The Etherington Brothers

It has come to my attention this morning that Lorenzo and I, although united in theme and purpose, often apply ourselves in quite a different manner. Where his day is enviably structured, mine remains adroitly chaotic. Where he is inspirationally diligent, I become distracted with stupefying ease. Wave a hobnob in my direction and all concept of prose and plot goes out the window. Sad but true.

Yet there is one aspect of the creative process to which we both adhere with unflinching, blinkered joy: the development of stories and characters that both satisfy AND subvert expectation.

To demonstrate, let's all take a look at this lovely piece of art from Tom Gauld.

This is a good list. An amusingly rendered collection of well known character types for a certain genre.
Using this as a basis Lorenzo and I would apply our unique take on just a single individual, thus:

Robin - Hmmm, I'd like to have a 'Birdman' in our next adventure but let's make sure he can't fly.
Lorenzo - Ha, he's a Penguin birdman!
Robin - No, wait, he's a penguin keeper! Who discovers that one of his charges can fly.
Lorenzo - But I'd still like him to be a BIT penguiny. Around the beak.
Robin - Yeah, sure, that goes without saying.

And there's just no distracting either of us when we're in THIS zone!

Except perhaps with a Double Decker ... or a Twix...

Robin