Sam and Fuzzy Q & A: Inktober Edition
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"Are you going to do Inktober this year?" -Allison
Er, sorry I waited so long to answer this question that you may well have already seen the answer, but... yes, I am doing Inktober!
For those who don't know, Inktober is a self-imposed artist challenge to draw one fully inked drawing every day for the entire month of October. I, uh, already draw way more than 31 inked "drawings" per month because of the comic, but I thought it'd be fun to make time for a single stand-alone illustration every day, and draw some stuff I might not otherwise!
You can see all the Inktober art I've drawn so far, and all the ones I'll be drawing for the rest of the month, on my twitter. So far I've mainly drawn fan art of some of my favourite characters, but I'll try to mix it up throughout the month. (I might also make a couple of them pin-ups if I can stop feeling so apprehensive about posting saucy stuff on my main twitter.)
"Doesn’t Sam hold 2 seats on the Committee, one for the Ninja Mafia and one for Sin Enterprises? Dissolving the Ninja Marfia should still leave Sam as a Committee member and as such entitled to possess status quo violating technology such as the Buddy Bots." -Matthew
Hi Matthew! I hope you don't mind me treating this like a Q and A question even though it wasn't expressly labelled as such. I thought it was worth printing here because, although this issue was slightly touched on (after you asked) in Wendesday's comic, it's largely hand-waived for now.
Sam did indeed hold two seats. He was granted the previously retired Ninja Mafia seat because a majority of the Committee felt he met the qualifications traditionally held by the holder of that seat, and he held the Sin Enterprises seat because a majority of the Committee agreed he was the most logical choice given the extenuating circumstances. In both cases, it was up to the Committee body to decide if he met the appropriate qualifications associated with each role.
Now that Sam has lost control of the bulk of the Ninja Mafia, with troops leaving en masse due to both financial problems and the scandal around his throne claim, Keller was able to successfully convince a majority of the Committee that Sam is a scam artist that no longer meets the qualifications for his original seat. And because his power and credibility are now in question, they've decided he's too dangerous to be trusted with Sin Enterprises and utilize the Buddy Bots as well. Or at the very least, that's the tact Keller and Rexford too to argue in favour of seizing them for the Committee's own purposes. (Taking control of a member's assets for the "greater good" like is the rare but precedented action allowed in exceptional circumstances that Rexford refers to earlier.)
It is a raw deal, but the Committee decides how their rules should be interpreted by vote. That's why each member's relative influence over the others members is such a big part of their dynamic.
"Is Elder Archie (who is one of my favorite characters, by the way) angry at Sam because his claim to the throne is a fraud, or simply because of how badly he screwed everything up? I mean, regardless of the validity of his claim, Sam managed to create an extremely viable criminal empire from essentially nothing, and one that Archie was very proud of the last time he visited. Is Archie such a stickler for tradition that he cannot look past Sam's illegitimacy as emperor, or is he simply furious at the fact that everything Sam managed to build is crumbling in an inescapable apocalyptic disaster spiral of Sam's own making?" -Dawson
Although Archie values tradition, he values the continued existense of his beloved Mafia over anything else. For a brief period of time, he convinced himself that Sam had stopped dicking around with charity work and brought back his beloved criminal organization properly. I think he would have happily overlooked or even actively hidden the truth about Sam's fraudulent claim if it meant the Mafia would live on. (You can see a bit of this sentiment in panel 6 of this strip, when he was angry with Rob.)
So for sure, he's mad that Sam lied to him and that his claim is a fraud. But he's mainly angry because it's contributing to troops abandonning ship and the Mafia falling apart again. The "real" Ninja Mafia was his life, and going back to a world without it is his biggest nightmare.
That's a wrap for this week, team. See you on Monday!
-Sam Logan
