Shishio sends word that Adventures In Digital Comics is apperently finished. For those of you not in the know, AIDC is a film by Sebastien Dumesnil about, you guessed it, web comics and comics in general. More information about the film, which was nominated for the Best Documentary Award at the Tel Aviv Film Festival, can be found on the website.

In particular, I found the interviews section very informative. Be sure to check it out if you’re looking for some interesting opinions on the medium of comics in general and the role the internet is playing in the industry.

I like web comics. I like dead tree comics. I like my web comics mostly because they are like the dead tree variety, only free. I’m really not asking for much more, to be honest.

Despite this, I recently visited the Telltale Games website, to download something and discovered web comics the Telltale way. The Sam and Max Comic is interesting. You look at it and you say “what is this? where is my dialog and sound effects?” and then you unwittingly hover your cursor over a pane and lo and behold! Dialog! Sound Effects Etc!

This is an interesting approach, and one that is obviously only possible when utilising electronic media. Sometimes, when reading a comic, our eye is drawn to a boisterous sound effect in the last panel, which can ruin the pacing and set up of a strip. Same goes for dialog within a panel. Sometimes we can get distracted by dialog in bold or italics, and not read things in order, once again ruining the experience the author had in mind for us. In Sam and Max, this is not a problem. As you hover your cursor over a panel, the dialog and sound effects appear in the order that they were intended.

Personally, I am undecided as to whether this is genius or novelty. The concept is sound, I think, but having to manually hover over every single panel makes extended reading slightly cumbersome. A bit more like playing a video game perhaps?

Well, that’s understandable I suppose…

So Tony Long doesn’t think that American Born Chinese is deserving of nomination for the National Book Award. This is one of the most poorly informed opinions I have ever read. Let me elaborate.

Mr Long has not even read American Born Chinese, but his assupmtion is that it is much harder to write a novel worthy of NBA nomination than it is to write a graphic novel of equal quality. In his words:

[A]s literature, the comic book does not deserve equal status with real novels, or short stories. It’s apples and oranges.

If you’ve ever tried writing a real novel, you’ll know where I’m coming from. To do it, and especially to do it well enough to be nominated for this award, the American equivalent of France’s Prix Goncourt or Britain’s Booker Prize, is exceedingly difficult.

I’m not even going to bother working out how many more novels have been nominated for an NBA than graphic novels, but I’ll give you a clue: lots. So I guess it’s much harder to write a novel worthy of nomination than a graphic novel, right Tony?

One other thing. Not only did Mr Long not read the book he is claiming to be unworthy of nomination, he clearly didn’t read the submission guidlines for the award he thinks American Born Chinese is unworthy of. Let’s take a look.

A. Full-length books of fiction and general nonfictionare eligible. Collections of short stories and collections of essays by one author are eligible. Collected and selected poems by one author are eligible. All books must be published in the United States.

Now, last time I checked, American Born Chinese was a full length book of general fiction. Maybe next time you want to claim that a fine work of literature is not worthy of a particular literary award, you should read the rules of eligibility for said award first.

The only thing that bothers me, after reading the specific guidelines, is that more graphic novels haven’t been considered for the Award in the past.

Edit: I was so mad about this that I forgot to give props to Jeph for pointing it out to me in the first place, and also to mention that Project Wonderful is not only a great idea – it’s also the best name for anything, ever!

So the word on the street is that Dr. McNinja is dead. Manny has shown up to take his spirit, so surely he is wormfood, yes?

Well, no. This is a comic, and this is the titular character we’re talking about here. Surely the rational explanation is that McNinja has two spirits, one doctor and one ninja, and they are  going to be granted permission by death to avenge their sticky end. I mean surely that much was obvious.

All that trivial business is, however, just a distraction from the “meat” (NOTE: this is a clever pun) of this week’s McNinja story, which answers that age old riddle: Gorrilla or Raptor?

Will Dr McNinja resume corporeal form? Which exotic species will emerge triumphant? How can a skeleton have a moustache?

All these questions to be answered in up coming issues of Dr McNinja (I hope), Stay tuned!

This is easily one of the strangest things I’ve ever seen on the internet. At leas one of the strangest things that I feel comfortable sharing with you guys. To be honest, I’m quite suspicious of the origin story on the E-hobo About page. Whether it’s true or not, it has spawned some truly inspired artwork. The fun comes from reading the amusing hobo names, imagining what they would look like and then gaffawing when you see that the illustration is almost always funnier than the picture you had in your head. The Hobo of The Moment feature is a nice touch for the hobo enthusiast in a hurry, and also opens our eyes to previously overlooked hoboes.

I never in a million years thought I would type that sentence.

For a comic that only has 22 strips under it’s belt, One Liners is really rather funny. Another shocking… shock is that the art is also extremely competent right from the get go. I particularily like the character design. Our antihero is dressed all in black, mask included, with a white brimmed hat. For no reason. No reason other than it looks really cool. Although the supporting cast aren’t dressed like demented super heroes, they are all well formed enough to be memorable in their own right too, even if two of them are called Ashton.

I appreciate that the humour in this strip isn’t going to be for everyone. This strip is brimming with sexual passive aggression, as well as the regular kind. Unusually, it’s just enough to be edgy as well as funny, but not too much as to be over the top and cringe-worthy.

I don’t think I’ve ever recommended a comic to anyone that has less than 50 strips, but this is the exception. If you’re looking for a new comic to read but you don’t want to traul through a few years of archives, One Liners is the one for you.

Unless, of course, it’s not.

There is an unexpected treat to be found in the White Ninja guest week. Guest weeks are usually a fun distraction, but this week at Whitey has been solid gold. I for one, have been looking forward to a Dr McNinja/White Ninja cross over for quite some time. Seeing the more realistically drawn art with the same surreal humour gives the Dr McNinja strip a real edge.

Steven Cloud‘s effort may not be as laugh-out-loud funny, but seeing his striking style in black and white makes me wish that he would employ it more in BOASAS, where he feels more at home with the comedic style.

Sam Logan‘s strip started off the guest week, and I would love to get in to some detailed analysis of his strip. The thing is, there just isn’t any point. All you have to do is look at the fifth panel  and see how Sam has taken the White Ninja humour and given it his unique spin.

I can’t wait to see what’s next.

Two weeks ago, I asked the Internet at large whether or not Mac Hall was dead. Today, I got my answer.

Let me state this so that it is absolutely clear; I am sad that Mac Hall is ending. Over the past while, It’s been easy to bitch about the lack of updates or story arcs but at the end of the day if something isn’t working any more, it’s best to just call it a day. This does not mean that all is lost, however. As Ian says:

Assuming all goes well, in October Matt and I will switch to the next phase of the comic and the site will have recieved some fresh code love. (I hope.) We’ll ride with that for a while, and if it works. Kick ass. If not, well, I’m sure we’ll figure something out. This is not ment as doom and gloom but just a simple road sign for things to come.

Again, change is on route. I hope you find it pleasant on your pallet. 

Good bye Ian, Matt, JM, Drew, Micah and Helen. You will be missed.

I think my brain may now very well be broken. Thank you Jeffrey, you are super awesome.

Seriously though, if there’s one webcomic creator’s blog you should be reading, it’s Jeff’s. It has a similar vibe to Overcompensating, but is not focused on delivering a final panel punchline. You should already know that Mr Rowland is a talented writer with interesting opinions, so visit his LJ: the humour is more subtle and you might even learn a thing or two about eagles or Wal Mart.

As yoy may know, I’ve been keeping a close eye on Mitch Clem ever since he declared that he was going to do the webcomic thing full time. Well, as close an eye as a man producing his first feature film can keep. My vigilance, however, was short lived. Mitch declared that he would be returning to the workforce in order to fund some kind of super secret project.

All I’m going to say is that I hope this super secret project was not kittens. Seriously, man; kittens? What the hell? I mean sure, why not? But am I the only one who thinks it’s weird that mitchclem.com now presents you with two punk comics and a comic about kittens? Don’t get me wrong – I am not down on the kittens. I am not kitten-bashing in anyway, but seriously dude:

What the crap?