And we are back after a brief bout with COVID. I apologize for missing a couple of weeks and getting this page uploaded a day late. I am better than I was, but stuff piled up. Anyway, this is Volume 4 Episode 3, page 5. This page of “Ladies’ Fight” is the 380th update of the comic and our last bit with Dash, Kracker, and Dorian for a bit.
Plus, Bucketbot Ship continues to be a charming, strange turn of events for the cast. Canonically though, they’ll still be listed as Bucketbot for tagging purposes and the like, but the identity is probably going to be a bit fluid as they can shift between duties fairly easily. Just as the AI is controlling the ship’s functions, the bucket body is still wandering around doing tasks. It’s like being in two places at once… if one had an omnipresent environment form.
Cosmic Dash Updates
COVID knocked my ass out, so updates have been rare. Pile that onto a six-week course I am teaching and things got a bit messy on my end. The last update over at Silver Spiral Stories was a page from the current Nightlifers story. So if you haven’t seen it yet, now is the time. It resumes next week.
On ucketbot
Bucketbot was never intended to be anything more than a gag in the first issue of Cosmic Dash. I hadn’t really thought much beyond the fact I love ridiculous unitasker robots as a design trope. Bucketbot was originally born as a gag and a little way to “humanize” the robotic staff of Shmoofyland in the first issue, to give a little weight to what happens.
Something about him stuck, though. On a whim, I decided that Kimney’s parting gift to Dash would be the robot bucket he had in his employ for a while, and I just sort of ran with it. One of the things I thought about was that this was a robot that had been around for a pretty long time. Not as long as Blu, but long enough that maybe the robot had begun to develop something close to sentience. So, as the comic has gone on, Bucketbot has grown and developed, treated as another part of the crew and it’s been interesting to see where he goes. He’s not as inscrutable as the enigmatic Blu, but he is a bit of a wildcard because he is so vocal and has a personality and desires he can express.
I am excited about where this new development as the Ship’s AI takes him. This is, of course, something we’ve seen developing since volume 3, but it’s nice to be able to write about it a bit more. We saw how important their new role was in the previous issue.
Bonus: Enjoy some sketches of unitasker robots when I was developing the first issue of the comic. Yep, that is proto-Bucketbot!
Cosmic Dash Volume 4 Episode 3 – Page 5 Transcript
Here is the Cosmic Dash Volume 4 Episode 3 – Page 5 Transcript.
Panel One
Dorian snatches the flask away from Kracker. Dash is snickering as he watches.
Kracker: Hey!
Dorian: Don’t you have to reboot the system, Senn?
Kracker: Already on it!
Panel Two
Kracker slips *another* flask from inside his shirt. Dash is amused. Dorian is dumbfounded.
Kracker: Bucketbot –
Ship (VO): I identify as Ship, now.
Dorian: How the…
Panel Three
Kracker looks up toward the ceiling. He is unscrewing the cap from the flask.
Kracker: Right, sorry about that. Ship and I have the system rebooting.
Panel Four
Kracker takes a swig of blue alcohol from the flask, then starts to talk.
Kracker: The dataspike did a lot of damage and right now Ship needs to sort through a lot of damaged relays.
Panel Five
A view of Ship at work. His icon form is shooting eye-lasers at some sort of wound in the digital space.
Kracker: We’re looking at at least 30-something hours before I can get in there and finish the work he can’t.
Panel Six
Dash, Kracker, and Dorian glance up at the ceiling.
Ship (VO): I am sorry I am not performing faster.
Dash: You’re doing great.
Dorian: You’re doing a fantastic job for a bucket.
Kracker: Dude.
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