Starbolts #705: Saving America

 Hail!

    Well, this is an interesting turn of events! The Lady Liberty bot is going to be Roger's vice presidential hopeful in his race for the White House. Interesting because the real Crystal is a bit too young to be vice president. She's like twenty-six years old at this point. It'll be mentioned in the next comic for sure. I'm sure people will focus on her age more than the fact that the Lady Liberty running with Roger is actually an alien android. Yeah. If you know anything about politics, it's always ONE issue that people will focus on the most and it's never the most obvious issue with a candidate.

    Either way, I don't think they'll have a leg in this race. They might not even make it to Election Day. We'll see how things go. Right now it looks like Roger wants to take his message to the national stage.

    This week I've introduced us to Jamal. Jamal is the magic user on this new team of metahumans. But, is he really a magic user? That's hard to say. He's really a metahuman who can tap into magical energies and make it look like he's a magic user. It's a strange power and it's currently unknown what the extent of his abilities are. 

    It's also interesting to note that Roger appears to look normal to everyone else even the reader. The events of last week's comic left him cursed. He now sees his old enemy Jade Skull when he looks at himself in the mirror. Creepy, I know. I suppose it could really just be an after effect of having Jade Skull's spirit inside of him. I'm not 100% sure what Medea and the original Iron Eagle did to him. But, I do know that he's now cursed. Will he lash out? It's hard to say. Stay tuned as we tag along with Roger on the campaign trail!

 

See ya next time!

Starbolts #704: Yesterday's Iron Eagle

 Hail!

    Happy Halloween! I decided to go a different route this Halloween because I wanted to give the Soldier Six ghosts a little vacation. They deserve it after the whole "pass the spectral necklace" fiasco. So, I decided to go with the ghost of Carter, Jack and Crystal's grandfather Steve instead. Steve teamed up with Medea to cause a little bit of trouble for Roger Stevens, the second Iron Eagle. It's always good to see Medea and it looks like she's still on her redemption tour.

    I did reference a lot of old Starbolts comics this week didn't I? Here's a series of links if you'd like to check them out:

Starbolts #240-275

Starbolts #437

Starbolts #688

     Whew. That's a lot of comics. At least I summed things up neatly this week. It seems that Roger has been keeping a big secret. He's not as free from the Nazi Jade Skull's influence as we thought. Every time he gets angry he reverts to the Jade Skull form. All Medea and Steve did was draw it out as a form of punishment. What this will mean for our heroes is unknown. I doubt it'll change much since Roger was well on his way to becoming a fascist anyway. Now it's just more apparent because he has the mark of a fascist villain in his soul. If there was no way for him to be redeemed before, there's no way to redeem him now. Once you go full fascist there's no way he could ever redeem himself. 

    Steve did his best to try and turn his successor to the light and in the end it failed and obviously the Jade Skull possession had nothing to do with how Roger became Iron Eagle. That revelation will be made clear soon. 

I hope everyone enjoys the Halloween comic! Have a great Halloween! See ya next time!

Starbolts #703: The Buzz Around the Office

 Hail!

   Wow! Isn't this a huge surprise? It looks like the Starbolt known as Dragonfly is back and is working for Shrall. King Shrall sent our buzzing buddy to investigate the man who bought the Sentinels and the Lady Liberty android from Barbo. There may be more to the story here. But, we'll have to see. At this point you have to wonder who is really working for "Cyclone Consulting" here. We have four Starbolts "working" in the office and now we have Tanis down with the metahumans. The only saving grace here is that the higher ups don't suspect a thing! That's probably going to change soon enough.

    Speaking of the metahumans, we have now been properly introduced to the ladies on the team and their names are Heidi and Barbara aka Babs. Heidi's basically the tank of the team. Her powers include superstrength and invulnerability. Babs serves as a speedster. They also referenced someone who is a reject from the magical Order of Korun. Could he be another magic user? It's hard to say at the moment. The team has three more members and in time I'll give them names and powers. I just have to think about what powers to give them. Nothing is set in stone except for the ladies. I really wanted to make one super strong and the other super fast. I'll work on the others' abilities soon!

    It looks like the organization they all work for doubles as a cult that wants to perfect the human genome. This falls in line with Crazy Steve's lover picking him to be the father of his child. She felt he was the best person to help usher in a new age for humanity. The people in the cult are obsessed with the idea of perfection through genetics and that includes metahuman DNA. This also falls in line with that attractive woman hitting on Firaxil earlier. She probably had her eyes on our Inobe friend and his genetic potential. I wonder what her reaction would have been if she knew he was an alien.

    We also got a little insight into one of the Alliance treaties. Hostile aliens must visit Earth and any other Alliance world via diplomatic channels or else there'll be severe consequence such as military retaliations and the like. Makes sense give how many times the bugs invaded Earth.

    The next few comics are going to be interesting as our heroes will have to deal with the cult, the androids, Tanis buzzing around and of course their original target: Crazy Steve. But, before we get there we're going to have our annual Halloween comic next week! Should be a good one!

See ya then! 

Starbolts #702: Working Nine to Five

 Hail!

    Our heroes have infiltrated the consulting firm and found that they are putting a team of metahumans together! To make things even more interesting, it looks like one of the members of the team is a Mosqukatara warrior. That's uh....definitely a choice there. I mean the bugs are known throughout the galaxy as tyrants, dictators and authoritarians. Does anyone think this guy might be any different? That remains to be seen. Like the old saying goes, you need to be careful of the company you keep. Sure you might want to keep your enemies close. But, a bug? That's a bit iffy. We'll see what happens like I said.

    I'm not sure what abilities the other members of this squad will have. I'm thinking one of them might have superspeed to compete with Marcus and another might have superstrength. I'm not sure. I haven't made their full character sheets yet. I assure you by next week's comic they'll have names, psychological profiles and power sets. Will they join the academy? It's hard to say.

    Leading this bunch is of course one of the Lady Liberty bots we met back in Starbolts #680.  I wasn't about to let that plot dangle. For some reason Dexter Howard thought Earth needed a Lady Liberty bot hanging around. Why? I don't know. It can't be for anything good. So, this team has a bug AND a bot. That's not a good look as far as the Starbolts are concerned. Firaxil's reaction is more than justified.

    That reminds me. I was tempted to make the blonde lady who hit on Firaxil a metahuman. But, nah. I don't think I want to mix up the office front with what Steve's organization is really doing. I'll be exploring that next time. For now, I think I'd better get that report on the boss's desk by five!

See ya next time!

Starbolts #701: Assembling the Team

Hail!

    Looks like our heroes are headed to the rat race this week. This time, however, they're on the trail of an actual rat. His name is Steve and if you've been reading the comics for a while you'll see that he was responsible for a lot of shady things happening in the Starbolts universe. First he tried to kidnap the Whitefox kids' mother Andrea. He got himself tangled up with an organization that unleashed several robots on an unsuspecting city. Finally, his organization woke up an ancient witch. The Starbolts have decided enough was enough. It's time to take the battle to the bad guys! 

    This week's comic also continues the arc from previous comics since Marcus and Crystal got engaged in Starbolts #700. I wanted to show how Marcus's parents reacted to the news about their son's engagement. Stan and Andrea's reaction was likely off camera and of course they were happy. I also wanted to show baby Dendra and how she's been doing and she's been learning how to shapeshift through animal books. Dunno if that's a good thing or a bad thing.

    Anyway, our heroes are at work. We'll see if they get involved with office drama and if they find the former Iron Eagle. He has a lot to answer for and our heroes will be the ones asking the questions!

See ya next time!

Starbolts #700: A Decent Proposal

 

 Hail! 

    We're finally here! The 700th edition of the Starbolts and what a celebration we have this time! We all knew this was coming eventually. Marcus and Crystal became an item back in Starbolts #303 when they had their first kiss. The hints for the romance were always sort of there. I initially just wanted to test the relationship to see how it would fly and it worked out pretty well. Marcus and Crystal compliment each other well and now they're going to get married. That wedding is sure to be a star-studded event. I'm not sure when it'll take place. It might be in a comic in 2025 or 2026 depending on  my mood. I think it might be best to have it be next year. I'll have to talk to my editors about it and see what they think!

    Anyway, it was a long time coming for these two lovebirds since they had been pining for each other for ten years or so in the comic. Thankfully, they got their feelings out in the open and now they're ready to take the next step in their relationship.

    I do like how Marcus and Mateo mentioned Mateo's proposal to Aquita. You won't find that in the comic. That was actually in the prose version of Starbolts. As a matter of fact, I should probably put up excerpts from the prose version on the site. However, a lot of things are no longer canon and it wouldn't gel with how the comic is now. For example, Jack was a completely different person. He was kind of a jerk when he showed up. At least certain things remained constant when I transferred the story from prose to the comic.

    At least I can always do flashbacks to that time period. I do go back to the prose version of the story every once in a while and see what could be added. I'm always looking for ways to improve the comic and my writing as well. So many things changed since I started writing this story in the 1990s and sometmies you have to move forward. 

    Seven hundred comics is a lot of work and I've been doing this comic since 2008. Even in the comic there have been changes to how the sprites all look and I'm always looking for ways to improve my work here as well. Who knows what the comic will look like seven hundred comics from now! Time will tell. I'm not going to be slowing down any time soon.

     I'm glad I made it this far and it's good to have this romantic payoff for two of my favorite characters in the comic. Starbolts #303 was when I decided to elevate Crystal to main character status and I think that worked out for the best because it allowed me to make Carter, Firaxil and Jack main characters along with Marcus. That cast fits together well. My only regret is that it took my so long to find a group of main characters to focus on for the comic. At least that's a good group of characters! 

    I hope everyone enjoys the comic! Here's to many more!

See ya next time!

Starbolts #699: Partners in Crime

 Hail!

    As if it wasn't clear already, Crystal and Marcus are made for each other. They compliment each other nicely and that makes them the perfect partners in crime. Well, they are superheroes. The sentiment still holds! We've got a nice little romantic payoff this week and for the 700th comic I'll be taking a break from the action to see how things pay off. Judging by the ring in the last panel, I think you'll see where this is going. But, don't worry! This won't be the usual "man proposes to woman" trope. I'll be doing something a little different next time and I hope everyone enjoys it!

    Meanwhile Tom got himself into a huge pickle as Marcus put it. He was in some serious trouble with the locals and his universal translator malfunctioned at the worst possible moment. It's never a good sign when an alien princess wants to hurt you and ideally you shouldn't stop for a second in a dark alley in a strange neighborhood. Good thing Marcus came by to save him albeit reluctantly. Other people would have let him suffer a bit. Marcus has a good heart. But, Tommy was definitely not grateful. Because of this he's not going to learn the truth about Zarantha and Hexuba's customs.

    The way I see it. Hexuba and Crystal talked a lot about Tom on the way to the garage and in the air. That was when they created the plan to trick Tom. In order for it to work, Marcus had to be kept in the dark. I'm sure he would have kept his mouth shut. But, it's better to be safe than sorry. I'm sure we'll see Hexuba and her father, R'ndor again some day. Diplomatic channels are now open so anything is possible.

Next time the comic celebrates its 700th edition! I hope everyone enjoys it! See ya then!