What follows is a brief, explanatory Q&A from Sam.

How did you pick the caption to kick us off?

Knowing that it might lay the foundation for the next eight drawings, picking the first title was harder than for a single drawing. Knowing that over the next two months we were going to try to make somewhat of a cohesive story, some choices were easy. I didn’t want to do a story about Crazy Monster or Zombies, so those titles were out. I also didn’t want anything too specific, so Matt’s jar of pickles was out.

I liked many of the titles, but I decided to begin the story with a title that mentioned “beginning.”

Where does the image begin forming—with the words? An image you already had in your head?

Reading over the titles, I began to have ideas for drawings. For a few of the titles that I didn’t pick I could visualize a full drawing in my head. For the title I did pick I had the idea of two characters in a boat, so I drew that first. As I drew I could figure out the rest.