If you haven’t listened to the latest Webcomics Weekly podcast (number 21, yo), pay special attention to Alex Guigar (age five!) at about the 41:40 mark, where he implores his dad to engage in the age-old ritual of beating another kid’s dad with his mad comic drawing skills. Note the quiet confidence in Brad Guigar‘s voice as he assures his son of victory.

In non-ass-handing webcomics news, I’ve been emailing back and forth recently with Kate Beaton, to whom I really must apologize for not mentioning her before today. She’s been doing some kick-ass journal-style comics (did you check out her tales of returning to the family homestead for Christmas?).

Beaton’s also been doing some challenge projects; much like John Campbell‘s famed 50 questions, Beaton asked for historical topics and did comics on the first 20. Astoundingly, it turns out that Benjamin Disraeli may in fact be ripe material for the webcomics treatment.

Anyway, historical figures and events, ranging from Tesla to Emperor Norton, from Canadian Heritage Minutes (my favorite: “This nation’s name is Ka-Na-Da” with a close second to the Springhill Mine Disaster of 1958) to Good Queen Bess, with a soupçon of Pope and naked CBC personalities. Come for the history, stay for the awesome.

Like all good souls, I was looking forward to today’s release of David Malki !‘s long-awaited movie, Expendable. Unfortunately, it looks like the release will be pushed back a week, so mark your calendars for 23 January when it debuts as part of the Now Film Festival. Now all we need is a Wondermark movie (score by Kris Straub), and all will be well.

Also! If you didn’t make it to MoCCA for Infinite Canvas: The Art of Webcomics, you’ve officially missed your chance. But you still have time to get your ass to the Cartoon Art Museum in San Fransisco for Shaenon Garrity‘s Cartoonist-in-Residence gig this Saturday.

So work has taken me to a place that is seemingly designed to crush all hope. Although I get a cell signal outside the building, it disappears as soon as I step inside. The security guards treat me like a convicted felon wanting to breach their perimeter. My pass doesn’t allow me outside for lunch, so I must make use of a mediocre-quality, overpriced cafeteria that doesn’t take money — I had to purchase a stored-value card in order to eat, meaning that I’m floating one of the largest financial houses in the country a zero-interest loan (with no chance of ever getting my change back at the end on of the week).

Needless to say, the phones are internal-only, and the internet “access” does not allow me to get to work email, work intranet, Gmail, Fleen, or nearly any other site on the planet. But I am allowed, but some weird chance, one means of sending (no receive, alas, but I’ll take what I can get) messages to the outside world:

The website banhammer has somehow allowed Sheldon to slip through its grasp, and at Sheldon there is a link to “Send [a strip] to a friend!”. Thus, I was able send today’s strip to my wife with a postcard message attached, politely informing her that I would most likely be psychotic by the time I got home.

Those of you stuck in similar circumstances (say, in the midst of a civil uprising against a particularly despotic regime) may want to make use of similar techniques to get word to the outside world about the atrocities you witness. Webcomics: Spreadin’ Freedom™.

In the meantime, Monday also featured Pixel!Boobies (SFW, NSFW) at Diesel Sweeties, and Little Dee‘s second book got a wonderful review courtesy of the Washington Post.

Two things today:

1. For those of you who skipped the reading assignment, Real Life now has a non-Cliff Notes version.
2. By the time you read this, it will have been 754 days since Fleen launched, meaning that I’ve been doing one of these, on average, 0.8899 posts per calendar day since we launched, which is considerably more than the five times a week you were originally promised. Since I hope that means I’ve built up a reservoir of goodwill, I pray your indulgence as I write about something even less tangentially related to webcomics than normal.

   So why the hoo-ha over 671 postings? Because when you add in the contributions of others who’ve written here are Fleen, it comes to an even 1000. I felt that a) that was worthy of some remark, and b) I’m stuck with extremely limited internet this week, and this convenient landmark could be noted quickly and with a minimum of cross-linking.

   This somewhat inconsequential site launched as part of a elaborate plot at world domination by a Machiavellian schemer (who, as it turns out, literally owns my soul), but children have a way of growing away from parental expectations.

   It’s gratifying to think that my (sometimes-desperate) attempts to find something vaguely informative or amusing to fill this space has been worthy of your attention. You’ve let me know when I’ve been slacking, you’ve taken me to task when we’ve disagreed, you’ve rallied about when I was warned to Govern Myself Accordingly. If nothing else, I hope you’ve found it true that the comments are open to all and sundry, that nobody’s point of view has been suppressed, and that the shitstorms provoked by our strict adherance to tabloid ethics have been, at the least, diverting.

   For an unpaid gig that regularly results in complete strangers letting me know exactly to what degree I’ve been fellating Jon Rosenberg, it’s been a lot of fun, and I hope you stick around for the next 671 postings.

Next week doesn’t look good, either. In the meantime, let’s channel some old-school Saturday morning cartoons, courtesy of Jerzy Drozd and Sugary Serials:

[Sugary Serials] has announced the release of the print editions of their first three issues, spotlighting the inaugural titles in the all ages anthology. The comics are inspired by the stories found in Saturday morning cartoons, and are created by some of the finest artists of the webcomics and print comics industries.

The comics are available in a variety of ways; on the web site, or they can be downloaded to the user’s PSP or favorite comics reading program. The comics anthology is collected in print at the end of each month and can be purchased from the IndyPlanet web site. The online archives will always remain free.

Sugary Serials promises some unique features to set it apart from the usual online comics collective or anthology. The stories are brand new, and the lineup will constantly change. Every month at least three stories are featured on the web site in 8-page “acts�. The stories run anywhere from 8 pages to 32 pages. As each story is completed, it will be replaced by a brand new title. The constantly changing lineup will ensure fresh content every few months.

The first three issues collect Chet Lucero’s DREAMFORM DEFENDERS, a story where spacemen, barrel kings, and sheriff mummies defend children’s dreams from the evil phantasms of the nightmare; Sara Turner and Jerzy Drozd’s EQUALIZERS OF THE DIVIDE, a fantasy adventure filled with robot bears, snake men, and demons made of wood; and Mark Rudolph’s CURSE OF THE PHARAOHS, a story featuring a boy tipping the cosmic scales of good vs. evil during his visit to a traveling mummy exhibit at the county fair.

For those of you wondering, it appears that there is more than one highly creative Jerzy Drozd out there. Wacky.

When they hand you the fancy paper and the hood, be sure to credit reader Hugh Campbell:

I had to share this thing I noticed. Since comics can only be snap shots into the characters lives there is often a buildup of an hours, event, over weeks of real time.

This one extreme example that sticks in my mind is from a strip called Apple Continuum…. [S]ince the strip began on 2002-5-15 and ended on 2006-7-6 there have been 147 strips. But upon reading the strip, those four years of writing and drawing have resulted in one and a half days of comic time.

Therefore there is a ratio of .375 “comic days” for each real time year. I would like to read find out other comics ratio but I am still just one man and can’t hope to figure out all of them.

If you want to start figuring Wigu, it’s neatly divided into story–days for your convenience (complete with clock times in the books). Oh, and new Dresden Codak, in case you hadn’t noticed. Much of the story that’s happened over the past calendar year has been within a span of 24 to 48 hours.

Bunch of things today, in the order they occur to me.

• The WCCAs are back for another go-round.
• Speaking of “another go-round”, xkcd seems to be drifting towards (filthy) continuity.
• The paper doll thing is really taking off, with others available now, and the promise of still more in the coming days. It makes me wonder who the most disturbing webcomics characters to get the paper doll treatment might be. Probably Jon and/or Hastings.
• Speaking of which: is that a mini Goats/Ugly Hill crossover I see?
• Latest to try the Offer Your Webcomic To College Papers Approach: Wondermark. Snap it up, college editors! All it costs is a little (potentially disturbing) information about your bizarre personal fetishes:
  

  The editor of the paper should email me the following information:

  1. Who you are and what school you’re from
  2. How many weeks worth of comics’ you’d need (i.e. how long is your semester)
  3. Name and contact info of a faculty advisor
  4. Favorite mammal and why

  Wow! Not creepy at all, David Malki ! from Wondermark!
  Crap, I just noticed that Malki !’s bio includes something about being a freelance firearms specialist. Um, sorry about all that “Dreamcrusher” stuff, Mr Malki ! sir. Please don’t murder me.

• Finally, welcome back from the land of No Internet to Christopher Wright.

It’s just stuff, y’know?

• If there’s one thing that Cheshire Crossing needs more than an every-six-months update schedule, it’s an RSS feed. But other than that, it’s good fun. And is it just me, or does the Mad Hatter look … familiar?
• Speaking of webcomics that give Peter Pan a reworking, a while back we told you about Bill Mudron’s involvement in the webcomicky collection of Whedonesque stories known as Serenity Tales. Mike Russell writes to tell us:
  

  After a nice long hiatus, the Big Damn Fan Comic website Serenity Tales is back — with three new installments (and a few more not too terribly far off).

  I noticed Ursula Vernon contributing there, which meshes nicely with Digger coming back from hiatus today and all.

• Nothing to do with webcomics, per se, but check out Christopher Butcher’s visit to the Tezuka Museum; I was lucky enough to visit almost five years ago, but there’s been some really cool additions since then. Most notably: a pile of 150,000 sheets of paper (which represents Tezuka’s lifetime output), and Tezuka’s actual desk, which you can sit at.

  Although, there was one almost unforgivably awesome display up when I was there — it was 5 April 2003, which according to Tezuka was just two days before Tetsuwan Atom was first activated. Thus, there was a major display at the museum, with a life-sized Atom laid out on a lab table, with a clock counting down to his birthday. I also sat through four consecutive screenings of Butchy in the City, because it was just so damn charming.

• And lastly, noticed on this morning’s trawl: I have no idea what applecat is, but I’m intrigued.

In the aftermath of pointless election-year posturing, the Washington Post got all webcomics-friendly, although it appears the article actually came from PC World.

Dirk Deppey, mad genius behind ¡Journalista! (the blogfront of the venerable and very serious The Comics Journal) has released a list of the Fifty Best Comics of 2007 (with a couple of ties, so it’s actually 52). A touch over 10% of the list is webcomics:

• A Softer World, at number 45
• Scary Go Round, number 37
• Sinfest, number 31
• Nothing Better, number 27
• The Perry Bible Fellowship (in the form of The Trial of Colonel Sweeto), number 19, and
• Achewood, coming in at number 10

Also, Dirk? Scary Go Round actually updates five times a week, not three, so I hope you haven’t missed out on 40% of the enjoyment.

Finally, while stopping by Wonderella for my weekly fix on Saturday, I noticed the announcement that there’s new stuff every day this week. So far, it’s a strip previously-posted on Clickwheel and some character studies from the strip’s development. Just start at the beginning and read forward, and muse on why you’re not awesome enough to have a cape.

Items of some note:

• When I think awesome, one of the first things that pops to my mind is insane webcomics experiments. And the current gravitational center of insane webcomics experimenters may be found at a commune in Mexico where Ryan Estrada and John Campbell cackle with glee each time they come up with a new mad scheme:
  

  hi gary!

  john campbell here, from the cartoon commune, pictures for sad children, etc. i’m starting my third year of hourly comics, which is this thing where i make a little journal comic every hour i’m awake for a month. they’re going up at hourlycomic.com. i’m wanting to see what journal comics look like if they are kind of preposterously detailed. because with daily journal comics i rarely feel like i get a grasp of what the author’s average day is like. the comics go up each hour i’m awake with a 24 hour lag time. which is part of this thing where i was wondering what if a website updated hourly is that something that is interesting (it is not all that interesting).

  On my first reading, I actually thought that Campbell would be trying to stay awake for a month, and a new comic in every hour would provide us with documentation of his descent into madness. Alas for my sense of schadenfreude but luckily for Campbell, a more careful reading reveals he’s actually doing a comic for every hour that he would be awake anyway. But there is an upside!

  the important thing is that you will get to see ryan estrada say and do what i am sure will be all sorts of dumb things.

  I am so there.

• Chris Hastings, abetting the beffudlement of through-drivers everywhere.
• An epic story started here (or possibly here), ended here, and now offers a jumping-on point for new readers here.
• Looks like 500 strips on January 3rd 2008 wasn’t just a Karenic Phenomenon. Behold.
• Finally, Friend O’ Webcomics Brian Warmoth has finished his escape from the Den of Satan Wizard‘s website to a different sort of diabolical situation. As of yesterday, Warmoth is now the new Marketing Manager of Devil’s Due Publishing, and will handle marketing, publicity and convention responsibilities. We at Fleen hope to see Warmoth on the convention circuit, and urge all reading to drop by the DDP booth to say “thanks” for all the great interviews he did.