Returning Tomorrow: Vice & Luna
by Zac Bertschy,
So last June we launched Vice & Luna, a weekly webcomic series that followed along in the spirit of Anime News Nina, the site's previous strip (it's 10 years old this year by the way - you can read the whole thing right here and there's even a hardcover full-color collection of the strip available!). We managed to make it about 14 pages in before production inevitably shut down - our artist had a full-time gig in addition to handling the strip every week, and her duties at that job heated up just enough to make the schedule untenable. Based on my understanding of the way webcomics are routinely produced (think "shoestring budgeted freelancers") this wasn't a particularly uncommon problem to encounter.
I think it was a good thing for the strip overall - we had time to regroup, look at the feedback we'd gotten and what people responded to the most. We found a new artist - the talented Tengu Arts - and put together a production schedule that will result in months' worth of uninterrupted story. We're relaunching tomorrow with new art and new characters and all that - if you haven't read the strip so far, you can click through our previous pages right here, but here's a quick refresher on what the strip is about.
Vice & Luna is set in the world of fairies, a vast unseen network of little winged fairy folks who do everything you've heard fairies do - change the color of the leaves in the spring, collect your unwanted children's teeth and so on - but they also live inside your electronics (a job erroneously credited to 'brownies' or gnomes in the past) and move tremendous amounts of data as part of the backbone of the internet.
Naturally, our strip is set inside the fairy world's Anime News Network office. Here's the cast:
LUNA is the office's no-nonsense manager. She works hard, takes herself seriously, and loves hoity-toity artsy-fartsy anime like Revolutionary Girl Utena and Joker Game. Has a thing for MAYBELL but has a bigger thing about not committing to a serious relationship.
VICE is the assistant manager. Likes to party. Refuses to take himself or anyone else very seriously. Harboring a thing for LUNA that he'll never admit to. Embraces otaku anime - Sword Art Online and Type-Moon.
BLUME is the team engineer and IT wiz - if there's a problem with the office equipment or the data sorting machines, she'll fix it. Beneath an almost painfully optimistic and sincere personality lies a brutal intellect. Fully fujoshi.
MAYBELL is a cashier at Taco Problem, the gang's favorite lunch place. Down-to-earth and confident, she's an aspiring comic book artist who spent 3 years at art school and now, well. Doesn't know a damn thing about anime - she's currently pursuing LUNA, with limited success (but, you know, some success).
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