Character: Ray

Mucilaginous

The word mucilaginous is brought to you by my girlfriend Caitlin, who busted that out when I asked for suggestions for a word that would be really gross to associate with soup. Yes, I do have to look up how to spell it each time.

EMPLOYEE OF THE WEEK:

Sylvia Douglas is Employee of the Week! Check out her short film Vanity, which screened in Edmonton and Calgary as part of the Got A Minute Film Festival. Can you say your film has been shown at every train station in Alberta’s two major cities? Sylvia can. She can also say she’s a multi-time Hell, Inc. Employee of the Week. You can say that, too, by supporting Hell, Inc. on Patreon.

Why should I support Hell, Inc. on Patreon, you ask, for the purposes of this paragraph? It’s pretty simple – you read Hell, Inc., and want me to work more on that putting my energy into freelance work. On that note, here’s a bit of an example of what that means, practically – as I write this, it is very early in the morning on November 11th. The last time I drew a Hell, Inc. strip? October 20th. What I have been doing in that time, you ask? Inking roughly 90 pages of a graphic novel that comes out next year from a major publisher. Which was cool, and paid pretty well, but it’s not MINE, y’know? The Patreon lets me work on stuff that’s mine –  and that you’re already reading –  for far more of my time. If you like Hell, Inc. enough to kick in even a dollar a month, that adds up pretty quick.

Want to help Hell, Inc., but can’t afford the Patreon? I get it. The best way to do that is to share the comic with new readers. The best way to do that is to recommend it directly to your friends, but the best results that can be achieved with a couple of clicks come from Top Webcomics. Hit the button below to upvote Hell, Inc. on Top Webcomics and increase its visibility to a community of tens of thousands of webcomic readers!

Next Week: Inarticulate rage! Read it early on Patreon!

All Practice All The Time

ALL PRACTICE ALL THE TIME MAKES BEELZY A PRACTICED BOY. ALL PRACTICE ALL THE TIME MAKES BEELZY A PRACTICED BOY.

EMPLOYEE OF THE WEEK:

Long-term employee Damion is Employee of the Week! Make sure you don’t park in his space. If you want to be Employee of the Week, support Hell, Inc. on Patreon!

As always, if you want to support Hell, Inc. but can’t afford the Patreon, vote for the comic on Top Webcomics! It’s a great source of new readers, and more votes gives it more visibility. Click on the banner below to vote!

Next Week: Team spirit! Join the team of Hell, Inc. Patreon supporters to read it early!

Mandatory Intramural Overtime

Happy Canadian Thanksgiving/regular Monday as applicable!

B.L. Zebub continues to be my favourite character to write, because I can do almost anything with him. All I have to do is have him be a dickhead boss and BAM whatever indignities he’s suffered are in the background again and he’s back to being a tyrannical villain. It helps that he has direct power over all of the other characters, so even if he looks like a buffoon, he doesn’t lose any power. He’s just mad about looking like a buffoon and has the power to make your life difficult because he feels bad about himself. I just accidentally explained all of managerial relations in one paragraph, you’re welcome.

EMPLOYEE OF THE WEEK:

We’re back at the top of the rotation with Cait of the North, who really earns Employee of the Week status by running a lot of my social media at this point. It turns out that I like Twitter and stuff a lot better when I don’t actually have to spend time writing promotional posts instead of drawing. If you want to help me spend more time drawing, you too can support Hell, Inc. on Patreon! For as little as $1 you can contribute to the comic’s financial viability!

As always, you can support Hell, Inc. for free by voting for it on Top Webcomics! Click the banner below to vote and help drive new readers to the comic.

Next Week: The practice schedule is revealed, because that’s a normal thing for intramural company softball leagues to have, right? Read it early on Patreon!

Summoned

There tend to be gaps in drawing Hell, Inc. strips. Typically I’ll draw 3-5 strips in a week or 10 days, then have to take a break to work on something else – commissions, other comics, boring business stuff, etc. Sometimes those breaks are short. If I’m doing a commission, for example, it might only take a day or two. Other times, those breaks are pretty long, like the two months I spent drawing pages for the new GWAR: The Enormogantic Fail graphic novel. The first strip I draw when I come back from a break is always an interesting experience. Aside from reacquainting myself with storytelling in the horizontal format, how I draw the characters and how I approach the compositions is always a little different. That’s mostly due to art being a skill that evolves over time – when I do a different project, I learn new things and hone skills I already have, so when I come back to something that I’ve worked on over a long period of time, my technique is a bit different. This is all a more-detailed-than-necessary lead-up to saying that starting with a bird’s eye view of the office, where there are many characters and a whole bunch of background objects, was perhaps a more challenging choice than it needed to be.

EMPLOYEE OF THE WEEK:

The Employee of the Week section is back to normal, post-Kickstarter. BUT, we do have a nice segue between the two, as I welcome new patron Barrie Deatcher, who is also a Kickstarter backer. Welcome, Barrie, and also welcome to the new readers that have discovered the comic as a result of the Kickstarter. If you want to be Employee of the Week, support Hell, Inc. on Patreon – it’s how I keep money coming in so I can cut down on the amount of freelance work I need to take on. Given the amount of freelance work I’ve done this year, it is not working haha.

Another great way to support Hell, Inc. is by upvoting it on Top Webcomics. It’s been the largest source of new readers by a pretty substantial margin, and higher rankings = more new readers. Click on the banner to vote, and make a habit of it – you can vote once a day!

Next Week: Everything that is fun is also mandatory, right? That makes sense. Read it early on Patreon!