![[0186] Take It Easy](/comics/2010-07-29-[0186]-take-it-easy.png "[0186] Take It Easy")
The current story arc started with this strip: Hit-Boy.
Whew, I’m already really excited about the strip that will be posted next Monday. All I can say is: This story ain’t over yet!
The original line of the police officer in the last panel was “Hey, look on the bright side! At least no SWAT team has shot your dog during an apartment raid,” but neither Powree nor Neveko got its meaning so I replaced it.
Big versions of the following two drawings can be found on our page for donators:
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- Nigel O’Sullivan: Good work, Mrs. Williams. Without your fast intervention this boy might have died!
- Ye Thuza: Oh well, the medic said that it was just a mild heart attack.
- Brandon: Can I go now?
- Nigel O’Sullivan: Not so fast, my friend! First I want to know why you two went completely ballistic after seeing some guys in superhero costumes.
- Nigel O’Sullivan: Hmm, maybe because… you’re your own best customers!?
- Nigel O’Sullivan: Hey, take it easy. In ten, twenty years you’ll be free again!
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at firs i though that you were using the word dog like gueto talk, so i he was refearing to his friend, wich would make sense… well for me it makes sense, and my vision of a apartment raid is strongly influenced by the one in gta san andreas… in wich many drug dealers and customers are killed by the swat.
Well I do have to say that I’m really glad that you opened the comments. 😉
I missed saying how much I like the comic! <3 <3 <3
What to say…
Pay attention not to haters, 'cause most of them are procrastinators or envious people. Focus always in people that have good comments. Asides, yes, the comic has landed into a very touchy subject in this arc, but it has keep it real according to the fun-nature, no-truth-hidden spirit it had at the beggining and all through it.
I'm not going to tell you how to do your comic. I would mildly suggest that in the wrap up you find a way in which the insight, as in many cases before in your stories, feel oriented to kids or a kid-like mind (the BEST kind of state of mind this planet has 😀 ). Now, I realize, I think maybe you're already on something like it… you actually did this swiftly in the past (my favorite Arc, the one with the forest, is the main example I keep in mind of a solid narrative) and you haven't dissapointed me so far. [Yes, that includes this one]
Thanks for inspiring us and making some of our cell brains grow. Even if you have to step a little on some toes. 🙂
Good artists do that.
P.s.: Brandon's expressions of guilt for the WIN!!!
P.s.s.: The one with the forest is oh so not clear. I meant the one in which a lady thinks the forest is full of animals with rabies and wants to hunt them all down… can’t remember the name now, but i LOVED it!!! [And sorry for the looong post, I just missed you]
So, THAT’S where Detective Columbo’s been hiding out at, all these years… 😛
Don’t pay attention to the haters? Hey, thats what DC Simpson is doing with Raine Dog, and we all see how that turned out.
Well Novil … you certainly got a LOT of comments (and hence, have a LOT of readers)! I Love the story arc so far and love the comic in general. I hadn’t been able to follow along for a little while, but I gather (from the closed comments) that things must’ve gotten heated for a bit … that is a shame, because I loved the way you portrayed these two dealers. And I’m anxious to see where you go from here too. (And I do agree, the finish to this strip was much more humorous than the other would’ve been – though, being in law enforcement myself – I would’ve “gotten it”.)
Thanks all of you for a great comic!
Shouldn’t Ye Thuza be charged with vigilantism?
Why she was just cosplaying as a super hero while passing there and helping the guy ;p
I don’t get it. Why did the cop plant drugs on the innocent guy?
Well wouldn’t dressing as super heroes, carrying weapons and skulking around darkened alleyways in a presumably bad part of town raise some questions?
Come on,it is a COMIC strip! It isn’t serious 😀
I really like that it is getting a bit darker.
It was a bit to “fluffy” some times 🙂
Great art work by the way!
Hmm I don’t see any weapon anywhere near there ^^ and even then, if I have to pass in a darkened alley in a bad part of the town I would SURELY want to have some weapon [legally] with me ^^
Not necessarily… For openers, It’s Only A Comic Strip, you really should relax. The comics are unavoidably compressed for space, and Officer O’Sullivan has come into contact with Brandon as part of a routine investigation.
Getting suspicious about Brandon’s actions and behavior (and perhaps smelling the drug on his person, or the lingering scent of it’s being used recently clinging to clothing…) could quite rightly give the Officer enough Probable Cause to do a pat-down search and find the drugs. It’s an A leads to -> B leads to -> C type of thing. As long as he can explain it to the District Attorney and the Judge, all is well.
And it may have been a joke, but who knows? With enough digging they might come up with 20 years worth of charges…
what about Woo? =P
i agree. and the movie that inspired this arc is awesome, too.
Sorry for the question, but what does the cop mean in the third panel?
“You are your own best customers?” It doesn’t make sense to me. 🙁
One little problem in this arc (of a very good comics, for sure), is that the cop here find the drug too quickly. How could he have known of its emplacement ? Plus, there’s still some reasons to freak out when you hear a detonation, then two masqued guys show up and you see your friend is lying on the floor. But, well, it’s a comics, and the situation is still logical.
And, but that’s a personnal point of view, I’m not very fond of the “we’re-the-guardians-of-peace” look that Cloud make in the last panel.
But still, a very good work ^^
@ Mosley:
Here in Spain it would make perfect sense. They’re outdoors anyway. If the policeman suspects you’re playing dirty they’re completely entitled to search your clothes (no damage involved). I thought it was the same in USA, at least in the USA police movies I used to watch when I was younger… which is exactly the background of this strip. Wonderfully made, by the way. I’m loving this story, Novil!
@ Dumb Reader:
“You’re your own best customers” -> I believe he suspects the kid is so excited because his perception of reality isn’t “real”. In other words, his actions don’t make sense because he sniffs drugs besides selling them.
On the other hand, I suppose his buddy wanted to quit because drugs were affecting his heart.
@ thundersnow:No this was absolutely illegal. You can only frisk someone without their consent if you have probable cause that they are armed. What the cop did in the third panel was extremely illegal.
@ Nievesg:No that is not how the law in the US works. You must give consent if an officer is going to search any part of your person. Frisks without consent are only allowed if the officer has probable cause that you are carrying a concealed weapon.
@ Derwyddon: The cop also found the drugs through a highly illegal search. If it goes to court that kid is getting off scott clean.
Bruce Bergman wrote:
Actually, no. You are only allowed to do pat down searches without consent if you have probable cause that the person has a concealed weapon on their person. Even if he smelled drugs, he would have to get the kid’s permission for the search.
WHOA, 10-20!? THE FUCK WAS HE SELLING, EXPLOSIVES?
Novil wrote:
Good grief, you’re not forcing anyone to read this, if they don’t like it; tell them to grow up or read Sesame Street Comics or something…
@ Novil:
I know right?
So irritating that people go on about that.
1. Its a webcomic if you don’t like what its doing just don’t read it
2. Correct me if I am wrong but this was never supposed to be ‘G” rated comic yes? I mean it was never going to be penny arcade in terms of violence, swearing or mature content matter but its not really a kids comic either.
Anyways yet another awesome comic from Sandra and woo!
@ Anteros:
America’s Zero Tolerance Policy has resulting in people getting ten-year sentences for what would normally be misdemeanor drug possession. No joke.
Seems we have over a million cons… erm… coons in Germany by now 🙂
http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/germany-overrun-by-raccoon-invasion-a-847847.html
I think maybe I should give the comments sections a skip from now on… or at least until I get closer to the present day.
It seems to be a subject shrouded in meta-drama that has little or nothing to do with the comic itself. Plus most of the comments (especially the oodles of massively upvoted ones) tend to err on the side of the vapid and pointless rather than the informative.
What was he getting a heart attack from? 25 years of chain smoking?
Dont tell me from drinking alcohol or smoking hemp (some panels before). Or was that a reference to chemical drugs? Sure warning of (any kind) drug addiction is a valuable deal in a comic for youngsters (all drugs = dangerous…). But I do not get the punch line.
This whole sequence reminds me of the story “Manalive” where the hero “Innocent Smith” shoots at at depressed pessamists who are wasting their lives on self destructive nonsense, who deliberatly, but VERY NEARLY, missing them, then shocking them into the realization of just how much they want to live. Cloud and his mother are very much the kind of heros that GK Chesterton highly admired. He would have been very critical of most of the Final Fantasy games, which tend to have a subtle, but distinctive anti religious subtext to the overall plot. I bet some of the writers are fans of the Dark Materials triligy, which tries, less subtly, to tell a pass a simmilar message.
@ Novil:
Yeah, the dialog in the last three or so strips seems a bit forced, so I found it confusing also.
Ryan Schneider wrote:
“Hero” you say? Sounds like a douchebag who likes to freak out folk who have too much grief in their lives already. Would be more merciful NOT to miss them. Anyone who would consider that sort of character heroic has a very twisted mind.
I for one enjoyed this entire arc. True Cloud’s mom got a bit extreme on everything and the language, but it’s funny as heck and she became more of a bad-ass than she already is.
bob wrote:
Even if a cop has a reasonable suspicion that you may be armed, they’re still only allowed to do a pat down. A more thorough search inside someone’s clothes is still out unless they find something in that first search.
The sequence of events did not look anything like a heart attack. It looked much more like a cardiac arrest. I know the difference because I had a Sudden Cardiac Arrest, received CPR from someone on the scene at the karate school, and was shocked back to a normal rhythm by the paramedics using a defibrillator. My arteries were clear; my heart had developed an electrical problem.
That joke that you were originally going to post may have crossed a line.
Still think that this comic is great though!
This is morally pretentious and atrocious
Ah. This is… ah well, anyhail, cool twist.