Introducing The Great Arcadian

Tito Adler is returning to Planet Nude’s Strips with a new monthly comic, The Great Arcadian, an ensemble comedy set inside a sprawling naturist apartment building near Pretty Beach.

The series follows residents, neighbors, and staff as their everyday lives overlap across apartments, hallways, courtyards, elevators, and the nearby beach. Rather than building toward one long plot, Tito plans to let the world grow strip by strip, introducing new characters as he goes and treating naturism as an ordinary part of the setting.

That makes The Great Arcadian a natural extension of the approach Tito explored in Unsexy Nudie Tales From Pretty Beach!, but with a broader cast and a sitcom-like structure built for recurring stories.

We asked Tito about the inspirations behind the building, how he is creating its residents, and what readers can expect as the series takes shape.

I had a few inspirations put together.

In 2003, there was a comedy from Spain I liked to watch called Aquí no hay quien viva (roughly, “No One Can Live Here”). It was about residents in a small apartment building. It had an ensemble cast, and the stories were slice-of-life stories about their lives and interactions with each other, which I enjoyed. In fact, the first episode had a tenant locked out of his apartment when he was getting ready to take a bath. The entire episode is him naked and avoiding everyone in the building until his girlfriend comes home to let him in.

I thought a naturist apartment building would make a fun setting, rather than sticking to the usual resort or campground. I also envision the building as being a walk away from Pretty Beach, like a beachfront property. So, we’re still in that universe, so to speak. I could see the characters taking a stroll there every once in a while.

The exterior is inspired by a mashup between two places: the Don CeSar hotel in St. Petersburg, Florida, sometimes known as the “Pink Palace”, and the fictional Arconia from Only Murders in the Building. I wanted the building to have the massive shape of the Arconia, with the 1920s Mediterranean design sensibilities of the Don CeSar.

As for the characters, I have been making them up as I go. I really tried to focus on diversity.

I’m just making them up as I go along. I like to draw the characters cold. It’s weird to explain, but sometimes the designs spark ideas for who they might be, what their jobs might be, or how they might relate to each other. I have fun teasing that out.

I like how they build on each other. It’s a mystery to me how things are going to unfold because I’m not really into plotting. The episodic format is fun because every new strip is an opportunity to flesh out more of the building and its residents by improvising. It feels more organic and natural to me that way.

I want stories that see naturists as ordinary neighbors and friends, like in the manner of a traditional sitcom while just happening to feature naturists as its cast. I want their problems to be everyday, relatable problems, like work, friendship, or neighborly disputes. My dream would be if a non-naturist were to read it and see that the concerns of the naturist community are the same as those of the non-naturists. 🪐