The Epic Webcomic Post

Lately I haven't been doing anything terribly interesting. That makes it a little difficult to blog. I have, however, been reading a lot of webcomics lately, and I thought I would share some webcomic blurbs with you, in case you are looking for some to read. Keep in mind that these are just what I like - there are some well known comics out there that I just haven't been able to get into and never found funny.

Background - my introduction to webcomics came through a guy who I was kinda-sorta dating. It didn't work out (my fault - I just wasn't that interested) but I am eternally grateful for the push towards some awesome comics.

The first comic I started reading, thanks to above-mentioned guy, was Questionable Content, which I still read failthfully every week day. QC is about some pretty normal, semi-hipster young people, doing the things young people do. It centers around a coffee shop one character owns, the owner's boyfriend, and their assortment of friends, roommates, and friend's roommates. It's generally funny, often quirky, and occasionally really moving. There are a few moments of suspension-of-disbelief, like the girl who grew up on the moon. Overall an excellent comic, and the progression of the art is absolutely amazing. This is probably one of my favorite strips.








Most people I know read xkcd at least occasionally, so it doesn't need much explanation. As far as art goes, there isn't much - the comic mostly consists of stick figures. But it's seriously heavy in smart and hilarious punchlines. I've learned a lot from this strip, since half the time the joke is too technical to get and I have to look it up. It's also the reason I watched Firefly, which in itself is a good enough reason to love it. The smart, geeky jokes are mixed in with occasional really cute comics about love and relationships. The comics are usually standalone, although there have been a few storylines.


Girls with Slingshots is another really awesome, hilarious strip about more-or-less normal young people being the awesome people they are. Danielle Corsetto does a great job of making every character unique in art and personality, and they all have good storylines. This one gets slightly NSFW - two characters work in a porn shop (just because they need jobs, of course!) and there's a dominatrix who shows up every once in a while. Like QC there's some minor quirkiness, like a talking cactus and a hypoallergenic cat with a seriously mischievous personality.




Gunnerkrigg Court is a little different from the above in story and the amount of work it takes to read. It's a beautifully done, fascinating comic about a mysterious boarding school situated at the intersection between an institution based in technology and a mysterious, magical forest. It combines British boarding schools with fantasy and sci-fi in a totally unique way. It feels a lot like several books in a graphic novel series, and it helps to read it that way - I get lost if I read one comic a day without refreshing myself on the backstory. Sit down and read it like a novel.


The Phoenic Requiem reads a lot like Gunnerkrigg Court, in that the reader needs to keep up with the story to avoid getting lost. It likewise has absolutely beautiful artwork, which means the comics come out less frequently. It looks and feels like it should be a period piece, but I think it's possible it actually takes place in a completely alternate world created by the artist. There is plenty of backstory and interesting details to learn about the main conflict in the story - the Shades that are somehow coming to life from the ashes of cremated dead and infecting people with a strange illness. There is also a counterbalancing element of (possibly) good spirits and male characters who somehow manage to be eye candy despite being artwork.


The Dreamer actually has been published as a graphic novel (actually, most of these have books) and really feels like one. The heroine in this comic lives a normal high school life most of the time, complete with a crush on a hunky football player. But every time she falls asleep, she's transported back to the American Revolutionary War, where (when?) she's apparently a real person who plenty of people know - but she can't remember anything. The Dreamer is aimed at teen girls, and there is plenty of teen-angst, hot guys, and fashion, but it's also historically interesting and very well-drawn. I recommend, again, reading this one like a book - it's easy to lose the plot if you're gone for a while.



Schlock Mercenary is one of the giants of the webcomic world. It updates every day, and has been running for what is best described as "ages." The comic follows the misadventures of a space-aged mercenary troupe named after a sergeant who most resembles a huge blob of...excrement. It's set incredibly far in the future, so there are occasionally long passages describing futuristic "technology" and customs. It's not my favorite, but I bet guys who love sci-far are all over it.


Heliothaumic is a comic that I'm still getting used to, and I'm not entirely sure how I think. It takes place either in the distant future or a completely different world, and there are plenty of new customs and cultures to get excited about. It's hard to say what exactly it's about, because there are storylines that currently include a sentient machine, a rebellion on another planet, a mysterious stranger, and several romantic relationships. I like that even though they live in a world that is a fantasy to the reader, the characters have very human skepticism - for example, despite being nearly immortal herself, one character refuses to believe in vampires (who happen to be harassing her roommate). I wish the artist differentiated between characters better though, because some of the members of the same race look nearly identical.


I'm listing Scary Go Round and Bad Machinery together because they're by the same artist and share a website. Scary Go Round is officially finished and Bad Machinery is relatively new. They also share a few characters. Scary Go Round is about...uh...a lot of people, doing a lot of weird things, including coming back from the dead, chasing the Kraken, saving the world, inventing a lot of stuff, getting kidnapped, and a heck of a lot more. It's a seriously odd and quirky comic with a fairly tenuous grasp of an overall storyline. I read it all and I'm still not sure I like it. Bad Machinery seems to be a little less bizarre and more grounded, and so far deals a lot with the mishaps of schoolkids (British) and an odd antiques dealer.


DAR is possibly the shortest and definitely least safe for work of the comics I've listed so far. It's the real comic-diary of a young artist who deals with the fact that she's pretty sure she's a lesbian but she's falling in love with a man, among other challenges. It's sometimes crude and sometimes funny, but always authentic. Don't read if you're offended by comic penises, the "c" word, and frank comments about sex.




There was supposed to be one more after this, but for some reason it was messing up the way the blog viewed. So, too bad, it's not one of my favorites anyway.


I'm not listing Unshelved because most people associated with libraries already know about it, and to me it has always felt more like a newspaper comic strip than a webcomic. My personal favorite way to read webcomics is like books - straight through from the beginning to the end/as far along as it currently is. I know there are some well-known comics I excluded - that's because I don't read them! I might have tried and not liked them, or I might not know they exist. If there's something I should read, let me know!