Families/Cемьи 03
The third page of a new voting incentive storyline Families/Cемьи is now available!
Kapitalist Pig found his roots in some old anti-West Soviet propaganda I found during my original “research” (ie Google search) for this story. Do you think I can find this image anymore? Nope. But true story, I really did find a pig in suspenders and an Uncle Sam hat holding a cross with a $ on it!
Anyway, Red Vlad and Comrade Katya mention here a roster of The International Justice Force somewhat different from the real one… sounds like their intel is a bit off. Also, for those wondering how/why Katya would be posing for Playboy – as depicted in the previous update – this update should answer that… fake nudes!
New update next Sunday… To Russia With Love!
What I wonder is whether Red Vlad and Comrade Katya are in on the charade or in the dark. As I doubt anyone can hear them talking to each other while in flight it would seem that at least Katya is in the dark. Also, does this mean the fake nudes were also a product of the Soviet propaganda machine? What about the comic featuring Red Vlad then? And… isn’t it stupidly bad preparedness if your main supers are in the dark of known supers that they actually might be up against?
Anything that was in English on page two would have been a product of the West. On the cover of the comic it says “We give the evil commie his own comic”. As for the involvement of the Kremlin in the Playboy piece, it is unlikely but you can bet they played a part in making sure Katya knew about it.
Whos is this imposter? And the others they refer to? Is it all just a propaganda film? No actual innocents harmed in its production ?
Yes, I wonder! Stay tuned!
Ooh, I see a possible parallel to another comic!
Hehe, the “Kapitalist Pig” is a perfect example of the Soviet propaganda, I saw quite a bit of this style in various magazines as a kid, when my country was in the Communist era. It usually came somewhere on page two, absolutely boring and ridiculous (but no-one dared to say anything), and everybody just skip that page. For supers in official-soviet style, this is precisely the expected enemy 🙂
Heh, that is good to know! I showed my original Kapitalist Pig sketch to a colleague who was originally from the Ukraine during the Soviet era, and she agreed it was pretty accurate. That was 8 or more years ago and I started to doubt myself when I couldn’t find it again recently!
Comrade Katya keeps reminding me of a character I made some time ago called Commodore Tatya (in a message board for a comic I’d follow where on the boards people would create stories and role play as their fan characters, who had potential to make it into the comic). Thing is, I’m sure I read some of Magellan before creating her as a character, so I must have gotten past the point in the comic where she’s mentioned, so it’s possible my character’s name was inspired by yours. Of course, they’re overall quite different, but interesting enough to me for me to mention.
I think both red Vlad and Comrade Katya first appeared in December 2004. Or was it 2005? Anyway, it was still a few years after DC put out Red Son – an Elseworlds where Kal El wound up in Soviet Russia and not Smallville, USA. Although I never bought it (wish I had) I was still aware of it, and that probably influenced the concept of Red Vlad and Comrade Katya.
Yeah, the comic whose message boards I was on had started I want to say around 2006, and I wasn’t aware of it until at least a year after. Meanwhile, I know I’d read some of Magellan (I’d read Loxie and Zoot and the Bare Pit, and was curious to look at your comic in my favorite genre for fiction). Just to note: the comic is Pride High, a story about a gay/straight alliance at a high school for super-powered youth. Sadly, their message boards have been down for some time and the comic hasn’t updated in a bit (since the creator, who isn’t an artist, has mentioned he’s rather broke). Hopefully it’ll come back in full some day. Though, its premise of a superhero high school does have a good amount of competition (not the least from this very comic).
Grace, initially when you said “New Update Next Saturday…Kapitalist Pig!” I thought you were playfully making fun of us readers and/or Soviet-era rhetoric, and I got a chuckle out of it. Didn’t realize you were referencing a person, LOL.
hah!
I really liked that you made the Playboy fake’s hair a slightly different colour to all the other images of Katya. Subtle.
Thanks – the good thing about having a bit of a buffer is that it gives me more time, per update, to consider details like that!