Backstory From My Old Comics: Chester's profession in the RAU history is a little shaky as I seemed to keep changing what exactly he was supposed to be for awhile. He was, originally, a traveling entertainer who played a guitar and harmonica. He was also a mechanic who built and piloted an airship. Although Chester has many talents, he's either a little bit on the dumb side, or just really childlike and naive. (He tends to start all his paragraphs with "Dude!") He is also somewhat of a "packrat" and tends to collect things. Robin Calypson is his partner and the two travel around the world together in a set of dual-airships that can lock together to form one large airship. His love for Robin is unwavering and he doesn't mind that she's half-demon at all.

Although Chester is happy most of the time, he is haunted by a tragic event in his past, which he won't talk to anyone, not even Robin, about. It was revealed later in the series that he was framed for murder in his hometown, a crime he didn't commit. Due to the corrupt law system, there was no chance for him to be found innocent, so he ran away. While Chet is usually oblivious and carefree, this incident fueled him with a sense of insecurity, and is the reason he keeps a red jacket tied around his shoulders at all times. (He doesn't want to wear it, but doesn't ever want to be without it - his own variant of a "security blanket".) He worries sometimes that Robin will leave him. He also tends to think up really ridiculous hypothetical situations and then starts worrying that they'll actually happen.

Chester's weapon is called the "Sundial", and it is a very large yo-yo. When thrown, blades come out of the yo-yo's edge. (It's similar to the thing the character Rygar uses in the Tecmo game of the same name.) He is about 20 years old.

Character Design Notes: Although Chester was still created a long time ago, he is actually one of my more "recent" characters, as he was added sometime about 3/4 into the original series along with his partner, Robin. Although I consider him a different character, he is actually somewhat of a rework of a character from the untitled preliminary episodes whose name was just "Halley". (I changed one letter in Halley to make Chester's last name.) Halley was like Chester in that he was rather dumb and goofy, but the main difference is that Halley was a police officer, not a traveling musician. There were some other aspects of Halley that I didn't like, so I just got rid of him when I started the main Image Arcane series. There were two main reasons I added Robin and Chester to Image Arcane. The first is that I was a little tired of the whole "boy meets girl" plot that was in a lot of things and wanted to do just the opposite: Have two characters who are already in a relationship show up and throw a wrench between them to test their bonds (in this case, it was the revelation of Robin's demon form and the secret in Chester's past.) The second reason is because some of the middle episodes had gotten too angsty and depressing and I thought some comedy was needed to pick things back up again. Several changes and inconsistencies in earlier versions of the Chester Hallet character include:

1. My first few drawings of Chester looked considerably different from the other versions. He looked like a direct cross between Rick Jones (one of Desiree's pirates) and Zimosa (one of the main villain characters), which gave off a creepy vibe, so I changed him. That version had a red scarf around his shoulders instead of a red jacket and a black cape, which I completely removed.

2. According to the old scripts, Chester drove a jeep-like vehicle. In the new series, I changed this to an airship so that he and Robin are now pilots. This seems to fit both their personalities and the storyline more logically.

3. This is a minor detail, but sometimes the band Chester wears in his hair changes design. Sometimes it has a red heart and other times it has an emblem that he resembles his yo-yo weapon (the Sundial).

Chester is usually dressed very casually in a simple white t-shirt, jeans, sneakersm and a peculiar red jacket tied around his shoulders. He sometimes wears pilot goggles on his head, too.

Chester in the RAU Gallery: Chester is now a student at the Grimmora University, although not a very accomplished one. He continues to work on the repairs of the Bluejay. Chester would eventually like to buy the Bluejay from Chance and become a world-traveler again. However, Robin loves her job at the University and seems as though she'd rather settle down there. Chester means well and has many good friends at the school, but his bumbling nature sometimes puts him at odds with more straight-laced characters such as Honen Calzoun and Chance Tomasaro.

First RAU Gallery Appearance: Adventures in Site Tracking #1: Of Hypocrites and Fire Eyes

This is what I used to make Chester's original RAU Gallery and Ezboard avatars.

Big group picture. From left-to-right, top row: Raymond O'Malley, Drago King (and it looks like Moonshy is behind him), Starla Wildflower, and that guy that's cut off is just a minor character. Not even sure why he's there. Bottom row: Zimosa (WTF??), Chester Hallet, Tomi Forrester, Cory McRaven (apparently cosplaying as a Final Fantasy white mage), Ulysses. Note that this is the original version of Chester Hallet that I changed for looking too much like Rick Jones and Zimosa.

   

Chester Hallet sprites

Chester Hallet notebook doodles.

"Gee, I knew it was the compact model, but I didn't expect it to be that small." (From left-to-right, that's Jack Sheen, Robin, and Chester, but I don't know who that extra set of eyeballs belong to.)

Sideview Robin and Chester sprites. This one must be older as it's a little different. His jeans are cut-offs and he appears to be wearing a red vest instead of a red jacket.