There must be a certain catharsis involved in beating up the evil alternate universe version of a close personal friend, I suppose.

Oh, BONUS MATERIAL: In addition to this director's commentary, I am going to put an ALTERNATE ENDING up on the Facebook group (see "Special School webcomic") at some point today. Will it be better than the proper one? Will there be a forced gag at the expense of character faithfulness? WHO CAN KNOW? You can! I feel sure.

Yeah, I couldn't think of any legitimate reason for either of them to be making jokes at this point. Serious comic is serious.

Oh! I also fixed Tuesday's comic, which I noticed had some spurious blue in the first panel. I shifted some layers, then changed blending types, and well, I'm happier with it but nobody else will ever know the difference.

In my own pond, I am the biggest fish.

Yeah I'm not completely sure what Evil Alex was thinking would happen here. I guess she was just thinking of ways to avoid the zappy doom herself, and just didn't think it through.

Also, there's a kind of an instinctive response when you have time frozen, and something dangerous, and an enemy ready to be thrust in front of it. In her defence, it is usually hilarious.

Balancing the desire to not confuse new readers with the reluctance to restate the obvious for the long-timers! That said, I am aware that the readers don't necessarily have as keen an insight into what's going on as I do, so clarity is perhaps for the best.

I think the dialogue in the last panel was originally going to be a whole strip for next week, but I realised it would fit in a single panel nicely. Well, anyway, this is what we've ended up with. If you like, you can pretend it starts with "I say, I say, I say!"

Incidentally, I don't think I've mentioned how satisfied I've been with the art lately. Today's and Monday's especially. I don't know if anyone else agrees, but I find them very pleasing to look at.

Postscript: I've amended the Twitter icon so it points to the spanky new Special School account. It's not that I mind people stalking me, but the service I've chosen to broadcast my updates uses login details^[1] and, ha ha, I'm not surrendering my password just because they asked. So I made a new one. Follow it for automated updates! (As soon as I figure out how this feed syndicator thing works, anyway...)

Post-Postscript: The "while they're frozen" thing is another shoutout to Seanbaby, this time the super quiz. Question 15 (applications of super speed), answer G. Yes, I remember this stuff.

[1] No, I'm not sure why they don't use Twitter's authentication API either. They seem to manage it well enough for Facebook...

That is all

I tried to think of a sound effect to put on there. But then I decided that would dilute the art too much. And I'm reasonably happy with the art.

Yes, between Tuesday's "one portrait and a shoulder" and today's "splash page" - not to mention the amount of copypaste I've done with Theresa, there - this has been a lazy week for me. On the plus side, what art there's been has felt less rushed and certainly less forced. So, swings and roundabouts, I guess.

PS. Dear new readers who are arriving for the first time: Wow, this must be a confusing day to do that.

You know when you're talking to somebody about your alternate universe counterpart, and they say something rude, and you can't help but take it personally? Man I hate that.

On a technical note, despite the overlapping tails here, read the bubbles in the same order you would normally - vertically down through each panel before moving on to the next. I don't think that needs explaining, but what is this director's commentary box for if not for stating the blindingly obvious?

In other news: Simplify Path, you are my new best friend.

So, I am letting deadlines slip. Where previously I have done the whole week's worth of comics on Mondays, currently I am more commonly drawing only Tuesday's on Monday and Friday's on Thursday. It is slightly more relaxed - drawing and colouring only one comic - but at the same time slightly concerning that I am cutting it so close to the wire.

I blame Channel 4 for placing Glee on Monday nights.

In Social Media news you can now find Special School on the Facebook! That's ... something. Yes, it probably is a thing. I also put up a link to my Twitter account. This may, at some stage, become a separate account. It depends how many stalkers I get. Is that not the word? Stalkers? Something like that, anyway.

BTW, I just noticed we're past 500 comics. There will be no fanfare. It simply is.

Ah, 266.