Webcomics [citation needed]

Centipede Damascus · December 2010

Webcomics, online comics, or Internet comics are comics published on a website. While most are published exclusively on the web, others are also published in magazines, newspapers or often in self-published books.

Webcomics can be compared to self-published print comics in that almost anyone can create their own webcomic and publish it. In January 2007, there were an estimated 38,000 webcomics being published. Webcomics range from traditional comic strips to graphic novels and cover many genres and subjects. Very few are financially self-sustaining.

Isoldae · December 2010

Webcomic OPs sure are weird.

Nerdgasmic · December 2010

Whats your favorite Toto song Marten??????

Houk the Namebringer · December 2010

My favorite webcomic is the one with the kinda dorky, socially anxious character

What's it called?

Oh yeah. Garfield

The Geek · December 2010

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nViWOd87oKY

unintentional · December 2010

i still haven't ever tried reading achewood
people have said you have to read a bunch for it to get good, but every time it gets posted it looks terrible and it's on hiatus or something so I don't really want to start liking it only to hit a cliffhanger

Centipede Damascus · December 2010

Yep.

Brolo · December 2010

Every body in the house say “punch n’ pie”, it’s the return of The Big 10! For the seventh entry, I’m taking a look at some of my favorite web comics. As we all know, when it comes to free entertainment, much of what’s offered is awful and lame garbage. However, there are some hidden gems of quality just waiting to be discovered. Web Comics are no different. With that in mind, here are my favored examples of online comics, combining both exceptional art and clever writing.
WARNING: Contains Brief Language And Mature Subject Matter
As per usual, keep in mind that this should in no way be considered a Top Ten, and the titles listed within are in no particular ranking order. With that out of the way, get ready to smile and laugh with “The Big 10: Web Comics”:

1. Striptease
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I’d never heard of this comic before just days ago. Thanks to my dear friend Susie, I was introduced to Striptease by way of the image you see above. It’s a Buffy reference, so I’m already smiling, but it’s the converting of a judgmental non-believer into an instant viewer that has me laughing. It’s funny because it’s true.

2. Sugar Shock
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Speaking of Buffy, here’s creator Joss Whedon’s new storyline, Sugar Shock. Ever since reviving the Slayer’s stories through comics in early 2007, Joss has become a golden god for Dark Horse Publishing. They’ll produce anything he has to offer, even if it’s free to the public. That’s great news for poor folks like me who can only afford a couple of comics a month.
This monthly mini-comic (each issue seems to run for roughly eight pages at a time) has vibrant pop art, a brisk but appropriate structure as well as the wit and charm that Whedon’s writing is famous for. Sure, there are only two issues at this point, but it’s already set itself up as a must-read in my mind. I just hope Joss can keep it up, and not run the risk of spreading himself too thin and ultimately burning out, like he’s done in the past. The loyal fans know what I’m talking about. Nevertheless, decent Whedon material is still awesome material in general.

3. Real Life Comics
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The characters and events in Real Life comics are apparently based on actual people and their lives. It shows. The writing feels natural and the characters are solid. Not only is the art clean and simple, but the observational humor found within this comic is easy to relate to and understand. And come on, Optimus Goth? So whacky, it’s gotta be true.

4. Penny Arcade
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Probably the most popular title on this list, Penny Arcade has actually been known to appear in Electronic Gaming Monthly. While focusing mainly on video game humor, the comic is also chock full of references to more accessible and universal forms of popular culture. The characters are well defined and consistent in their actions. It doesn’t feel like just one voice spread over a number of talking heads.

5. Kristy VS. The Zombie Army
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Take a bit of Sam Raimi, Tim Burton and Joss Whedon and mix it all up. The end result might resemble this comic. It deals with a young girl’s seemingly random battle with hundreds of the undead. As the story progresses, so does the character of Kristy, as she finds she has a connection to all of this, and there are bigger forces at work here. It’s fun, quippy and sometimes even shocking. In any other comic, this story would have grown repetitive and stale, but Kristy’s adventures are constantly evolving and moving forward. It really is hard to know just what will happen next.

6. Ctrl+Alt+Del
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Control Alt Delete mixes the bug-eyed art and violence of Jhonen Vasquez with the sly, spastic humor of Mel Brooks (or maybe Albert Brooks). Regardless, it’s never boring and always good for a chuckle. It’s quick and disposable, but totally worth a look.
7. Dueling Analogs
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Dueling Analogs is what it would be like if the Zucker Brothers were hardcore gamers. This comic is at its best when doing one-shot parodies. The style of the art is sometimes changed to reflect the title being lampooned, but it’s always spot on. They’re the kind of comics that come from years of watching The Simpsons and reading Mad Magazine. Clearly, a solid combination.

8. Questionable Content
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Questionable Content wears its indie cred on its sleeve, referencing obscure band names left and right. The best part is, it does it without any snobbery towards the reader. One gets the sense that the artist just likes to share what he enjoys. The comic feels very friendly and personable. The humor jumps effortlessly back and forth between high and low brow. The weird and abstract is even thrown in sometimes for good measure.
Probably my favorite element of Questionable Content is its arc-based storylines. Beneath the cool and aloof sillyness, there lies the occasional jolts of pathos and empathy. It’s dramatic without being melodramatic. The characters are diverse and endearing and the art has a wonderful grace and progression of skill.
I would love to see a live-action adaptation of this story, although the talking computers/robots could present a problem within the translation. Still, the stories are strong enough and identifiable, I’d like to see someone take a stab at it. In terms of casting, main character Marten looks EXACTLY like Diggnation’s Kevin Rose.

9. Sheldon
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Sheldon is in the tradition of comics one would find in the Sunday newspaper, both in art and script. Another example of excellent, observational humor. Like Calvin & Hobbes before it, Sheldon gives us amusing but ponderous humor that can only come from the innocence of youth. A true classic. Plus, that duck character is mad adorable.

10. VG Cats
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I love cats, so maybe I’m a bit biased. Beyond that, I think I’ll let the above image speak for itself. Enough said!

Honorable Mentions:
Boy On A Stick And Slither
Fang Gang Lite
Player Vs. Player
Three Panel Soul
Little Gamers

That’s it for this edition of The Big 10. Got a list of your own? Go forth and get posty with it.

-John Pavlich
www.sofadogs.com

The Geek · December 2010

unintentional wrote: »

i still haven't ever tried reading achewood
people have said you have to read a bunch for it to get good, but every time it gets posted it looks terrible and it's on hiatus or something so I don't really want to start liking it only to hit a cliffhanger

I was never able to get into it. I read through the whole archives a couple years back and didn't find any of it to be funny. It's just not my style.

Centipede Damascus · December 2010

unintentional wrote: »

i still haven't ever tried reading achewood
people have said you have to read a bunch for it to get good, but every time it gets posted it looks terrible and it's on hiatus or something so I don't really want to start liking it only to hit a cliffhanger

Just start here.

http://achewood.com/index.php?date=03122002

Cilla Black · December 2010

I've never seen such a bad Top 10 list for anything ever.

Penny-Arcade? Really? Who reads that shit? Never even heard of it.

Houk the Namebringer · December 2010

"Control Alt Delete mixes the bug-eyed art and violence of Jhonen Vasquez with the sly, spastic humor of Mel Brooks (or maybe Albert Brooks)"

This comparison has literally blown my mind to the moon, where it has suffered explosive decompression

CAD is so far away from anything Jhonen Vasquez or Mel Brooks has ever done, I have to assume it's mistaken identity

Coinage · December 2010

To further elaborate, webcomics first came to be a long time ago, and let us reflect for a moment on the courage of some of the early pioneers who have also had the fortitude to continue their struggle to the current day. Soon, the whole world will recognize the power of WEBCOMICS.

There is Netboy from 1994

This comic began in 1995, and you can barely tell from the web design. There is also from 1995, Kevin and Kell

From 1996, Help Desk
hd20101227.png?1293463062

Faux Pas

From 1997, Sluggy Freelance

PHD Comics

PVP

Dharma the Cat

User Friendly

Nukees

From 1998,
Pokey the Penguin

JerkCity

Bruno the Bandit

Never Never

Boy on A Stick and Slither

Irritability

The PC Weenies

General Protection Fault

And, of course, Penny Arcade.

Many more of the 1999 comics are still going so I will not post them Pause for a moment to give thanks for the incredible bravery of this circle of champions. Without them, this thread might not even exist.

Shabooty · December 2010

who here knows about checkerboard nightmare

my first webcomic, that

Muggins · December 2010

Pokey The Penguin

Business as Usual Circa 1998

Nerdgasmic · December 2010

Shabooty wrote: »

who here knows about checkerboard nightmare

my first webcomic, that

Cilla Black · December 2010

Coinage scrolling down that list was like going down the walk of shame of all the terrible webcomics I used to read in college.

Franko · December 2010

i wonder if people will post webcomics in this thread

hopefully it gets locked before it comes to that

Avraham · December 2010

My friend recommended Sluggy Freelance to me recently but looking at the archive, the art hasn't changed much over 13 years

Brolo · December 2010

punch your friend in the dick

do it twice

punch him in the dick any time he uses the words 'sluggy' or 'freelance'

Avraham · December 2010

he could probably beat me up

Cilla Black · December 2010

Sluggy Freelance is one of those I used to read in college. And not even just out of habit. There were a few storylines I enjoyed! Enough so that I never want to go back and actually re-read it to see if it was actually bad.

DE?AD · December 2010

As much as I'm not a fan of PVP, or internet-meme-based-superheroes, I gotta say I really do love that Scott Kurtz made Santa a Green Lantern analog. That's just delightful.

JayKaos · December 2010

I still read Sluggy Freelance.

Mainly because I read what was there in a big-ass spree a few years back and now I need to know how it ends yes I know it will never end shut up that's just how it works.

Didgeridoo · December 2010

We're going to have to work together to get over our hangups if we're going to learn to move on Catan's hexagonal grid. It's bad enough that we lost our crew of pawns when we passed within firing range of Battleship.

Campion · December 2010

Nerdgasmic wrote: »

Shabooty wrote: »

who here knows about checkerboard nightmare

my first webcomic, that

Yeah I used to read a lot of Checkerboard Nightmare. How far he's come...

SabreMau · December 2010

Campion · December 2010

DE?AD wrote: »

As much as I'm not a fan of PVP, or internet-meme-based-superheroes, I gotta say I really do love that Scott Kurtz made Santa a Green Lantern analog. That's just delightful.

http://greenlantern.wikia.com/wiki/Rot_Lop_Fan

Weaver · December 2010

superpoop is over with

DE?AD · December 2010

Campion wrote: »

DE?AD wrote: »

As much as I'm not a fan of PVP, or internet-meme-based-superheroes, I gotta say I really do love that Scott Kurtz made Santa a Green Lantern analog. That's just delightful.

http://greenlantern.wikia.com/wiki/Rot_Lop_Fan

Man, don't act like I don't know about the F Sharp Bell.

For some reason I have his oath, and the Green Lantern oath memorized.

I don't even really read DC comics.

Campion · December 2010

I was sick one day and just read Marvel and DC history on wikipedia. I've never read any comics. I know so much.

SabreMau · December 2010

SLyM · December 2010

I feel like that art is maybe trying too hard to look like Dr. Seuss?

HugmasterGeneral · December 2010

Same Campion. I like reading about all the canon on wikipedia, treating it like TV Tropes by opening new windows for each of the links I cross.

L|ama · December 2010

The history of Jerkcity stretches back to the mid-to-late 1980s, when Michael Lopp (aka Rands), Tristan A. Farnon (aka Spigot), and two others known to the world only by their handles (Deuce and Pants) met on BBS services in the San Francisco Bay Area. By the mid 1990s, all four were constantly connected to a private chat room, where they blew off steam and amused each other with dick jokes, programming jokes, and other off-color humor. In May 1998, Rands purchased the jerkcity.com domain name independent of any actual use for it; ideas included using the domain for a masturbation resource.
The genesis of the Jerkcity strip itself occurred when Rands discovered Microsoft Comic Chat and decided that, along with the domain name, he now had all the ingredients for creating a comic strip based on the three years of logs from the group's private chat room. He culled jokes from the logs, generated a few sample strips, and put the whole affair on jerkcity.com.
Jerkcity production continues today in much the same way as it has since 1998. First, jokes are culled from the private chat logs. Next, the dialogue is "spoken" by an army of IRC bots while the producer of the strip observes the strip's creation in Microsoft Comic Chat. The producer may then choose to reset the strip and replay the dialogue until the desired combination of timing, framing, and facial expressions is achieved. At this point, the strip may be tweaked using any number of image-manipulation tools. Finally, the strip is run through several automated perl scripts which add the title, credits, URL, and grey text, at which point the strip is queued for publication on jerkcity.com.[1][2][3][4]

Characters and Dialogue
Jerkcity features a central cast of four characters — Pants, Rands, Deuce, and Spigot — and a dozen or so minor ones[5]. Almost all characters in the comic strip, including the main characters, are standard characters bundled with Microsoft Comic Chat, and each character is thus depicted using a limited number of pre-existing poses and expressions. As a result, characters will often indicate action through onomatopoeia even though they appear to be doing nothing more than standing in one place and talking[6], and are sometimes covered with censor bars to suggest nudity[7][8]. The strip's dialogue is often absurd, obscene, and/or completely incomprehensible gibberish[9][10], and is occasionally redacted without explanation[11][12]. Because of the inscrutable nature of much of the dialogue, the site contains an official glossary, which helps to explain various slang used in strips, like "HUGLAGHALGHALGHAL" (the onomatopoeic representation of "dicklicking") and "T" (chat lingo meaning "Tell", followed by the name of the person who is being addressed).
[edit]Themes
The primary themes of Jerkcity include drinking [13], drug abuse[14] (especially marijuana[15]), misogyny[16], prostitution[17], gluttony[18], dick jokes[19], homosexuality[20], masturbation[21], oral sex[22], anal sex[23], coprophilia[24], coprophagia[25], urolagnia[26], urophagia[27], sex in public toilets[28] (many strips even take place in a public men's room[29]), glory holes[30], other homosexual [31], homophobic[32], and/or paraphilic activities[33], and computer programming[34]; also, cocks[35]. While certain Jerkcity installments make misguided attempts at bringing some class and refinement to the strip's often crude and ridiculous content[36][37], many other strips indicate that Jerkcity holds no pre-tense of actually being worth reading in the first place[38][39][40][41][42].
[edit]Story
Jerkcity contains almost no character development, plot, storyline, or continuity (it is described by its creator as "a story told out of order"[4]). Sometimes, however, a running joke which demands some level of continuity asserts itself, such as in the Big Faggoty Dick series, the Rape Cops series[43], the Holy God series[44], the Zen Boners series[45], the For Fags series, a series of strips hand-drawn and subtitled in Esperanto due to technical difficulties[46], a period in the autumn of 2000 in which the characters went on strike[47], a series of strips in which Pants refuses to come out from under the sink[48], a series of strips in which the Jerkcity players hold auditions for the role of the Cockbot[49], and a series of strips not featuring Pants or Deuce due to them being "arrested by S.H.I.E.L.D."[50]. In another instance, Spigot and Deuce poke each other in the eye[51]; subsequent strips portray both with an "X" over one eye. Their eyesight was inexplicably cured[52] some two and a half months later. The Jerkcity players occasionally act out scenes from Spigot the Bear, which is ostensibly a T.J. Hooker-like cop drama, although the episodes tend to bear little resemblance to any sort of cop drama and appear instead to be subtle variations on the standard Jerkcity repertoire.
[edit]Real-World Commentary and Interaction
Jerkcity appears to take place in its own universe of endless gay sex and drug abuse, including its own schedule of holidays[53]. However, the strip does occasionally comment on real-world mainstream news ephemera and current events, such as the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal[54], the death of John F. Kennedy, Jr.[55], the Terri Schiavo case[56], the trial of Robert Blake[57], the Laci Peterson abduction[58], Tom Green's battle with testicular cancer[59], the paralysis of Christopher Reeve[60], the murder of Sherrice Iverson by Jeremy Strohmeyer[61], the incarceration of Mumia Abu-Jamal[62], the release from prison and subsequent probation of Kevin Mitnick[63], the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on Manhattan[64], the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami[65], the death of Charlton Heston[66], the cancellation of the 2007 revival of The Bionic Woman[67], the presidential inauguration of Barack Obama[68], the Bernard Madoff investment scandal[69], and even a woman left in a makeshift grave after the flooding of New Orleans[70]. Strips have also included OpenBSD bug reports[71], corrections to this Wikipedia entry[72][73] (including a statement that a contemporary version of this article "needs more references"[74]), ridicule of a Wikipedia admin[75][76], ridicule of Wikipedia founder Jimbo Wales[77], and ridicule of Wikipedia in general[78][79][80][81].
In November of 2004, some cast members went to Disneyland and left contact information for Jerkcity fans to send messages while in the park. Staff replied to many of these messages with pictures taken from a cellular phone's built-in camera[82][83].
[edit]Production and Publication
Once or twice a year, comics are substituted with photographs without explanation. In some strips, one of the standard backgrounds is replaced with user-created or submitted images[84][85][86][87]. Although the backgrounds are usually inconsequential to the strip's story, there have been occasions where the background is either a running gag in and of itself or actually affects the story. On 14 June 2004, a series of strips with a white background began; characters noticed the lack of a background and provided commentary[88]. Even though the strip's dialogue soon reverted back to normal, the backgrounds remained white until 7 August 2004[89]. From 26 January 2009 to 21 November 2009, all strips took place, without explanation, in a public men's room[68][90]. After a short hiatus, the men's room background was brought back for another run from 3 December 2009[91] through 2 February 2010[92]. At the logical extreme of the strip's sometimes-cavalier attitude towards the traditional comic strip format, strips are occasionally posted with intentional production errors which render them partially or completely unreadable[93][94][95][96][97].
Although a new Jerkcity strip is usually published every day, there have been periods of respite in the publishing schedule. Sometimes, this is intentional, as when the strip's publishers officially took a vacation in August 2004[98], but other times, it seems that the Jerkcity team simply forgets that the queue of unpublished strips has gone empty. In these cases, the strip will usually return with an apology of some sort, although the sincerity of these apologies varies widely[99][100][101]. At times, more than one strip per day has been published, as with the publishing of three strips on 30 December 1999[102][103][104] and, two days later, the publishing of two strips on 1 January 2000[105][106]. Notably, Jerkcity's first few months of existence saw the strip published on a haphazard schedule[107]. Despite these inconsistencies, the comic celebrates its own publishing milestones, as when strip 4000 was published on 19 October 2009[108].

Nerdgasmic · December 2010

Weaver wrote: »

superpoop is over with

for a second I thought you said supermega

SabreMau · December 2010

SLyM wrote: »

I feel like that art is maybe trying too hard to look like Dr. Seuss?

It's got Larlar standing behind an angry caution sign that says "NUH-UH", so it's allowed to. And it doesn't always do so:

Bucketman · December 2010

The Geek wrote: »

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nViWOd87oKY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H4hvZkBpUJs

crwth · December 2010

Didgeridoo · December 2010

huh

Devil seems like a pretty nice guy

Bucketman · December 2010

So 2010 is ripping around in a sports car running over poor people? Sounds about right

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