And now we finally get to Part 2 of the Finale! Now… I do understand that some readers had some issues with how I viewed the first part of the finale. I make no apologies. However, I will say that Part Two? I thought it was a pretty strong one, mainly because pretty much everything focused on what I tuned in to watch: what makes a webcomic succeed, and the potential within all the artists. Perhaps if I’d seen more episodes like this, I would’ve liked Strip Search much more.

The show starts with some lightweight banter. Gabetycho all of the sudden notice Abby’s hair, namely how it’s shorter on one side than it is on the other. Abby, who seemed very nervous in the initial episodes, is far more comfortable now with snarking back and forth with the Penny Arcade guys.

Katie, on the other hand, seems very nervous. I mentioned that she seemed a little edgy in the first part of the finale, and that continues here. I think there’s far more riding on this for her than the other two contestants. She has a current job in the animation field, but the show she was working on hadn’t been picked up for another season and there seems to be a lot of uncertainty. Still, out of the three contestants, her illustrations are easily the most polished.

At the end of the last episode, she hit a mental roadblock while she was working in Photoshop. So, rather than continue, she decided to rough it out old school with a Sharpie pen and paper. Maki is the last contestant toiling away on a computer while Abby and Katie sketch it out with pencil guildelines and thick ink. And you know what? It’s a much more interesting thing to see on video than a guy on a computer.

Gabetycho look over the submittals and remark about Abby’s natural affinity toward drawing creatures. While her style is loose, she clearly has a good grasp of anatomy. They ask her if she ever wanted to get into taxidermy, and she says she thinks about it all the time. Girl’s got moxie.

They’re less complimentary when looking at Katie’s stuff. There’s something in her comic that strike them as a teference for reference’s sake. “We don’t get to explore the idea that pop culture is a currency for kids,” say the two headed judges of doom. Katie sorta grunts in assent. I think she’s trying to make up for lost time and filing the white noise buzzing around the room for future reference.

Meanwhile, Gabetycho decide to do some weird visual gags with food. First, they eat some rotisserie chickens and egg the contestants on the moistness of it.

I was actually wondering aloud to myself where those chickens came from. My gut instinct is someone picked them up from Costco. However, there’s a sign in the back that says New York City Comic Con. Would there be Costco’s at the Convention Center? Maybe there was a street vendor outside selling rotisserie chickens? I mean, that’s a New York thing, right?

And later, the bald one puts his face in a cake.

Maki sorta disappears for a while, only being mentioned when Gabetycho start to speculate on which contestant they would’ve eaten. Maki does mention that Strip Search is good at marketing me as a character and winning would be a big reset button careerwise. But… well, given how little attention he’s been getting thus far in the finale, he shouldn’t get his hopes up.

Maybe he’d get more attention if he was more snarky like Abby? Gabetycho lampoon their early reality show baiting by asking her if anyone in the house was kissing. Abby just sorta rolls her eyes, makes a quip about falling back on old tropes, and then makes fun of her own weak attempts at being a reality show character. Clearly, Gabetycho are in love with Abby. And really, who wouldn’t be?

The clock winds down, the contestants stand together, and Gabetycho ponder their etchings.  I mean… no, not in that way.  Get your minds out of the gutters, guys!

Both Gabe and Tycho agree that the drawings that Abby put together in four hours were better than the results that came out of her studio.  They wonder if maybe she’s better when she works under a constraint.  Next is Maki’s stuff.  Gabetycho look at it in a bit of a daze.  They are clearly not big fans.  Gabe, I think, mentions that it’s ”anthropological in nature.”  I…. think that means he thinks it takes the character studies too seriously.  I have no idea why “anthropological” would be used in that context, though.

It doesn’t matter though, since, despite Gabetycho claiming that they love all three strips, the subsequent discussion is whether they should pick Abby or Katie.  Katie’s drawings were less great than her studio drawings.  However, the stuff she came out in four hours time was still pretty good.  They know that the winner’s going to be working in a studio environment, and Katie’s studio drawings were definitely up to their standards.  Abby’s, meanwhile, were not as good.

Gabetycho realized that that person they selected would have to be treated as a peer.  They wouldn’t feel confortable trying to give advice to a fellow cartoonist in the same way that they let Scott Kurtz and Kris Straub pretty much do their own thing without supervision.

And thus, Gabetycho make their decision.  The winner of Strip Search is Katie Rice.

What can I say?  She definitely deserved it.  Katie’s drawings were easily the best illustrated, which should be no surprise given her animation background.  Even after switch from computer to pen an hour into the competition, Katie’s drawings looked far more polished and dynamic than either Abby’s or Maki’s.

Thus ends the first season of Strip Search.  While I can’t say I was the biggest fan of this show, I thought that the second half of the finale was especially strong.

On Friday, July 19, at the San Diego Comic-Con, the Eisner Awards will be handed out to the best-of-the-best in the world. They will join luminaries from yesteryear such as All-Star Superman and …

Uh ….

Well, to be honest, the only reason I remembered that All-Star Superman got the award was that I just downloaded the issues on Comixology during the recent sale, and the “Eisner Award Winner” circle was on all the covers. Seriously, comics folks, if you want to have your award breathlessly mentioned in the same vein as the Oscars, you’re gonna need to do a better job of branding.

And each year, the Sugarshock-o-meter is around to select the winners. Named after its first official triumph, when, over at ComixTalk, it correctly predicted that Joss Whedon (director of Cabin In The Woods, Much Ado About Nothing, and a little passion project that some folks call The Avengers) would bring home the award after penning a little comic about an intergalactic rock band called Sugarshock.

Since then, the Sugarshock-o-meter has had an 80% accuracy record. It stumbled a little the next year after failing to predict the 2009 winner: Finder, by Carla Speed MacNeil. (The Sugarshock-o-meter foolishly predicted the winner to be Vs.) Since then, it’s been running smoothly on all gears. Sin Titulo, The Abominable Charles Christopher, and Battlepug were all solidly selected by the Sugarshock-o-meter as the eventual winners.

After priming the pump and turning over the engine by handcrank, the infernal machine at the heart of the Webcomic Overlook churned out the chances of the various candidates. Here are the results:

It Will All Hurt by Farel Dalrymple (reviewed here). A bunch of kids fight hairy zombies in a psychedelic future. It’s narrated by a cat. Chances of winning: 76%.

Ant Comic by Michael DeForge (reviewed here). This comic includes a scene where cartoony little ants fertilize a queen’s eggs with bored, resigned expressions on their faces. Chances of winning: 83%.

Our Bloodstained Roof by Ryan Andrews (reviewed here). Birds slam on the roof of a house. It’s pretty red. Chances of winning: 85%.

Oyster War by Ben Towle (reviewed here). In the dawn of the Gilded Age, oysters are gold. Which means battles between pirates with magic and Civil War subs. Chances of winning: 85%.

Which brings us to the Sugarshock-o-meter’s predection of the winner of the 2013 Best Digital Comic:

Bandette by Paul Tobin and Colleen Coover (reviewed here). It’s in France, it’s been compared to Tin Tin, and its protagonist is a girl in a mask and cape. Despite the Eisners sorta not being a friend to superheroes, I think they’ll make an exception here. Chances of winning: 95%.

Who I think should win: The one that was I most entertained by, though, was Ben Towle’s Oyster War. He’s definitely taken great care with developing the world and the character relationships, and he establishes these so deftly that it seems effortless. I also dig the old school art style. It may look like something drawn in the 1940′s, but it’s a reminder that a lot of the techniques pioneered by Cliff Sterrett, George Herriman, and E. C. Segar are just as effective (and sometimes more effective) today. It’s like uncovering a secret treasure, seeing how a lot of the classic storytelling methods have been dusted off and made fresh and new.

In other categories: Dinosaur Comic‘s Ryan North stands a very good chance of picking up the Best New Series Award for his writing in the Adventure Time comic (he’s competing directly against Bandette for the same award). He’s also up for the Best Publication for Kids Award and Best Humor Publication for the same comic. Given the sheer amount of Adventure Time fan art on the internet and dearth of, say, Baby Blues fanart, I think Mr. North has a lock in every category he’s nominated in.

Bandette‘s Colleen Coover is also up for the Best Penciller/Inker Award. She’s going up against some stone-cold masters though (which include Chris Samnee and David Aja), so I don’t really like her chances here. She might fare better in the Best Coloring department, but I think Dave Stewart’s taking this one for Batwoman. Still, if Ms. Coover manages to win the Best Digital Comic Award and a mess of other awards she’s nominated in, I think it would be quite the amazing upset for the Best Digital Comic winner (and a sign that the digital age has eclipsed the print business).

I’m kinda curious who wins the Best Comics-Related Periodical/Journalism award. After the debacle that happened to Comics Alliance earlier this year, will a sympathy vote ensure that it gets the Eisner for the first time in its existence? Awards in the past years have more or less been alternating between Comic Book Resources and The Comics Reporter. Both are represented here (though CBR’s nomination has been more focused toward its subsidiary, Robot 6).

Brigid Alverson posted on Robot 6 today that Brad Guigar is putting together a sequel for the How To Make Webcomics book entitled The Webcomics Handbook. This time, it’s without Scott Kurtz, Dave Kellett, and Kris Straub. Guigar’s new book will be based in part on Webcomics.com. Incidentally, Ms. Alverson also conducts a pretty nice interview discussion the modern state of webcomics, which is well worth reading. For example, when asked what might be less important than when the first book debuted, Guigar replies, “Comic conventions are a little less important than they were in the first book.”

Here’s a question to all you webcomic creators out there: do you generally seek out guidance when putting together your webcomic? If so, where? Is it from an online community like DeviantArt? Do you refer to the How To Make Webcomics book? Is it through seminars or art teachers? Or do you generally fly solo and let Fate, more or less, decide of your webcomic is going to be a success or not?

Even bloggers need a break now and then. The Webcomic Overlook is taking a month-long hiatus for July! I’m going to be off in another country for most of that time, and I don’t think I’ll have much time for reviews and updates until about early August. I’ll check in every so often, but until then assume I’m in that silver DC-3 going on grand adventures and whatnot.

To tide your webcomic hunger, make sure to check some of the comics in the sidebar under the “Shilled” header. (Or here if you’re viewing on a mobile device.) Or check the many other webcomic review sites available!

Hey, there. I am still on vacation, so still no regular updates. However, I thought I’d deluek for a second to share in the news that WordPress has just launched a theme specific to webcomics: Panel. As WordPress is my blogging format of choice, I’m quite happy with this news. The interface seems pretty user friendly, though I haven’t tried it out, so I wouldn’t know. Current webcomic creators using WordPress: give it a spin and drop a comment on what you think of it.

And I’m back! In the States! I probably won’t be back to regular posting for a week yet (being away for nearly a month means there’s plenty I have to catch up on in real life before I get back to writing reviews and stuff). However, it’s time to announce the winner of this year’s Eisner Award… which is pretty old news as of this posting. Hey, man, I had some jet lag and some chronic recurring illnesses to get through first. I cannot operate at the speed of the internet. More like the speed of a geriatric turtle.

So! The votes are in. The winner for the Best Digital Comic for 2013 is… DRUMROLL PLEASE…

Bandette, by Paul Tobin and Colleen Coover, the comic about a chipper thief in an red fright wig and a mask.

It is the first digital comic winner that’s downloadable only through print comic digital services such as Comixology. (Hence, it is also, not technically, a webcomic.) It was also the one predicted by the mystical formula of the Sugarshock-o-meter, which has had only one incorrect prediction since its incorporation in 2008. This makes it the most accurate predictor of Best Digital Comic winners of all time? Never mind the tiny detail that it’s the only predictor of Best Digital Comic winners of all time.

Incidentally, the Bandette win means that no webcomics won at this year’s Eisners. I mean, Ryan North won for something… but it was for a comic in the supposedly obsolete floppy format. Guess we’re going to have to wait for the Harveys for webcomics to be getting awards again.

I’ve been reading John Teti’s excellent article over at Gameological about the nature of reviewing called “Chasing The Dragon.” The article calls out Warren Spector, who posits that video games won’t gain legitimacy unless there are noted reviewers like Pauline Kael and Roger Ebert on the movie side to filter the content through tastemaking outlets. Teti counters, though, that the internet has changed much of that dynamic:

It makes more sense for the shape of the discourse to shift over time, regardless of the supposed authorities in a given moment. As art evolves, criticism changes as well, not just in its content but also in its form. Criticism ought to be (and inevitably is) more responsive than any one-size-fits-all maturation process could accommodate.

Teti points out that TV criticism, for example, didn’t take off until it was implemented in an episodic format.

That has changed in recent years as the episodic review format has taken hold online. Newspaper and magazine critics tended to check in on programs sporadically—typically during premieres—and then the conversation would end. The space constraints of print made any more intensive converage impractical. On the web, though, writers like Alan Sepinwall and Stephanie Zacharek—not to mention the staff of Television Without Pity—discovered that they could comment on TV with a frequency and depth that did justice to the episodic form.

Naturally, this got me to thinking about this site. There really are two ways of doing webcomic reviews online. Websnark, perhaps the most well known webcomic review site, follows Teti’s recommendation of episodic reviews. This site — and most other sites I’m aware of — treat each webcomic as an individual entity, assessing the whole work in one post.

But … which is right? The episodic format often demands that you stay to the same ten or so webcomics. A one-review-per-webcomic format lets you cover more, but reviews tend to get obsolete quickly.

If you read a lot of webcomic reviews, which is the type of review that you prefer to read?

(Apologies for the self-serving nature of this post. I should have a proper review up by the end of this week, by the way.)

It’s getting to be a familiar site these days to see animators flexing their creative juices in webcomics. Just about 5 years ago, it seemed like a novelty when Chris Sanders, animation director of Disney’s Lilo & Stitch, brought his verve to the little electrical screen with Kiskaloo. An actual animator! Deigning to illustrate webcomic! How about that! Man, webcomics aren’t just for bored college liberal art students with a poor grasp of MSPaint anymore!

Nowadays, it’s a little more commonplace. Katie Rice, the winner of this year’s Strip Search, to point out one of the most prominent examples, is herself an animator. I suppose it makes sense. As an animator, I’m thinking that most of the time you’re shackled to someone else’s brilliant vision… like, say, Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted. Sure, there’s some creative leeway there. Maybe suggestions on the character design. Or ideas on fun little background elements. Or animating the letters “S-E-X” in the clouds near Aladdin and Jasmine.

I, too, wanted to be an animator once.  Inspired by the Disney Renaissance of the early 90′s, I even once bought a book about how to break into the biz.  If these animators were anything like I was, I’m guessing a lot got into the field because they wanted to tell stories. Their stories. There’s a creative force gnawing inside, waiting for the day when it can be finally unleashed on the world. Something like … a crazed little demon.

Speaking of crazed little demons, that’s sort of the premise for Ava’s Demon. The webcomic was created by Michelle Czajkowski, who, as I understand it, is an animator at Dreamworks.

There’s one thing you can guarantee when there’s an animator at the helm: you’re going to get some damn good art. Ms. Czajkowski dies not disappoint.  Her character designs are a little familiar, bearing traces of the Dreamworks house style.  One of the perks of having an animator draw a webcomic is that there’s strong attention to illustrating movement.  Parts of Ava’s Demon resemble storyboards, with subsequent panels supplying the language of action. Ms. Czajkowski decided to have one page represent one panel.  The reading experience, then, is a breezy one.  I tend to linger on a page for only a few seconds, and then it’s a click to the next.  It’s definitely a much different experience than reading a standard webcomic.

(Incidentally, Ava’s Demon had a very successful Kickstarter to fund the print edition.  Congratulations are in order for Ms. Czajkowski.  However, I do wonder if this comic successfully translates on paper.  No doubt the art would still be pretty.  The pacing, though, would be something different.)

Ms. Czajkowski’s animation experience shines through in other ways.  There are points in the comic that are animated a set to music. Yup, it’s the dreaded motion comic. Now, I’ve been pretty down on motion comics before. However, I actually kinda like the ones in Ava’s Demon. Maybe it’s because these videos are well drawn and incorporate several scenes without overstaying its welcome? In any case, these videos are optional. The first time I read through Ava’s Demon, it was on my iPhone, a device that’s perfect for the single panel programs but is strongly averse to any video-embedding program not named Quicktime nor Youtube. I had to skip the Vimeo videos. While the scenes of Ava rocketing off are indeed well done, they’re not necessary to understanding the story.

The single panel format and the inclusion of video and music reminds me a lot of Homestuck, by the way. There’s even similarities in the way the story is told in the way it follows around a huge cast of characters as they go about on their own adventures that are tied clandestinely to the central story. Crap, one of the characters has candy-like horns. Is Ms. Czajkowski a Hussie fan? At least at no point did I have to put up with an absurdly long and unreadable chatlog.

Ava’s Demon features some lovely color palettes. It’s probably the comic’s strongest defining feature. Palettes are typically simple. There’s usually varying shades of one or two colors, which create the illusion of three-dimensional depth while illuminating the characters like neon lights. It starts off with the website. You know how most sites use either white or black as a background. Ava’s Demon bucks the trend by featuring a deep shade of red. (“#4d0a00″ for you color hipsters.) The color bleeds around the edges of the comic proper. It has the interesting effect of making the panel pop off the screen. An elven looking character named Gil is primarily rendered in sky blue. Another girl, Maggie, is awash in bright green and orange. Pretty much all the characters a walking bug zappers, and we are the poor moth caught in the thrall of bright shiny objects.

Pretty much the only character who seems to blend in with our maroon red background is our title character, Ava. Also, to a lesser degree, Wrathia, the demon who live inside her. At least Wrathia usually pulsates a fiery hot orange, threatening to blind the reader with her tangerine heat. Ava is often the same shade as the page itself. It occurs to me that this is probably intentional. Ava is a sad, shrinking violet. With a demon possessing her, she often exhibits embarrassing outbursts similar to Tourette’s. (Early on, she’s expelled from school and is fated to be in a Special Needs program.) Blending into the background? It’s totally a character trait.

But back to the colors. There’s another sequence that I like where the color palette is front and center. There’s a sequence when Gil shows Maggie a space Bible. It’s a little like an iPad, and a little like those glowing blue screens at the marketplace kiosks in the Mass Effect games. Czajkowski cheekily animates these panels to wiggle and flicker, a reminder that while there’s some pretty nice tech in the future, it’s not all perfect. However, my eyes were drawn on how the bright blue screen paired nicely against the red background. The color combination, as well as a brief moment that eliminates the panel borders (which, on other panels, resemble a torn out page), and, if I can be pretentious for a second, brings about a unity of form.

So yeah, I’m a pretty big fan of the art. So what about the story?

… meh.

It’s not that I hate it per se. It’s got the seeds of some sort of epic space opera with demons and robots and vengeance and Goth Lolita snipers for some reason. Why it’s everything a little boy could ever want … and more! Unfortunately, it call boils down to a very common complaint that I wish I didn’t have to make: I just did not care about the characters at all.

I think we’re supposed to sympathize with Ava. Why wouldn’t we? She’s had a pretty terrible life. The demon, Wrathia, and a mad plan to be reincarnated into a powerful warrior so she could defeat Titan, who, in this comic, is sorta God.  (Also, if one of the background images is to be trusted, Titan is apparently an EVA.)  Instead, she ends up in the body of Ava. It turns out it was a really stupid plan. That’s OK, I suppose, since at this point Wrathia is more of a comic relief character than an actual threat. She’s not even the main character in this comic, despite it being named after her.

So Ava’s had a whole life of being shunned because people just didn’t understand what she’s been going though.  It’s pretty much an allegory for the teenage years.  She should be easy to sympathize with.  And yet, I actually find it had to root for her. Oh, I don’t hate her.  She’s likable enough, in a Mickey Mouse sorta way.  But when Ava’s saying things like, “I used to dream about what it would be like if I could make friends… fall in love… what it would be like to enjoy waking up,”  I’m pulling the same grumpy face that Wrathia’s got in that same scene.  I don’t know, maybe it’s because I’m a cynical old fart now.  Or maybe it’s because Ava comes off as a total doormat who probably could’ve subdued a total doofus like Wrathia a long time ago if she had even an ounce of defiance.  Or maybe she’s a little whiny.  It makes it very hard for me to care if she ever gets her desire for “a new life.“

As for the other characters… they’re pretty.  That’s all they have going for them.  At the beginning of the story, Ava is essentially a stowaway on a ship with two other characters.  One is Maggie, who is instantly abrasive.  The other is a stuttering dude who apparently has ulterior motive that he’s told no one about, including the reader.  Neither gives us any reason to like them.  When Gil shows up, you sorta expect the blue pretty boy to be someone to care about.  Yet, he just comes across as a loopy hippie weirdo.  Granted, that’s a little more likable than the scheming green-haired girl with plant powers, but he’s too dense to be truly likable.

It’s not necessary for all characters to be cookie-cutter hero types, but there has to be some reader investment into seeing a character get closer to fulfilling his or her agenda.  It’s what hooks you into seeing a story to the end.  Ava’s Demon is an example of a webcomic I really wanted to love based on the art alone, but in the end felt ambivalent and let down because the characters didn’t interest me at all.

Rating: 3 stars (out of 5)

The Joe Shuster Awards, which goes to Canadian comics creators, were announced this week. The award for “Webcomics Creator / Créateur de Bandes Dessinées Web” have actually gone to some fairly prominent names in webcomics, such as Karl Kerschl, Cameron Stewart, and Ryan Sohmer. Lately, though, the awards seem to be focused on promoting lesser known works. Emily Carroll, for example, is a two time winner who picked up the award in 2011 and 2012.

And that seems to be the case this year. Of the list of nominees this year, the only one I recognized was Salgood Sam… and that’s mainly because I reviewed Dream Life on this site two years ago. (Whoa, has it really been that long?)

The winner of the 2013 Webcomic Creator Award goes to one Michael DeForge. Who, you ask? Well, he’s the writer of probably one of the weirdest webcomics that ever got nominated for a Best Digital Comic Award at the Eisners: Ant Comic (which I reviewed this year). While I like the comic (I gave it four stars), it’s definitely not for everyone and a YMMV sort of of thing. In any case, congratulations to Mr. DeForge and his bizarre, psychedelic webcomic.

The Shuster Award site had this to add:

Michael DeForge was born in 1987 and grew up in Ottawa and lives in Toronto, Ontario. In the few short years since he began his pamphlet-size comic book series Lose for Koyama Press, Michael DeForge has announced himself as an important new voice in alternative comics. His semi-weekly webcomic Ant Comics, which began in the fall of 2011, will be adapted into graphic novel format as Ant Colony, to be published by Montreal publisher Drawn and Quarterly in early 2014.

Nintendo video game mascot Mario Mario is no stranger to webcomics. Thanks to the crazy video game webcomic boom that gave the world the PAX video game convention, Mario has probably appeared in more webcomics than video games. Shoot, there’s probably a webcomic out there referencing Mario being created as we speak. However, there’s one aspect of the Mario universe that doesn’t get touched upon that often. You know, the one where King Koopa was evolved from dinosaurs and played by a greasy Dennis Hopper? The one where Mario and Luigi were trying to liberate a dystopian cyberpunk alternate dimension, clearly an aspect of the Mario universe that needs to be expanded upon and explored?

Why do webcomic creators always seem to cruelly ignore Mario and Luigi from the 1993 Super Mario Brothers movie?

Steven Applebaum and Ryan Hoss must be some sort of genies, because they’re making all your dreams come true with Super Mario Bros. 2: The Comic. SMB2: The Comic answers the question that has, for 20 years, been lingering on all our minds after the tantalizing sequel bait at the end of the movie: what happens to the Mario brothers after Princess Daisy returns from an alternate dimension, armed to the gills like some 90′s Image Comics superhero? This ain’t no video game run of the mill fanfic, people, as it’s mentioned that the story ideas come straight from one of the ten screenwriters from the movie. So it’s at least … one-tenthed canon, maybe?

Anyway, it involves going to another dimension which is probably the same world as the one from SMB2: the video game. And like the game, odds are Mario is going to wake up from a particularly vivid fever dream where someone, somewhere, made a webcomic sequel to the Super Mario Brothers movie.

(h/T AV Club)

I have begun a journey some years in the making.  Yes, last time I finally buckled down and started reading Act 3 of Homestuck in preparation for an upcoming review.  Now, I’m not as of this moment qualified to make a value judgment, but quite a few opinionated online denizens seem to to prefer it to the earlier Problem Sleuth (which I quite liked).  This got me to thinking: which Andrew Hussie project reigns supreme?

I’m baaacccckkkk!

It’s time once again to delve into the world of comics in the digital medium, where your eyes are bombarded not by inks and tree fibers but rather by the warm, embracing glow of an LCD monitor. There’s been a pretty big gap in my reviewing back catalogue, which for some reason includes something called Loviathan and something called Glam but for some reason doesn’t include the webcomic whose cosplayers overtook Emerald City Comic Con this year.

That’s right, readers: it’s time for yet another review of Andrew Hussie’s MS Paint Adventures: Homestuck!

Now, for those of you who are unfamiliar with Homestuck, or maybe you’ve heard about it in bits and pieces but really don’t know much about it, there’s one thing you should know right off the bat: it’s a very long webcomic. A VERY long webcomic. And deceptively so. As a result, I’m splitting this review into two segments. The first will reivew Acts 1-4, which focused mainly on the players of John, Rose, Dave, and Jade.   (I will call these four “Pesterchums.” I don’t know if that’s the official term for them, but that’s how they appear categorized in their chatlogs.)  The second will deal with Acts 5 and beyond, which seems to focus on the trolls.

Is this a fair dividing point? I think so. Back in the day (holy crap, this comic started back in 2009?) fans on the webcomic seemed to be split on how to take Act 5. The focus one trolls cause some to quit. On the other hand, trolls seems to be what maneuvered Homestuck to the big leagues. How much fan art is devoted to trolls vs. that which is devoted to the original crew? I’m guessing a million to one. As a result, my scholarlycomparison of trollspeak to Li’l Abner‘s cornpone dialects is going to have to wait until Part 2. Doesn’t that sound exciting?

… yeah, I didn’t think so either.

Up front, let me just say that I’m a pretty big fan of Hussie’s work. I love watching his ridiculous TNG Edits, which have a sense of humor that fluctuates between low key and flat out absurdity. I had fun reading Problem Sleuth (reviewed here), even during the end game when it kept going and it seemed like it would never end.

And yet… that’s probably the same reason I really haven’t manned up to read Homestuck until now. I’ve tried, mind you. I’ve picked it up from time to time, retracing my steps because I thought I may have missed something, then dropped it again. “Maybe when I have the time,” said the disaffected voice nagging in my head. For some reason, I was ambivalent toward Homestuck… and a large part of it was probably because I really liked Problem Sleuth.

Reader “MrGraves” made a very astute observation in a previous comments section that Problem Sleuth is to Homestuck as The Hobbit is to the The Lord of the Rings. This is so elegant that I could probably end this review right here.

OK… bye!

Rating: 5 stars (out of 5)

(Yeah, yeah… I know. I did this exact same joke three years ago when I did the Problem Sleuth review. But is it a repetitious joke… or is it a clue to some part of a larger tapestry that will unlock the deeper mysteries of The Webcomic Overlook?)

Back to why the analogy is so brilliant. There are fans of The Lord of the Rings who deride the childish nature of the earlier work. And then there are fans of The Hobbit who think that LotR just takes things way too seriously. While MrGraves only introduced me to that analogy days ago, the truth of the statement hit me with its power. The big reason I was apprehensive about Homestuck was … mainly because I’m a bigger fan of The Hobbit that I was of LotR. Whimsy and wonder, to me, trumps sometimes stuffy scholasticism. (Though don’t get me wrong, I do like both.)

There’s another way The Hobbit/LotR analogy works. Back during the launch of The Hobbit movie, I came across a review that pointed out that The Hobbit and LotR were the same story. Not that LotR was a continuation of The Hobbit (which is true). But that it’s the same story. Both stories have parties traveling long distances, fighting orcs/goblins in the depths of the mountains, meeting up at Elrond’s house, spend some time in a hidden elven city, and culminate in a gigantic battle between multiple armies. The difference is the way it was told. Children’s story vs. epic history. The plot of Homestuck is the same plot as Problem Sleuth, only in Tolkien overdrive.

This time, the story (at least until the end of Act 4) centers around four 13-year-olds. John is a cheerful dude who loves crappy movies and lives in a house decorated with harlequins. Rose is more morose, loves knitting, and lives in a house decorated with wizards. Dave is the cool guy, taking things in with a detached sense of irony (like his house filled with puppets and swords). Jade is sweet and seems to know a lot more than she lets on. The four of them communicate primarily through Pesterlog, which is basically instant messaging. Pesterlog will be replacing word balloons in Homestuck.

This is a big advantage that Homestuck crew has over the silent protagonists of Problem Sleuth, by the way. Pesterlog can be tediously long at times. The dialogue patterns, however, feel authentic — unlike, say, how online conversations are portrayed in pretty much every other aspect of pop culture media. Hussie has apparently spent a lot of his life in chatrooms and messageboards, because the personalities reflected in the logs should be familiar to anyone whose spent anytime online.

The Pesterlogs do a great job fleshing out each characters’ the personalities and “speech” patterns. It would be one thing if John were just a silent protagonist like the heroes from Problem Sleuth, for example. Since the comic is structured like a video game and told in second person, it would be easy to graft our own personality onto John. But, because of the Pesterlogs, John becomes his own character. He’s awkward yet likable, pleasantly goofy and loyal to friends that he can’t really see. John isn’t a stand-in for the reader. John is John.

The story starts when John and Rose decide to play a game. Not just any game: players themselves can manipulate reality. Rose, for example, can use her pointer to expand John’s house like it’s The Sims or something. The game itself seems to be a mishmash of several gaming tropes. Hussie gets a lot of comic mileage out of the vagaries of the inventory system (which remind me of the sometimes complex spell systems in the Final Fantasy games) and the goofiness of combining items (I’m not sure what he’s parodying specifically, but Dead Rising 2 does let you combine a drill with a water bucket). Battles are pretty much what you’d expect from a JRPG parody, only with that Andrew Hussie fondness for archaic (and funny-sounding) words.

Eventually it turns out that the game is bigger than it seems. Meteors fall out the sky. The earth is burned up. Swordfights are fought with puppets. Epic battle rages between living chess pieces. Portals open to different planets. And the pesterchums are contacted by trolls who are traveling backwards in time. As it goes.

I won’t talk about the trolls much yet. However, it’s pretty easy to see why fans would latch onto the concept. Well, beyond the fact that plenty of the trolls are themselves nerds with weird obsessions. (There’s a juggalo troll, for example.) The concept, though, is high-concept and heartwarming. When the kids first encounter the trolls, they can’t understand why they’re being so antagonistic and immediately dislike them. However, as the story goes on, the trolls explain their side of the story. They’ve played the game, and they know that the kids are in large part responsible for why things go south (i.e., cause the end of the world). As the kids learn more, the trolls learn less… because from their point of view, the conversations they had with the kids haven’t happened yet. So there’s a cool idea that the initial party is gaining more knowledge because the latter party is unwittingly informing them at some point in their future.

Here’s the somewhat heart-warming part. Both are aware that there’s only a short period where one group moves forward in time while the other backward where they know enough about each other to sorta be friends. So both the pesterchums and the trolls know that at some point in their respective timelines, their friendships are going to end. It’s a little bittersweet, but also carries the subtext that the two group have to make to most of things with the little time they have left.

(Incidentally, I haven’t gotten that far into Act 5 yet, so there’s still a very good chance that the next review will consist of nothing but “F*** THESE TROLLS” over and over again.)

Despite the name of the comic, MS Paint Adventures: Homestuck is not actually done in MS Paint. I’d like to think that this is in some way a homage to the earlier heritage of hastily scrawled webcomics. Hussie’s earlier works, like Bard Quest, probably were done in MS Paint, maybe even ironically (more on that later). However, as his expertise in the medium increased, the crude Microsoft drawing platform had to be abandoned. The only thing that stuck around with the style.

Online comic pundits are always clucking their tongues about the brave new world awaiting digital comics. More animation! More interactivity! Lately, there’s been a lot of hype around Batman ’66. Wow, look at how the background totally changes when you swipe to the next page! So… are we supposed to go gaga over what looks like standard Powerpoint slide transitions? Please.

PLEASE.

Hasn’t Hussie pretty much been practicing the theoretical digital comic ideal for at least the last five years now? I wonder if there aren’t a few reason why this isn’t acknowledged by mainstream sources as much. Maybe it’s because Homestuck is kinda dense, making it a little inaccessible to all but the hardcore devotees. Or maybe it is that art style, which looks deceptively crude.

This style, though, is simple and necessary. Would a glimpse into the Land of Light and Rain look nicer if it were more photorealistic? I don’t know. Maybe. But I suspect that the animation wouldn’t look quite as nice. This also goes for the comic’s many scored animation sequences, which are all mind-boggling from a plot standpoint and very nice to look at from a visual standpoint. I’ve had discussions online over whether or not MS Paint Adventures actually qualifies as a comic as all, as it disposes a lot of the traditional elements. (In fact, if you go by the Scott McCloud definition, MS Paint Adventures is not technically a comic.)

it definitely a lot of hard work, though. I’ve only gone through a year and a half worth of content as of this reading, and it boggles the mind how much material I covered. I think that I may have read through 2,000 pages of stuff. In the sometimes glacial pacing of webcomics, that sort of feat is unheard of. Again, credit to Hussie’s simple style. It’s the South Park principle: simple drawings lead to a unique style and a faster way to deliver content. In South Park’s case, it’s swift commentary on current events. In the case of MS Paint Adventures, it lets Hussie ramp up the storytelling complexity while freeing up his time to execute the comic’s trickier artworks. If comic pundits are serious about introducing a more interactive experience for the reader, these are the sort of techniques current and future creators have to adopt.

A recurring theme in Homestuck seems to be that while no one is completely responsible for their actions, everyone is responsible for what’s to come. Who’s in control? First it seems that Rose is in control of John’s world. Then it seems like Jade, who eerily has a spook knowledge of things to come, seems to be the one pulling the strings. But then the cameras are pulled back. Those text-adventure commands that you’ve been seeing since the beginning of the comic? It turns out that they weren’t just a clever gaming parody. Those were commands typed in by Wayward Vagrant, a mysterious man in bandages who is watching events unfold from the future.

But who is the Wayward Vagrant? Some sort of god? No, he’s just a hungry goofball who himself is thrust into circumstances by events beyond his control… which, in a roundabout way, may have been caused by the Pesterchums. Cause and effect is cyclical. We saw something like this in Problem Sleuth, but the result there was mainly the creation of new characters. Here, as everyone begins inadvertently meddling in everyone else’s business, the final result is the end of the world.

(And sometimes they end up creating a new cast of characters through time travel shenanigans. See what I mean about this being Problem Sleuth in Tolkien overdrive?)

I imagine that the four pesterchums reflect different aspects of Andrew Hussie’s personality… just like Captain Planet! The one that I think comes closest to the heart (or the Ma-Ti, as I like to call it) of what Homestuck is about, though, is Dave. John may have the pranksterism, Rose may have the cynicism, Jade may have the enthusiasm, but Dave. He has a webcomic. Dave creates Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff, an ironically bad webcomic that looks at first to be a one-off joke but ends up cropping up all over the place. Dave lives a life in constant irony. He lives in a house filled with swords and puppets, but he thinks it’s cool (or maybe, deep down, he doesn’t) because it’s supposed to be ironic and stuff. The thing is, the line between ironic and stupid and genuinely creepy is so thin that often Dave has no idea what he’s supposed to think.

You know this is ironic and all, and your BRO reaches echelons of irony you could only dream of daring to fathom. But on rare occasions, when your guard is down, it all seems just a tad unsettling to you.

Could this be what this comic is about? After all, it IS really, really silly. We readers may not have a house filled with puppets like Dave or plush Manthro Chaps like Jade … but we ARE reading Homestuck. This is a comic where there’s a Cosbytop, which is a laptop in the shape of Bill Cosby. It’s one where the creator has decided to devote time to an extended tribute to the Nicolas Cage movie, Con Air. How can anyone take anything this silly so seriously?

Because Hussie makes the mythos so goddamn dense that it’s impossible to simply approach Homestuck with a sense of ironic detachment. Like Dave, you get a sense that there might be something in there a tad unsettling. Homestuck chips away at your guard until you’re immersed in the complicated world-building. There’s a whole cosmology of different planets (some existing on a dream plane), the cause and effects of time travel to keep track of, and characters going on grim, epic quests. Lose the train of thought at any spot and things get completely and utterly confusing. Throwaway gags all of the sudden become significant. When John gets wigged out by Betty Crocker, it is both silliness AND a clue as to where the plot is going.

Man, if you can’t even ignore the throwaway gags, you can’t ignore anything. And keeping track of it all can be tiring.

Now, factoring in that this is a Tolkien-overdrive Problem Sleuth, I have a feeling that, in the end — when we factor in the world-building and the time travel and the trolls and the religious chess symbolism — I will come to the conclusion that over a span of four-plus years, Andrew Hussie has been playing a huge, drawn out prank. Just like the Joker would play when he kills an auditorium full of people and decides it’s part of some huge gag! It’s just that, you know, we haven’t reached those “echelons of irony you could only dream of daring to fathom.”

Spoiler Alert for Problem Sleuth! By the time Problem Sleuth ended, a silly parody of a Sierra adventure game set in a film noir had gone off the rails and become downright apocalyptic. It culminated in ridiculous (yet epic) Final Fantasy spells and an extremely long, drawn out boss battle. And I smiled. This was the most ridiculously convoluted joke ever executed, and the economic complexity made it even more hilarous. So you can obsess over the minutae of the Homestuck universe… but it’s also one populated by salamander people who blow bubbles and crudely drawn imps in jester outfits.

Here’s on of the biggest incongruities: Homestuck is filled with long Pesterlog chats that, initially, are hidden. First of all, why are they even being hidden? You sort of need read it in order to understand where the story’s even going. But even when you do unhide them, the text itself unfolds in the least clear way possible. There’s the l33tsp33k, the parts that might or might be pointless BS, keepingetc. But then there’s also the part where the trolls are traveling backwards in time. There are long stretches dialogue where the and our main characters are trying to figure out who knows what.

But then when we get to the major plot elements, the ones that actually depict what’s going on, they’re more often than not buried in those animated videos. Short seconds-long snippets lumped with other snippets that only let you get a glimpse of meteors hitting Earth and time travel and regicide. The only other way to get the plot is alternately Hussie periodically chimes in to try to get the reader caught on with what just happened. (It is really, really telling how dense the plot has gotten by how long these things are.) So what does that tell me? All this hard work trying to understand the plot… might be a collosal waste of time.

That doesn’t mean I don’t like it.  In a recent poll I pitted Problem Sleuth against Homestuck.  Now that I’ve read Acts 1-4, who would I vote for?

….

I’m not sure.

Despite following similar plot elements as Problem Sleuth, it’s an entirely different creature.  The world-building may be silly as hell, but it’s still well done.  The universe of Homestuck really is a place that feels lively and vibrant, a universe that you’d want to get lost in.  It’s like those old sci-fi shows where the crew journeys from planet to planet, finding something new around the corner.  Each world is different and unique, and half the fun is seeing what’s next.  What are our Pesterchums going to see when they disappear through the next flower shaped portal?  What kind of world will we see when we explore the worlds around the characters?  Will it be a futuristic building perched near a frog-themed temple?  Maybe it’s on a golden city covering a moon chained to a planet.  Amidst all these intentionally crude illustrations, Snoopy snowcone swords, and Pesterlogs where “3″‘s replace “E”‘s, there are the moments of beauty and genuine wonder.

Like Hussie likes to invoke pop culture elements, so will I — Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. At one point in the movie, Khan’s crewman says that they have the ship and the Genesis Device. Why are they wasting their time going after Kirk? With a twinkle in his eye, Khan responds, “He tasks me. HE TASKS ME….“

Rating: 5 stars (out of 5)

The 2013 Hugo Awards — the Oscars for the science fiction community — were announced two days ago at LoneStarCon 3 in the lovely city of San Antonio, Texas. Among the winners were The Avengers (for “Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form” … what?!?!? This qualifies as sci-fi now? WHAT?!?!?!?!) and the Game of Thrones TV show. Something called Redshirts won the Best Novel award. Also, for the first time ever the “Best Graphic Story” award did NOT go to a webcomic.  This time around, it went to Brian K. Vaughn’s Saga.

The Best Graphic Story award was introduced in 2009, and Girl Genius its inaugural winner.  The comic went on to win the next two awards (2010, 2011). 

The Foglios then recused themselves, hoping to spread the joy to other nominees. The next year, Ursula Vernon’s Digger was up for nomination right as the saga was coming to a close. It won in 2012.

This somewhat momentous streak of webcomics being recognized in a field that’s not primarily about sequential art comes to an end, though. Saga, that comic with the demon lady breast-feeding her baby on the cover of Issue One, puts the ball back into the court of the print-media types (though with same-day-digital being such a big thing these days, even that distinction is incredibly blurry). Always-the-bridesmaid-never-the-bride Schlock Mercenary was on the list of nominees, but missed out on the big award again this year.

Let’s take this meaningless award and extremely phallic trophy back in 2014, webcomics!

Just a quick aside about the next review: initially my plan was to split the Homestuck review into write-ups of Acts 1-4 and Acts 5-6. That was the past. I was not prepared for how long Act 5 was. I’m pretty sure I have actually reached a point where Act 5 is longer than the entirety of Acts 1-4. So…. Act 5 and Act 6 are getting separate reviews. (Seriously, my nights are now filled up read/keeping track of Homestuck. It is not an unpleasant experience, but there are many times when I’m looking up at the clock, it is 2:00 am, and I had been spending the previous 5 hours reading a webcomic. You might say that in the evenings, I have become … homestuck myself. Badum-tisshhh.)

Also, there might be a quick, non-Homestuck digital comic review up tomorrow. About Batman.

So, kids, once upon a time there was this TV show in 1966. It featured a somewhat pudgy guy in a Batman outfit and a teen sidekick in short pants. He was such a great detective that one time he foiled a sea crime, and deduced that because it took place in the “sea”, it was a clue to the letter “C”, which means one of the culprits was “Catwoman.” Giant letters like “POW!” and “BAM!” would show up on the screen during fights, there was a catchy as hell theme song, and Gotham was sunny Santa Barbara, California, for some reason.

I am talking, of course, about Electro Woman and Dyna Girl.

No… wait! I mean Batman. Despite repeated attempts over the last three decades to turn the Dynamic Duo into a grim Dark Knight, and despite the show not being available on DVD due to entangled rights issues, no one has ever been able to fully erase the goofy fun and colorful campiness of the megapopular 1960′s TV show. I wasn’t around back then, obviously. Guys, I’m old… just not that old. However, I did catch whole runs of the show back when it was on FX. (This back in the day when that channel was promoting itself as an upscale lifestyle network and not a gritty drama network. It’s… a weird fit either way.) In my opinion, the show got a lot right. It had the best ever live-action depictions of both the Riddler and the Penguin, and it captured the wacky Silver Age feel that comic creators are desperate to recreate these days.

The show’s spirit shows up every so often, partly because a lot of comic professionals are secretly in love with it. From time to time, characters created for the show, such as King Tut, reappear in the comics. (In fact, the Riddler would haved been a forgotten minor character if not for his prominence on the show.) Batman: Brave and the Bold was essentially an animated sequel to the show. And now there’s this: Batman ’66, an digital comic on the DC2 imprint featuring the new adventures of the Dynamic Duo.

Digital copies of Batman ’66 are available for digital download at $0.99 a piece. Most stories are multi-part. Covers are provided by Mike and Laura Allred. How is it that these two haven’t illustrated an entire issue yet? Allred’s retro ’60′s style is perfect for this kind of project. Can’t they see that they were made for each other? Writing duties are handled by comic veteran Jeff Parker, while art is provided by a rotating group of artists not named Allred.

The first three issues of Batman ’66 feature that sexy swiping feature that the digital comic wags are all upons these days. What does this mean? Digital comics with friggin’ Powerpoint transitions. Now, I know that there are quite a few fans of this look, and I admit that there are some benefits artistically. There are times when the panel is kept the same, only the color palette goes from a realistic look to a crazy pop art style. And of course there’s the show’s trademark onomatopoeia, which looks great when it takes up the whole iPad screen and it’s coming our right atcha. In a way, these comics are probably the gold standard for digital comics based on a TV show that was itself based on a comic. (The less said about the Arrow digital comic, the better.)

Here’s my problem, though. Like I said, this is basically a comic in Powerpoint format. But have you ever had to sit through a Powerpoint presentation made up almost entirely of weird special effects and creative transitions? It’s nifty at first, but after a while it gets really old. Batman ’66 doesn’t get quite that bad, but there are pages upon pages where you’re swiping through the pages where word balloons pop up one excruciating panel at a time. It kills the pacing a little. Plus, the end of my fingers got so warm from all the swiping that I began to wonder if heat signature was a potentially untapped new comic book language/gimmick. Either that or I need to start spraying my iPad screen with WD-40.

The first story is mainly to reintroduce us all the characters, including Irish stereotype Chief O’Hara. It’s a simple Riddler story. Dressed in the hated spandex suit (actor Frank Gorshin was actually the one who opted for the suit and tie look because it was more comfortable), the Riddler taunts the Dynamic Duo with clues while he goes about on his crime spree. At some point, Catwoman is involved. The riddles here are more intriguing than the one from the Adam West Batman movie, or even the ones in Batman Forever … but then again, what isn’t? (For the record, I remember Riddler’s clues being way more clever on the TV show than their reputations suggest.)

Anyway, it’s pretty light disposable fluff. The Powerpoint gimmicks are disposed of by the fourth issue, though, at which point you’re going to have to ask yourself: am I such a big fan of Batman ’66 that I’m willing to sit through what’s basically a modern update of Silver Age Batman stories? There’s a hazard with writing stories for a beloved TV program. You can’t really change the characters too much or they’ll become unrecognizable. Joker, for example, can’t suddenly become the homicidal maniac as he’s been portrayed in the comics for the past 40 years. Doing so would invalidate the existence of a comic based specifically on a silly kid’s show.

Tthe comic does remain experimental, though on a smaller and traditional scale. In issue 6, Batman encounters a singer named Circe, whose voice puts Batsy in a hallucinatory state. (I have a feeling this was inspired by the Justice League Unlimited episode where Circe runs a night club, but I don’t know. Maybe this is just the character’s M.O.* in the DC universe.) What follows is a pretty trippy sequence which recall less the 60′s comic pop art sensibilities and more the airbrushed paintings you’d find on vans a few years later. This is still Batman rooted in the 60′s but less Andy Warhol and more Woodstock.

Batman ’66 leans on the nostalgia card, which is to be expected. For why else would Batman ’66 exist? The villains look very much like their 60′s incarnations. This version of the Joker even has the mustache that Caesar Romero refused to shave! (Serious talk here: I always felt that Mr. Romero, mustache or no, was the actor that came the closest to looking like the comic book Joker.) Then we have the villains who show up that were created only for the TV show. Egghead shows up in all his Vincent Price finery to menace the Dynamic Duo, and there’s a cameo by that one cowboy dude who I think was named “Shame.” It’s only a matter of time before fan favorite King Tut shows up in his Party City pharaoh Halloween costume. You even get a reference to the beloved “Batman and Robin walk up the side of a building” gag.

But then Batman ’66 throws us for a loop by including very ’60′s version of characters who never showed up on the show. Characters such as Harley Quinn, who was created for the 90′s animated series (though the nerd in me wants to point out that it was Gotham Penitentiary, not Arkham, where villains were sent in the TV show)…

L

… and the Red Hood, a character who showed up briefly in the ’50′s but didn’t gain prominence until recently when former Robin Jason Todd took up the mantle.

That panel above is pretty nifty from a comic history sense, by the way, since the original Red Hood from 1951 was … *SIXTY-TWO YEAR SPOILER ALERT!* … the Joker himself. It was his villain identity before he took the leap into the acid bath.

I guess that this is a comic that’s fine for kids to read, but has enough Easter eggs to make adults happy. (Which, weirdly, is a little bit like what the TV show was like.) But… it’s hardly ever essential. By the time I reached the last page, I was amused and a little happy that I got to revisit the characters I loved all over again. But after that initial burst of fun, am I all that eager to download it again? Is the only hook to see how modern characters would be reimagined in the swingin’ 60′s? I mean, I might tune in again to the same Bat-Time, same Bat-Channel just to see what Bane ’66 looks like. (My guess? He would look A LOT like my luchador alter ego.)

I stopped at Issue 9 despite technically have one other issue (#10) available for download. That one has Batman matching wits with The Mad Hatter. This is the one with the obsession over hats, not the beloved Alice In Wonderland loony. And I was all, “Is this something I really want to read? Campy Batman fighting a guy with hats?” That issue remains undownloaded.

A little West goes a long way.

Rating: 3 stars (out of 5).

*M.O. – Modus Operandi. Plus there’s a pretty fun gag where a little yellow caption box explains exactly that.

The Harvey Awards were announced this weekend at the Baltimore Comic-Con. Among those were the award for Best Online Comics Work, which generally has gone to works that are more easily identifiable as webcomics than, say, the Eisner Award winners. Past winners, for example, include American Elf, PvP, Perry Bible Fellowship, and Hark! A Vagrant.

This time, the award’s going to a large dog, a Conan the Barbarian fellow, and a naked lady telling the story. That’s right: Mike Norton picks up a Harvey Award in addition to his already-won Eisner for Battlepug. The other nominees included Colleen Coover and Paul Tobin for Bandette, Lora Innes for The Dreamer, Noelle Stevenson for Nimona, and Dave Kellett for Sheldon.

(h/t Robot 6)

(This is Part 2 of the massive Homestuck review. Click here for Part 1, covering Acts 1-4.)

I get it.

I totally get it. The appeal of the trolls, I mean.

When Andrew Hussie’s MS Paint Adventures: Homestuck started out, the characters could be best described as perhaps being tied to one personality trait. John is nerdy, Rose is gothy, Dave is cool, and Jade is sunny. They’re pleasant enough protagonists, but they’re pretty much video game heroes. Whether you’re Master Chief, the marine from Doom, Mario, Sonic, or the guy from BioShock, the main character is typically a stand-in for the player (or in this case, the reader). There has to be enough wiggle room for you to, in a way, become that character.

The trolls are different. I have a weird feeling that when Hussie started off Chapter 5, he was intentionally trying to tax the reader’s patience. We’ve been following the same four characters for four whole acts, when all of the sudden they disappear and are replaced by twelve all new characters that we hadn’t been invested in at all. Now, as an avid reader of fantasy novels, I’m pretty used to chapters where we abandon our main characters for long stretches to flesh out and establish new characters and communities. I have a feeling, though, that when this act came out, long time readers were throwing their hands up in disgust but about, say, the fifth troll introduction.

Yet, at the same time, the trolls ended up becoming the most visible symbol of Homestuck. I remember distinctly when the initial supporters (usually posting some variation of “Wake up, boy”) gave way to the cavalcade of troll fan art and cosplayers. I’d read some Homestuck before, though I’d stopped before even the end of Act 1. And I remember scratching my head, thinking, “Wait. This is the same webcomic?”

All the same, I totally get it.

(NOTE: The following review will compare Homestuck to friggin’ James Joyce and George Bernard Shaw. For readers with low tolerance for pompous malarkey, discretion is advised. Then again, PBS and Tor Books’ Mordecai Knode made the same comparison, so nyeh!)

That’s because the trolls have what John, Rose, Dave, and Jade (whom I’m told are to be referred to as “Beta kids”) lack: personality. And they’re full of surprises. Initially, we’re on the Beta kids’ side with finding the trolls to be a bothersome nuisance. Why wouldn’t we? They’re called trolls, and their Pesterchats — already somewhat annoying — tend to be order of magnitudes longer than when the Beta kids are messaging among themselves. They’re hard to keep track of, what with their being twelve of them, each with an online handle and an abbreviation of that handle, and a few looking visually similar. (Initially, distinguishing Terezi from Vriska from Kanaya from Aradia was hella confusing.) Their messages have weird spelling quirks. (One replaces all “B”‘s with “8″‘s and another replaces “H”‘s with “)-(“, for example.) And they start off looking like antagonists to our heroes.

In the end, though… they’re still kind of annoying. But, thanks to the strengths of their personalities, I ended up liking them. A lot. Even more than the Beta kids. And I know I’m not the only one. This was a hell of trick for Hussie to pull off. Find a way to make the readers hate the trolls, but them turn them in the comic’s legit breakout stars? Seriously an amazing trick. Give the man a pina colada.

How does Hussie do it? Well, I’m going to focus on one troll as an example: Equius. He’s not one of the main ones. Karkat, the leader, gets the most air time and pretty much is the one most in contact with the Beta kids (many times with Jade). The murderous Vriska, who may be the most complex of the trolls, also shows up a lot thanks to her association/flirtations with John. The blind justice-minded Terezi is also pretty major, guiding Dave and providing him inspiration for his comics. (The fourth Beta kid, Rose, has a troll following her around as well. Rose tends to split from the other three to do her own thing, and frequently Kanaya finds that she’s fairly ineffective. Kanaya isn’t exactly minor, but she’s nowhere near as prominent as the first three.)

The rest of the trolls sorta fade into the background, including Equius. In fact, Equius may be the most minor of the trolls, getting the least exposure outside of the one guy who’s, like, an Aquaman pastiche. However, Equius may be my favorite, as he’s the best example of how Hussie sets up expectations only to knock them down flat. When we first run into Equius, he’s a troll that’s looming in the shadows. All we see are his cracked glasses and menacing silhouette. Hussie even expresses distaste, trying to put off the introduction of Equius as long as possible. This guy… he’s got to be a big deal, right?

And then… well, like all the trolls, Equius has a pretty embarrassing hobby. Terezi spends her off hours hanging stuffed animals from nooses. Karkat is into romantic comedies. But Equius? He’s based on that one piece of “art” that Hussie found which I was first introduced to in that one fantastic TNG Edit. It’s the one where a horse-man flexes his muscles while sitting on someone while saying, “I LOVE BEING STRONG.” And… he pretty much sweats profusely and demands towels when he witnesses feats of strength.

So Equius is introduced as being a monster to be feared. When the curtain is pulled back, though… he’s just gross. He’s also pretty capable of some heinous things. At one point, he gives a dead girl a robot body, but programs the robot to fall in love with him. But, toward the end of Act 5, he’s sorta swung over to being … adorable? Especially since we see him treat cat aficionado Nepeta with a sense of tenderness. It ties into a theme that’s reiterated often in Homestuck. Although everyone’s faced with death, destruction, and the end of the world, characters from alternate dimensions and other timelines are always popping in to tell you that things are going to be OK. Equius is pretty much that in character form. Hey, he might look terrible at first, and maybe his is terrible, but get to know him a little and he turns out to be alright.

So how to explain what happens to Homestuck in Act 5? Those of you who’ve read Homestuck know that it’s not that easy to condense. The comic goes from being more of a game parody in Acts 1-4 to creation myths, the apocalypse, and Christ allegories. Emotions get ramped up. There’s romance, drama, epic adventure, and a big mess of gory murder. At some points, it demands you to take things seriously, while at other points, you feel rather foolish for not having a sense of humor about things. The storytelling becomes frustratingly unlinear, as if Hussie had just finished chain-viewing Lost and said to himself, “I wonder how I can make things even more confusing.” Whole character journeys are represented in barely seen vignettes, and pesterlogs become a test of patience. It’s almost as if Hussie is daring the readers to jump ship, but instead picking up more readers (and accolades) in the process. In a way, it’s a little like what Pete Abrams tried to do in Sluggy Freelance with “Oceans Unmoving”… only without the annoying space moose and with characters that you actually care about.

But let’s talk about the art! Hussie’s works have always used classic video game imagery. I mean, it’s a webcomic, and what’s a webcomic without video game references, right? But Hussie is the kind of guy who’s always searching for novel avenues of humor and nostalgia, and I think he knows that Final Fantasy references are getting played out. He does something I’ve never seen before: he replicates the effects of a scratched CD-ROM. (It’s actually a major plot point, but it’s something I’ll probably hold on to until my “Act 6″ review.) This was a revelation… that you could somehow feel nostalgia for the beats and patterns for a video game glitch.

I know in my previous review, I mentioned that Hussie’s playing a big prank on the reader. (And, frankly, there are parts of Act 5 that do support this idea.) I meant that you were meant to take parts of the comic seriously, and that in itself was part of the comedy. A cosmic joke, if you will, about how inherently silly life is, yet how that silliness builds up to great global ramifications. I didn’t mean to imply that it was disposable, trivial, or otherwise inessential. it was more along the line of how Joyce fans defend Ulysses as a great piece of comedic prose, and not a giant, humorless gobstopper of paper better served to balance out a particularly finnicky table. (Having never read Ulysses, I can’t weigh my opinion either way. At least, not until the webcomic finishes. Seriously, reading something without pictures? BAH!)

This sequence is a visual representation of that. While the video was going on, I was was amazed that a long, buried part of my psyche, one embedded in the collective consciousness of gamers everywhere, was being dredged up and that I was pleased as punch to see it. Seriously, in a world where 7 in 10 webcomics used be be about video games and video game nostalgia, how come no one’s come across this very same gag before? This must’ve been how our parents (or grandparents) felt the first time someone put the now familiar “record scratch” sound effect on a TV track. But, taken on its own… it’s just a pretty silly Flash video depicting what would happen when a CD-ROM skips. In other words, it is both profound and profoundly silly.

Seriously, guys, the entire point of Act 5 is *SPOILERS!* that the universe was created by twelve 13-year-olds playing a game. You can dissect that for its religious symbolism (Oh, look! All these teens correspond to a sign of the Zodiac!), but the reality is that the entire concept is really very silly. Especially when you factor in that one of them’s a juggalo.

Homestuck was already no slouch in turning the webcomic format into a crazy mixed media experiment using videos and simple point-and-click interactivity. With Act 5, Hussie more or less redefines what it means to be a webcomic. It’s almost a fulfillment of the future promised us when we first laid our eyes on Argon Zark! Entire story arcs are unveiled by clicking on links embedded in the images themselves. Mini-stories unfold in the margins of the banners. The flashiest effects happen when Homestuck turns into an RPG.

There are whole sequences where you take control of a troll character, and you walk around the room making small talk with other trolls. Now, this could be one of the most gimmicky gimmicks imaginable. However Hussie makes it work because 1.) we get to see the characters in their animated JRPG designs that are a refreshing break from their short, stocky “symbolic representations,” and 2.) the character and plot developments that unfold during these mini-games are pretty essential.

Incidentally, this also means that this comic is definitely not for everyone. I know a lot of people who have zero patience when it comes to the tedious RPG dialogue boxes.

Also somewhat experimental? Those damn pesterlogs, which have stretched to the length of a goddamn book. They’re probably the number one complaint I’ve heard from lapsed Homestuck fans. After all, they signed up for a visual experience, not long stretches of prose that you periodically have to highlight to read. Personally… I kinda like them. In fact, it’s both a throwback to an earlier era and also a glimpse into the future. (Which, weirdly, kinda ties in with the Beta kids’ hipsterish obsessions toward archaic entertainments.) What do I mean as a throwback to an earlier era? Think George Bernard Shaw. While you can watch a performance, most of us have come across Shaw’s works in written form. Perhaps in English Lit. Now, when you read the play, the dialogue is the main driver for plot and character development. Arms and the Man reads a lot like a Pesterlog, and vice versa.

As for what I mean by a glimpse into the future? As I mentioned in my first review, Homestuck is the sort of work that defies categorization. It’s not quite a comic, not quite a blog, and not quite a book. It is something new. Something that can only exist on the internet, where videos, images, and prose exist side by side. We’re in a time in history where we’re still trying to figure out the best way of presenting information on the internet. Webcomics are in the same conundrum. Old formats meant to work on the newspaper page or in 22-page issues may not be the best way to view things online. Can Homestuck be pointing the way to what comics will be?

(My answer: “It’s getting there.” Seriously, I’m still kinda smarting that the most Flash-heavy panels wont work on my cellphone or my iPad. Plus, the cookie-enabled bookmark is kinda neat, but it doesn’t work when you’re viewing the comic on your laptop one day and on your desktop the next.)

There’s another nifty trick that Hussie pulls off with the pesterlogs. I mentioned the little quirks that Hussie tosses into the troll dialogue to show that they are, in fact, quite annoying. Yet, these serve an incredible double duty. For example, say you come across a line that includes “D –>”. This is an emoticon for a bow an arrow, which is a sign that our old friend, Equius, is the one whose speaking. It’s also a subtle reminder of his personality trait: the bow and arrow is associated with centaurs, whom Equius admires for their strength. Or, say, you come across dialogue where the troll talks (or types?) with alternating lower caps and upper caps. And from time to time, there’s a “hOnk”. That’s an indicator that you’re reading dialogue from Gamzee, the aforementioned juggalo.

It feels surprisingly authentic, like something you’d potentially come across on online message boards. I guess I shouldn’t be shocked, but man… have you seen how online interactions are depicted on TV and in movies? A-puh-puh-palling. I think Hussie should be contracted out as a consultant for those shows. There’s a lot to be mined from just the way letters are capitalized and sentences are structured. Karkat, being the hothead leader, types in ALL CAPS. Of course. Easy. Tavros, who is meek and peace-loving, is a little more subtle. His dialogue is halting, starting and stopping in short fits, and while mostly in CAPS the first letter is lowercase. This implies someone who’s a little uncertain when it comes to public speaking.

It reminds me of something from Scott McCloud’s Understanding Comics. (I’ve already referenced Joyce and Shaw, making this the most pretentious review I’ve ever written.) In the book, there’s a scale between “reality” and “meaning,” where photorealistic images are close to “reality” and text is close to “meaning.” Somewhere in the middle is the “picture plane”. By using emoticons, caps, and other characteristics formed in the crucible of online discussions, it seems to me that Hussie’s straddling that fine line that separates simple images from test. After all, you can’t sound out “::::)”, but you know that, when you see it, you’re seeing words from the spider-like Vriska.

Speaking of Vriska, I quite enjoy the awkward romantic relationship developing between her and our main character, John. I have no idea if it will last: she’s the sort of character who has multiple available options (from both sexes). However, there’s just something there that feels genuine. She and John are opposites: she’s a violent psychopath who has crippled a friend and he’s a mellow, happy-go-lucky dude. But there’s something cool to how they open up to each other online that makes you want to root for them. Like, John already knows that the other trolls find her extremely dangerous, and he knows first hand that she’s done a lot of killing, but there’s something about her dangerous nature that intrigues him. Meanwhile, she knows that he’s saddled with these human emotions of sympathy and kindness, but that makes her want to open up to him about her guilty conscience (as well as a deep-seated need for someone to love her). I’m not going to say that I’m a total shipper and I’d ragequit if these two don’t end up together in the end. However, it’s kinda sweet… and it’s weird expecting this out of a comic where the characters look like Muppet Babies most of them time.

(I know, I know… “symbolic representation”!)

That’s why I get the trolls. When the characters were journeying by themselves, the characters were hardly interacting outside of the Pesterlogs. (Shoot, when John and Rose are actually in the same room together, finally, Rose is asleep. When she wakes up, John has rocketed off.) But with the trolls, there’s sense of community. There’s fiery passions, suspicions, love, anger, and betrayal from characters who are in close proximity to each other. That behavior spills over into their interactions with the Beta kids. I suspect that’s why the Beta kids were a little leery of the trolls when they first came into contact. Their way of communicating was a product of their close-quarters interactions. (Hence why their Pesterlogs are incredibly epic.) They type not just to share information but also to share emotion. I’d go on and on but I’ll bet someone has already read a friggin’ college dissertation about this already.

However, there is a downside: Hussie makes things so complex that pretty much all the casual readers have no choice but to jump ship. Hey, remember how, when Inception came out, people were raving about how complicated the movie was? Like, there were actual charts out there, published on blogs, to help people understand the who dream-within-a-dream thing.

Those chumps were amateurs.

I was up until 2 a.m. last week reading Homestuck. No lie. I tweeted about it, and I got a response, saying, “Why would you do this?” I’ll tell you why. It wasn’t necessarily because I was enjoying myself (though I will say that it’s wasn’t totally unpleasant). It’s not unlike those fantasy books I mentioned waaaaaaaay up in the second paragraph of this 3000+ word review. I have this fear that if I put the book down, I’m going to forget all those plot thread that I’d worked so hard to try to remember. And, Good Lord, there is a lot to keep track of.

I guess it’s my own fault, as I forgot my own rules. After all, is it all that important to know how Rose has accumulated her group of reptilian and amphibian followers? I don’t think Hussie tells you. We just see her at her laptop with her crew of blanket-swaddled followers. It doesn’t matter how she got to that point but that she got there in the first place.

But then we get to long, expository segments about the the ancestors of the trolls, and that’s where I start to get impatient. I think my problem is that while previous segments were anchored by characters we were invested in, these parts are told by a boring pool-ball-faced guy who really doesn’t have much charisma. Granted, the images are pretty epic and I have no doubt that all this is going to pay off in Act 6, but I can’t deny that I merely powered through this section with growing irritation and disinterest. That may have been Hussie’s intent, as Homestuck is rife with meta-gags meant to ruffle and unhinge the unwary.

Still, that part was at the end of Act 5, and by that point I’d invested so much time and emotion into Homestuck that there was no way I was quitting now. Act 5 started off as Tenchi Muyo!, morphed into Genesis somewhere in the middle (or maybe to you anime buffs out there, RahXephon), and then stretched itself out into the damn Silmarillon. Much of the goofy pop culture gags from Acts 1-4 have been wiped away and replaced by ruminations of the cosmic. Like Scott Pilgrim‘s Bryan Lee O’Malley has said, “It has things to say.”

What things? Well… to go over that would probably require more than even the three reviews and 10,000 words total that I plan to write on the friggin’ “Ulysses of the Internet.” Your best bet is to go to a comic convention, pull aside some grey-skinned cosplayer with candy-corn horns, and hear from them first hand.

Or, you know… the Internet.

Rating: 4 stars (out of 5)

You know, I debated a while on if I should report this or even bring it up. I missed the controversy for a couple of days as I was off doing something that weekend. Also, I was a little brained by my Homestuck marathon. But… this being a site that does report on the big going ons in webcomics and this being perhaps the biggest thing to happen in a while… something happened last week at PAX East.

Rachel Edidin discusses things in her Wired piece, “Why I’m Never Going Back to Penny Arcade Expo” (which should clue you in as to what this is going to refer to):

… on Monday at PAX, in front of an audience of thousands, Krahulik told business manager Robert Khoo that he regretted pulling the Dickwolves merchandise from the Penny Arcade store — merchandise he had created as a “screw you” to rape survivors who had had the temerity to complain about a comic strip. While the audience burst into applause, Khoo nodded sagely and said that now they knew better; now they would just leave it and not engage.

This prompted quick response from online types (from who I understand were primarily from Tumblr, but this is second hand knowledge and I have no energy to do a search on this). There was even a response from fellow webcomic creator Rich Stevens from Diesel Sweeties who called them “bullies” and “Rush Limbaugh with tattoos”:

Cartoonist Rich Stevens of Diesel Sweeties reached out to WIRED when he heard we planned to report on the PAX incident. “It’s just so disappointing to see people I’ve known since we were all new and broke turn out to be such tone-deaf, old man bullies. He’s Rush Limbaugh with tattoos. I could get over the original comic if they’d just moved on or apologized, but they had to make merchandise out of rape just to poke back at people and then encourage fans to wear it to a convention that supposedly has pro-woman policies,” said Stevens.

“It’s like he never got the point of growing up having been bullied as a kid. You’re supposed to get older and not repeat it … I wish more people in our field would be open about this, but I think there is a lot of social and economic pressure not to be… I really want to let them know that not everyone in webcomics is scared to stand up to them.”

Again, I was willing to ignore this, but the core of it is a debate that I think will affect webcomics for years to come: free speech vs. responsibility. Penny Arcade, and — let’s face it — a lot of webcomics hit the big time because they were unencumbered by the censorship issues that tamp down the creativity in the more mainstream print fields. The early jokes were how Garfield had been reduced to Monday and lasagna jokes because that’s all he was allowed to do.

But now we’ve reached the point where, while webcomics aren’t exactly mainstream, they’re mainstream enough to garner attention. Most don’t seem to have a problem with the original comic so much as the follow-up responses from the Penny Arcade guys have been really rather cruel.

And, well, compounding that issue are that Krahulik and Holkins aren’t young guys trying to make it in the world anymore. I mentioned during the Strip Search reviews that attempts at being edgy just seemed forced. On the other hand, if Penny Arcade were somehow neutered of that edge? Well… then it’s not Penny Arcade anymore.

Again, there’s no easy solution, as the “free speech vs. responsibility” thing easily boils down to “young and wild forever vs. grow up already.”

On the other hand… I really should’ve gone to CafePress and made a bunch of these shirts for realsies, dontchathink?

A recent contest by DC has drawn the condemnation of no less than American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, American Psychiatric Association and National Alliance on Mental Illness. Man, that is, like, some high-level people getting irritated! My earlier post about an angry Rich Stevens? Absolutely pales in comparison.

Robot 6 reports:

Their comments capped off a week of growing criticism about the panel, which Harley Quinn co-writer Jimmy Palmiotti clarified on Tuesday is part of a surreal dream sequence intended to have “a Mad magazine/Looney Tunes approach.”

“We believe that instead of making light of suicide, DC Comics could have used this opportunity to host a contest looking for artists to depict a hopeful message that there is help for those in crisis” the three groups said in a joint statement, published by USA Today and The Huffington Post. “This would have been a positive message to send, especially to young readers,” the statement continued. “On behalf of the tens of millions of people who have lost a loved one to suicide, this contest is extremely insensitive, and potentially dangerous. We know from research that graphic and sensational depictions of suicide can contribute to contagion.”

Which in turn caused DC Comics to release an apology.

Here’s the panel in question as drawn by webcomic creator Philip M. Jackson, who draws the furry webcomic Sequential Art (reviewed here):

EDIT: Ah, my reading comprehension is terrible today! The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, American Psychiatric Association and National Alliance on Mental Illness were not railing against Mr. Jackson’s panel (that was just an example of one of the entries, perhaps the tamest one) but against the contest itself, which is still ongoing.

So here was a glimpse into the script:

PANEL 1
Harley is on top of a building, holding a large DETACHED cellphone tower in her hands as lightning is striking just about everywhere except her tower. She is looking at us like she cannot believe what she is doing. Beside herself. Not happy.

PANEL 2
Harley is sitting in an alligator pond, on a little island with a suit of raw chicken on, rolling her eyes like once again, she cannot believe where she has found herself. We see the alligators ignoring her.

PANEL 3
Harley is sitting in an open whale mouth, tickling the inside of the whale’s mouth with a feather. She is ecstatic and happy, like this is the most fun ever.

PANEL 4
Harley sitting naked in a bathtub with toasters, blow dryers, blenders, appliances all dangling above the bathtub and she has a cord that will release them all. We are watching the moment before the inevitable death. Her expression is one of “oh well, guess that’s it for me” and she has resigned herself to the moment that is going to happen.
- See more at: http://www.dccomics.com/node/305151#sthash.13tn1bO4.dpuf

Jimmy Palmiotti addressed the controversy with the following statement:

I should have also mentioned we were thinking a Mad magazine/Looney Tunes approach was what we were looking for. We thought it was obvious with the whale and chicken suit, and so on, but learned it was not. I am sorry for those who took offense, our intentions were always to make this a fun and silly book that broke the 4th wall, and head into issue 1 with a ongoing story/adventure that is a lot like the past Powergirl series we did.

I’ve actually retooled this post pretty majorly due to my blunder (which originally implied that Philip M. Jackson had won the contest) (which I think he should, by the way).

Robot 6 reports controversy surrounding a Grumpy Cat T-shirt. Being a person of the Generation X persuasion, everything about it astounds and confuses me, but apparently Kate Beaton was involved. In summary:

Among the most popular shirts, Gawker points out, is one that combines a photo of Grumpy Cat with the caption “I HAD FUN ONCE/IT WAS AWFUL,” which, after a stop off at Reddit, where it became attached to the feline, actually originated with cartoonist Kate Beaton’s popular webcomic Hark! A Vagrant! Gawker, which concluded that the best way to get rich from memes is to “steal other memes,” contacted Beaton for her take.

Things I find baffling:

1.) That people are willing wearing an internet meme on a gray shirt
2.) That Kate Beaton apparently had a Gawker?
3.) That there’s even such a thing as Gawker?
4.) That the entire quote I posted above would baffle and confuse English teachers from 20 years ago.

For the record, Ms. Beaton seems to be cool with it:

“No, I never authorized anything. And some people will argue that I never wrote the joke, that it’s ‘been around forever,’ she tells the website. “But I made a comic, and one panel became a meme, and that’s fine. The nature of a joke is to take on a life of its own. At some point, the meme was applied to Grumpy Cat, where it fit well. It is only how Grumpy Cat is aggressive about protecting their brand with that joke as part of it that has ever rubbed me the wrong way.”

Also, apparently the people behind Grumpy Cat said something like, “We’ve got a saying over here in team meme: ‘Respect the cat,’” and it makes me weep for our generation.