πŸ’¬FAQ

STORY & CAST

Here's LB's summary for you to make of what you will:

"After a mix-up with their leases, two Lesbians, Jaden and Riley, must learn to share a small, one-bedroom apartment. Friendship, and eventually romance ensues."

I love how invested readers are in Blaire as a character, and all the speculation that has come with it.
My advice is to wait for her to actually take action, before you ask if she'll be redeemed.
I have a lot planned for Blaire as a character, so let us burn that bridge when we come to it πŸ˜‰
My main goal with LB, has always been to create the representation *I* as a lesbian wanted to see. So: lesbian romances that aren't wrapped up in femininity BS, gender ideology, or involve past hetero romances + fleshed out, deeply human female characters

Before my tumblr termination, I got a lot of asks about what readers could expect representation-wise.

"Will there be any intersex characters?

"Will there be any Jewish characters?"

"Will there be any Latino characters?"

"Will there be any disabled a characters?"

"Will there be any mentally ill/disordered characters?"

"Will there be any detransitioned characters?"

"Will there be any happily transitioned homosexual characters?" (no, fuck off)

"Will there be any feminine lesbian characters?" (no, fuck off)

While I understand, and even sympathise with the intention of questions like this, receiving them was very frustrating and disheartening. It felt as though the quantity of representation boxes I could/ would tick off was more important than the quality of my current characters, or the story I've chosen to write.

I feel like this mindset has gotten a little out of control, and tumblr is an absolute breeding ground for valuing the fact there is representation, over the quality of it.

There's a level of entitlement involved in asking this of creators, especially those of us who are single-person teams.

I am not a huge company with the finances to accurately, respectfully and satisfyingly represent every single marginalized group. And honestly, any company that tries to claim that they do do that, is probably just looking to sell you something.

I appreciate, and hold no ill-will towards the readers who have asked me this question, but don't particularly want to be asked again.

Stories are not meant to represent every experience, and that's okay. I strongly encourage anyone yearning for it, to also, BE/create the representation they want to see.

Male characters in Lease Bound only exist as vehicles to further develop the important (See: female) characters.


I have chosen to do this as direct response to the plethora of male creators who waffle out excuses for the lack of female characters in their works.  

While they try to save face, saying things like "I just don't understand women", I am honest in saying "I do not want to humanise men. There already exists countless pieces of fiction that serve as propaganda to men's humanity. I am choosing not to add to it."

This is also why I've avoided showing any positive heterosexual relationships in the story. It sets up an unrealistic expectation about what het/bi women can expect from partnering with men.

Lack of Fathers?

Some readers have expressed concern about the lack of father characters in Lease Bound... the lesbian webcomic and suggest that it is a racially motivated decision.

So I have made a chart that details every father who's appeared in Lease Bound.

You may notice it is not a high number across the board, regardless of race, and will remain as such.

(see the male character policy section again for why).
Time will absolutely tell. Stay tuned :3
Her mum, Josephine, knows her way around a set of clippers, and cuts it for her.

With regards to Jaden's emo-hair specifically, she didn't dye it, but just braided in red extensions/fabric to achieve the look.
Originally, way back in 2017 when I was still just scripting LB, I was intending the reference to be about Steven Universe, since it was very popular with gendies at the time.  

I was even gonna call it Stephen Galaxy, but then I was informed that’s apparently the nsfw tag for Stephen Universe. So had to rework it x-x   

By the time I had this scene drafted (late 2022) ,I’d seen so many examples of children cartoons informing gender identities that I figured I’d just go more generic. So you get to choose which children’s show you think it is. No wrong answers! πŸ˜‚
Lease Bound is set in Adelaide, South Australia. It takes place in the year 2017 - which is also the year I started writing it!

MAKING LEASE BOUND

I used the Australian Classification system as a guideline when picking an advisory rating for Lease Bound.

American Pie which involves a guy on-screen sticking his dick in a pie recieved an MA15+ rating. If memory serves there's female toplessness in it too, and the entire premise is a group of boys making a pact to have sex for the first time.

Twilight Breaking Dawn Part 1 involved a nongraphic sex scene. Rated M15+. Sex is discussed often throughout the film series too.

  My Hero Academia is rated anywhere from PG15 to MA15+ depending on the season of anime. It frequently sexualizes it's female characters (including minors). Puts them in revealing outfits, shows them naked/bathing, shows them being sexually assaulted by male peers, and puts them in sexually charged/suggestive situations. More recently it's manga counterpart (from which the anime is adapted) depicted a naked teenage girl on the front cover.

  I am giving these as examples as they were/are all marketed to a teenage audience. I don't necessarily agree with all these ratings, or the content of these pieces of media, but I firmly believe Lease Bound isn't MORE graphic than any of them.
On average, it takes me a week to make a page.

As a one-woman show, I wear a lot of hats. There’s many things to be done before I can even put down the first line of a page.

  Story planning - Lease Bound has an ending written, as well as some large plot points standing between now and the finish line, but there is gaps in between. I organize scene ideas into chapters. Once I'm ready to start work on that chapter, I refine all the scenes into a solid script with dialogue + actions/blocking.

  Thumbnails - Basically a tiny, grayscale version of the finished page. Written scenes are organized into pages. Sometimes this requires a lot of re-dos to make sure it flows well.

Sketching - The tiny thumbnail is stretched out to it's proper size. I create boarders, and start doing detailed sketches.

  Lineart - Sketches are lined over with a finer pen-tool, and then removed. Lots of back and forth to make sure the energy of the sketch isn't lost in crisper lines.

  Colouring - I apply flat colours, and then shading + backgrounds. I usually decide on an entire colour pallet before a chapter begins to make sure things stay consistent.

  Dialogue - Dialogue is added, and often changed to either fit in the page, or to fit better with the visuals.

  Here's a Speedpaint of the page-making process, from sketch to completion

Currently, I use Clip Studio Paint PRO - but I've done a lot of swapping and changing over the years XD

===Chapter 1 + 2 + Prologue===

Sketch+ Lineart:
Cheap pens + printer paper. Then scanned.
Colouring + Line Cleanup:
Gimp 2.6

===Chapter 3===

Sketch:
Cheap lead pencils + lined notebook i had lying around Then scanned.
Lineart + Colouring:
Gimp 2.6 (pages 0-7)
MSPAINT-XP (pages 8-19)

===Chapter 4===

Sketch+ Lineart + Colouring:
MSPAINT-XP

===Chapter 5===

8 year old tablet died. No money to fix.
Sketch+ Lineart:
cheap lead pencils + printer paper. Scanned in.
Colouring:
Dark blue craft paper, with felt pen patterns drawn onto it for texture/different levels of darkness.
Line Cleanup:
Gimp 2.6. with mouse, not tablet U_U

===Chapter 6===

Sketch+ Lineart:
cheap lead pencils + printer paper. Scanned in. (pages 0-69)
Gimp 2.8 (pages 69-98)
Colouring:
Gimp 2.8 with mouse (pages 0-31)
Gimp 2.8 with tablet (pages 31-98)

===Chapter 7 + 8===

Sketch+ Lineart + Colouring:
Gimp 2.8 with tablet.

===Chapter 9===

Sketch+ Lineart + Colouring:
Gimp 2.8 with tablet. (pages 0-14)
Clip Studio Paint Pro (pages 15-20)

===Chapter 10 (and on wards)===

Sketch+ Lineart + Colouring:
Clip Studio Paint Pro

Yes!



Both Volume 1 and 2 are now available for order again here.


On July 24th 2022, Lease Bound's first volume made it's debut in physical form. 50 copies were printed, bought and shipped out.

Yes!


I am working alongside several incredibly generous volunteers, who have offered their time to translate LB pages. It's a slow process as it's entirely free - and is secondary to continuing to get more pages out - but translation options are definitely coming in future!

Oh man I have had MANY thoughts about this. I feel like it would be incredibly fun to do!


I always get stuck in logistics though.

1) I feel like I should pay the people who lend their voices. And much like hiring on women to help produce LB, I don’t really have that income.

I don’t know how effective I’d be as a voice director so I'd be concerned about the amount of guidance I could provide to the voice actors.

I would also like to take care in casting actors that match the race of the characters and not just all white people.
I’m on the fence regarding the accuracy of accents- given Lease Bound is set in Australia and there’s lots of Aussie slang slipped in. But it's definitely a much lesser concern, and I think if it was the only thing holding me back, that it could just come down to a matter of suspension of disbelief.

It's definitely not entirely off the table, I just don't think I have the resources to pull it off right now. That said, if it's something any woman reading this would like to be in charge of, I'd be more than happy to co-operate/help in anyway I can. IE: providing blank pages without speech bubbles, giving advice on moods/tones ect.
Short Version: Woman who has made a hobby of making call-out posts, made a call-out post about me to her sizeable instagram following.

Enough of her followers reported my patreon page that I was suspended. To lift the suspension (and allow payments again) I was asked to remove "offending" content. I chose to leave the platform instead. Her harassment has continued to this day.

Long Version Here

ABOUT ME

My name is Rusty Hearts, I’m a married, Australian lesbian in my 30's.

I’ve been involved in online radical feminist/gender critical spaces since 2016, and started making Lease Bound in 2017.
I am a firm believer in action informed by theory, when it comes to radical feminism, so it felt like a no-brainer to marry this desire to do feminist action, with my passion for creating art and telling stories.

I'd also noticed a rise in homophobic trans-rhetoric in many creative circles I was running in. Most notably indie webcomics.

Suddenly, every 'lesbian webcomic' I read was actually about a heterosexual coupling. One lead a man, pretending to be female, and the other a woman pretending to be homosexual.

Worst of all the dishonesty, the sex of the man usually wouldn't be revealed right away, instead being an unwanted surprise once I got invested in the story.

So basically, I wasn’t seeing the representation for lesbians (or women in general) I wanted, so I set out to create what I wanted to see. This is why Jaden and Riley state explicitly that they’re lesbians right in the first chapter, I didn’t want any confusion or vagueness about their sexuality.

The infamous AGPgang from Chapter 3 were similarly dedicated to every piece of """lesbian""" media that pulled a β€˜surprise one of these characters is actually a be-dicked individual with she/her pronouns’ on me.

"Surprise! You thought this was just a cute lesbian romance? It is, but also there will be NO tolerance for men who call themselves lesbians. Surprise! Hope you like the taste of your own medicine <3"

And here we are 5 years later!

Didn’t find the answer you were looking for here? Feel free to submit your
question below and I’ll be happy to answer it!

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Feefles
Feefles
15 January 2024 10:44 AM

Your comic seems very inclusive on the surface, however, you very obviously only have inclusivity to part of your very own community (The LGBTQIA+ community).

You portray trans people as though they are these terrible/childish people, and even stoop to misgendering and deadnaming your own trans characters.

It is perfectly acceptable to have any opinion on trans people, but it is not okay to portray trans people in a poor light in a public comic. If you were planning on treating these characters, how I would assume you would treat an actual trans person, like myself, you may as well have never even added trans characters into your comic.

It just sends a poor message and paints you in a quite terrible light. This is however just my opinion of you, your comic, and your characters.

i ought to be asleep
i ought to be asleep
29 January 2024 12:42 PM

Hi there!
Firstly, adore the comic. I just read through it all in one night and see myself in Riley so much. My lover and I are butch4butch. I’m 100% rooting for Jail for very selfish reasons ha!

I was just wondering if there would be, in your opinion, any peace between trans individuals and us same sex attracted people? Personally, I choose to interpret the chapter with the AGPs as exactly that; they’re AGPs, and that differs from those people who have real gender-differences. Of course, I believe that regardless of where you stand, respect should be shown to peoples boundaries. I, as a female for example, would never enter a gay male bar. In the same fashion, I would expect that males do not enter female spaces and there are trans women who would agree with that. I just wish we could all be cool and live in parallels, y’know? Like how lesbians and gay dudes joke around and it’s this clear “I love u and support you and I will never be in your bed, nor do I have an interest in that” thing.


I don’t know. It’s late and I’m speaking out my arse, but im curious what u would say as a fellow lesbian artist and ex-tumblr user. btw the cotton ceiling thing is so so gross, I learnt about it from Pillar Saltt. Thank u n goodnight!

insert fake name here
insert fake name here
19 February 2024 7:31 AM

Hiya!
I absolutely love your work and have been following the comic for about a year now. It’s nice to see other lesbians who think like me.
My question is, what are your opinions on detransitioners?

I identified as female to male transgender from the ages of 14 to 18 after intense sexual trauma and not wanting to be associated with my womanhood because of it. I am now 20 years old and have accepted that I am a woman and there is no β€œcorrect” way to be one, that me embracing my femininity is not feeding into what my abusers wanted me to be.

I now reject trans ideology and see it for how incredibly flawed it is, especially when it comes to minors. I know this isn’t the story for all detransitioners, but it is mine.
What are your thoughts on that?

Conflicted and Confronted
Conflicted and Confronted
3 March 2024 11:15 AM

I saw someone asking what substantive value leasebound has without feminism and or taking pot shots at TRAs, and while I like it for those things… it got me wondering about what else there is to your story. Would you be willing to elaborate on that?

Ninten Earthbound
Ninten Earthbound
11 April 2024 6:00 AM

So is this a radical feminist comic? I came from tiktok if that’s the case let me get my nonbinary self away from this degenerative shit.

justincase
justincase
1 May 2024 1:11 PM

Hi!
I have an About You question that isn’t related to making LeaseBound if you don’t mind? Do you like playing video games at all and which ones?

DariaJones
DariaJones
1 May 2024 1:14 PM

I’m thinking about launching a GL webtoon soon but I don’t know where to host it do you have any suggestions?

Ghostsss
Ghostsss
3 May 2024 4:27 PM

I cant bring myself to say I’m quite fond of this comic, but my real question is why you chose to have Shez’s mother start off Hijabi, then become non hijabi (and assumably non-muslim, if that is your intention).

I understand that situations where immigrants will disconnect themselves from their faith when moving to a new country and away from pressures that may stifle her freedom of faith. However, as she is the first and only hijabi in the story, and seeing as you are a feminist who already excludes men, i wonder if this is a sign of your opinions on muslims and muslim women’s hijabs.

I also wonder why you chose to make the majority of the QT Alliance, the seeming bad guys of the comic, to be predominantly white. Are you trying to make a racial statement with this choice? I’m not trying to hate on your comic nor actively root on your downfall, but I fear that your comic reflects some political beliefs that can be seriously dangerous to marginalised groups like muslims.

As a fellow Australian, surely you can atleast consider giving a group of people a fair go when writing them by trying to listen and understand and if even that is hard for you, then why write them at all? Once again, no hate to you, we are both human beings who dont know eachother and probably never will, but I do genuinely want to know your perspective on this. Thankyou for your time.

Parniya’s biggest fan
Parniya’s biggest fan
3 May 2024 6:53 PM

Rusty, since you deleted your insta, is there a way to contact you privately about something?

Anonymous
Anonymous
4 May 2024 11:51 AM

Why do one of your black characters not have a dad?
As a black person it’s a harmful stereotype that we don’t have dads due to them leaving.

anon
anon
8 May 2024 4:11 AM

hello!
i began reading this comic after viewing a video on how it’s a comic ‘by terfs for terfs’. while i do not agree with how my community is displayed in the comic, i was just wondering if there’s a reason that you dislike the ‘trans idealogy’?
please delete this if it’s too personal, i was just curious especially since i think the story of this comic is compelling – just the hatefulness of this comic makes me find it difficult to enjoy it

Anonymous M.
Anonymous M.
9 May 2024 5:29 PM

Few things here. Would you consider adding any characters with mental disabilities, like autism or personality disorders, even going to the extreme of DID? And 2, if you have any advice for someone who is in a DID system who’s questioning their stances on trans identity and radical feminism vs the rest of their system, what would you suggest I do as the sole outlier? Thanks for your time.

Friendly Anon
Friendly Anon
20 May 2024 8:43 AM

Hi! I love your artstyle, I was wondering what program you use? Also, am I allowed to use your artstyle as a reference to improve my own? Thanks in advance! Also,, sorry if this is asking for spoilers, but are Blaire or Clancy getting a redemption arc? Because I love Clancy so much!!

Autism Anon
Autism Anon
21 May 2024 10:38 AM

I’m hoping this is actually submitting to the FAQ?

If I sent this to the wrong thing I’m so sorry lol. I cannot recall the page number, but around the beginning of the story, there’s a page with Riley on it that says “Trans women are women” as a repeated thought w/ text behind it about how you relate to Riley in this moment as an autistic butch lesbian.

As an autistic woman who’s also gnc, I was wondering if you’ll explore autism and how it effects lesbianism and womanhood at all though out the comic? Or, if it’s not too personal to ask, how has autism effected your experience of womanhood? Hope that was worded semi-coherently!

starry anon
starry anon
23 May 2024 4:06 PM

I wanna say that I really respect how open and firm you are about your ideologies. I don’t think it matters if I agree with them or not; all you’re doing is making a space for the kind of content you want to see. You’re not directly going on people’s pages and harassing them, you’re not spitting vitriol, you’re polite and keep your values strong whilst not pushing them on others (but not hiding them either.) That’s not something most Internet users can say they do, LGBTQ or no, so I’m glad for that.

Also, I’d like to ask your opinion on girls who attempt transition to male? Reasons, effects, etc?

I personally tend towards supporting trans people but, I think it’s important to know all the different sides of an argument. Everyone has different traumas, experiences, and beliefs; there’s reasons for people who hate cis people, who hate trans people, bla bla bla. Co-existence is completely possible, we simply need to be able to understand that others opinions don’t affect us directly….

Unlikely Fan
Unlikely Fan
1 June 2024 12:16 PM

Hi! So, this is probably going to be a weird ask to answer. I identify as transgender (I am a biological woman, and I’m not at all here to say you should perceive me as anything else), and I heard about your comic via YouTube, so I decided to give it an honest look.

I obviously disagree with many of your views, but thing is, I truly like a lot of your comic, and I actually DO agree with many points about gender that you make. I especially ADORE CH9PG4, like truly, I feel it addresses how people cannot seem to fathom that women do not have to abide by misogynistic beauty ideals to be women, and how harmful it is to assign identity to women who aren’t “feminine.”

Besides the feminist aspect of the comic, I also feel you put so much love into your characters; it’s very tangible.

All this is a long-winded way of saying: I don’t agree with a lot of your comic’s views, but I like it, and as someone who has an identity you don’t agree with, I honestly just want to learn more about your views of the world and your comic in a respectful way. Is there anyway to do an email interview with you? I would call myself a genuine fan of your work, and I just would like to ask more in a way that isn’t via askbox lol. I hope you’re having a lovely day!

Anonymous M.
Anonymous M.
20 June 2024 4:33 PM

DID Anon again. After a lot of thought and determination I’ve realized the only reason I ever agreed with TERF standpoint was actually self hatred and other internalized bullshit I’ve been dealing with, including ignoring my mental health and gender identity in favor of trying to be the “normal” one out. Sorry to say I’m definitely not a TERF, but I’m not a TIF either. Just a GNC lesbian riding the waves and figuring my shit out slowly. Thanks in some part for helping me figure this shit out.

LesbianKiwi
LesbianKiwi
15 July 2024 7:48 AM

Hiya hiya, Kiwi here to ask a question more comic related!- I know there’s another ask here asking about something similar, but I thought I’d shoot this out anyway!

As I said in another page, I’m thinking of making a lil lesbian comic of my own, heavily based on my own experiences of being just- a gay Hispanic teen- and I wanted to know if you can suggest any good sites to put them on! I’ve been at work with character designs and other dumb art stuff ever since my third-to-last comment here, and I think I put that I want my work to also be pretty gender-critical, inspired off of yours, and I haven’t found a safe site where I won’t be- yknow, crucified 😭

I’m debating just taking out all of the stuff I have in mind for it, but I really don’t want to have to do that, yknow? I have a lot of experiences with mysoginistic and homophobic TIM’S and TIF’s in the past, my experience being a ex-TIF, how the gender-stuff usually targets girls and effects people in negative ways (mentally and physically) ect ect- and I have some strong beliefs about it that I want to be able to talk about without getting too harassed about it, being- well, a m i n o r πŸ’€ I don’t want grown men in wigs sending me death and rape threats-


I’m also pretty- anti-men in general- which usually puts a huge target on girls back but bleugh, I’m proud of my beliefs and just want a safe place to put my art and vents about it all 😭

jan Sen
jan Sen
31 July 2024 10:29 AM

Hello, I’m a person also from Australia who would interested in interviewing you for some of my personal research. I was wondering where could I contact you? Keep up the work! πŸ™‚

the Billy goat
the Billy goat
18 October 2024 4:57 PM

is alexis a demigod daughter of zeus

Anonymous
Anonymous
20 October 2024 12:34 PM

Are you a vegetarian yourself? Are any other characters vegetarian besides our two favourite room mates?

Ycaro :)
Ycaro :)
25 October 2024 2:43 PM

Hi! So, I started reading LB a few months ago after seeing a video about it. Not to mention, it’s the first lesbian comic I’ve read. As a trans person (biologically female), I have to say that I don’t agree with some of your views, but I do think your art style is really cute, your characters are really interesting, but I really feel bad about how you view trans people as basically “monsters” and consequently people from your own community. I really don’t have anything against you or your work, I have a lot of respect for you as an artist and comic creator. Anyway, I hope you take this as constructive criticism, if you want to have a friendly discussion about our differences in views, I’m all ears. (also, sorry for my bad English, it’s not my first language)

No.1 leasebound hater
No.1 leasebound hater
29 November 2024 8:30 AM

Can I just say I hate everything about your work as a lesbian. You’re bootlicking those against lgbtq+ by selecting one group in your own community to hate. I bet you’d be so mad if someone made a comic where the only sliver of a plot is hating lesbians. So why is your only source of any creativity or plot hating a minority? Your “comic” is a fucking joke to your own community I mean come on, your only sense of a story is having a character being a total fucking danger to her own community. It’s just your own wet dreams about harming minorities drawn out. You’re a dangerous freak and I’m ashamed to share a community w you