Surprising Octeal
English
Episode 1
Episode 1 - Transform
NSFW
5.1K views • Nov 25, 2023
A young woman named Suzanne is given an offer of a lifetime... which almost immediately gets derailed.
Episode 4
Episode 2 - Madness
NSFW
2.2K views • Jul 25, 2024
Suzanne is recovering from her transformation and receives a visit from Phin Fridman, come to explain what will start happening now that she's gained a power. Apparently, there's also another super who transformed recently...
Episode 9
Episode 3 - Limbs
1.2K views • Mar 15, 2025
The day after she's attacked, Phin chooses to inform Suzanne about why what happened, happened. With what she hears, Suzanne makes a decision that pivots her life onto an entirely new path.
Episode 12
EP 4 - Temp 1
227 views • Mar 30, 2025
Suzanne is... panicky. It's funny cus' she's not that bad at socializing when she's calm but it all goes to hell pretty quick when she's stressed.
Episode 15
EP 4 - Temp 2
208 views • Apr 09, 2025
Sometimes extroverts drive me nuts. They can be some of the worst people in the world.
That one extrovert who pops in to mellow stressful situations or manage social stuff with other people in mind though... THAT extrovert has my eternal gratitude.
Episode 21
EP 4 - Temp 4
201 views • May 03, 2025
Kim is a pretty socially open character... which makes her a great foil for the much more guarded and internal Suzanne.
Episode 24
EP 4 - Temp 5
211 views • May 22, 2025
Something of a literary trick, you can use a character's curiosity to hint at things you want your audience to pay attention to.
Episode 25
EP 4 - Temp 6
192 views • Jun 14, 2025
Most of the changes I've made for the reboot have been tiny. Mostly just line changes. One thing that has surprised me is just how much I've changed Suzanne as a character. I gained a much better understanding of her over the course of the original run. She was definitely Flanderized... but in a good way I think.
Episode 26
EP 4 - Temp 7
166 views • Jul 02, 2025
Really tried to get this release out by today as I'm about to head out to a family reunion for a week and a half. Gonna bring a sketchbook to continue working on Octeal while I'm there... which will be interesting because I've been all digital for a long time... I wonder if I'm out of practice with regular old pencil and paper.
Episode 27
EP 4 - Temp 8
160 views • Jul 23, 2025
... Heheh, I wonder if any of the folks who read the original run feel a little twinge of fear seeing Song again~
Episode 28
EP 4 - Temp 9
149 views • Aug 09, 2025
I need a break from outdoor backgrounds... what's next?... oh... indoor backgrounds!... great...
Episode 29
EP 4 - Temp 10
149 views • Aug 24, 2025
In the original run I realized the apartment building had a layout that was physically impossible purely because of a stairwell between the first and second floor and how it related to Suzanne's room (which overlooks the pool). It's not really significant but it did always kinda bug me.
Episode 30
EP 4 - Temp 11
136 views • Sep 08, 2025
I'll be editing some of these panels when the full episode comes out... somehow, I drew an very good version of forward-facing Suzanne in the third panel but abruptly lost that in later panels. Heheh...
Episode 31
EP 4 - Temp 12
144 views • Sep 16, 2025
I designed Suzanne's gills to look like sewing pins. Over time, however, I began to worry they looked like... a certain part of a woman's anatomy. I've fiddled with the design multiple times to steer away from that. It can be hard to say if this makes a difference or if anyone else even noticed as I'm usually my only critic.
Episode 32
EP 4 - Temp 13
116 views • Sep 25, 2025
Funny, I realize that this story-bead actually relies on people being familiar with the "electric jellyfish" trope. In fact, for people who aren't familiar with this trope it might actually fall flat... I wonder what those people would think in this situation?
Episode 34
EP 4 - Temp 15
161 views • Oct 14, 2025
I originally wrote Lina to be a pretty bog-standard "Valley Girl". She was very... boringly written. I pretty quickly realized I had to try a little harder with one of the main secondary characters.
Episode 35
EP 4 - Temp 16
53 views • Oct 27, 2025
Suzanne and Lina's dynamic is kind of playfully snarky. They simultaneously have very similar personalities but also extremely different priorities. In spite of -or perhaps because of- that, they settle into a comfortable friendship.
Episode 36
EP 4 - Temp 17
43 views • Nov 13, 2025
This is the longest sequence in the episode... or... maybe it is? I guess this could be considered two sequences even though it's all set inside the gym.
Episode 37
EP 4 - Temp 18
35 views • Nov 19, 2025
I actually spent a chunk of time a few days ago updating Casey's reference file to bring his iron form up to date. I kinda kept flip-flopping back and forth about how complicated I wanted to make the design. On the one hand I want it to look good and on the other I don't want to spend hours on one panel. I finally settled on some design methods that are a little more complex than my comic norm but still pretty straightforward.
EDIT: Aaaaand I put a "you" instead of a "your"... guess that's another thing on my list of things to fix before the final upload...
Episode 38
EP 4 - Temp 19
31 views • Nov 26, 2025
There was an old documentary that was about cheetahs or something, I think. The one part of it that always stuck with me, though, is a part where they talked about what would have to change about a human to make them as fast as a cheetah. That tidbit in the documentary formed a lot of what became Bianka's power.
Episode 39
EP 4 - Temp 20
23 views • Dec 03, 2025
Octeal is a four arc story, and each arc has a different prefix. "Surprising" Octeal is actually the first (I've mentioned before that the second arc will be called "Eminent Octeal"). The cast will change, sometimes dramatically, between series. Bianka is actually the only one of the trainees beside Suzanne who will return to a major role in the second series.
Episode 40
EP 4 - Temp 21
21 views • Dec 11, 2025
Knowledge (or lack of it) is something I often lean on when writing. "What does each character know?" This is a minor example of that. Suzanne hasn't put a lot of thought into human athleticism. It's not her hyper-fixation. But making a character ignorant is a useful literary technique. In "Surprising" especially I really leaned on character ignorance, but it's sprinkled all throughout Octeal.
Episode 41
EP 4 - Temp 22
13 views • Dec 20, 2025
I've been pumping out updates pretty fast for the past few months. That's... mostly because I've been unemployed (I'm fine, no need to worry, btw). This latest update was a LITTLE slower since I've been fiddling with potential side hustles, the most time consuming being an Etsy shop. It... certainly doesn't hurt that doing my weekly job search has reminded me how horrible the job market is. I'm not holding my breath that I manage to build a decent side hustle but I've got the luxury of time, so I'd at least like to try.
