Thinking about writing lately, and about the concept of writing a grander narrative. Though the era of webcomics died, leaving many more stinking corpses than you can shake a stick at (you thought that comic was good, it sucked; the periods between uploads muddled your ability to smell the shit properly)

So, then the question is, what would I do if I was there, young and spry, with a dumb idea. Since I can't keep my desires straight for more than 4 months... we'll just ignore that. Let's focus on setting up the structure of a good story.

In my eyes, a webcomic is three elements. Any comic, actually. Those are the heart, skeleton and skin. We'll just call the heart 'soul' so we get alliteration bonus points to cash in later. These elements must work together. Without soul, a comic is lifeless and pointless. Without skin, oh dear god, people are too distracted by skeletons and you ahve to be super Ace to pull that off. Without skeleton, the art cannot meaningfully be animated by the soul.
In fact, anyone super Ace enough could remove any element, but you still need heart. A point.

The Soul (I called it heart before, I know, sush) is the theme. The core idea. The point. When someone looks into the palettes, the writing, the characters, the theme is that one shade of purple you use to shade it all. The word you use in every line. It connects, it binds, it whispers sweet thoughts into the reader's ear.

Now, the theme dictates a lot. More than whatever Genre Shortcuts you intend to employ. If the story is about silly video games, you have no Soul. Perhaps literally, but mostly figuratively. Those gag comics are fine, but even XKCD relies HEAVILY on that Skeleton to the point it's probably just a Bone Naga. He's got Soul. Somewhere. Anyway, theme.

The theme is, essentially, your point. THe moral. The takeaway. Good always winning is a classic, but you should aim higher nowadays, if you want to be serious. Otherwise, it's your spare time, go nuts. Be the best darn Soulless you can be and smile!

Okay, serious time. Theme being the point, the center, means it dictates a lot. Artstyle, writing, characters. Everything is flavored by theme, just like how your personality flavors your fashion sense, posture, etc. And perhaps your bones. In a good setting, protagonists and antagonists are reflections. They are both the same idea, but warped.

Let's take an idea. "Hard work can get you anywhere." Sweet, crisp idea. A logical villain is someone who was born with everything or a huge bonus. A good hero would be someone who has nothing.
Okay, that doesn't work. At all. For one, everyone is born with SOME advantage. Something to give, innate to themselves. Evne if its that goddamn discipline they're touting. So that kinda falls flat. And such a whiny villain is a strawman to the argument, and unless the hero's got charm, that ain't flying for long. Even Darth Vader took a minute to tell Luke about the family bloodline, despite literally being Big Scary Kill 'em Man in his faction.

So, better is to nuance it early. The hero has to work MORE. Or we take a different angle. The villain has advantages from super genes and magic goobers, on top of having money so he can buy the best trainers and gear. The hero, however, has friends and moral support. An expansive network of second opinions and Ancient Sagely Wisdom ™. Oh, that's a nice nuanced idea, ain't it? It's more about the same idea, taken from two angles.
The villain is built on highly focussed ideas. The hero is forged from many angles in many ways. The hero is tempered through struggles and humbled by their lacking social position, the villain bears no scars as he's never had a fight he had to try in.

Now, you might be tempted to write the big finale with the hero and villain being equally matched. While this is a good idea, it's also bad for this idea in specific. Think hard: the point is about Hard Work. Study and practice. Naturally, Super Genes Bad Guy is not going to be beaten by Average Genes Jen on pure muscle alone. Experience in hard fights may have given Jen something he does not: tactics. Plans. Back-ups? After all, if the villain never loses, his tactics were never forced to become flexible. He never learned that no plan survives contact with the enemy. A proper opponent that knows this well enough to never engage head on would confuse him. Call into question his training.
Oh fuck we just made the final fight about the central theme, that's exactly what we need.

Now, if Fallout taught us anything, it's that the final boss doesn't have to be a shooty bang bang situation. The final conflict may be a meeting of minds, or simple the villain falling apart as the heroes are just So Damn Good nothing he can do can result in victory. The Emperor was defeated by Luke staying true to himself by wearing white clothes and teaching Vader that you can always be a traitor even if you wear black. The whole Death Star blowing up probably means something too. Something something weakest link, I guess. I think the Ewoks muddled that message for merchandising purposes.

So yea. The big conflict doesn't have to involve fists. It usually does because Humans Like Punching. It's fast, high stakes and viceral. A good fight is dramatic because it caries Stakes and Implications. A good fight is, in reality, a meeting of minds. Where the strongest ideologue (at that time) wins. In writing,at least, in RL being a good fighter person is probably more important.

Anyway, we can just have the hero and villain talk. A screen show their crystal shatter. Perhaps the Villain was a Lie and the hero struggles to stay true to themselves? Maybe the story's about the good in our hearts. The final baddy could just be the guards holdign the gates to Evil City closed. And there, because the hero never strayed, some stupid series of events caused the guardsman to recognize him and go "oh fuck he's nice" and open the door when he shouldn't. The hero is free, showing that even the most corrupt cogs, yada yada. The point is, the final conflict pushes the Good and Bad ideas really close until the better idea wins for some reason.
Fights just look nicer though. And require less thinking.

Wasn't this about themes? Whatever, maybe'll I'll write more about proper theming. This is nice.