Category Archives: adventure webcomic

The Webcomic Overlook #192: 2D Goggles

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Through its relatively short lifespan as a genre, webcomics have proved they can do things just as good as any other form of media can. They can make you laugh. They can make you cry. They can make you poo your pants when you get a surprise animation of a creepy anime zombie girl. They can make you find the goodness in humanity through the flooded streets of New Orleans, and they can make you feel the frustration of trying to find a loved one in Iran.

And, yes, webcomics can teach. Moreso, I suspect, than conventional print comics can. There are a lot of webcomic creators out there — such as Kate Beaton and Randall Munroe — that actually respect the intelligence of their readers. They’ll give you a set up using an obscure historical figure or an advanced calculus mathematical equation and trust that you’ll laugh even if you don’t get it at first, and that you’ll do more research if the subject piqued your interest.

Take, for example, Sydney Padua’s 2D Goggles (subtitled The Thrilling Adventures of Lovelace and Babbage), a webcomic about two historical characters that I hadn’t thought about since my high school BASIC programming class.

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The Webcomic Overlook #191: Lady Sabre and the Pirates of the Ineffable Aether

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Greg Rucka is the sort of comic book creator who’s developed quite a reputation for writing strong female characters. I mean, real strong female characters. Not the unrepentant cheesecake masquerading as feminism that Kate Beaton famously mocked that studios like Top Cow have exploited to the extent that you’re actually more embarrassed reading their comics in public than if you were reading, say, Maxim.

Rucka, though, is the real deal. He was at the helm for the controversial launch of the new Batwoman, Kate Kane, perhaps the first prominent lesbian superheroine with her own title. He turned Batman supporting character, Rene Montoya, into the mysterious, faceless Question, which is about as far from the girls-in-swimsuits look that most superheroines sport. He’s been given writing duties on other notably headstrong female characters like Elektra and Wonder Woman.

His most famous independent work is Whiteout, which starred a female Deputy US Marshall. In 2009, was turned into a movie starring Kate Beckingsale. Another independent series, Queen & Country, centers around a female secret operative who goes no dangerous missions. For his efforts, he’s won 4 Eisner Awards, 1 Harvey Award, and 1 GLAAD Media Award.

Last year, alongside artist Rick Burchett (a fellow Eisner Award winner for his collaboration with Paul Dini and Ty Templeton on The Batman and Robin Adventures), Mr. Rucka also launched his won webcomic: Lady Sabre and the Pirates of the Ineffable Aether.

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One Punch Reviews #54: Power Nap

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Every time I come across a reference to Maritza Campos’ Power Nap, there’s always a reference to College Roomies From Hell. I’ve never read that comic. I suspect it’s a blind spot that will prove to be my undoing, like that time I didn’t know what Penny Arcade and Ctrl+Alt+Del were. (Oh, to return to those blissful, innocent days.) It’s long, and it never really seemed something that was up my alley, anyway. I’ve never really been a fan of college roommate comics, let alone one where they’re apparently from the eternal netherworlds of the damned. So I’m not the guy to go ask if this is better or worse than CRFH.

It doesn’t much matter, anyway. First of all, it’s visually distinct from CRFH. This time around someone else is handling artistic duties. Power Nap is penned by Bachan, a Mexican illustrator who also does Vinny. It seems to be about a werewolf of sorts.


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The Webcomic Overlook #190: Mokepon

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It would probably be fair to say that I was too old to get into the whole Pokemon phenomenon. Oh, I watched the episodes when they first aired on the Kid’s WB. I did have a younger brother and sister after all, who, I suspect, actually watched the show semi-ironically.

The magic of the show, too, was that it was one of those rare instances that a young adult or adult can watch a kid’s show without feeling too weird about it. Frankly, I blame Beanie Babies and Tamagotchis… which, for you youngsters, were like NeoPets but way, way more annoying.

However, if you asked me to identify a Pokemon beyond, say, the core 20, I’d probably be at a loss. I would totally fail those infamous “Who’s that Pokemon?” stingers, thus bringing shame to my ancestors. I never played the game on the Game Boy, nor was I part of the card craze, nor am I familiar with the show after Ash, Misty, and Brock disappeared. I don’t remember the name of that lame-o Brock replacement guy. Hell, I was totally befuddled by the whole “Gary F***ing Oak” meme and had to google it just to get caught up. Let me tell you, when you have to resort to “Know Your Meme,” then you know you’ve truly lost the pulse of what makes young people tick these days.

So you’d think that I’d be the totally wrong audience for Mokepon, a webcomic on Smack Jeeves written by someone who apparently goes by “H0lyhandgrenade.”

Au contraire, mon ami! Mokepon turned out to be a surprisingly fun read, full stuff that can entertain even a reader with only a passing familiarity of Pokemon. Let’s dig in, shall we?

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The Webcomic Overlook #189: Delilah Dirk and the Turkish Lieutenant

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There are two ends of the reviewing spectrum that make me a bit nervous. The first, as I mentioned in the previous review, is when a webcomic looks so amateur that you’re a bit hesitant to talk about it.

Then there’s the opposite end of the spectrum. Sometimes a webcomic is so polished that you’re sort of taken aback by how good it looks. “Wait,” I say, “is this even a webcomic, technically? I’m pretty sure this was always meant to go straight to print.” I’m not slamming the art in webcomics, by the way, which can be quite stunning. However, most have a distinctly non-commercial flavor, where the art is geared close to the heart of the creator. I’m talking about comics that seem so ready for prime time that you’re surprised that there isn’t already an animated adaptation airing on Cartoon Network with a live-action movie deal in the works.

That’s how I feel when I read Tony Cliff’s Delilah Dirk and the Turkish Lieutenant (not to be confused with Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch), a webcomic about swashbuckling adventure in the 1800′s.

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The Webcomic Overlook #187: Clandestinauts

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It sometimes astounds me how many posts I’ve devoted to webcomics. It’s, like, more than “a lot” and just short of “a buttload.” The peril, at this point, is that sometimes you run the risk of saying the exact same thing about one webcomic that you said about another webcomic. Repeating myself is perhaps my second greatest fear in the world.

The first is my mom’s dog, Cinnamon.

Curse that Japanese Chin his sharp, pointy fangs. Why am I the only person he ever seems to bite?

So when I sat down to write about Tim Sievert’s Clandestinauts (a webcomic that I chose to read primarily because I am a big fan of the world “clandestine” — seriously, when I was a kid, I even created a superhero with that name), I was set to write, “Well, as much as I like the art, I wasn’t too big a fan of the story.” Then I thought to myself, “Wait. Didn’t I write that once? Like, at least five times before?”

If I had the time or inclination, I could probably track down all instances I expressed the exact same sentiment. I’m pretty sure I said the same thing about, say, What Birds Know. But life is short, and plan on spending my free time owning noobs on iPad/iPhone game Valor later, so let’s just say that I’ve said it a lot.


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The Webcomic Overlook #186: The Night Owls

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“But wait, El Santo,” you say. “Aren’t you taking a break?”

I know. I’ve got to admit something to you: I’m terrible at this whole taking a break thing. And the worst part of it is… I’m breaking hiatus for something that is not, technically, a webcomic.

Twins Peter and Bobby Timony’s The Night Owls is, in fact, closer to being on the digital comic side of the scale than on the webcomic side. It could have been considered a webcomic when Zuda was around. But then Zuda died, a good number of my Zuda-only webcomic blogger compatriots disappeared, and the remaining Zuda issues have been banished to the nether realms of Comixology.

If you want to read The Night Owls anymore, you must download it for $0.99 an issue … though the first issue is free. The Night Owls has since ended, capping off at 9 issues, so a full run of The Night Owls is going to cost you $8 (and a bit more more if you’re going to spring for the print version on Amazon).

I suppose a site called “The Webcomic Overlook” should probably let this one go… but then who would review it? From my experience, most sites reviewing digital comics are focusing on much the same things as their print comic sites … namely DC’s New 52 initiative.


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