, ratings systems etc, it all factors in! On Drunk Duck we need to have a ratings system that comics fall under. Our Adult rated comics have restrictions on them, and we don't allow comics that depict underage characters in sexual situations, (that can be hard to police). Comics designed to defame others can also face restrictions. So censorship is everywhere! Though DD is more free than other comic hosts on the net and that has always been one of our main features from the very beginning! What have been your experiences with censorship? This week Gunwallace has given us a musical theme inspired by Mortify - A sepulchral, highly evocative, almost dreamlike reverie on the tenebrous existence of the penumbra between life and death, dark and light, where souls hang on the edge of oblivion. Topics and shownotes Links Info on freedom of expression https://humanrights.gov.au/our-work/rights-and-freedoms/freedom-information-opinion-and-expression Forum post about censorship issues https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/forum/topic/180046/ Featured comic: Dragen Asylum - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/jul/22/featured-comic-dragen-asylum/ Featured music: Mortify - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Mortify/ - by Pit Face, rated T. 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 Kawaiidaigakusei - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/kawaiidaigakusei Banes - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Banes/ VIDEO exclusive! Become a subscriber on the $5 level and up to see our weekly Patreon video and get our advertising perks! - https://www.patreon.com/DrunkDuck Even at $1 you get your name with a link on the front page and a mention in the weekend newsposts! Join us on Discord - https://discordapp.com/invite/7NpJ8GS

This week our cast is about the folly of following fashion! It could be with clothes, hair, interior design, architecture, music, OR creation! Things like plot styles, story structure, art, lettering, fonts, jokes, twists etc, all are subject to fashions of the day. And we are driven to participate in it, not because we're fashionable creatures who want to be "in" with the latest trends, rather it's because at our core we're just simple social animals and following fashion is an instinctual way for us to fit in with our social groups and participate in the simple social hierarchies based on how closely we follow the current fashion and how cleverly we express it. It's herd behaviour. But why is it folly? There are a few very important reasons that you shouldn't follow fashion: 1. It dates you in a really unfortunate and specific way. So you stuff is forever tied to a specific time. 2. Fashions come and then go, which means you only have a limited time before what was cool and making you fit in turns around and does the EXACT OPPOSITE. 3. You become just another part of the crowd, which is hard to stand out from, and in truth you will probably be a bad version of whatever the popular style is, which will be more obvious when the fashion moves on and no one makes allowances for you anymore because you were expressing a fashion they liked, rather you'll just be seen for what the are: a wannabe. 4. You will be driven to change things in order to keep up with fashion changes, which will be very disruptive to your work and annoying for your audience. 5. Audiences that are attracted to you because of the fashion you're expressing will also quickly leave when that's not the in thing anymore. Slang changes all the time. The very worst and most stupid thing you can ever do is try and unironically keep up with current slang, especially if you're trying to see "cool". Why is that? Because the people most up with the latest slang are 12 to 14 years old, do you really want to be thought of as cool to a 12 year old? Aside from that the constant changes mean that using current slang dates you more than anything and gives the opposite of your intended meaning, instead of ever being cool you will look very stupid. If you must you can use it ironically and that will save you, you can also use it historically to date your stuff to a particular time, OR you can invent your own like A Clockwork Orange, the Simpsons, or The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Now we come to the topic of "style vs fashion". You can be stylish instead of fashionable, this means you pick styles from where and whenever you like (even current fashions), based on your passion for those things and you intelligently incorporate them into your own personal style. The difference is that you are not simply following a trend because it's the done thing, going along with it, doing your own poor version of it because you don't really understand it and it not fitting in any way with you what so ever. Style is making the best choices and picking the best examples of things that worked, while fashion is simply fitting in. So what have been your own worst fashion mistakes? This can be in creation, clothing, hair, whatever. Did you try and jump onboard with manga style when that first became the big fashion in Western comics? I know I tried and did a terrible version of the style! Did you do the whole non-linear story thing? The alternative world thing? The superhero in the "realistic" outfit and setting thing? The "webtoon format" vertical scrolling infinite canvas thing? There are many more fads and styles… It's NOT a bad thing to do any of those as long as you're not just don't it because it's the popular thing at the time. Also, back in the late 80s I had black/grey acid wash jeans and white high-top shoes. And I also had a pseudo mullet (long at the back with lots and hairspray and gel on the sides). Gunwallace wasn't able to do a theme this week so instead we have a reprise of May the Rain Come, by Zimeta. It's a very beautiful piece. From Quackcast 177, 28th of July, 2014. Topics and shownotes Links Featured comic: Sheltered Lands - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/jul/14/featured-comic-sheltered-lands/ Featured music: May the Rain Come - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/May_the_Rain_Come/ - by Zimeta, rated T. 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/ VIDEO exclusive! Become a subscriber on the $5 level and up to see our weekly Patreon video and get our advertising perks! - https://www.patreon.com/DrunkDuck Even at $1 you get your name with a link on the front page and a mention in the weekend newsposts! Join us on Discord - https://discordapp.com/invite/7NpJ8GS

Tantz Aerine showcased LGBTQ+ comics and creators for Pride month in June with the help of Skyangel, Mainly on Bluesky. It went to so well that she came up with the amazing idea of doing more monthly features for other themes. She doesn't want to dictate to us what those theme should be though, she wants input into the idea so we can all come up with good themes together! The idea behind a month long showcase isn't to be socially conscious so much as having a reason to bring more promotion to creators- that's important to remember. This is marketing :) We have a forum thread discussion* where people have shared their own recommendations. InkyMoondrop, Bravo1102, Lothar, Dragonsong12, PaulEberhardt, Kawaiidaigakusei, and J_Scarbrough had some great suggestions already! PaulEberhardt: - April as Autism acceptance Month. - December as Universal Human Rights Month - December's also Learn a Foreign Language Month. - October is Dyslexia, Depression and Breast Cancer. Bravo1102: - February is Black African heritage month - March is Woman's heritage month - November is for war, veterans and remembrance. Dragonsong12: - Hispanic heritage - Mental health Lothar: - Relationships - Mental health -Drugs and alcohol - Poverty - Religion - Politics - War - Existential dread Ozoneocean (me): – Erotic comics awareness month – mixed media comics – Newspaper strips – Political creators – War – Romance – Female creators – Creators who started before the digital age. Kawaiidaigakusei: - Alien Month - Furry and Scaly Month - mental health - Language Other than English Month - Fantasy Month J_Scarbrough: - October: Scary comics - December: Christmas, good will, happy celebration theme. All good suggestions but some of them can be joined into others I think? Something like "Hispanic Heritage" could go into a category like Kawaii's "Language Other than English Month", and "Poverty" and "Drugs and alcohol" could be subsets of "Mental Health"? Also on the Quackcast Banes suggested February for "Romance" because of valentines day. Please give your opinions and suggestion! Tantz wants a popular vote of these. This week Gunwallace has given us a musical theme inspired by Over the Asphodels - Creeping, crawling, sneaking, and snarling from a delicate orchestral beginning into a grinding, heavy electronica Topics and shownotes Links *Let's design DD Month Events together! (forum thread) https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/forum/topic/180026/ Featured comic: Tech Rush - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/news/2025/jul/08/featured-comic-tech-rush/ Featured music: Over the Asphodels - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/Over_the_Asphodels/ - by Ma_Na, rated E. 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 Kawaiidaigakusei - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/kawaiidaigakusei Banes - https://www.theduckwebcomics.com/user/Banes/ VIDEO exclusive! Become a subscriber on the $5 level and up to see our weekly Patreon video and get our advertising perks! - https://www.patreon.com/DrunkDuck Even at $1 you get your name with a link on the front page and a mention in the weekend newsposts! Join us on Discord - https://discordapp.com/invite/7NpJ8GS