Webcomics, Part 2

Nic Buxom by Nic
Autobiographical comic by a professional dominatrix. Interesting subject presented in a cute way.

The Non-Adventures of Wonderella by Justin Pierce
Wonder Woman as a lazy, selfish alcoholic. Once a week, usually parodies whichever superhero movie just came out.

NSFW: Oglaf by Trudy Cooper
Fantasy + sex = hilarity. The main plot concerns an extremely unlucky apprentice to a sorceress. Some jokes do require knowledge of Celtic folklore or Oscar Wilde to understand.

Our Valued Customers by MRTIM
Strange things said by real people in a comic book store, illustrated. Distinctive art and, being based in reality, always surprising.

Overcompensating by Jeffrey Rowland
Jeffrey Rowland runs Topatoco and supplies the image for necrosis. This is, very loosely speaking, his journal comic. Often features other artists from this list as characters.

Penny Arcade by Mike Krahulik and Jerry Holkins
This one is obvious. It's been running for over a decade, defined the gaming webcomic as a subgenre, spawned conventions, a charity, a game series, an online reality show, and potentially a feature film.

The Perry Bible Fellowship by Nicholas Gurewitch
This has been on hiatus since 2008. The general rule of comics is the fewer words, the better. Gurewitch is the master of conveying meaning quickly through art alone, or a handful of words. His artistic range covers a variety of styles as well.

pictures for sad children by john campbell
imagine magical realism that's so depressing it loops around and becomes hilarious. this is like that.

Questionable Content by Jeph Jacques
If you're reading this because you were in my circle of friends in high school, you already have favourite characters and ships you'd die to defend. For everyone else, very good slice of life comic with a large roster of characters, great art evolution and serious character beats amidst the hilarity. Also most of the characters are on Twitter.

Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal by Zach Weiner
Before you start reading this: the red circle below the comic has an extra panel. Nothing worse than being halfway through the archive before you realise that. Statistically the second funniest thing ever. In some cases the image will establish an expectation, the caption will subvert it, the second line of the caption changes the meaning again, and the extra panel again changes the meaning. Weiner has also written other comics on this list, and has a sketch comedy show.

Scenes From a Multiverse by Jonathan Rosenberg
Well drawn, very funny comic about life in an "ordinary, everyday multiverse". Each week readers vote for one scene to be continued the next week, so each week Rosenberg is trying to create more interesting characters and settings than the last.

NOT SAFE FOR WORK. SERIOUSLY, THIS IS "THE ARISTOCRATS" TERRITORY HERE: Sexy Losers by Clay
One of those cases where the content warning tells you everything you need to know.

Sinfest by Tatsuya Ishida
Another long runner. The allegory can get a bit dense at times, but the art is great, especially the extra long, colour Sunday strips. Slick is my id.

Snowflakes by James Ashby, Chris Jones and Zach Weiner
More kid friendly than most of this list. Seven kids in an orphanage have adventures. One believes Jesus was a Viking, and has memorised the pressure points of a kraken.

Three Panel Soul by Matthew Boyd and Ian McConville
Autobiographical comic following on from Mac Hall, which I admittedly never read. Brilliant art in a variety of styles.

Tree Lobsters by Steve D
Conversations between arboreal lobsters, usually about skepticism or science fiction.

Wigu by Jeffrey Rowland
I've only read the more recent stories, but this has a thousand page archive. At this point, it's a kid having adventures involving a surreal alternate dimension. Since the author also writes Overcompensating and manages merchandise for most of the comics on this list, it's not updated often.

Wondermark by David Malki !
Webcomic made from photoshopped 19th century illustrations. Features ironic shirts, aliens and the majestic piranhamoose.

xkcd by Randall Munroe
You knew this was going to be here. Second or third webcomic I started reading in high school, took the zeitgeist by storm, Munroe as voice of a geek generation, inevitable backlash, equilibrium, etc.

v0.1

They say all innovation starts with boredom. Jimmy, I said to myself, there’s no shortage of that now.

I found myself deeper than I’d ever been, deeper than any reasonable person would go.

I turned on the lights.

Took a moment to adjust, but things were, well they were better than expected.

Not wanting to go mad down here, I set a day/night cycle. That’s something accomplished, then.

I got the renovation systems running, and set up the command centre far above the testing floor. Something else to cross off the list.

The bottom levels were flooded. A diagnostic had already found the leak, but it was too big to deal with yet. I had that area sealed off and the rest drained.

I opened the Central catalogue and went a little nuts.

I ordered seeds and embryos of just about everything fully documented. If they complained, I’d just tell them I was testing field conditions.

The local backup generator looked like it could light up the whole space, so I set that under the command centre. I also put an old star map on the ceiling, cause why not? Keep everything naturalistic, you don’t discover any new forms of madness.

Maybe I’ll change things up later.

It was time to start testing, so I ordered a couple of humans from Central.

And this is where things started to go wrong for poor Jimmy.

Webcomics, Part 1

I read a lot of webcomics. Allow me to enumerate, with some notes beforehand. First, allow me to recommend Archive Binge, which allows you to read the available comics at the rate you choose, daily, two on Thursdays and Saturdays, whatever.

Secondly, I used to read Control Alt Delete. It was the second or third webcomic I started reading, so grandfather clauses applied for a while. Then I started reading criticism and seeing the deficiencies, but I was still invested in the characters. So I was momentarily glad at the prospect of a more serious character focused arc, but you probably know which one I'm talking about. After that, I read it asking myself questions like, "did Buckley manage to get the punchline in the right panel today?" This went on for a long time before I gave up completely.

On to what I currently read or have finished, in alphabetical order. Drink when you see a Canadian.

A Softer World by Joey Comeau and Emily Horne
Joke a day strip with surreal jokes over beautiful photography.

Axe Cop by Malachai and Ethan Nicolle
If you aren't reading Axe Cop, do so now. It's the imagination of a six year old illustrated by his thirty year old brother. There is a ghost dragon tyrannosaurus. Abraham Lincoln blows people up. Unicorn horns grant wishes.

Bug by Adam Huber
Four jokes united by a common theme each weekday.

Cyanide and Happiness by Rob DenBleyker, Dave McElfatrick, Matt Melvin and Kris Wilson
Joke a day, done by four different guys, all with stick figures, respects no boundaries. You've probably heard of this one.

Captain Stupendous by Zach Weiner and Chris Jones
Single story, now a graphic novel (name was changed from Excelsior to Stupendous for legal reasons). A superhero's ex-wife is getting remarried. From there it gets very strange. Features the most interesting take on superhero disguises I've seen.

Concerned by Chris Livingston
A bumbling idiot precedes the events of Half-Life 2, done entirely in Garry's Mod. Livingston also ran Not My Desk, 1fort, Living in Oblivion, First Person Shouter, First Person Observer (read the comments section), and now runs Screen Cuisine.

Dinosaur Comics by Ryan North
Comic that uses the same art every day. Survives on the writing of computational linguist Ryan North. Three dinosaurs discuss any and all topics. Has been running since 2003. I use Archive Binge for the old ones as well since continuity is pretty weak.

Dr McNinja by Chris Hastings, coloured by Anthony Clark
This is about a doctor who is also a ninja. There are also raptor bandits, and Dracula has a moonbase. Yes, there is an Axe Cop crossover. You can start at the beginning, or with the first coloured comic.

Dresden Codak by Aaron Diaz
Science fiction comic that started as just one off jokes. Now each page takes months to complete and there is a recurring cast and arcs. There are problems with the storytelling and there is no schedule to speak of, but it always looks amazing.

Eight-Bit Theater by Brian Clevinger
Sprite comic based on Final Fantasy I, which I haven't played. Completed, I'm reading using Archive Binge.

Fleep by Jason Shiga
I've also read Bookhunter by Shiga, but I need to read more. Fleep is the story of I man trapped in a phone booth after a building collapses around it. Then he realises he doesn't speak the local language of wherever he is.

Freakangels by Warren Ellis and Paul Duffield.
No not the musician Warren Ellis, but the guy who wrote Transmetropolitan, which I still need to read. Freakangels is about twelve psychics with a hive mind (yes, you should be thinking of the Midwich Cuckoos) who accidentally destroyed civilisation and are now trying to fix things. It's almost finished at time of writing.

Garfield Minus Garfield by Dan Walsh
Exactly what it sounds like. Turns out Jon is crazy.

NSFW: Ghastly's Ghastly Comic by Chris Cracknell
Very, very NSFW strip that showed what would happen if hentai tropes, particularly tentacle monsters, happened in the real world.

Girl Genius by Phil & Kaja Foglio
Firstly, it's not steampunk, it's gaslamp fantasy, apparently. What if Victorian Europe was controlled by mad scientists? Reading this with Archive Binge.

Girls With Slingshots by Danielle Corsetto
Nice slice of life comic. Not on Archive Binge, so I haven't read the whole archives (what is this, the dark ages?).

Great Showdowns by Scott C.
Cute art depicting famous film conflicts.

Hark! A Vagrant by Kate Beaton
History and literature comics. Good art, very funny.

Indexed by Jessica Hagy
Graph jokes.

Irregular Webcomic and associated projects by David Morgan-Mar et al.
Irregular Webcomic is one of the longest and most regularly updated comics out there. It's also one of the few made by an Australian. There are multiple plot threads involving pirates fantasy adventurers, Shakespeare, Steve Irwin and the Mythbusters. The main draw for me is the scientific annotations, particularly this one. The site also hosts other projects. Darths and Droids is a Star Wars version of DM of the Rings and codified the tropes of that particular subgenre. Mezzacotta is the longest webcomic in existence. Lightning Made of Owls allows anyone to submit a comic using a predefined set of characters. Square Root of Minus Garfield is endless Garfield remixes. Comments on a Postcard may have some database issues, but the art is always experimental and the annotations very helpful.

Magpie Luck by Katie Sekelsky
Time travel adventures.

Manly Guys Doing Manly Things by Kelly Turnbull
Video game action heroes try to cope with normal life. Came close to being picked up by The Escapist. This arc has gone viral in Pokemon circles.

Plenty more to come.

Short Story: Geometric

My car came to a stop outside the park, and I erased the line of action from the nav square. I’m cautious like that.

The body was near a stand of trees. Beth was already there.

“Do we know who it is?” I asked.

“One Nathan Ogilvy, Research and Development for General Chalk.”

“Cause of death?”

“See for yourself.”

It wasn’t pretty. I could hardly see his eyes for the blood. There was more around the mouth. No other visible wounds.

“Scene secured?”

“Violence search found nothing past the victim’s face and hands. They’re breaking the spell down, blooding it. Some of the victim’s blood already collected for a search.”

Both checks failed. Violence got a bird eating a worm. None of the victims blood was anywhere but his body, at least from the past 24 hours. No marks of the victim or underneath.

Beth just stared at the body. “He did this to himself.”

There was a call from the trees. One of the officers had found what looked like a marked tree. Then we found another. And another.

“From the right angle on the path, it could be a complete seal,” Beth said.

“The hex connectors are right, but what would the trigger be?”

Beth stopped and stared at me. “It’s mental. Reading the seal triggers the effect in the brain, where there’s too much interference for us to detect it.”

“I’ve only seen maybe five mental seals in my life, never anything more complicated than euphoria or something. This was perfectly broken up, too.”

We walked back to the path. The top of the seal was obscured by shadow.

“Dawn. It could only be seen around dawn.” Beth said.

“Especially since one of the symbols is gone.“ I said. The seal was incomplete, missing the highest portion.

“Complex construction, precisely timed, single ring, with a symbol that probably doesn’t exist officially.” Beth summarised. “Now what?”

“I think it’s time to talk to someone from General Chalk.”