Matt, just utilize your one true strength when it comes to dialogue.

Steal it from other sources and adapt it lightly for the comic.

(Okay, that horse has just officially been beaten to death, sent to the glue factory, rendered into glue and then beaten on some more.)

Honestly speaking, the conversation flowed a bit weirdly, but I didn't feel there was stuff missing. It was just... really ad hoc, even for a conversation where somebody's drastically trying to change the direction of the conversation.

Still, I've read worse dialogue in professional print, so...

Seems to me that's how a lot of chats/conversations are though. Especially when you're talking w/ someone like Kit... Cos if you noticed she was the one who kept jumping around subjects..

Maybe the Dreadful's dialog is just written in a style people aren't used to. I've read books/short stories with similar dialog styles, and I prefer them over the classic "smooth" dialog. I think having it flow perfectly where everyone takes turns speaking and always sticks flawlessly to the conversation at hand reads and feels really unnatural. It makes dialog read like a legal transcript or a bad RPG.

That kinda thing might work better in a book though, I dunno. I'm happy w/ the way I'm doing it even though it could probably use some refinement. It's probably not wise for me to have tried a "not normal" approach w/o building up some experience first, but.. meh. Much like video games, I always prefer setting the difficulty on "hard" :)

But the dialog can't be totally random and spontaneous.. Kit smelled something funny and spoke what was on her mind. This will pan out in the course of a few pages, so it's not ENTIRELY pointless.

It's probably more natural, yeah.
It's just weird when you're seeing it used in comics. ;)

Just keep going with it. People'll get used to it.

Page 29! Where Kit investigates oddly shaped tracks leading into the cave and continues questioning Liz. She is quite a little detective. Or maybe she just has the curiosity of an over-caffeinated 10 year old...



I'm sure once I practice more with the style I'll get better. I mean, I'm only 30 pages in and I never entered this business aiming to establish myself as a writer.. Though I like doing it and making up stories so I'd hope I'd get better. The bulk of, or all of, my comic creation training was focused on drawing. I really don't know what I'm doing when it comes to writing :D I just kinda feel it out.

Minotaur?

All will be revealed on page 30! :D

On this page, the dialogue doesn't bother me, since it seems to only be there just to illustrate that they're chatting about kinda-semi-important-to-them-but-not-to-us stuff. The only important thing is that they noticed the tracks, and they're following them into the cave.

The "do you smell something" thing should eventually have a point to it. A clue, perhaps to whatever is in the cave. Otherwise it's just a distracting red herring.

Pretty sure it does, considering the glowy eyes in the cave. And the tracks.

For the record, I liked the dialog everyone's discussing. Kit doesn't want to talk about The Dreadful, and that could be for a multitude of reasons - so she changes the subject. Then she notices a godawful smell, and that interrupts her again. Simple.

...Do you really not know how The Dreadful works yet? I mean, I can imagine that her not wanting to talk about it would have something to do with a malevolent secret or harsh downside to its use, and she probably doesn't trust Liz enough to let her know that she has anything but an omnipotent laserbeam at her beck and call.

I have some ideas as to how the dreadful works, but I'm still mulling things over. I also think Kit may not be fully aware of how it works either. After all it's not like it comes w/ an instruction manual and no one's really taught her anything. Maybe she'll get her a teacher later :)

Though even if Kit did know its strengths and weaknesses, she probably wouldn't tell Liz that much. If anything. It'd be a lot better for Kit if Liz thought she could use it at any time.