Ein- I recall you being none to pleased with the leg removal nor the machine gun replacement- ah the good ole days eh old friend? But as you rolled with it so too shall I. I know you invested alot into Reana, as I know Luthor has invested much into Lily and Bullet- and I with Tin. We do care about our characters perhaps more than most when you put several thousand hours into them. I don't expect you to understand that Spike when you have 30 or so in your stable, none too terribly developed aside from Johnson. We typically visit grievous harm upon each others battlers but to significantly alter a character or commandeer them doesn't feel right.
I feel where you're coming from- its the future and thus things done there- to Lily or to Cive- don't truly affect the character as its being done outside continuity's canon. I just wish you could have given us some kind of showdown between Bullet and Cive, a clash of titans with bikers fighting clones and a massive melee- with some banter! Thats innate to Cives character, Bullet didn't even mention his poor treatment of Lily. We never saw them reunite in the future, there was room to characterize their relationship in the future, for them to make amends and heal it or not. At the heart of this story was a family theme- Tin/Cherry and Bullet/Lily that I was hoping would be developed in the same way the mentor/protegee was addressed in 3:10 to Yuma if you're familiar. The parallels between the characters made for a nice juxtaposition of good intentioned fathering and rebellious daughter that I wish had played out better. There was a lost opportunity there just barely redeemed with Lily and Laika in the end. This conclusion however was so tangential to the plot of the first three cycles, where you had a responsibility in the final cycle to tie up all loose ends, not create a bundle of new ones. The bit with the helmet was brilliantly written I'll admit.
As for my upset over the mishandling of characters-I suppose I just would have preferred you'd handled Tin with some manner of dignity and not made him go down like a bitch- the guy has fought through hell and back with an axe.
Definitely not discounting your collaboration Luth, Pen, Ben and Five- its impressive and I'm thrilled you all worked together with us to conjure this massive and complex round, its quite a feat and I thank you for your contributions.
Artwise it is excellent, Penryn you especially strutted some impressive inks this round, you've seriously improved in your framing and characters in just a few short round and I give you props. Having guest artists granted you some time to churn out great quality pages. You even managed to develop the Valkyrie family unit, only to kill them off which was depressing.
I agree we could have communicated a bit better and certain liberties will be taken in preference of ones own characters, I had high hopes for this round because I greatly admire and respect all the creators in this round and our potential to work together to do something that hadn't been done in Arcadia before, it fell just shy of true greatness. Lessons learned for next time.