In a galaxy far, far away…
Banished returns.
For me, this was unexpected.
It is not that I thought poorly of Banished in any way. It was an enjoyable comic, sure. It had a good sense of humor and was developing into an interesting story.
But the artist left. And while that isn’t a guaranteed deathknell for a comic… well, I’ve seen too many fall by the wayside. Rising from the ashes is the exception, not the norm.
Banished seems to have pulled it off.
Now, there is only one strip by the new artist thus far. We’ve yet to see if they can maintain a solid schedule, etc. But that one comic… damn, but it is promising.
Previously the strip has been more of a gag comic than anything else. The art was very cartoony, which worked perfectly. Freaky aliens, silly robots, even mammazons – the strip was clearly driven by laughs.
Over time, though, story began to develop. And with the emergence of the new artist, it looks like the story will have the chance to shine. The new art is really, really forceful. Before, the cartoony looks helped convey the jokes and punchlines of the strip – now, while the laughs are still around, there is instantly a much more powerful sense of action and drama.
Making that change can be good and can be bad, but with this one strip, I’ve got high hopes about what is coming. That in itself is pretty promising.
Dancing with the Devil
Ok – I’ll admit I was rather dubious when the latest PvP storyline seemed to be an arbitrary strike against those who weren’t entirely happy with Skull’s voice in the upcoming PvP animated shorts. Grinding the point into the ground… well, it seemed to be doing the very thing that Kris Straub spoke out against not long ago.
Kurtz wants to use a high-pitched voice for Skull. That’s how he views the character, it’s his property and his show, so no problem – that’s his call to make. Of course, he shouldn’t be angry at fans for giving their honest opinions on the topic – they are entirely able to feel however they want about it, and certainly free to not spend the relatively insane price of purchase if they don’t want to. Regardless of which side you are on, it’s not worth continuing to beat the topic to death – which is what I was afraid Kurtz was doing in this sequence.
But while the first strip or two seemed along those lines, I was pleased to realize that wasn’t entirely the case. Kurtz has taken the topic and run with it, with some very funny results. But more than that, I realized what was actually going on.
See, one of the worries about this just being a grudge-fest on Kurtz’s part is that it would be meaningless to the majority of readers. If they didn’t watch the animated PvP teaser – or if they did so, but didn’t pay any attention to the discussions that sprung up regarding it – some of the strips just would have neither point nor punchline.
But what Kurtz is doing is establishing Skull’s voice within the story. Readers generally have to invent within their own minds how each character sounds. Given that this is a character that clearly engenders all manner of different possible voices… Kurtz is putting his view of the character clearly in the story.
This way readers who have read through this arc won’t be as startled if they go on to watch the tv series. More than that, it allows Kurtz to flesh out details of the world that normally he can’t convey on paper.
So I’m ok with that. I’m hoping the storyline doesn’t feel the need to make any more low blows at those who originally imagined Skull’s voice different than Kurtz did, because attacking a loyal fanbase over such an irrelevant detail is… well, let’s just say that Kurtz has spoken out against other webcomic creators who have acted like that, and here is his chance to prove he is better than them.
In other news, given that I realize that I’ve had a lot of posts on the same strips of late, I’m making an on-the-spot, Third-Tuesday-Afternoon-of-January Resolution to spend the next few weeks focusing on new comics, or ones that have fallen by the wayside. So if Kurtz does descend into rampant villainry, or if the current Sluggy storyline proves to be as inane as it looks to be, you won’t hear about it from me!
I’m Back!
When Randy first introduced the little blue… thing… during some of the holiday filler at Something*Positive, I was officially horrified. Despite the desensitization of the modern age, I finally had found something in a webcomic that seriously made my skin crawl.
But it was just filler, right? I can live with that.
When he mentioned he had a way to work it in as a ongoing cast member, I again felt that feeling of absolute dread sinking into my stomach. S*P has some odd characters, but Choo-Choo Bear and Pepito – even Twitchy-Hug – managed to work within the confines of the strip. And I couldn’t for the life of me think of any possible way the blue thing could be worked in without entirely disrupting the strip. I pondered, with no avail, what possible bribe I could offer to keep this monstrosity from appearing.
I should have known better than to doubt. It’s in the strip… and it works perfectly.
Nothing Special
Starting off the new year sick has not been the best experience to me, and refreshed me on exactly why I dislike the common cold. Despite thinking I was just about over it, it decided to hit me for one last day of ‘fun’.
So no rants or insights today, I’m afraid. Instead, I’ll just share that my day was fortunately improved by the unexpected (at least by me) return of CRFH, along with noticing the eerie similarities between today’s Sam and Fuzzy and Something Positive strips. How about that, eh? Coincidence or conspiracy, the world may never know.
Second Looks
Websnark is back, in force. Websnark is the grand-daddy of webcomic blogs, but I’m pretty sure everyone already knows that. The esteemable Eric Burns has set a challenge for himself in 2007, and set out to accomplish a certain amount of writing by the end of the year. Towards this writing, he’ll be endeavering to post daily on Websnark.
I’m pretty pleased to see this for a number of reasons. One, my own webcomic blog was inspired largely by Websnark. Two, the final motivation for actually starting it was to give myself something to keep me actively writing day in and day out. And three – well, let’s face it, he writes some damn powerful stuff.
Already worth checking out is his final tribute to Narbonic, which says it better than I ever could.
I’m confident he doesn’t need the plug, but for those who weren’t aware of his resurgence, I figure it can’t hurt to mention it.
The Webcomicker is launching similarly forward with a hefty goal of a post for every single day in the year – and has brought back his webcomic, Birdsworth, as well.
While I don’t have any such lofty ambitions for my own blog, I do have some big ideas in store for the coming year. More will be revealed in time!
Moving on to other topics – I’ve got to give props to Questionable Content for some strips earlier this week. After suddenly (and skillfully) making Ellen into a villain a little while ago, he equally skillfully has rendered her human again. Despite being let-down by a lot of the other storylines in the strip of late, J.J. has done this little exchange extremely well, and I have to give him credit for that.
And finally, Scott Kurtz seems to be continuing his recent trend of stealing material from Tim Buckley, as he suddenly has his characters launching their own winter gaming holidays (complete with bizarre holiday outfit) in eerie similarity to Ctrl+Alt+Del’s Winter-een-mas.
Which, let me clarify, I don’t find despicable for its own sake. Stealing ideas you like from other sources is a long honored tradition in pretty much all forms of creative work, and there isn’t anything inherently wrong with that.
The problem is that Kurtz has spent so much time lambasting Ctrl+Alt+Del for just that – being a rip-off of PvP and Penny Arcade. Taking their ideas and somehow finding success with it. Kurtz has ripped into Buckley time and time again for this very thing. I simply find it rather… ironic that Kurtz is now doing the exact same thing. The plagiarism is fine – the hypocrisy, a little less so.
I’m sure Kurtz would give the same defense he gave when he launched the Animated PvP Series – namely that even if he was doing the same thing as Ctrl+Alt+Del, he was doing it better, funnier and with more quality than Buckley ever did. While I don’t believe that renders the hypocrisy null, I can’t deny the truth of it – I’ve generally flinched when I saw a new Winter-een-mass storyline, whereas this last week of PvP has been one of the funniest I have ever read.
So I can’t deny having enjoyed this storyline. I just hope that, after all this, Kurtz will at least ignore Buckley, rather than continue accusing him of ripping off other artists.
Oh, and a final disclaimer – I’m not saying all this in defense of Tim Buckley. Even if he’s behaved himself in recent drama this year, and regardless of his comic’s quality or lack thereof, his actions in the past have still rendered him, in my eyes, the vilest webcartoonist I know of.
Rather, I’m simply taken aback by Kurtz’s actions after his rants in the past. It seems a strange note on which to start the new year, but I suppose if Brent can do it, then so can he.
The Future is Now
A little while back Kris Straud (the webcomic tactician behind Starslip Crisis) started Halfpixel.com, a site devoted to “disposable internet humor.” As far as I can tell, it is designed to give Kris a chance to experiment with spontaneous new comics without having to create a new site for each one – as well as all manner of other humor and thoughts as well.
And hey, that’s cool – it’s something between a webcomic artist’s blog and a new comic itself, and is both handy at peaking into his deranged mind and enjoying some random funny on the side.
But what makes the site really awesome is that you can use it too. Users can submit their own posts, and if he likes them, he puts them up. That’s wicked cool. I imagine there are a lot of funny people on the internet, and quite a few of them are part of the webcomic crowd. And quite a few of those don’t have the time to make their own daily comic – but will be able to produce some real gems on a site like this.
It gets even better, too. One of the funny little strips he came up with on the site is Time Friends. Each strip of Time Friends has the same art as the others, but with the joke and punchlines changed. Very similar to many other fixed-art webcomics out there, though few of those were quite as gag-oriented, and tended to thrive more on their own wordiness. (Which is not to say that is a bad thing.)
But Straub’s little strip was quick and easy. So easy that everyone could pop their own words in, and could make their own Time Friends strips. Heck, they didn’t even need to photoshop the strip (though plenty did), but simply post the four or so phrases the comic would consist of. And when Straub saw these goings on… well, at first he was less then pleased at seeing others honing in on his field. After some thought, however, his generous nature won out, and he not only accepted it, he embraced the idea with the Time Friends Maker.
Enjoy.
Happy Birthday, Something Positive.
In the Comixpedia End of 2006 Roundtable, Something Positive’s Death of Faye storyline was mentioned as one of the top webcomic storylines this past year.Mike had a kid.
Jason and Aubrey got married.
And we saw the Fall of Kharisma which I discussed on a handful of occasions.
All those things right there – that’s enough to make a good year. That’s a ton of change. That’s a ton of development – some development’s more meaningful than others.
But Randy, apparently, isn’t so easily satisfied.
He traditionally ends each year of Something Positive with a significant moment. The first three years ended with darkness and depression. Year four ended with a ray of hope.
Year five is ending with a very intense moment, yes – but it isn’t like all the other endings. It’s not actually outright good or bad. Once you get past the sheer shock of it, ask yourself – what exactly does this mean for Davan?
Remember, we’re talking about Davan, who has been drifting through life since the strip began. He has gone from one relationship to another, most ending badly – and even the ones that didn’t end badly still ended. His latest relationship has been casual sex with Kim (which seems pretty clearly to be nothing more than that). He is moving back home to Texas out of a sense of familial obligation.
And now he has a kid.
More than that – he now has had a kid for the past three years, one that has been growing up without him. That’s a bit to take in, yeah? I’m sure Donna had her reasons (whether good ones or not), and I’m sure that Davan is likely to not hold the lapse against her – and feel that sense of familial obligation weighing down on him once again.
Still, speculation about Donna’s situation and how much Davan will interact in his son’s life… well, we’ll see where that goes. I’m not going to hazard too many guesses without knowing enough about Donna (though it seems likely she will need Davan’s help, though seems unlikely to demand – or possibly even ask – for it.)
But you know who this really leaves me wondering about?
PeeJee.
A year ago, PeeJee was alone and filled with despair. We’ve all been there – though she was lucky enough to have a friend to show up and remind her that she was loved.
A year later, and she’s alone again.
Well, not alone. She’s got Choo-Choo Bear. She’s not confined to a hospital, and has friends she can visit nearby.
But she doesn’t have Davan.
Does she love Davan? Well, duh – they’ve been friends for years. The two of them, and Aubrey, are bound by ties as close as they get.
But does she love Davan?
That’s a hard question. He’s been there for her through thick and thin, more than any other. He moved to Boston for her sake, and now she’s moving back to Texas for him.
And look at how many of their friends have paired off or left the picture in the last few years… Aubrey and Jason, Monette… even Mike has found a family.
Family. Back to that word again. A general perusal of S*P would indicate that Davan would probably be the last man to want kids, to have to deal with children, to be a ‘father figure.’
But… Davan’s a decent guy, at heart. Angry, bitter, and fed up with the stupidity of the world? Sure, more often than not. But you can’t forget that he was raised by the best. You think that with the example of his parents, there’s even the slightest chance that Davan wouldn’t make a good father?
Now he has a son… and we still haven’t determined just how fully PeeJee cares for him. Her own family… oh, it’s a good one, but while Davan’s family in many ways was a haven against the bitterness the world instilled in him, her own presented it’s own share of turmoil. And let’s not forget that her track record with relationships seems even worse than Davan’s. He at least had Branwen. I don’t know if PeeJee’s ever had someone get truly close to her.
Except for Aubrey, who has now gotten married.
And except for Davan, who is off in Texas, and suddenly has a son.
Regardless of how she loves him or not, PeeJee suddenly is very much in danger of being alone. Well and truly alone. She isn’t at her darkest moment, like she was a year ago. She is simply sitting there, in the middle of her life… and she’s still alone.
You know how earlier I said that the ending of Year Five of S*P was different from the others, because it wasn’t actually outright good or bad, just momentous? Yeah, not quite true.
I’ve got the sneaking suspicion it will be good for some people… and potentially very bad for certain others. We’ll find out next year.
I know that I’ll be watching.
On Bats and Bones and Many Things
I had meant to comment yesterday on the appearance of a familiar face in Scary Go Round, but… well, let’s just say that dodging falling meteorites would have been a less harrowing ordeal than some of the chaos that ambushed me.
But aside from assuring us that the inimitable Rich Tweedy hadn’t simply just ceased to exist, we only had a moment’s glimpse at the blast from the past – and today we’re dealing with far more urgent affairs.
Still, as interesting as the current storyline is (the return of the inimitable Ryan Beckwith! Troubled times for Tim and Riley! Friend Bat is dead; long live Comrade Bat!), that glance back at the days of Bobbins did bring out a certain nostalgia.
Scary Go Round is one of several comics that I still think of as new, solely because I was around when they began. Of course, by now, it’s actually been around for four years, and almost as large as it’s predecessor. It is also sometimes hard to keep track of time in Mr. John Allison’s works due to the very structure of them, and the fact that he bounces from one set of characters to the next with abandon.
Scary Go Round represents a number of curious contradictions in my eyes. Allison doesn’t really like jokes, persay – but that doesn’t mean it isn’t funny. Humorous dialogue and scenes are as fundamental to the strip as anything else, and Allison shows that his comic can make you laugh at every panel without worrying about setting up punchlines.
Similarly, the plot tends to lack a central focus, and instead have any number of ongoing threads that it jumps to and from at any given time. When the strip started, the focus was a bit tighter than it had been with Bobbins. But over time it’s return to a similar style, and while a more polished work in general, it still seems to move from scene to scene at it’s creator’s whimsy.
Which isn’t a bad thing, mind you. Whimsy is what makes Scary Go Round… er, go round. Allison has never feared change in his comic. He often experiments with new art styles, ditches some characters and focuses on others, and occasionally even kills characters off… even if they equally occasionally come back. And despite the fact he doesn’t simply stick to a single tried and true formula, he’s one of the fortunate few making a living from his comic.
That certainly says a lot to me.
Addendum: Check out Saturday’s post, now that I’ve gotten around to realizing I only posted half of it.
Two Funny Guys
Today is the last day of Bikini Suicide Frisbee Days.It is strange to mourn it’s passing, for it isn’t the end of a webcomic, merely the end of guest filler in a webcomic. Of course, most guest strips are brief things, not weekly reoccurences – nor of they as supremely well done as BSFD.
Clay Yount, one of the geniuses behind Rob and Elliot, was able to perfectly capture the essence of classic Sluggy Freelance. Doing that in a single guest strip is hard – doing it week after week takes skill.
It helps that it isn’t too great a leap from the friendship and wackiness of Rob and Elliot to that of Torg and Riff – but at the same time, he managed to use the similarities without just writing a Rob and Elliot comic with a few names changed.
The previous guest-strip maker on Sluggy Freelance gave us Meanwhile, In the Dimension of Pain… which, let’s face it, just didn’t work. I have nothing against McDonald, but he just had a different brand of humor, and a different style of art, that just couldn’t quite do the job. It is nothing I would hold against him – after all, I don’t expect perfection from most guest strips I see – but it meant I skipped every Saturday strip as hastily as I could.
But Bikini Suicide Frisbee Days? They didn’t just work, they worked well. And at times, I even found myself as eager – if not more – for them as for some of the currently running Sluggy storylines.
Lately Sluggy has had my interest again, but I’ll be honest – I like seeing Torg and Riff around again, but just seeing them wandering around acting like the idiots they were in the good old days just doesn’t work. They’ve been through too much (Torg especially), and while I understand that they themselves want nothing more than to go back to being carefree and silly… it still rings a little false. It doesn’t drive me away from the strip, mind you – but it doesn’t do much for me, either.
We’re waiting for the more momentous events, these days. I know that Pete wants to preserve the humor that the strip was founded on, rather than just run with the more serious storylines it has built up to… but it is already past that stage. Does this mean the comic should abandon humor entirely? No way, certainly not!
But it needs to place the humor within the current setting it has grown into. Bikini Suicide Frisbee Days work because they were outside of continuity, set in the past, set in that atmosphere that really was just about random amusement.
The Bikini Suicide Frisbee days are long past in the main storyline, however – and now they’ve come to a close for a second time.
It is no small act that Clay Yount has managed to create a series of guest strips of such quality that people are sad to see it go. Rob and Elliot is slowing it’s weekly activity as well, due to the coming of Cosmobear.
Which I currently no nothing about, but let’s face it – it’s likely to be just as good as the rest of their works, and I’m sure I’ll be there in two weeks to take in the laughs when it is released.
All the pieces fall into place…
I read this week’s Perry Bible Fellowship, and somehow forgot which comic I was reading. I managed to finish the strip, thinking, “Aw, gee, this week’s PBF was actually nice and happy, with the kid using his gaming skillz to clean his room in a new and innovative way and OH MY GOD.”
Maybe it’s a sign of my boundless optimism that I didn’t immediately notice that this week’s strip was just as horribly evil as the rest of them. Maybe it’s just due to the wooziness from all the strange chemicals they dripped into my eyes during my eye exam earlier today. The world may never know!
No more to report today, but tune in tomorrow for a special Saturday post!
Damn Good Comics 