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 Post Posted: Wed Jan 15, 2020 12:35 am 
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So I've been reading regularly since somewhere in the early 2000s (I *think* I started around DDA or Kesandru's Well, Holiday Wars at the latest). For whatever reason, I stopped keeping up with the strip a few years back, and just caught all the way up.

Figured the reactions forum is more for "today's strip" than "FIVE YEARS OF SLUGGY" so I'll just dump my kneejerk responses here, in case they're interesting to anyone. Spoilers abound if anyone's hopelessly out of date:

* OH GOD SASHA'S BACK

* OH GOD SASHA'S GONNA DIE

* OH GOD SASHA'S DEAD

* OH GOD SASHA'S PROBABLY THE SNIPER AND/OR KUSARI

* OH GOD SASHA'S THE SNIPER AND KUSARI!

* I hope Sasha gets a happy ending, I don't care how many murders she/they did.

* So long, Schlock. I'll miss you. You were tragic to the last, and re-reading old strips now as I re-binge the whole archive (as one does) has taken on a somber tone. It really wasn't all your fault.

* Animas are cool.

* Where'd Crystal go? Did she die and I missed it?

* People I want/expect to see more from: Strawman, Sashsari, the new Sam Cirkail (Mamajamma).

* Curious if/when/how we're going to get the middle part of Bun-Bun's history.

* Seriously, I hope Sasha gets a happy ending. I'm such a sucker for conflicted, tragic, flawed characters trying to find a way back to "ok."

* Seriously, I'll miss you, Dr. Schlock.

* I wonder how much more Oasis we're gonna get? I assume some, but I'm honestly find with her getting a short epilogue and a ride off into the sunset with the Zalias. She's earned it.

* How much longer is this thing gonna go? I'll keep reading it forever, but I do hope it finished before Pete does. It's too great a work to go unfinished.

* Lastly, how'd I go five years without reading Sluggy? What's the matter with me?

PS: Kesandru's Well still slaps.

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 Post Posted: Mon Jan 27, 2020 10:45 pm 
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AOL: LilimKaoru
I just came back after a long hiatus as well. It was great reading everything in a single binge!

I'm convinced we picked the perfect time to start up again.

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 Post Posted: Mon Aug 31, 2020 3:41 pm 
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I just came back after being away since around the time things were moving up to Schlock's space station, and I've got to say I'm amazed Pete was able to stick the landing on Oasis and Schlock and all of it so well. For the longest time I was expecting the Oasis mysteries to have a disappointing conclusion or reveal, and I am so glad to be wrong.

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 Post Posted: Fri Aug 06, 2021 4:29 am 
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Joined: Mon Jun 10, 2013 12:41 am
Posts: 163
Hey hey, long time reader, currently in the middle of a re-reading binge, becoming a paying Defender once again now that I am an adult with a Job and an Income (luckily no need for ties, blowtorches or explosives), and was looking for a thread in which to share the strangeness of the experience. I believe this one fits, even though I'm chiming in a year later.

I first bumped into the strip in college, when Oceans Unmoving was just starting and I had no freaking clue what was going on (and still didn't until later when I finished Oceans Unmoving II) so I dove into the archives and worked my way to the then present quite fast (I had time. I was in college).

Somewhere around Mokhadun (which I LOVED) I lost track of Sluggy, don't really know why. I attempted a reread which didn't get me quite updated (up to about Six Months Later) but that didn't quite work.

Now here I am, living in a different city, freelancing for the first time in my life, finishing up my return to college, and taking my time through the archives. Just finished That Which Redeems and found myself tearing up at the very end when
Spoiler: show
Torg breaks down in tears when getting back to Zoe in his world
. Forget Pete's experimentation with Serious Storytelling in Fire and Rain and with Oasis's goth phase - for me that moment when the strip really started growing up.

TLDR - Catching up, getting weird feelings, peeking into the chapters I have not yet read and can't wait to enjoy the full complication of the current storyline in its full glory.

p.s.: Is there a thread for re-readers and binges? I would appreciate if someone pointed me there.

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 Post Posted: Mon Nov 01, 2021 2:47 am 
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Thought I'd reply here since I recently binged and caught up after an even LONGER time away (don't look for me on the forums, I never posted before). I lost interest way back in 2005, during Oceans Unmoving 2, so I picked up and re-read everything from the beginning of OU, just to get the full picture of that story and whatever comes after:

* Oceans Unmoving is better when reading straight through in a binge and not as slow as it felt in real time (especially with all the Z-Com filler strips breaking up the pace). My complaints about it still stand: (1) it's a REALLY long time for a story that only involves one of the main Sluggy cast (and increasingly tangentially as it goes along), (2) Pete is forced to explain A LOT about the world of Timeless Space and often resorts to characters just explaining it directly to you, (3) because this story does not contain characters we've had years of investment in, Pete also has to work overtime to make us care about an entirely new cast, an effort that's only partially successful.

Anyway, it's not a terrible story in and of itself, it's just a bad one to cram into Sluggy. It also came at a time when a lot of subplots remained up in the air (Oasis still running around, Aylee still cocooned, Book of E-ville harassing Gwynn, etc.) so it felt really frustrating to spend more than a year on this weird tangent. That said, this catch-up did help me realize something about Pete's writing and give him more credit for something:

* When Pete "wraps up" a storyline he tends to leave some space for that subplot to return if he wants to, but not in a way that he HAS to. So before Oceans Unmoving happened, he had basically closed the book on three major running storylines. The haunted-house stuff was finished in Kesandru's Well. The Holiday Wars were finished by that last three part event at the end of 2003 (Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas). The Dimension of Pain demons were done after That Which Redeems. At the time I didn't realize it because each one kind of felt like there were loose threads left to be picked up (Kesandru himself still in the Never, Mrs. Claus' last comment to Santa, Psykosis taking over), but those are not really things that HAVE to be addressed again. As far as these characters/worlds interact with the main Sluggy gang, we are basically done with them.

So Pete really was wrapping a lot of stuff up in the years prior to OU, I just didn't understand it back then. Now with the benefit of hindsight and going through all the subsequent stories, I see that he hasn't picked up any of that stuff again, except for some minor characters reappearing for different reasons (like the Black Ops Elves).

Anyway, it's getting late so back tomorrow with more thoughts on the last 15 years of Sluggy.

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 Post Posted: Mon Nov 01, 2021 7:01 pm 
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Next batch of random thoughts from my 15-year binge:

* Oasis stories are always great. I thoroughly enjoyed everything she was involved in, and yes, the reveal about her origin was very satisfying. You can tell this is one of those things Pete had been planning from the beginning; everything about it just fit.

* I know a lot of folks were upset about it, but I loved Sasha's heel turn. I'd always found her a slightly boring character before. She had no identifiable character traits besides being unbothered. Revealing her as a Kusari also made everything fit.

* "Aylee" was a great storyline. Loved how it crystallized what Aylee's arc really is: wanting to be more human. Would be nice to get her more involved in new storylines, though.

* I like how Pete has been tightening the stories up with fewer detours. Everything has felt pretty purposeful after the last Torg Potter/Yarncraft stories ended. Even the ones that felt slightly pointless at first have morphed into something meaningful (Safehouse). They also all seem to have some level of closure and don't feel too open-ended. Like, if we never saw Oasis again she still would have gotten a good ending. Even if Sam had never come back, it would have still been good to leave him staked in that closet. Book of E-Ville and Mohkadun gods seem like the one thing that needs more resolution, and also what the current storyline is about. Oceans Unmoving story relevance issues are a distant memory now.

* Love that Torg and Zoe getting together happened right in the middle of a storyline, not as the end game. That's the right approach, I think; finding your true love doesn't end your story, it adds to the adventure.

* Obviously the artwork has improved over time, and Sluggy is now in more of a "graphic novel" format, as opposed to the "daily newspaper strip" style it began with (so no more color Sunday strips). I do miss seeing our heroes in color, though. Some really good newer characters have never been seen in color!

On that note, my favorite characters introduced since I last stopped reading:

1. Ranger Noogy. Not a lot of time with her, but I liked what she brought out in Zoe, and it was nice that Pete designed a heroic/attractive woman character outside of his usual body type. Maybe she can be part of another adventure?

2. Crushestro. Funny villains are the best, when they're humanized even better.

3. Slaughteresa. She brings out great responses from the whole gang.

4. Izzy. Does Pete have a thing for casually introducing people of mixed-Asian ancestry into the comic? If so, I love it. Back in the 90s when the strip first started you hardly ever saw characters like this in media; Zoe was one of the few I could think of who had a background like mine.

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 Post Posted: Tue Nov 02, 2021 12:26 am 
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Wasn't sure where to post this. I haven't really been 'away', nor have I been on a binge, or even a prolonged deep dive. Really more of a 'Pete posted reference links, and I went to that archived strip, then followed another link from there, etc... - so, an archive link rabbit hole - which seems fitting for this strip...

I guess you could call this a 'delayed reaction' to this particular strip (and those before/after it.)
Not not really speculation, so much as a 'worlds are colliding' brain explosion that has resulted in some possible 'head canon' unless struck down by Pete later...

https://archives.sluggy.com/book.php?ch ... 2013-10-23

Having finally watched all of Season 1 of Loki on Disney+, and then seeing this strip again after quite a while, it made me wonder... Is Dunuloa a Loki variant? Same basic crown type, no???

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 Post Posted: Thu Jan 27, 2022 7:41 am 
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I love hearing everyone's reread reactions. I started reading in 2005, and then didn't read from roughly 2006-2016, when I did a massive re-read... But that was already 6 years ago! I've been reading strip by strip since then, but there is something very satisfying about those long archive dives!

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