I just like hearing your opinion on these types of things so here goes. What do you think Paranatural could do to fix their awfully slow pace? I re-read the whole archive and it really became apparent how little has really happened over the course of years. And is it me or does the protagonist just need to cut the dang snark?

I’m hesitant to criticize Paranatural’s pacing too much because I find it’s often much less bad when you archive binge, and webcomics having slow pacing live is endemic to the format. I also don’t want to say this chapter is “badly” paced until I can see how it ends. If Morrison is putting all his ducks in a row and then will have a massive climax where all of it comes together, then it feeling slow now is totally worth it.

That said, why DOES this feel slow, besides being a webcomic? I don’t think the problem is that too little has happened, it’s that too MUCH has happened. So far in chapter 5′s 217 pages, we have:



1. Johnny discovers the identity of the club, and begins a face turn

2. Max and Isaac have a fight over Max keeping secrets Isaac feels entitled to

3. Isabel dealing with the loss of Eightfold and her new companion Flipflop

4. Spender realizing he has to open up to his teammates

5. Zarei and Agent Day have a confrontation that morphs into a date

6. Spender tries to learn more about Forge.

7. PJ wants a weapon so that he can join the Paranatural club. Max learns this is impossible and doesn’t know how to break it to PJ

8. Suzy is blackmailing Max for information on the Paranatural Activities club

9. Introduction of the student council and their vague plan

10. Hijack plot

11. Parody of overly long fight scenes in anime by way of a “hitball” game.



There’s also Dmitri having super-powers, Forge being in Johnny, and Ed feeling like he let Isabella down, but none of those really get too much screentime. Still, that’s eleven plotlines.



For comparison, let’s compare this 217 page (and counting) chapter to the last six chapters of Gunnerkrigg Court (58-63), which are 203 pages combined, and also include a really long action scene. That feels about fair. In those chapters



1. Worldbuilding short story with the fairies.

2. The kids fight and try to free free Jeanne

3. Annie takes on a major debt with the pyschopomps to save Smitty

4. Ayilu gets a name

5. Red flips out at Annie for risking her and Ayilu’s lives.

6. Annie reflects on her actions, talks about it with Ysengrin and Kat

7. Arthur and Juliette want Kat to make Arthur a flesh body

8. Kat teams up with Anthony, Annie freaks out.



There’s actually fewer plotlines, unless you want to count “Coyote tells Parley and Smitty a story” or “Parley has superpowers now”.



In this time, Paranatural has resolved the hitball game, Isabella dealing with the loss of Eightfold, and Spender realizing he needs to open up to his teammates. Gunnerkrigg Court has resolved six. Moreover, it’s the first six, and the only things still hanging are the ones that were introduced at the end of chapter 63. Each chapter has an end to that chapter’s story, even as the main plot churns on.



In comparison, Paranatural’s juggling more storylines at a time, so it takes a lot of pages for any one of them to get resolved. Moreover, when they ARE resolved, they come randomly in the middle of a chapter, so Isabella and Spender resolving to rely on their teammates more doesn’t feel like the big emotional character beat it is, since it’s sandwiched between a bunch of other shit and doesn’t have time to breathe.

This is normally the point where I’d start writing about how Paranatural could be paced like Gunnerkrigg Court, and the pros and cons of that approach, but I don’t think I can actually do that right now simply because I don’t know how this story ends. So don’t take what I’m about to say too seriously as a prescription for “fixing” Paranatural. Still, in the interest of giving you something to think about

Chapter 5 is a short chapter. Zarei and Day meet up, and pry each other for information, but it turns into a date.



In Chapter 6, Isabella and Max talk about Isaac, who later pesters Max for information, leading to a fight. Isabella discusses this with Spender, and the two notice each other hiding injuries. They have a heart-to-heart and determine to keep fewer secrets and rely on the team more. During this, we see Johnny and team bullying Jeff for information.



In Chapter 7, there’s the hitball game. Jeff having super-strength is as big a surprise to the reader as it is to the audience, as it wasn’t set up in advance. The rest of Chapter 5 gets put here.



This is, obviously, a pretty major change. And given that I don’t know what the endgame is for all these plotlines, they may all be bad changes. I really want to stress that I’m not saying this is how this chapter should be. There are cons to this style of pacing! (two big ones: You can’t show Hijack posessing Jeff until the chapter it’s relevant, and it requires the audience to accept that characters are politely doing their various business in an order that’s convenient for the reader instead of the way that makes the most logical sense), but then you can put stuff like this

At the climax of a shorter chapter, positioned to make it clearer that this is the big moment it’s supposed to be, instead of Isabella getting hit in the face by a door on the next page because there’s a mystery plot to get back to, or having the Zarei/Day date have it’s own place in the story, instead of randomly showing up in the middle of the hijack arc, sticking around for a few pages, and then disappearing to cut to another side-plot. I think it’s good to deal with one or two things at a time, instead of juggling a whole bunch.

All that said, if this chapter ends with all these plot threads coming together in a major climatic way, then the way Paranatural is paced is 100% correct and all the slower pacing will pay off in a big way, provided Morrison sticks the landing. And right now it looks like they plot lines are going to collide in a big way, even if I’m not sure about the “stick the landing” part, but I thought the Ghost Train was good when it was all done, so we’ll see