Commentary from August 9, 2002
The first time we see the stuffed Ishida. I love panel 2 — the look on Ishida’s taxidermied face is just downright creepy. I was thinking about an old horror show about a taxidermist. I can’t remember if it was Creepshow, Tales From the Crypt, Twilight Zone, or something else. But in the end, the taxidermist gets taxidermied, and the oddly swollen look in the face was something that haunted me for some time afterwards. I wanted Ishida’s face to not have a natural expression.
This also develops Shiunji’s character a little, beyond the fact that he likes dead people. I liked the idea that he’s a romantic, and romancing a dead body adds a touch of irony, I think. It’s bad enough that Shiunji’s messed up enough to dig up a body and stuff it, it’s worse that he carries it arround and does romantic things with it, like it was alive again. Shiunji using a romantic cliche in these situation always makes for a good punchline.
In the last panel, I used real screentone. Instead of toning the actual artwork, I scanned the screentone and CGed it in and faded it.
Eh are you thinking of “Collection Completed” from Tales from the Crypt where the guy snuffs and stuffs all of his wife’s pets animals and then she snuffs and stuff him?
It could be, it was decades ago when I saw it.
A true friend would be supportive.