Paranatural Chapter 5 Page 223

>Thanks for reading! I've had a wild month that's not letting up and I'm about to be away from home for a week (apartment hunting! moving across the country!) but I'm going to do my best to keep the updates coming throughout. See ya next time!!

isaac is desperate to let everything out and isabel is desperate to hold everything in and both are probably impossible tasks. either way they end up hurting each other without meaning to, which is one manifestation of a theme i wanted to explore in this chapter. beneath all that, however, the two of them possibly have the most in common of any two members of the activity club. also i'M THE ALt TEXT and i'M SUUUuuUUPER WAAckY

Other urls found in this thread:

jellykitsch.tumblr.com/post/165762690766/isaac-and-isabel-are-opposite-sides-of-the-same
twitter.com/AnonBabble

But... They only touched on that once.
Briefly.
This arc, not that I'm complaining that it's actually moving forward.
This isn't establishing characters as much as 'I know you're gay, but'-ing them.

They need to just fuck already. Ed can just sit in a corner and watch.

Man, I hope wherever he's moving has good wrist doctors.

Does anyone still care about this?

What the fuck are they both going on about? I know it's been years, but I don't remember these two having any particular beef (other than Isaac being cranky that he was left out of some things). This whole rage on Isabel's side feels like it came out of nowhere.

ARRRRRGGHHHHHHH

Just fuck already!

post wrists

In this chapter, it was established that Isaac fucked up somehow. Isaac thinks THAT'S the reason they keep him out of the loop/hate him. Isabel stated (to Max) that that's not why, but Isaac has been so obsessed with knowing where he stands to the point of obsession, she's not sure she would tell him anything at this point, even if she was allowed to.

I am so tired of this fucking chapter.

How long has it been going?

Almost 3 years.

Isaac looks sexy with those eyes.

Zack is badly in need of an editor, someone who could help deal with the pacing issues that have been killing this comic since chapter 4.

I'm guessing this is supposed to be emotionally heavy. Instead I'm slightly baffled because any sort of build-up to this is buried under months of different memories. A lot of people are complaining about the drop in art quality, writing and bad paneling decisions, but it's really the pacing that's killing the comic.

Isabel is still in the wrong. Isaac is right about feeling that hes not wanted or trusted in the club, he just doesnt know the reason. The fact that everyone loves Max makes it a lot worse since its suddenly confirmed to him that its him theyre singling out for something he did, not just because he's new. The way Isaac sees it he has no chance at this point.

I remember threads from 1-2 years ago where people non ironically defended the pacing, and said that it was solely the schedule making it seem worse. They told us that in a few years on reread itd flow so much better and we'd forget about there being any pacing issues.

Even 1-2 years ago those people were a minority and most considered them merely shitposters.

I think him trying to make more pages, or rather even assuming that he needed more pages was his downfall. He should have remained concise producing few but good and meaningful pages instead of churning out literal filler.

This fucking chapter. He has thrown in
>Hitball Arc
>Isaac/Izzy Drama
>Johnny becoming a spectral slowly
>Fucking busjumping of all possible boring subplots
>Ed/Izzy Drama
>Ed/JOHNNY/MAX DRAMA
>A brainwashing Brain
>Fucking SPIES
For fuck's sake, I get Zack has a 'vision' but break this all up, the list above is 3-4 chapters worth of material

Hitball took nearly a year and it was ONLY A SMALL PART OF THIS CHAPTER. It was too long even if it was its own chapter, ffs.

My apologies, a few more.
>Teacher hunt
>A saloon scene
>Spender Drama

You forgot the lesbian date that went nowhere.

Sorry, that was tied in with the SPY PLOT, this goddamn comic.

Are we really supposed to feel sad or that this is dramatic when we've spend like 10,000 pages putzing around like fucking retards. I have a hard time even remembering the names of these characters anymore,

The worst part is over the course of this trainwreck the comic has GAINED readers and Zack has GAINED Patrons. Webcomic readers are so fucking stupid.

I normally don't like to feel elitist over this sort of thing but you're pretty much right. It's just dumb teens liking dumb shit. Like how when Homestuck got more popular there were actually people who thought Acts 1 and 2 weren't good.

I mean, I get it GAINING fans. They haven't had to wait for 2 years for a payoff in a single chapter.

>Zack has a vision

This is the strangest part for me: the plunge in coherence and pacing isn't in service of an obsession over a niche personal interest or some idiosyncratic storytelling technique. The plotline, setting, and characters are all still underdeveloped and generic as fuck but the length of this chapter alone would make you think Morrison is losing his mind over it

AAAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUGGGGHHHHHH

I like how people care so impossibly little about the comic nowadays that this thread was only posted like ten fucking hours after the actual update.

I also find it weird how Zack is gushing about their dynamic in the alt text like a teenage girl talking about her OCs on her tumblr instead of just fucking showing it in the comic. He really has gotten corrupted by that crowd.

How can you possibly even know when he actually updates with 3/4 weeks usually going pageless due to wrist implosion?

Honestly surprised that not more people are talking about this. He broke the "show, don't tell" rule for no reason whatsoever, he's gone from "hack" to embarrassingly bad. I've seen text-based stories with less blatant exposition.

Let's see here, untouched plot points since introduction
>Max can be possessed at any time, most likely by a second spirit in his head
>Johnny's got Forge
>Lefty, a ghost-hand with spectral training
>Doorman

But no, HITBALL AND DRAMA

I know people's feelings on the lesbian date and RJ's spontaneous biography and all that other shit but this has to be the worst page in recent memory to me. It's nothing but fucking staring, it flows terribly, and the only dialogue is meaningless, nonsensical whining that doesn't sound like it's coming out of a human, let alone a child.

And to think I was actually excited to reach more dramatic moments between the kids. This just feels like cardboard.

>Lightningrodgate: the mother of all dramas
>pic related, this gobshite twist
>Johnny going all homoerotic Raoul Silva for Max

He needs to plan the outline first EVEN BEFORE putting his feebly wrists on his tablet drawing the first page of that chapter.

>the two of them possibly have the most in common of any two members of the activity club
All well and good saying that. But in the last 6 years they've spent about 10 pages together. And I've never gotten even a vague hint they have anything in common. Is Izzy a secret weebo?

>"the two of them possibly have the most in common of any two members of the activity club"

>not Isaac and Max for their muggle backgrounds, related spectral powers and shared skepticism for weird higher authorities

I'm tired of this comic. It was good then turned into rambly shit. The second the art deteriorated what else did he have left? At least when the art was still good when he rambled you'd have fun backgrounds to look at and beautiful panel structure and composition.

Has Isabel even talked to Isaac much in this comic? This is ridiculous, I'm sure Zack writes as if we can all see his notes.

>I'm sure Zack writes as if we can all see his notes
He has done so for a good while now because he releases information to his following on streams and over twitter.
He has no idea what he's doing

>on streams
Like, Patreon streams? What, he dishes out future spoilers there or something? Didn't see anything worth scrutinizing on his Twitter account...

Live streams and his twitter stuff is small Q and A shit. He doesn't tell people the story but he hashes out characters, backstories and things happening in between chapters on twitter. He answers tweets like
>why did x character do y
all the time

I miss Paranatural

At this point I just want him to quit and pastebin the plot

Meanwhile on Tumblr: Gaslighting?! On my PNAT?!

jellykitsch.tumblr.com/post/165762690766/isaac-and-isabel-are-opposite-sides-of-the-same

>gaslighting
Can you explain this loser talk to me?

Those resentful, angry sex eyes?

>wanting to object to the sexualization
>stops when reminded that you've seen Rule 34 art yourself here
>cringes remembering that you posted teases to those R34 art as a cruel joke

I didnt notice because Ive forgotten most of what happened and assumed he just wrote a summary of things he already showed

Gaslighting used to mean doing something to someone and denying it constnatly to the point you make that person think theyre insane and appear non-credible to others. By this definition, yeah, Isaac is gaslit.
They really treat Isaac like shit. I think z/hack is gaslighting me because I have no idea what Isabel is talking about when she says her feelings are being ignored.

I think with this page in particular, he doesn't want to get in trouble with his SJW readers so he's just laying shit out.

Even if this doesn't really make any sense, since I have no idea what Isabel is talking about and how it relates to Isaac being the medium for a hostile spirit, which is what I thought this was about.

>Isabel is talking about when she says her feelings are being ignored
Which is an outright lie when I stop and think about it. A large part of the comic has been her talking about her feelings to people.
>her grandfather in the dojo
Max on the walk to school
>Spender in the Classroom

Can someone repost the previous page? I forgot what was said in it so this page doesn't make any sense to me, and I'm not giving Zack the hack any of my precious clicks.

Isaac broke the levies in his heart.

I've got a particular opinion about the pacing and storytelling here, and while I don't know the ulterior motive for it from a narrative perspective, it doesn't follow worth a shit.

Chapter 3 we established Isaac's distrust of his group, Chapter 4 explores it a bit more and puts it in a proper context (he's possessed by a fucking storm war spirit, loose lips) and now in Chapter 5 that all comes to a boil because he's got Uchiha blood and gets too emotional over things.

The thing is, immediately before this we saw Isaac approached by Garcia who seemed to know some shit. Then Isaac waltzes in with an evil smirk and this exchange happens where he spews his feelings because he's just never trusted and thinks they hate him for other reasons.

Everything we know about their past as friends is basically from this interaction itself and Isabel's speech earlier in the chapter on the walk to school. It's too little setup for what's meant to be an enormous emotional explosion, and if this is going to resolve anything it feels rushed. Why set up that Garcia lead-in if what he has to say wasn't immediately relevant to him snapping? Proper story structure would focus on the immediate elements and their overarching effect on underlying principles and elements.
A proper story flow would be
>Garcia tells Isaac something offscreen
>Isaac comes in guns blazing
>we get to see what Garcia said before to give context to this outburst
>the outburst is managed to be solved while the underlying trust issues established this chapter fester

Dramatically, introducing this huge issue and confronting it like this takes all the wind out of that potential plotline. We want payoff for this setup, and it hasn't been earned yet, exacerbated by the shitty schedule rationing crumbs of development to several starving plots while the audience has withered without anything to care about when focus shifts every ten pages.

>Everything we know about their past as friends is basically from this interaction itself and Isabel's speech earlier in the chapter on the walk to school.
And this page, which ironically depicts their relationship as being smooth sailing and harmless...

Also related to the off-screen action playing out: what drove Isaac to think about texting something and then actively selecting Max as his receipient, and why is that text so concerning to Max?

(I like how the recent updates have made us forget what this chapter is focused about...PNAT now is hella bloated.)

I have no idea why this is happening

that whole chapter is actually about her first period

>The Activity Club and the Insidious Infiltrator
Oh God the infiltrator is puberty. Well played Zhack. Well played.

>characters not acting super wacky, just retarded kid wacky
>friction but no melodrama
WISH WE COULD TURN BACK TIME

>The Activity Club and the Insidious Infiltrator
>Titular Insidious Infiltrator hasn't shown up for what's almost definitely over a year, possibly even two years

Tumblr is right, Isaac is being emotionally abused

>prequel updated before this chapter even reached the halfway point

>Tumblr is right
Punished Isaac can't be intentional on Zack's part either. No way that man would make fun of a kid being bullied by his only friends if he realised what he was doing.

Digits confirm that we'll have to wait 4 more years

>tediously explaining plot points in the alt text that is currently happening on the page

I haven't regularly followed this comic since it became clear this chapter was going to last five years but god fucking DAMN it Zack. Why?

I have just a little faith in him. Maybe Zack actually does have an outline and this will be setup for when he betrays them and joins with Forge, Doorman, and the Angel

Too bad Zack has to cram that up and resolve it before Isaac graduates middle school ().

Though, another part of me is doubting that route would be the end-all considering the promotional merch showing the Club doing just fine...pulling this otherwise would be marketing suicide on Zack's part.

He could easily make money by splitting the fanbase with that. Now on the Paranatural Store, #TeamIsaac shirts and pillow covers

The majority of the audience he's cultivated will side with the Women of Colour. God help us.

>ignoring the "Team Lightning Rod"-loyal minority

using the in-comic pairing name very lightly here - shipping names make me nauseous

Dear god I haven't checked back in five months and nothing has happened STILL. What's meant to be a huge emotional bit comes out as a wet fart because it was so poorly set up and because those bits were so long ago that everyone's either forgotten and they don't care. Zack, for the love of god GET ON WITH IT. ENOUGH WITH THE SIDE PLOTS.

>because it was so poorly set up

It was set up?

this is so flat and lifeless

>It's a "the comic shits on Isaac's life" episode
This poor kid can't catch a break.

...

>not a single background

I honesty want him to join the villains at his point.

Nguaaaaahhhh