Comments on: Stay off my power lines!

Stay off my power lines!

djspicerack — Tue, 04 Feb 2003 05:10:45 -0800

It's a bird, it's a plane, It's....Major Power! Celina Utilities has come up with a comic book superhero whose job it is to keep the power flowing. His arch enemy? Squirrels. Those little tree rats are jumping on his power lines and making life generally difficult for the rest of us. And he's not happy. There are some little comic strips on this page, and a link to the artist, Dan Davis, who has a decent resume himself. Via the Wall Street Journal

By: kaibutsu

kaibutsu — Tue, 04 Feb 2003 05:40:50 -0800

Respectable, though Mr. McCloud may have a thing or two to say about adapting print comics to the web... Noone loves the scanned-page-scrolling-half-an-inch-to-get-those-last-couple-lines-of-text method.

By: Shane

Shane — Tue, 04 Feb 2003 06:13:05 -0800

"Don't worry, if I hit [an electrical line], I can just let go of the shovel." "Hey, that wire's down. Maybe I can drive over it." (Major Power intervenes.) So basically, this Major Power... he's, like, the enemy of the Darwin Awards?

By: PinkStainlessTail

PinkStainlessTail — Tue, 04 Feb 2003 06:22:30 -0800

What's fascinating about the comic book (haven't looked at the strips) is that it has very little to do with practical, hey-don't-fly-your-kite-near-the-powerlines safety tips. It's basically an old style 8 page superhero comic. Although in fairness I do now know that I shouldn't send out my army of robotic squirrels to sabotage the city's power supply. But that's okay. I'll find other uses for them.

By: furiousthought

furiousthought — Tue, 04 Feb 2003 07:21:54 -0800

Yeah, usually for jobs like that they try to fill the script with as much facts as possible and it winds up making the visuals really awkward. It's actually pretty, uh, clean for the genre. I like how Major Power apprehends the Squirrel by dumping acorns behind him as he runs away. I also like the depressing trade show pictures. So this somehow rated a mention in the Wall Street Journal's "Utilities Can't Stomach Fried Squirrel" article, I take it?

By: padraigin

padraigin — Tue, 04 Feb 2003 10:39:37 -0800

Is he any relation to Max Power?

By: eddydamascene

eddydamascene — Tue, 04 Feb 2003 11:30:27 -0800

Major Power failed to follow a basic safety rule - don't short the city's power grid with your body.

By: kliuless

kliuless — Tue, 04 Feb 2003 18:46:39 -0800

here's the wsj article, it should work... as long as those damn squirrels don't screw it up! (also there're more "rodent tails" off to the side, just insert a '_email' after the article :)