#the alien species is one i made up btw they're just there for vibes

[hollis-art]

spiderman data. or interweb? idk i haven't actually figured out his name yet

his design is based on a Velvet Spider! i know very little about them, but i thought it suited him from what i learned :)

[rocketchip-comic]

Totally ok if this isn't the vibe of what you're exploring in rocket chip's world, but I'm personally really interested in how different fantasy/sci-fi societies view gender & how that relates to characters, so how does Rocket's planet view that & how does that affect Rocket's worldview, and how does Chip view it, being a robot and all? :D (I adore these two btw your art is so fun & it brightens my day to see them!!)

Ooh I like this question! It's something I've thought about a lot . (BIG DISCLAIMER: every time I mention societal stuff here I'm speaking from a VERY American lens. For our purposes we can assume Rocket is from the equivalent of America. I can't speak for anything else.)

Fun fact, if you go back far enough, my original concept for rocket and chip had them both be boys! I ended up rethinking that after going through some reevaluation of my own identity. I realized that I only made them male because that's what I mostly saw in other sci-fi stories, and I wanted to make the characters be closer to my own experiences. I'm a girl, and I like being a girl! But I don't want that to define me, y'know? I decided that the label can mean whatever I want it to mean, and whatever I'm comfortable with. So I decided it would be the same for these two!

You'll notice I refer to Rocky and Chip as girls, but I only use she/her pronouns for them outside of the actual comic. Within the story's text, I've been trying not to have them refer to each other by any gendered terms at all! And if it can't be avoided, they both use they/them. This is mostly because I want readers to come to their own conclusions, and not focus on it too much!

Rocket's planet is extremely similar to ours, just with an extremely exaggerated version of our class divide. The rich cats created a barrier around the planet to contain all of the pollution, living on top while the poor "undercrust" cats stayed underneath the shell. Their society is capitalistic to the ultimate extreme, and everyone is focused on working their way up to the top. (Very unlike the cats from earth actually!)

The cats are biologically the same as earth mammals. They're actually the least interesting aliens that appear in the comic haha they're basically just anthro cats.

But another detail that won't be explored until later, is that their society necessitates working so much that the concept of marriage and parenthood doesn't really exist. Things happen and kittens are born, but the majority of the kittens are sent off to live in schools and don't know their parents at all. This makes their view of gender kinda different. There isn't really an expectation for women to have children or be homemakers, likewise there's no expectation for men to be strong protective breadwinners. It's better in some ways, worse in others.

But generally, even though gender inequality still very much exists, gender isn't considered as big of a deal. It's also more socially acceptable to present as gender neutral. Not that they're super progressive or anything, it's just that they don't really care about it as much. Especially from Rocket's point of view. See, Rocket was always ignored a lot. She's short for her species and shies away from attention so she never really cared to express herself at all. She was never really expected to be anything but neutral though. It was less of her choice, and more a side effect of being easily overlooked and not really thinking much of herself.

The ONE thing you could consider "girly" about Rocket is that her favorite color is pink and she loves things decorated with hearts. She's a little embarrassed about that now, but over time she'll start showing it more! But it's the reason she always wears that jacket with the pink heart and trims. But even if she was a different gender she would always love pink hearts!

Now Chip's origins are still a total mystery for now! 🤫 But she genuinely did not consider gender AT ALL. I think she still hasn't. Not a thought in her head. When the alien at the recycle shop referred to her as an "it" she was not at all offended. Chip genuinely would never care what pronouns you'd use for her. For that matter, Chip's body is all doll anatomy. If she wasn't already wearing clothes when Rocket woke her up for the first time, she would prefer not to wear any. (The only reason she continues to wear clothes at all is because Rocket gets embarrassed when she doesn't. Chip thinks this is hilarious. Chip thinks the concept of sex at all is hilarious.)

Now considering all that, why does chip use she/they pronouns? Because Rocky does!!! And Rocky is so cool! It's as simple as that!

[gollancz]

#I love me some sci fi where your friends and found family are aliens#something something queer experience#But also#Love me some archaeology and ancient civilizations#Also really into 80s retro futurism#give me that good synthwave and sovietwave music#Also a big fan of people. Just people in general. I love human connections

@thefloatingstone SO for retro futurism and synthwave... CELESTIAL by M.D. Lachlan is set in an alternate space race, and the cover (nominated for Best Cover at this year's Kitschies!) is S T U N N I N G:

Makes me froth at the mouth every time I see it. It's set in the 70s, so slightly pre-synth, but STILL.

If you haven't read any of Pat Cadigan's stuff - SYNNERS and FOOLS are both part of our SFMW - she is one of the originators of the cyberpunk movement, and she is steeped in 80s cyber-futurism. We also have Philip K. Dick's DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP and William GIBSON'S NEUROMANCER which to me have a lot of 80s synth-neon-futurism ~vibes~. Something which is more Soviet themed, ROADSIDE PICNIC by the Strugatsky brothers, which was made into the film STALKER. It's set in a town beside a forbidden area known as the 'Zone', in which alien artifacts can be found, but unearthly forces are warping the world. It follows a man who quests into the Zone for contraband, and how it impacts his life.

In a spin on the ancient cultures and archaeology for SF: REVELATION SPACE by Alastair Reynolds is a space society inhabiting and exploring a world left by a long-dead alien species; as does GATEWAY by Frederik Pohl, where people can bid for a chance to fly in a space capsule left by a more sophisticated aliens culture, but they don't know how to fly them, or where they will be taken. It could be to a better life, or to certain death.

SEVEN DEVILS and SEVEN MERCIES by L.R. Lam and Elizabeth May are peak Queer Found Family experience, although no aliens feature in it. Also featured: Everyone On This Spaceship Is Gay, Token Straight Man, and Overthrowing The Government Is The Sexy Thing To Do.

The peak Found Family Are Aliens books are obviously Becky Chambers' Wayfarer series, which aren't published by us but dang they're fab. I'll keep pondering to see if I can think of any others!

General books about People Actually Being Not Bad Really and Human Connections (such a wholesome tag there, btw, it gave me warm fuzzies), obviously Peter S. Beagle can't be overlooked. In particular, we are reissuing A FINE AND PRIVATE PLACE later this year (will queue up the cover to share later because it's lovely) which is about mortality, humanity and connections, and it's just gorgeous.

A totally different vibe, but also potentially fun, is the very trippy THE THIS by Adam Roberts, which starts with the idea that human life is an endless cycle, then proposes a social media network that is implanted directly into your skull, and then things escalate, and then we have alien time war.

There's also HOPELAND by Ian McDonald, which explores a range of ideas of human connection, both bad and good, through the lenses of different relationships, world cultures, and social structures, all against the backdrop of a changing, struggling climate.

@torbooks me + you = bffs

[bitter-sweet-coffee]

no like. think about it. eclipse was created because his people were defeated and a dying species already, and they came to earth to hopefully restore the black arms SO THEY DONT FUCKING DIE LMAO??? and he doesn't instantly go apeshit like even though he was created to destroy shadow and is plagued by being made in his image aka not his own person (cough shadow cough metal sonic) but he asks shadow to join him. against his orders btw. and then tries to mind control shadow to cooperate instead of just like, y'know, killing him. basically begging for an ally.

then later on eclipse gets thrown to earth with the eggs as he literally begs to help back home (because unlike literally other black/dark arm antagonist he ACTUALLY fucking cares about his species' survival). oh then black death fucking dies and so does the eye so eclipse is furious and also hurt (very reasonable that's his dad basically?!?)

to make matters worse, in the crash landing only 4 of the hatchlings survived. 4. yeah that's a real strong generation guys like ??? he's distraught he's so relieved when he finds survivors just look:

like??? look how pure he is i'm so mad about it:

he's literally just this young dude thrown into existence to save his dying people, and then disobeys orders to try and make sure everyone he knows is safe and happy BUT THEN ALSO BEFRIENDS THE GUY HE'S SUPPOSED TO KILL NOT ONCE BUT TWICE BC HE DOES IT AGAIN LATER AND WANTS A DAMN FAMILY MEMBER??? EVEN AFTER SHADOW & CO KILLED HIS DAD???

like. some people might argue "well he still wants to harvest the earth" uh yeah because food? He'll do anything to protect his people that's not inherently wrong just help the dude by giving him a different source because using earth is all he knows? sure he's the only black arms with free will (lmao in your face shadow) but he tried to ask for shadow's help numerous times and that fucker denied him. like. SHADOW. MY DUDE. YOU ARE MAKING AN ENEMY HERE. HELP ECLIPSE RESTORE HIS (ACTUALLY BOTH OF YOUR) ENDANGERED SPECIES/ALIEN RACE WITHOUT IT HURTING ANYONE SO EVERYONE WINS???

i think shadow should have said yes but worked with eclipse to find sustainable food for the black arms that wouldn't hurt others so they could get an ally and a family member out of it. imagine eclipse ruling the black arms which restores them to full power??? AND THEN THEYRE REALLY STRONG ALLIES IN CASE OTHER THREATS COME ALONG LIKE IMAGINE SEASON 3 OF SONIC X BUT SORTA LIKE 06 WITH A VIBE OF SHADOW THE HEDGEHOG 2 WHERE AT ONE POINTS HE CALLS ON ECLIPSE (revealing the now prosperous colony) TO HELP ASSIST SONIC & CO??? AND IT WORKS???

oh my god. since they're potentially not forced to stick around earth for food they could explore the galaxies. why couldn't the black arms eventually SOS shadow because these extremely advanced aliens are wrecking their shit and stealing everything and draining them because these dudes are basically gods and shadow is like "okay i'll get help" because these godly aliens will eventually find earth. oh turns out these are the babylonians! yeah! like they found the REAL babylon (planet) not just the measly scavenger ship that crashed to earth and caused all that riders crap + gave us the babylon rogues.

why. why couldn't we have this. SEGA i'm so disappointed this is why i used to never bring up archie because while i admit i haven't reread the comics in years and thus the nostalgia and bias might have warped my memory of events... eclipse deserved better. we could have had really cool allies but instead they went with a second black arms genocide. grrrrrr