As I keep having to remind myself, this whole Book IX of Daily Grind is essentially a salute and "send off" to Mike Stevens, the most recent competitor to drop out of this ding-dang contest I always link to in the paragraph above this one. The "ninja death" comics Mike did for so many years inspired me in several ways, and Steven, the mouse guy with the sword, only exists as a character because of those comics.
So when Mike fell out of the contest, I knew what I had to do: kill Steven off in as grandiose a fashion as possible while representatives from the other four comics still left in the contest stood by in horror: Howlett, of course, representing my comic; Rustle, my tribute to Brad Guigar--look at the picture on his page there and tell me he's not a mouse sorcerer!; Lem Varese, who's based largely on the grouchy bird-guy Gulius from Ryan Smith's Funny Farm, one of the three or four strips Smith does each week; and Rocky, who's a centipede because most of the characters in Andrew Rothery's Tru-Life Adventures work for a toy store with a centipede mascot.
Now I've just gotta actually go through with it....
Fifty-Four - Totenfeier
