Casey and Andy

IT'S OVER!!!

2008-08-25T04:17:58Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

August 25, 2008:

Well, there you have it. Strip 666, and the end of Casey and Andy.

I am so greatful to all of you for reading my comic. I can not express what all your emails, words of encouragement, and readership has meant to me.

I never imagined, when I started this all those years ago, that I would ever have so many people listening to my ramblings in any form. So to all of you, thank you so very much.

I suppose what most of you will want to know is "What happens next?" The truth is I don't know. I may begin work on Cheshire Crossing issue 5. But I also have another completely new concept for a comic in mind that I might want to take a crack at. Whatever I work on, I'll announce it on my forums and on the Cheshire Crossing mailing list. In any event, I won't be doing anything for a month or two.

Some folks have requested the art originals, so they can make fanstrips or just generally mess around with stuff. So I zipped up all the Adobe Illustrator files I have. I started using Illustrator on strip 564, so that's just over 100 strips of art. Should be enough for whatever you're up to. The ai files are presented "as is". They're very disorganized in the early strips, becoming more reasonable around the time the finale arc begins. Enjoy:

http://www.galactanet.com/comic/aifiles.zip

I guess that's it. Wow. I can't believe it's actually over. Once again, thank you all. :)

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-08-19T08:03:00

2008-08-19T15:04:43Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

August 18, 2008:

This is back to the basics. Casey and Andy at home. Mary hates Andy. Mad science. Satan looking the way she's supposed to. Jenn getting harassed by science gone wrong. Everything is back to the way it should be.

I will be able to end it on 666, mostly because of the "tall" strips I've been posting to tie things up.So the next strip, 666, will be the last.

TRIVIA TIDBIT:

I drew, stroked, colored, and texted this strip before realizing I had done the Arm-O-Mat wrong. Andy's right arm is missing, so the Arm-O-Mat should be a right arm, but in the original version of today's comic, it was a left arm. Fortunately I noticed and corrected it.

-ATW

[ed: Sorry for the delay, I came down with a nasty case of excuses yesterday.]

c_and_a @ 2008-08-11T08:45:00

2008-08-11T15:47:53Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

August 11, 2008:

And so we see a happy ending for the Religious Zealot. What better place for him than 1886? Even Quantum Crook gets a happy ending.

I had to think a bit for what "Evil Jenn" would look like. I decided to play it simple. Give her an eyepatch (a good evil indicator) and change her color scheme. Seems to work all right. I considered naming her "Jen" (one N instead of Jenn's usual 2) but I thought that might be too subtle. So she's Jann.

TRIVIA TIDBIT:

Of the various dimensions Casey and Andy have gone to, we saw the most of the D&D dimension. Most of the "Mountain of Mages" story arc took place there. But the most interesting dimension would have to be the "Dimension of Hackneyed Stereotyped Opposites", which I of course based on Star Trek's "Mirror, Mirror" universe.

In that dimension, we see the following character's hackneyed opposites:

Andy - Andi
Doctor X - Doctor Y
Mary - Space Shuttle Commander
Mime Assassin - Mime plumber
Lord Milligan - "Milligan" (a rock star)
Quantum Cop - Quantum Crook
Jenn - Jann

And, I suppose it should be mentioned:
Cosplay Cop - Confederate Cop

Notably absent is Satan. It just never came up.

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-08-04T04:08:00

2008-08-04T11:11:59Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

August 4, 2008:

They say that in a story, the main characters should undergo a change of some kind. Well, there you go. Quantum Cop lied. He's never been able to do that before.

With the strip count at 663, if I wanted to stick to 666 strips as my ending point, I would really have to compress things. Or have fairly "tall" pages with lots of frames. It would be nice to end it on 666, but as I said before, telling the story well is more important than an arbitrary ending point. We'll see how it goes.

-ATW

TRIVIA TIDBIT:

We first saw the Dimensional-Teleport-O-Mat in Strip 197. The swirling portal effect for it was first seen in Strip 200. And, one final tidbit of trivia, Strip 200 was the first time a C&A strip was "story arc sized".

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-07-20T22:00:00

2008-07-21T05:01:39Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

July 21, 2008:

Poor Satan. She looked so scared.

TRIVIA TIDBIT:

I always tried to portray the Zealot as a somewhat likeable guy. It's easy to do the "hate on religion" thing. I didn't want that. He's just another weird guy in the Casey and Andy universe.

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-07-14T08:39:00

2008-07-14T15:41:45Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

While failing in his original goal of making a creature capable of eating the world, Cas- I mean Doctor X did have some success. The Planet Devourer can eat absolutely anything. Even indestructable satanic artifacts of great evil.

As for the Religious Zealot, well, who would you bring to a fight against Satan?

TRIVIA TIDBIT:

Satan, in her more normal form in C&A, has a little tuft of hair right between her eyes. At the time I first started drawing her, I was very much in to Genesis Climber Mospeada, better known as "Robotech: The New Generation" in America. I stole that little tuft of hair directly from the character Rook Bartley.

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-07-07T08:18:00

2008-07-07T15:19:54Z

[ed: Happy birthday, Andy! I hadn't thought about it when I posted this, but when I looked this morning, I realized I had gotten the date wrong...]

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

July 7, 2008:

In the C&A universe, "JURRRZ" is the official sound of time travel. I believe that started somewhere around the "Jenn in Time" story arc. Consistant sound effects make storytelling easier.

In other news, I will again reiterate that the strip is very unlikely to end at 666. I'll keep making strips till the story is done. That's now looking like it'll be well beyond 666.

TRIVIA TIDBIT:

I have only ever publicly named one story arc in C&A. That was "Quantum Crook". All the rest of them have generally accepted names, devised by fans. The wikipedia article lists the story arcs as: "Evil Mime", "Hell Coup", "Quantum Crook", "Jenn in Time", "the Mountain of Mages", "The Petroniad", and "the Final Story Arc".

Some of those arcs had internal names, used by Casey and I when discussing plot ideas. "Evil Mime" was originally called "The Story Arc" because it was the first one C&A ever had. We referred to the "Jenn in Time" arc as "Back to the Jenn". "Mountain of Mages" was simply "The Fantasy Arc". I've been calling the current story "The Finale Arc".

[ed: I've been calling it "The Terminal Arc".]

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-06-30T07:30:00

2008-06-30T14:31:57Z

[ed: Happy birthday, Andy! I hadn't thought about it when I posted this, but when I looked this morning, I realized I had gotten the date wrong...]

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

June 30, 2008:

For some reason, I forgot to put a date at the top of the last several strips. I'm back to dating them again now.

The 19th Century White House Teleport O-Mat was last seen in Strip 302. Yo gotta admit, it's the perfect tool for the job.

TRIVIA TIDBIT:

Like any nerd, I've always disliked the concept of "Meanwhile... in the past". So I thought I'd point out that, while any amount of time may have passed for Quantum Cop and Crook, it's only been seconds for Casey and Andy. Also, I give an explanation for why they didn't immediately return.

Interestingly, Casey and I came up with a time travel genre intended to be used for tabletop RPG games. It featured naturally occuring "gates" that connected two times. If you step through a 57 year gate, you go back 57 years. If you waited an hour then returned, you'd return an hour later in the present. Both ends of the gate move forward in time at the normal rate. So it was possible to say "meanwhile, in the past" in that context.

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-06-15T22:37:00

2008-06-16T05:40:16Z

[ed: Happy birthday, Andy! I hadn't thought about it when I posted this, but when I looked this morning, I realized I had gotten the date wrong...]

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

It was before the hiatus, so I'll remind everyone that Jenn wrote Sith Lord of the Rings as a means of income.

In case you didn't get it, "Jediar" is a combination of "Jedi" and "Maiar". "Gandalf Kenobi" is obviously a combination of Gandalf and Obi-Wan Kenobi. I figured Gandalf's hat, Jedi robes, and a blue conventional sword was a good combo.

TRIVIA TIDBIT:

The obvious name for the policeman, using C&A character naming conventions, would be "Cosplay Cop".

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-06-09T07:44:00

2008-06-09T14:46:18Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

Well it was a good week off, and it went by way too fast. I accomplished my goal of doing nothing, so I'm proud of that.

TRIVIA TIDBIT:

Sometimes, when I was strapped for ideas, I would try to come up with ideas in terms of "A versus B". With a cast as large as the one I have going in C&A, this can break a writer's block. I would try to come up with a central conflict for a strip that involves two characters at odds that have never been at odds before. Casey vs. Andy happens all the time. What doesn't?

That's how I came up with one that was Quantum Cop vs. God. And the King of Sweden vs. Mary. That sort of thing. A fresh conflict makes for a fresh comic. I leave the finding of those particular strips as an exersize for the reader (being too lazy to dig them up myself).

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-06-02T07:44:00

2008-06-02T14:47:05Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621
Well I'm taking this whole up-coming week off. No reason, and no plans. I just want to not work for a week is all. My job is very project-oriented, and it's pretty much impossible to take vacation in the middle of a project. So when I have an opportunity to take vacation without causing something to fall behind schedule, it's best that I go for it.

I plan to generally be a bum for a week. I plan to accomplish nothing productive. I do not want to better myself in any way, and I will only leave the house for food and beer. This is my goal and, with God's help, I'll achieve that goal.

TRIVIA TIDBIT:

The first 6 C&A strips were drawn in a very old-skool fashion. I drew them on a drafting table, sketching them in pencil first, then inking, then erasing out the pencil lines. Then, I used adhesive pattern paper to apply dot patterns for shading. At that time C&A was intended to be a black and white comic.

I gave up on the pattern paper pretty quickly. It was an incredible pain in the ass. I simply added the patterns in photoshop after about strip 6. Strip 16 was actually the first ever color C&A, and I abandoned pattern shading at that point. I later retro-fitted Strips 1-15 to match.

Strip 136 was the first strip where I started coloring the eyes white. I was too lazy to retrofit 135 strips, so that art style change remains visible in the archives.

The next significant art sytle change was when I moved over to Illustrator to do the line-art, instead of scanning inked lines. Strip 564 was the first to use Illustrator in a normal C&A. However I had used Illustrator to make Pun Paladin cheesecake in Strip 562.

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-05-26T09:49:00

2008-05-26T16:53:22Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

That's certainly the most graphic violence that's ever been in C&A. Casey and Andy have both "died" many times of course, sometimes unpleasantly. But there's never been blood and gore. [ed: Sorta.]

In 19th century fiction the Devil is truly evil. Not the stylish, deal-keeping friendly personna that is portrayed in most 20th/21st century works. So I figure that means she had a different personality back then. I guess she mellowed out a bit in the intervening 120 years.

TRIVIA TIDBIT:

I'm going to reveal a little comic author secret.

When you have a minorly successful comic like I do, people start coming up to you and suggesting ideas for plots or gags. 9 times out of 10, the idea will suck. The other time, the idea will suck more. People who don't make comics themselves rarely understand that what seems funny when they first come up with it might not be funny when actually made in to a comic. Or it will be an incredibly trite and overused gag ("Hey, what if they made jokes about knowing they're comic characters!").

But you don't want to hurt their feelings. They're usually your friends. So how do you politely deflect their retarded comic idea without making them feel bad? The answer: "I'll put that in my ideas file."

Pretty much every comic author has an Ideas File. It's hard to come up with new gags several times a week. So when you come up with one, you write it down. Eventually you realize you need a central place for them. So you have 20 or so ideas in a file somewhere. When you're stumped, you peruse it and pick the best one.

Just tell your friend "I'll put that in my ideas file" and they suddenly understand their idea will be put with many others and not immediately made in to a comic. They no longer have the silent expectation to see their idea in your next update, and walk away happy. Of course, you never make their idea into a comic (nor are you likely to actually put it in to your ideas file) but they forget about the whole conversation long before they would get suspicious about it.

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-05-19T10:07:00

2008-05-19T17:10:07Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

First off, I'd like everyone to see the Casey and Andy Cast Song Video made by forum goer JVM:

Cast Song Video

TRIVIA TIDBIT:

It could be argued that the Cauldron of Fate is a character. It talks, after all, and has a personality. Also, it was in several strips before the cast song was ever made. So it's one of the few "characters" accidentally omitted from the Cast Song.

First appearence of the Cauldron

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-05-13T08:24:00

2008-05-13T15:27:33Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

I wish I could have gotten some Hindu religious stuff in there, but I was short on space.

For those who are curious: It being 1886, the Pope who blessed the holy oil would be Pope Pius IX. The Dalai Lama would be Thubten Gyatso, the 13th Dalai Lama.

TRIVIA TIDBIT:

The demon serving as bridesmaid has been seen once, long ago, in Strip 68. Apparently, this is Satan's "go to guy". She's not shy about summoning him up to Earth when needed.

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-05-05T09:45:00

2008-05-05T16:47:00Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

I've been pretty busy this week and I didn't have time to make a proper strip. So you get cheesecake. That's the deal that I came up with some time ago. I don't remember how, but that's the deal. No strip = cheesecake.

For those of you who are worried about me "running out of strips" before finishing the arc, don't. I'm going to keep making comics until the story arc is over. I likely won't be able to get it done by Strip 666, considering that's only 14 strips away. So maybe C&A ultimately has a run of over 666 Strips. Not the end of the world.

TRIVIA TIDBIT:
The real Cujo is still alive and kicking. He's 13 years old now and healthy as a horse. His latest annoying habit (in a long line of unique and bizarre personality quirks) is something I call "The Town Crier". He will periodically, without any reason, start meowing. For about 10 seconds. Then he gets over himself. This isn't a big deal, normally. But at 3am it can be a little irritating.

Anyway, here's a recent pic of Cujo in a very refined and dignified pose:
http://www.galactanet.com/pics/cujo3.jpg

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-04-28T20:07:00

2008-04-29T03:09:25Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

About a week ago, I had knee surgery. Boy am I sick of having my knee hurt. It was arthroscopic surgery, so it'll be a faster recovery time. But it's still been a week without being able to walk more than about 100 feet, and feeling random pain. I'm told I can expect another two weeks of that sort of thing before it settles down.

Today's C&A Trivia:

Casey and Andy is one of the few webcomics that was around during 9/11 that didn't make any reference to it at the time. C&A started in February of 2001, but it went on hiatus for about 8 months starting in July 2001. Thus, September 11th was during the hiatus.

It hasn't made much in the way of reference to it after the fact because it's something I don't like to talk about and something I definitely don't find funny. The only reference in all of C&A to 9/11 is here.

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-04-21T07:24:00

2008-04-21T14:25:19Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

Jenn's outfit is actually a direct rip-off of Shanex's outfit in Theft of Pride. I wrote Theft of Pride long ago, but always loved the outfit I came up with for Shanex to wear, and lamented the fact that the novel was not a visual medium. So I recycled the concept for Jenn's thief outfit.

In fact, making Jenn a jewell thief is a general way for me to use concepts from Shanex's story.

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-04-14T07:26:00

2008-04-14T14:28:04Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

Alert readers have reminded me that I was posting a bit of C&A trivia with each strip of this arc. Frankly, I had forgotten that over the hiatus. Well I'll get back to it, shall I?

We discover in this story arc that Frances Cleveland is Satan. However, I didn't come up with that idea until I was scripting out the arc. So it kind of makes this strip a little strange. But I figure I can justify it by saying it's the principle of the thing that Satan was upset about. Or, perhaps she was aggressive about it simply to prevent Andy from finding out she was Frances Cleveland. Pick any explanation you like.

In the GURPS C&A sourcebook, there is a little 3-page story-arc featuring Andy going back in time and taking Frances to the present. Satan finds out and is visibly angry. Again we have a little strangeness there. If for no other reason than there is a period of time where there are two Satans walking the earth. Probably that's bad for mankind.

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-04-07T11:19:00

2008-04-07T18:19:55Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

Not a lot to say this week. Here's the comic, hope you like it.

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-04-07T11:17:00

2008-04-07T18:19:09Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

March 31, 2008

So I got a pool table last week. I've been playing a great deal. I came up with a solitaire game to try to improve my skills.

I call it "Clear". The objective is to sink all the balls. Start by racking all 15 balls (rack them any way you like, the balls have no unique distinctions). Then break. Then, you get ball in hand to start the game.

Once placing the ball, sink balls as best you can in any order. It's a called shot game. If you miss a shot, you gain a point (points are bad). If you scratch you gain a point. You can only get 1 point on any given shot. So if you miss the shot and scratch it's still only 1 point.

If you scratch, you get ball in hand. This seems like a reward for scratching, but it really isn't. You really work hard to avoid getting points. You're hardly likely to deliberately gain one.

Once you have cleared the entire table, note your score. The lower the better. Obviously, the best score would be 0, meaning you ran the whole table. So far, my personal best is 1. Just 1 miss while sinking 15 balls. I feel pretty good about that. :)

Special case: When there is only 1 ball left on the table (ignoring the cue ball), you simply take 1 shot at it. If you sink it, great. If you miss, you gain a point and the game immediately ends. You do not chase the ball around the table, missing shot after shot. The reason for this rule is because the game is intended to teach pool fundamentals. Mostly it teaches you how to leave the cue where you want after you make shots. But when there's only 1 ball left, you have nowhere you're trying to leave the cue ball. You can't predict where the object ball will be if you miss, so it becomes an exercise in making shots that are poorly positioned over and over. To combat this, you only ever shoot once at the final ball.

-ATW

[ed: Oops.]

c_and_a @ 2008-03-24T07:14:00

2008-03-24T14:14:18Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

March 24, 2008

And what could be more fun than hiring your arch-nemesis by mistake?

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-03-15T08:54:00

2008-03-15T15:59:52Z

Note: The current story-arc begins at Strip 621

March 15, 2008

Yes, indeed, I'm resuming Casey and Andy. I intend to finish the story arc, something I've been vaguely promising to do for quite a while now. Once the story arc is over, C&A will be put to bed for good. (The archives will remain available indefinitely).

It's been about a year and a half since C&A went on Hiatus, and I still regularly receive emails asking me to resume it. That's the main reason I'm getting back in to it. So you can thank persistent fans for this continuation.

My current plan is to update once a week, on Mondays. This update, on a Saturday, is because I promised to announce my next project (this) on or by March 15th. So here you go. Next update will be *next* Monday, March 24th.

If I get motivated, I might move up to twice a week. But for now, I'd rather move slow than burn out again.

-ATW

[ed: Andy's rollback of the strip numbers annihilated the two previous posts. Sorry, dmmaus. Also, because of the switch to php, previous strip links won't work, and I'm not interested in taking the time to fix all 400+ entries.]

[ed addendum: Andy put dmmaus' pic in the fanart gallery, so I could fix the previous post.]

Next project -- Casey and Andy

2008-03-15T15:16:54Z

I promised in my last posting to this Cheshire Crossing mailing list that I would post again when I decided what my next project would be. Well it's going to be Casey and Andy, my original comic.

http://www.galactanet.com/comic/

I worked on C&A for quite a long time before hiatusing it to work on CC. I will finish the story-arc in progress on C&A, then it will be done. Once that is complete, I will consider what my next project will be. There is a good chance it will simply be Cheshire Crossing #5, but I make no promises.

I won't make any further announcements to this list about projects I'm working on. You signed up for information about Cheshire Crossing, not "whatever Andy's working on". The only reason I am posting this message is because I promised to in the last one.

The next message you receive from this list would be the announcement of Cheshire Crossing issue 5, if and when it is complete. Probably at least a year from now.

So, bye for now, and thanks for reading. :)

-ATW

c_and_a @ 2008-01-05T20:43:00

2008-01-06T04:45:48Z

Cheshire Crossing Issue 4 is posted.

You can find it at:
http://www.cheshirecrossing.net/

If you have a slow internet connection, you might have a better reading experience by downloading the entire issue at once from here:

http://www.cheshirecrossing.net/Cheshire_Crossing_Issue_04.cbr

In order to view that file, you'll need the CBR Viewer (freeware) available here:
http://www.geocities.com/davidayton/CDisplay

I will be taking a short break from comic making, no more than a month, while I figure out what to do next. I have not yet decided what comes next. I have several options I'm considering.

*I might simply roll forward in to Cheshire Crossing #5.

*I might focus on making a print version of issues 1 through 4, which is no small feat. There are about 100 pages, each one needing some special handling to convert from RGB to CMYK color space (You don't want to know the details. It's boring. Just trust me that it would take a long time.)

*I might finish the "Casey and Andy" finale story arc which I abruptly abandoned and get regular emails pestering me to complete.

*I have many other comic ideas that I'm considering, if I feel I want to branch off in a new direction.

So as you can see, I don't know what I'll be doing next. But when I decide, I'll announce it on the forums.

Anyway, enjoy Cheshire Crossing #4. :)

-ATW

[ed: Other CBR viewers are available for non-Windows platforms.

Mac OS: FFView, ComicBookLover

Linux/Unix: scansreader]

c_and_a @ 2006-12-20T08:54:00

2006-12-20T16:54:40Z

[ed: No, unfortunately, C&A isn't restarting. It's a fan-strip.]

David Morgan-Mar sent this pic in when I first announced the hiatus. It took me this long to post it. How sad is that?

-ATW