I had a lot to learn about set blocking, too. The way Shanna elbows Tim out of the frame works passably well, but Clara might as well be pole-vaulting over that table.

I've always been an ambitious writer, and in the early episodes that was often not an asset. Looking back at the first installments of other online humor-adventure comics (Sluggy Freelance, Narbonic and Goats for starters), you can see that their scripts are much cruder than they would eventually become, but at least they lead with modest, simple concepts you can get your head around immediately. Early Fans belts you in the face with half-a-dozen concepts on any given page. Look out, we've got the Star Trek alumna AND the iconic slob-fan AND the S.C.A.er AND the lovestruck Archie-meets-Godai-from-Maison-Ikkoku AND some kind of... snob reporter or something.

Thank God for Jason Waltrip and his emphasis on storytelling clarity: without someone like him this would have been completely incomprehensible. More about Jason in the next installment.