NY Times’ City Room Blog Marginalizes Comic Fans

In an entry on NY Times’ City Room Blog yesterday, Alan Feuer posted a blurb titled “Comics and Combovers” about the upcoming NY ComicCon. In one sentence, Feuer manages to insinuate that anyone over the age of thirteen who attends ComicCon is juvenile, while presumably, he’s supposed to be encouraging the public to attend. It’s a small comment…. but it really pisses me off.

“The culture is strewn with examples of grown men in their 40s – some in their 50s – unabashedly proclaiming love for comic books, an obsession that hints at lingering boyhood hungers and ranks up there with coin collecting as something to be given up by age 13. Maybe the security of affluence has permitted men to remain adolescents at heart well after middle age has taken their bodies.”

Well now. If you plan on following this blog regularly, (and hopefully, I will be posting regularly), it would be best if you realize this sort of thing is going to result in a tirade.

Hello, world.

Still setting things up on the back-end. Be with you shortly.

Have finished import from LiveJournal, and tagging and categorizing old posts.

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YAY HIGH MOON FINALLY STARTED UPDATING

If you like the Wild West, or werewolves, or if you just like good comics, please go read High Moon at Zuda.com. I’ve been dying for this to update ever since it won, and I’m glad to see my anticipation was justified.

Many thanks and congrats to David Gallaher.

Also, Wizard Magazine has nice things to say about it here.

Personally, I think comics like High Moon benefit greatly from the full-screen option Zuda provides. With such quality art, I don’t feel I can really bask in it when it’s crammed into such a small place on my browser. A lot of readers have felt this feature was unnecessary for web comics, and if we were talking about most web comics, they’d be right. But Zuda allows us the option of seeing print-worthy books for free on our screens, with is great for people like me who have no money, no room for those comics storage boxes, and a deep love for quality comics.

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Cloverfield.

Alright. So, I’m a bad geek and didn’t say anything about the Mac Keynote this year. Summary: the Mac Air is sexy and I want one, and I don’t care about anything else they talked about.

I’m still a bad geek. I almost passed up talking about Cloverfield, because I figured nobody would want to read a post that just said, “OMG SO GOOD” over and over again.

Then I made the mistake of reading what other people said on the Internet. As one usually feels when they make this mistake, I instantly wanted to throttle people.

For those who haven’t seen it, I’m trying to leave out spoilers. But the thing you absolutely must know before reading the rest of this is: the movie is shot as though with a handcam, a la Blair Witch. Not like a documentary, though. Even more informal than that. You should also know that I didn’t actually follow a lot of the viral marketing. I saw the promo poster of the Lady Liberty missing her head, and that was it. I loved the movie.

I started reading comments like “awkward acting, poor script” and my mind boggled. What is wrong with you people? Every word that came out of someone’s mouth in that movie was exactly what someone would say in the situation they were in. A negligible amount (only one moment that really struck me as ‘too’ predictable) of lines were cliche’, yes, but naturally so. In the “Yes, you expected him to say that because THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT YOU WOULD SAY TOO, MORON” sort of way. I found one or two moments of the acting a bit awkward, now that I think about it, but for the most part, I believed every emotion that flitted across their faces. I believed Rob was a douche, in the overly romantic yet overly insensitive sort of way. You know the types.

Hud, the cameraman, was my favorite character. You don’t even see his face for most of the movie, but you see everything from his point of view, and I love him. To be honest? I didn’t care that much about Rob. Not because he was unbelievable or unrealistic, but because he WAS believable, and I didn’t like him. He’s a jerk who thinks he’s a nice guy. His brother (Steve?) is a jerk in a much more obvious way, and I at least like the fact that he doesn’t try to cover it up.

Other comments that made me want to kill people? “Waaaaah, not enough monster.” From the amount of this I heard before seeing the movie, I seriously thought I would get to see no more than a leg or a tail whip or something, and that would be it. Then I saw the movie and was surprised to see a whole monster on the screen. This isn’t that crappy American Godzilla movie, folks. This is not a movie about all the different inventive ways in which a monster can go “ME BIG, ME SMASH.” The monster is not the main character. Hell, this story isn’t even ABOUT the monster. It’s about a small group of people trying to survive. From the marketing, I didn’t expect that we’d get to see much of the monster, actually.

What did they expect? The movie was shot from the first-person view of the characters, in a congested, skyscraper-filled city. And they’re trying to survive. When you’re trying to SURVIVE a giant monster, you don’t exactly put yourself in its path so you can get the money-shot. Now, maybe if they were in Kansas, they’d be able to give us more views of the monster while trying to stay away from it. But a monster crushing some crops and a couple of barns isn’t that exciting. You get to see plenty of destruction. Soak it in, and stop complaining that you don’t know what the square inch of skin behind the monster’s… (er, what would one CALL any of those body parts?) looks like.

“Waaaah the camera was too shaky.” Ok, now, for those people who legitimately get motion sickness or vertigo, I understand, and I’m sorry. This visual style wasn’t for you, and I hope you never have to watch a home movie where the cameraman was running, or someone tried to find a button on the camera while it was still recording. You have a legitimate reason to dislike this visual style, because it makes your tummy hurt. I’m sorry you couldn’t enjoy it as much as the rest of us.

But for those douches who just went “God, what shoddy camera work, use a Steadicam already” I just want to say: you, sirs, need to STFU, and FOAD, right now. Maybe, I don’t know, draw a box, walk far away from it, and try to think? Sorry, now your head hurts, my bad. I don’t know about YOUR home movies, but of course I use a high-end professional Steadicam for mine! I’ve just got one lying around, so that if a monster attacks the city while I’m shooting something else, the recorded evidence I have of this fact will be professional looking and smooth. You’ll never be able to tell I’m running with the camera. The movie is about average people who were in the middle of something else when disaster struck. They were taking a home movie when it happened. Let’s see, what do average people use for home movies? Crappy handcams! What DON’T they use? Steadicams! The handcam visuals were an integral part of the film concept, and added to the realism. The movie is supposed to look like you stumbled upon someone’s camcorder, complete with awkward cuts and snippets of the footage that’s been recorded over.

The focus of this movie was not to look pretty, or to follow the monster on its rampage. It’s about the first-hand experience of a small group of people who wouldn’t have a professional camera crew following them around. The movie delivers the quota of destruction and explosions, and its quota of monster viewing.

I cared about these characters. I was clenched the whole time. When something bad happened to them, I was pressing my hand over my mouth to muffle my screams. Alright, so I didn’t like Rob. But I spent the whole movie hoping he and his friends didn’t die. He was real enough, and I don’t like real people to die unless they’re murderers or rapists. Of course, from the very beginning of the movie, you know there’s going to be death. Come on, would it be realistic for ALL of them to make it out?

I thought this was an excellent movie. The camera work was what a guy with a handcam would do, so you don’t get the awesome technical shots that are talked about in other movies. You do get great special effects anyway, and characters you care about, and a monster you’re afraid of. You get a sense of impending doom and expecting the worse throughout the whole thing.

A warning: Don’t go see this movie if you’re a purist about textbook camera work. I don’t want to hear your bitching. Don’t go see this movie if you like “MONSTER SMASH” movies with shitty plot. I don’t want to hear your bitching. Don’t go see this movie if you get motion sickness or vertigo easily. You may have a better reason than the douches, but I STILL don’t want to hear your bitching. Basically, don’t go see this movie if you’re an ignorant putz with no mind for creative concept. I want to rip your throat out.

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Oh man, I did that thing where I put things off and they never get done.

So, here I am in New York, recovering from partying a little too hard in Boston this weekend, and suddenly I realize, oh damn, it’s January, and I never posted my December Zuda reviews. I am a jerk.

Sorry this is so long. I tried to keep it short on some reviews, but obviously, I have strong opinions, whether positive or negative, about some of them, and that requires a lengthier explanation. Here goes, in Final Rank order from lowest to highest.

Rank 10: Ponbiki Z
Appropriately ranked. The unprofessional word blocks would be enough for me to put it there, even without the “ok-but-not-awesome” art and uninspiring writing. Giant robots have been done awesomely way too many times before for such a “meh” piece of work to be even remotely interesting for me.

Rank 9: Word of Power
Meh. It was alright. I like the story concept, and the manga-style isn’t poorly done, though I thought it unpolished. I don’t find the writing that engaging, and it doesn’t use its eight pages well. I felt this one was ranked where it belonged, though the story concept could have had potential.

Rank 8: Adventures of Maxy J Millionare
The adventures of a stuffed animal separated from his human. NOT a story for children. I can’t believe this rated below the pretension of Frankie. Worse, I can’t believe this rated below the “been-there-done-that” of Development Hell. This story was way cute and actually delivered adult messages through “childish” language. I think it takes real talent to make your writing “child-like” and yet completely adult at the same time. The art made me think of Where the Wild Things Are, for some reason. I’m really glad this one will get to continue on elsewhere, and I only hope that the weird contracts Zuda forces competitors into won’t hinder that. It’s thought provoking because it’s different, and that’s what it has in common with all of my favorite pieces in this contest.

Rank 7: Development Hell (Sorry this one’s long, but it’s a different sort of entry)
Of the Zuda pieces I’ve read, this one is the only one that has standalone pages with no real overarching storyline. It’s a string of computer-geek jokes, which of course I find funny, but not really a contest winner. The humor appeals to a very specific niche, and visually, this comic just does not stand up to most of its competitors. In fact, it lost me on the very first screen, where the art from the first panel is repeated in the third. Each screen only contains three panels, and four of his eight screens use the same panel twice, with minor changes. Mathematically, out of the 24 panels this submission contains, 16% of them were just recycled. I think that’s pretty unprofessional when you’re trying to catch the eye of a Big Two publisher. If you were trying to get it published in the back of a coder’s magazine or newsletter, it would work. It’s got funny content, but the episodic format doesn’t leave me dying for more. Basically, I like it, but still feel it was a poor competition piece.

Rank 6: Araknid Kid
This one’s got a really, really neat concept, but I worry the Kid’s way of expressing himself would get old too quickly. One-image pictographs run the risk of limiting this character to overly simplistic expression. If more sophisticated pictographs, they may be too ambiguous for the reader to get what the Kid’s trying to say. That said, I think this is an awesome, awesome concept, and the art looks really polished, and the artist does really well highlighting very small, very important details. Have I mentioned I really want to see how the rest of the story goes? I was sad this ranked as low as it did, though it wasn’t my pick for the winner.

Rank 5: Frankie
A story about Frankenstein’s son and his angst, basically. The art on this one was fairly pretty, but the story and dialog of this 8-page submission are disorienting at best, pretentious and boring at worst. I wasn’t impressed. Based on the synopsis, could be interesting, but based on the example shown, I don’t care. I’m upset this did better than the Kid.

Rank 4: Avaste Ye
This is the only comic that uses the “simplistic” Paint & copy/paste art style. The art’s cute, and there are plenty of successful, really well-done comics with “simple” or “easy” (Quotes because that art is not, in actuality, really simple or easy) art, so it’s not like this is unknown in the webcomic world, and it’s certainly not childish, though I’d classify it “unprofessional,” considering the company it was submitted to. The story’s cute, and a fantasy I’m unashamed to say I’ve had on many an occasion. That said, I couldn’t compare it to the works that take advantage of the full-screen reader with gorgeous, detailed art, and provide intricate stories that leave me glued to my iBook screen. The Internet’s already got topical funny. The web is full of sticks. I’ll take eye candy and new brain stimulants, thank you.

Rank 3: The Mundane Overrated Misadventures of Spudman
This was one of my very last reads, because from the title and the thumbnail, my first impression was, “Super-hero potato? Not interested.” Then I read it. The art, so good! The story concept, definitely new! The writing, so surprisingly hilarious! You may have noticed I don’t give a lot of praise to the comedic comics in this contest (still loving alliteration (and consonance, for that matter (and the meta-metacomment on the meta-comment))), but oh man, this is just good writing. I was glad it moved up through the ranks, and happy to see it above Avaste Ye.

Rank 2: The Crooked Man
(Insert cliché cries of “WHY?!” and “NO!” here) I wanted this to win SO badly. Beautiful artwork, a period piece (I’m such a sucker for them), fantastic writing and pacing, and a story I just want to keep following. I’m a sad, sad girl, especially considering the first place comic. If you couldn’t tell, this was my vote.

Rank 1: Pray for Death
The art is different and neat, and I like gritty. It’s the only thing I like about this comic. I like detective stories, but this one didn’t grab me. And this comic completely, totally lost me with the huge bubble of exposition text right at the beginning of the story. Unnecessary! Detracts from the current action! Completely unrealistic in the moment! Leave me wanting more; don’t tell me everything right off the bat. I don’t want to know NOW why the protagonist’s former co-workers don’t love her, I want you to make me BEG for that story. Tantalize me! I also just can’t believe this detective, who seems to want a fresh start, would air her dirtiest laundry in the middle of trying to figure out a murder case, something she needs her focus to do, as well as the focus and trust of her partner. In one panel, she went from feeling like a person to a writer’s tool. I was highly annoyed this was number one, when so many other comics expressed higher artistic and writing talent.

Overall thoughts: The December competition felt like American Idol to me. You know, where you watch real talent get passed over because the voters are, on average, average people, and average people apparently choose average contestants. I just hope some of these competitors get the OK from Zuda/DC to publish their comics elsewhere soon. I think the contracts say you have to get the OK from them even if you lose, unless some certain amount of time passes or something. I could be wrong on that.

I’m keeping my fingers crossed that Zuda eventually sets up some system where the readers can say, “I’d like to nominate this former finalist to be re-entered in a future vote.” But more on that when I talk about the Zuda website in general.

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Quick clarification for anyone who isn’t quite sure how winning Zuda works

Sorry if you already know all this, or if you’ve read my explanation at

webcomics already! As I understand it…

So far, at the beginning of each month, ten finalists are picked by the Zuda mod-type guys (I’ll call them ZMGs) for the readers to vote on. Each reader gets one vote for the month, though the reader can change the vote as many times as they want by the end of the month. Their vote only counts for the last comic they vote on. At the end of the month, the comic with the most votes gets a contract. So far, the other 9 don’t, and so far, they don’t go back in the competition. There’s also an Instant Winner so far every month. Instant winners don’t get submitted for voting. The ZMGs hand-pick them to get an instant contract. This process repeats each month.

So, so far, there’s one Instant Winner and one Voted Winner every month. So, there are more than one winners in general, but only one winner that gets chosen by the readers each month. So, there’s not just one winner, but there’s only two winners (one voted, one not) each month.

It’s a rolling submission contest. Once a comic goes into the pool, it stays there until DC chooses it as a finalist or rejects it outright. So, if someone submitted in October, but weren’t chosen for the November or December finalists, they might still get chosen in January. Or they might never get chosen at all, and (assumedly) after a certain amount of time, Zuda will withdraw their submission and send them a “Sorry!” letter.

Next time, I diverge from what my planned topic was going to be to respond to all sorts of interesting topics someone brought up in response to my last blurb.

Now… I’m going to go pull another all-nighter in a row, on no sleep. WOOHOO!

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Superheroes soon to be on screen! (God, I love alliteration)

I’m taking a break from the all-nighter I’m pulling (yay finals!) to write this.

OMG. Yes I know, I’m resorting to Internet speak of a preteen, but like, seriously, OMG!

So, after AGONIZINGLY glaring at the leaked Dark Knight trailer, willing it to be better quality so I could tell whether my excitement was warranted, today, the Official Trailer finally hit the ‘net, in all its high-quality, takes-up-my-whole-browser glory.

Not to go back to that whole preteen fangirl thing, but… SQUEE!

I can finally hear the dialogue clearly, but more importantly, I can finally see the Joker well enough to fully understand the hype around Heath Ledger’s portrayal of our favorite crazy.

Now, up ’til now, I didn’t care too much one way or another about Ledger. I thought he was a solid enough actor with a really pretty face. Wasn’t what I’d consider a fan, but liked his performances in all his movies well enough. Given he’s known for being a pretty boy, I was worried about his casting.

Now I’m in total awe. I mean, just, it’s beautiful, in the absolute most incredibly terrifying way ever. As much as I hate to cite MTV.com, this article by Shawn Adler got it almost spot on when Adler said “Ledger inhabits the character.”

As someone very close to me pointed out, it would be more appropriate to say the Joker inhabits Ledger. I mean, the actor seems to be possessed by the character, channelling his energy and life force straight out of the comics by inhuman means. At least, that what it seems to me. Granted, I haven’t been reading comics as long as most comic lovers.

But I genuinely can’t see a pretty boy anywhere in that maniacal, deformed face. I completely forgot there’s a smoking hot body under that suit. Because you can’t think about those things when you look at the Joker. It would just be wrong… and possibly suicidal for anyone but Harley Quinn (otherwise known as Lady Not Appearing In This Film).

And I have to wait until JULY? ::whimper::

In other DC movie anticipations, I’m getting antsy about waiting for JLA casting confirmations. I know, I know, I have to wait about two years for the film anyway, but really, I just want to know FOR SURE if Adam Brody’s going to be the Flash. I would adore that. The other casting rumors I’m wary of. I’ll completely understand if I get called a closed-minded biased brat for this, but I get nervous about casting rappers and models in a super hero movie. Zoe Kazan I’m cool with. She’s got quite a few note-worthy acting credentials. I’m willing to put faith in her based on her IMDB list alone, without knowing anything else about her.

But isn’t she in her mid-twenties? I mean, I know Barry Allen has to be about the same age as the rest of the JLA, but if Wally’s the same age too, are they still going to portray Barry and Iris as Wally’s uncle and aunt? I’m so curious. I have questions. I happen to be a girl with no patience, and this movie is still two years off.

I don’t know what to think about the other casting rumors. I don’t know any of Scott Porter’s, Teresa Palmer’s, or Arnie Hammer’s work. All I know is that their credentials are few, and not particularly impressive. On one hand, I love “new” talent, because you don’t have any previous notions about them. You don’t look at them and see every other character they’ve played. On the other hand, you also don’t have any indication of whether they’re any good.

Then again, Brody’s been a mostly small-screen actor too. Only, one of his TV portrayals was a main character on a show that ran for four seasons, and the particular character was a huge geek, especially about comic books. (A geek who was a major hottie. Shut up, they exist, I’m friends with plenty, and I’m dating one too. So there.) Brody also has writing credits with WildStorm, on Red Menace. So, what he possibly lacks in film cred, he MORE than makes up for in geek cred.

Goodness, between using the phrases “OMG,” “like, seriously,” “smoking body,” “shut up!” and “major hottie,” I think I need to go back to high school. In the 90s. Wait, I was in junior high for most of the nineties. Well, most of the second half of the nineties. And they never used “OMG.” Oops. Anyway, I think this was the most professional entry I’ve read by anyone, ever, don’t you? No? OMG YRU SO MEAN?!!!!

Now, back to writing fourth year college papers. People will see me grow up someday, I promise. Just not before I turn eighty.

(I promise this blog won’t always be so DC-heavy)

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Zuda ponderings, pt 1.

Since I’ve been reviewing some Zuda comics lately, I thought I might publish a series of short blurbs on issues I’ve encountered on the site.

I’ve made some comments on Zuda.com on some of the comics there. Some of my comments made quite a few people angry. They’ve brought up all sorts of points I just don’t agree with, but rather than flood the comics’ pages with my responses, probably making the creators very angry, I thought I’d just start posting them here.

Today, I’m going to start with the issue of what Zuda is, and in my next post on this topic, will evolve into how Zuda relates to DC as a whole.

“Where’d you get the idea that this was Vertigo Online? This is Zuda! It’s for webcomics! The site mods don’t ship it as anything other than a webcomic contest, so who are you to say what belongs here and what doesn’t?”

My point? The mods can promote the site any way they want. But ultimately, it’s a site where the readers vote, so the site’s going to end up publishing what the readers want. And if, like me, the majority of readers prefer realistic art to stick people, and if we want visually gratifying art over repeated panels, and if we want in-depth story over topical, stand-alone jokes, well, by golly, that’s what we’re going to get.

What IS Zuda? Each of DC’s imprints seems to have a specific set of topic matters or a certain demographic they look to appeal to. So, what’s Zuda’s “niche?”

Simple: whatever the readers want it to be. The audience? Anyone who reads comics online. That’s a huge “demographic.” I use quotes because really, it’s not a demographic at all. The online comic reader constituency varies too much in demographic variables to qualify as a specific group. In race, age, gender, economics, education, the webcomic reader can be anybody. That’s the beauty of webcomics. You can publish a webcomic on any topic and have a readership, because basically every kind of person is on the internet.

Now, narrow that down to people who would be interested in DC’s involvement with webcomics. Ok…. still a huge number of people, who have interest in a number of different things. How do you know who to appeal to? And lo! There was a solution. The readers are presented with 10 finalists every month, and we get to vote! WE get to choose what direction the imprint takes!

Zuda appeals to whoever we CHOOSE it to appeal to. It takes advantage of the interactivity of the web! So if I say, “Well, I don’t think there are enough comics with long involved plots and beautiful drawings on the web, so I want more of those,” guess what? I’M RIGHT. Because I’m a reader, and I voted.

What’s that? You think Zuda should follow the trend of topical, episodic, stand-alone humor comics? Cool! YOU’RE right too! Go vote for pirate stick figures, and if they win, well, you were MORE right than me. That’s just it, whoever’s in the majority is “right” in this contest. The masses choose.

I don’t know what direction Zuda’s MEANT to take, but I do know which direction I WANT it to take. (More on that in later posts.) So, if I want one thing, and you want something else, can’t we just agree to disagree and let the votes decide rather than start an “I’m right and you’re wrong nyah!” war? I’ve never seen so many flat-out mean readers in all my life.

Some other time, I’ll give you what I want from Zuda, and the argument about Zuda’s relationship to the rest of DC.

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My Top 2 November Zudacomics

These are my top two favorites from November. These don’t get cuts, because you should read them.

Battlefield Babysitter
Ok, so, normal girl in a superhero world. Not sooo original. Girl pressured to go into the family biz, definitely been done. Brightly colored hair? Passe’. Yet, somehow, I still found this comic fresh. Maybe it’s the first page, where the creator either pays homage to, or snubs the publisher it’s working with, I couldn’t tell. And frankly, I didn’t care, because either way, I was amused. Or maybe it was the panel where they poked fun at comic readers’ tendency to drool over gratuitous T&A. Or maybe it was just that I think this is plain good writing, with decent art. With DC paying more attention to stories that appeal to teenage girls, I thought this comic would add nicely to their repertoire. I also like the way the protagonist breaks the fourth wall, but stays quite nicely in character. One advantage this submission had over the others was choosing the exactly correct pacing for the 8 pages the creator has to work with. It had a suitable, “Part A ends here” vibe. I was left with “Boy, can’t wait to see how THAT goes” anticipation, without the annoyance I feel with the samples that seemed to end mid-thought.

I was actually sad Battlefield Babysitter didn’t get November’s win, until I read High Moon.

High Moon was the voted winner last month, and rightly so! It’s got gritty-yet-beautiful artwork, engaging (if somewhat predictable) characters, and a subject matter we can all get into. Not to mention a punny title! It’s a story about werewolves and the supernatural in a struggling Old West Texan town, complete with more-important-than-thou Mayor, sassy, overworked daughter of a dead sheriff, and a mysterious, irreverant stranger out to collect a bounty. Wait, no, he doesn’t care about the bounty. Oh, and a guy named Jeb, who has some strange ideas that are actually right. Well, half-right. While I’m not thrilled with the amount of unused space behind the panels on some screens, that decision actually allowed the creators to fit MORE material on each page, which is important when you’ve only got 8 pages to convince readers this comic is worth their vote. The creators use their visuals fantastically, making dialog secondary in telling the story. Some readers found this a weakness, which I was appalled by. Hey, guys? Uh, comics are, you know, a VISUAL medium. The ability to highlight subtleties without needing the help of text requires intricate composition and a real good dose of talent. Screen 5′s flashback? Glorious. Loved it. High Moon far outstripped the competition, and I can’t wait to see the rest of it. I’d especially like to see it *gasp* in print.

I’ll start posting December’s reviews and the reviews of ongoing pieces pretty soon.

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In which I try my hand at reviewing

The comic geeks among you may have heard of Zuda.com, DC’s webcomic contest/experiment. I recently got around to taking a look at some of the work on the site, and am sorely disappointed with some of what I’m seeing. On the other hand, some of these creators show promise.

In this post, I’ll review three of November’s submissions.

Leprenomicon
A story about a man who captures a Leprechaun to escape untimely death, Leprenomicon seems a good read. Visually pleasing art, a neat concept, and good writing and pacing. This was my first Zuda read, and I’d like to see more. I found the character’s facial expressions emotive, and the story genuinely funny.

Dead in the Now
This was my second Zuda read. It’s a story about a cynical kid, Braz, who finds a “jovial sort” of zombie, and names him Z-Rex. Braz and his friends soon decide that the world sucks, and the zombies should get to eat almost everyone. Disturbing-ish hi-jinks ensue. This one reminded me of the sort of thing Jhonen Vasquez would do. The visual style’s a little bit reminiscent of his work, and he’s got that “disturbed, destruction-loving” protagonist thing going too. While disorienting, the 8 pages we’re presented with are intriguing, though without the synopsis, I’d have dismissed it, as I didn’t feel I was presented with enough to engage me. Another comic I’d like to see more of, though it wasn’t my favorite November submission by far.

The Enders
About a girl given powers by a huge, weird, really mean being. She’s got a year to save the world from… something, but only a month if she wants to save her baby sister too. Otherwise, the big mean thing kills her sister the same way it killed her parents. Art’s pretty, and I’m a sucker for female protagonists. Looks like it will be a story about how all our itty bitty actions have big consequences. It’s been done, but I’m intrigued nonetheless.

None of these are my favorites from November, and I’ll save those two for another post.

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