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The Two Doctors Reference
Current Chapter - Prologue
Notes
Episode published on Friday 11th of January, 2008.
The two doctors have been in my repertoire of characters for quite a while now. Ralph started out as a one-off villain in one of my earlier attempts at drawing comics (comics that will never see the light of the internet, thank the gods), but being so distinctive I kept him around and actually developed him. He's now one of my favourite characters.
Gyrode was (almost) defined by Steel Nation. Obviously he's heavily inspired by one of the greatest videogame villains of all-time, and I had always wanted to do an extended parody of that type of villain. Gyrode started out as "Dr. Garodnik" (very subtle naming, I know), and then he became "Dr. Garode", and then when Steel Nation arrived I finally decided on his name - Dr. Gyrode. I entered him because I didn't know anything about what kind of character he would be, and by the end of Steel Nation he was possibly one of the most complex characters I've ever written.
I entered Steel Nation for Gyrode, really. I paired him up with Ralph because he needed someone I could rely on, and I already had a fairly complex understanding of Ralph's character.
Both characters have absurdly long names because villains need to have extravagant titles for when they introduce themselves: FACT.
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Transcript
TITLE: The pilots - the two doctors
Two mad scientists working together intending to bring a storm to the Steel Nation tournament and win, by hook or by crook.
IMAGE: The main image is an annotated picture of the two doctors, Dr. Ralph Smiffington III and Dr. Ivanovich Gregori Romani Gyrode. Ralph is a short balding ginger hunchback in a fez and Gyrode is a tall, skinny old man with a huge moutache and long silvery hair.
RALPH'S FEATURES:
- A pink fez
- An evil eye (it is yellow with a red swirl). Don't ask!
- Ralph has always suffered with a hideously huge hump on his back, and thus has to modify labcoats to fit him specially
GYRODE'S FEATURES:
- Gyrode's huge moustache is his pride and joy
- Gyrode's long, silvery locks. It may all just be an ornate wig (it isn't, though!)
RALPH'S BIO:
Ralph Smiffington the Third hails from a wealthy family of philanthropists, and his official occupation is that of "International Supercriminal" (obviously he's suffering from a generational gap). Saying that, all of his schemes for world domination and holding the world to ransom are all very contrived and, on the occasions where he isn't foiled by the authorities, there's often some oversight in the plan that he's forgotten which will often foil his scheme (he's self-foiling!). However, despite his awful success rate, Ralph's strength lies in his determination and what he lacks in intelligence and strength he makes up for in sheer dastardly underhandedness. Don't turn your back on Ralph, that's for damn sure.
Ralph's specialty is oversized weaponry (all those heat rays and laser beams he's threatened the world with, after a while it all becomes a hobby), so he will be in charge of the Deathbot's armaments.
GYRODE'S BIO:
Dr. Gyrode used to be a KGB scientist (because let's face it, if you're a mad scientist and living in Russia, the KGB will get ahold of you pretty damn quickly). From an early age he always demonstrated a talent for mechanics and. by the age of twelve, he had constructed his first fully-functioning clockwork automaton. After escaping from the KGB and his critics in Russia at the age of 32, he fled to England to further his research on "organic batteries".
Now in his mid-fifties, Dr. Gyrode spends most of his time tinkering with mechanics, trying to conceive the "perfect" mecha. His imagination is only ever hampered by his skill, as his creations are often monstrous contraptions welded together haphazardly out of whatever he can get his hands on. Being more familiar with mecha technology than his colleague Dr. Smiffington, his role of the duo is to pilot the Deathbot's movement as well as looking after general maintenance.
IMAGE 2: There are a series of images labelled as showing off the "expressive duo", giving examples of them being unimpressed, shocked or surprised, and (of course) engaging in manic, evil laughter (it's a perk).