Make It Make Sense

[brigid]

9 Chickweed Lane for 11-29-2022

Nothing in the layout of this strip, of either panel, is good.

The order of dialog very much should dictate the layout here. In both panels Edda speaks, then Diane speaks, then Edda speaks, then Diane speaks. In the first panel Diane's speech bubble is further to the left than Edda's speech bubble; in the second panel the tails of their speech bubbles cross each other. This is confusing. There's no flow to these two panels, to the dialog!

There's also no reason to focus on their upper bodies (as represented by the back of someone's head and her back, and turned face and back of the other person) and then on their lower bodies.

The pacing would work so much better if they were just... strolling from left to right in both panels.

Or even, say, seated some place with their dialog over the space of one long uninterrupted panel.

If a comic strip like this isn't clear then it fails as a comic strip.

This isn't some "oh you missed a detail" or "you didn't understand a word" or "you forgot this bit of history" or "you can tell these similar characters apart by these details you overlooked."

This is a messy layout where the dialog doesn't flow because it's poorly laid out.

And it's sad. Because "You have a mother you can ask these sort of questions of; I did not and had to turn to your mother, who was helpful and kind" is interesting. It... doesn't exactly make sense why her child's former school teacher would turn to Juliette for this kind of... really intimate information and advice. But I suppose you could chalk that up to Main Character Syndrome.

But the jumbled speech bubbles, the absolutely unneeded leg shot, the complete lack of background... seeing the back of someone's head as she engages in conversation! It's poorly planned, poorly laid out, and poorly executed.

Also McEldowney apparently forgot that Edda's skirt is green and red plaid in the second panel.