It was sad that Deadmouse, its author, cut things off, but i can venture a guess at the main reason behind the decision. Ballad, in its very scope and detail, probably became too much to handle. Every facet gained a life of its own, every episode unfolded into a separate story. Retying so many threads to continue the tale coherently seems like the work of a lifetime. Already, before its untimely end, the artwork was showing signs of fatigue, getting slightly sketchier. The complaints over the hand-lettering alone must've been more of a headache than it seemed worth.
Still, it's in the nature of many comics, sequential as they are, to be eternally unfinishable. Even without knowing the over-arching purpose of Ballad's second life and the role of anarchy under the rule of Lord Bogg, the imagery of the existing episodes is enjoyable in itself. I suppose it helps that as one whose own thinking tends toward the chaotic, i can appreciate a good scatter-plot.
I do hope at some point to figure out what a Drake worm actually is, though.
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Edit: 2016/01/28
Ballad has been offline for a year or two now. Both moderntales and deadmouse.net are down. It was partly captured by the Wayback Machine, luckily. In another decade this little omage might get another few hits and I might just decide to post all I have saved of the comic. It deserves to be seen. For now, here's just one random page, reposted completely without permission, but with the best of intentions.
Thank you for the lovely work, Deadmouse, whoever and wherever you are.
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edit 2025/06/18
I've uploaded all my saved images to this folder. Hopefully the link is valid. I tried keeping the original publication order, including a few inter-chapter illustrations. Enjoy, closure and all.
Hi! Could you post the pages you have saved? I remember following the Cakes for Tea chapter, and then the sites went offline );
ReplyDeletethanks!
That picnic chapter (where the bully gets gobbled?) was pretty much the end of it I think. The comic had a short (if memorable) run. Sadly, my old images are on a hard drive with a now broken read head. So until I take that in for service or Do It Myself I don't practically have them. Wrath of old father time and all that. And anyway, I'd give the author a couple more years to decide to repost them somewhere.
DeleteI've been looking for the end of the comic for so long and it makes me happy to see others are as well. I have a tattoo of the arm-head librarian and several items with the seven-point star and drake worms. I hope one day that drive gets repaired and you're able to post the images.
DeleteHi Ness Kono, someone posted in a obscure forum some parts. There is 4 chapters: 1 Ballad, 2 Cakes for Tea, 3 Ballad And The Marine Library of She'lotith and 4 Picnic In The Park (sadly only 3 pages)
DeleteI posted these backups on imgur, you can find searching for "Ballad webcomic by deadmouse"
just stumbled by your post and stopping by to say thank you :)
ReplyDelete