I figured after the heart-pounding action last week, you kids needed some old-fashioned verbal sparring, courtesy of James and Michelle. Enjoy.

In light of two major events occurring in tandem — San Diego Comic-Con and moving into a new house — there is a 50 percent chance The Utopian will not be updated next week. I’m still hoping to finish up this fourth chapter of the story as scheduled next week (which would make a lot more sense), but we’ll see how things go. Right now, everything is up in the air and though I’m trying to get ahead of the game with this strip (one day ahead right now), I can’t guarantee anything.

On the flipside: WOW. I can’t even believe we’re already coming to the end of what will end up being the first print collection of The Utopian. Today is the three-month anniversary of the web series. That went by quickly, huh? It’s interesting to see how much the strip has developed in even that short span of time, especially visually. As I may or may not have stated when this thing started, I was very out of practice drawing before embarking on bringing this story to life. While visual art was my first talent and passion, I’ve spent the last decade focusing so much on writing, I let that “muscle” entropy. But when you see the first chapter of The Utopian put against the latest, well, it’s obvious the level of suck is generally decreasing.

Thanks so much for sticking around and don’t plan on going anywhere: Things are just getting interesting as we round the corner here.