BustArtist’s grOw/cinema 2: grOwing to a Crescendo Episode 2: “Audition”

Good morning everyone,

Welcome back to There She Grows. Yesterday, I had the pleasure of accompanying the love of my life during a brief out-of-town excursion. We dined on gourmet burgers and trekked countless miles across the scorching Yokohama landscape until we found the Olympic Rings and took a few photos. Then we rode the new gondola, one news article classified it as a “city ropeway,” called the Yokohama Air Cabin. Afterwards, I grabbed a black sesame milkshake at the nearby Shake Shack, bought some craft beer, and began our trip back home.

While writing this review is not as rewarding as time spent with the lovely Mrs. Solomon G nonetheless I am happy to once again analyze BustArtist’s work. This post will examine BustArtist’s latest production, grOw/cinema 2: grOwing to a Crescendo Episode 2: “Audition.” Episode 2 was released on July 16th and consists of 68 frames, one frame shorter than the previous episode. (NOTE: For a review of that first episode check out grOw/cinema 2: grOwing to a Crescendo Episode 1: “Overture.” Additionally, you can read an interview with BustArtist here.)

The story continues on with the universe expanding with readers learning more about “resonance,” a supernatural force capable of modifying bodies, and the types of people who can interact with and tap into resonance. Those people are classified as “Accompanists,” “Conductors,” or “Performers.” Creating additional types of body-morphing people was a nice act of world building and added depth to the story. Although, enough concepts have been introduced and now they should be given room to breath. With any luck, we’ll watch resonance-powered people find creative ways to utilize their awesome abilities in future episodes.

That noted, there was already some joyous creativity at work in Episode 2, such as in the following:

There was also another frame showing our protagonist signing a contract on top of his new employer’s swollen bust! Mind you, she was also playing with his cock at the same time.

There was also a developing conflict, which was great! Hopefully, Cinema 2 gets a proper resolution to that conflict, unlike its predecessor Cinema 1. I can’t predict the future, but it appears that Cinema 1 will never be concluded and that Episode XVIII will be the last installment, unsatisfactorily stopping in the middle of the action.

In general, I really liked this comic! However, there were some minor missteps:

There were also a few minor typos:

There’s also a tendency to show readers something and at the same time tell them what they are seeing. To demonstrate, let’s look at the following and try to answer two questions: #1) Did Cadence push Harmon onto the bed? #2) Did she remove his pants?

It’s clear that Cadence shoved him onto the bed as indicated by the motion lines around his head and shoulders. Additionally, her right palm is open as we would expect if she had just pushed someone. Furthermore, Cadence is holding pants in her left hand while Harmon is no longer wearing pants. That indicates that she removed his pants. This is an illustrated story not a motion picture. So, we don’t actually see her push him back. Instead, we have to make assumptions about what happened between the visible frames.

However, playing devil’s advocate, it is possible that Harmon threw himself back onto the bed at the same time that Cadence decided to open her palm. Additionally, you might be saying to yourself, maybe Harmon himself removed his pants and then handed his pants to Cadence so she could hold them for some reason.

Personally, I find those possibilities to be implausible and not worth considering. What do other people think? Do you think it was reasonable to assume that she pushed him and pulled off his pants?

Of note, text was removed from the above image. The frame as originally published included narration at the top left:

My point is that the narration was unnecessary and a little bit insulting as it implied that readers would not understand what is happening without assistance. Maybe breast expansion fans are less intelligent and thus require explanations to follow simple stories? Personally, I don’t think that’s true.

This is not to claim that the superfluous text ruined the enjoyment. From far from it! Rather, this is merely to ask creators to have faith in their customers and let them figure out stuff on their own. That can make for a more engaging work and invite readers to pay closer attention to the artwork. (NOTE: I know what you’re thinking. “Solo, maybe you can follow the action without extra narration, but you have a 12th level intellect and a huge penis and you’re adored by millions!” That’s all true of course 😉 but still I’d argue that I’m not the only one who doesn’t want hand holding.)

Also, if I was king for a day, I’d have BustArtist hand draw the backgrounds and not just the characters. That would make for a more cohesive final product. For the most part, the computer-generated backgrounds were fine. However, sometimes the backgrounds did not mesh well with the hand-drawn characters, like in the following:

I also prefer the standard comic making method of including thought bubbles inside the frame themselves. I understand that it was a conscious choice to put text inside the “letterbox” area to avoid covering up artwork. However, there was a lot of dead space, like unusually blank walls, which could have been partially covered by dialogue without negatively effecting anything. For example, why not spice up the drab gray wall in the following frame with colored text? Alternatively, perhaps the Cinema series could be published as a slide-show type video with voice actors playing the different parts?

In general, I’d prefer if there was an option to get this episode with or without text for those customers who want to see every bit of the drawings. ZZZ’s comics used to come in Collector’s Editions which included text and no text versions and that could also work for BustArtist.

It may seem that I had a lot of gripes, but they were minor issues. Despite my nitpicking, I strongly recommend Episode 2 to breast and body expansion fans!

That’s it for today folks. Next week’s reviews will begin with a look at a CGI series from EndlessRain0110. Until then, keep growing!

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