I GUESS THE ANSWER TO THE ETERNAL QUESTION IS, “YES. YES, YOU CAN SPEAK EVEN WHEN YOUR HEAD HAS BEEN RIPPED FROM YOUR BODY BY YOUR BOON COMPANION SLASH GREATEST NEMESIS AND IS SLOWLY SINKING INTO A MIRE OF BLOOD THAT IS THE REMAINDER OF THE TOTAL DESTRUCTION OF YOUR SMALL, SELF-CENTERED UNIVERSE.” JUST IN CASE YOU WERE WONDERING.

GOODBYE, GAMER1 AND GAMER2, FOUL-MOUTHED, SEMISENSICAL AVATARS OF THE DIGITAL AGE, POST-MODERN SUCCESSORS TO AKBAR AND JEFF. GOODBYE, SCOTT. YOU WERE ALWAYS A GOOD ELEPHANT. GOODBYE, MARTY. YOU WERE ALWAYS A GOOD MIDGET CLONE. GOODBYE, SPHERE OF SMARTNESS, GLAIVE OF KRULL, SQUIRRELS, CHRISTMAS ELVES, DEMON FERRETS, BONO, JERRY FALWELL, AND YOUR MOM. GOODBYE TO BENTAR THE MAGNIFICENT, AND MONKEY DIDDLERS, THE MOST AWESOME GAME EVER, BANE OF REPETITIVENESS VULTURES EVERYWHERE.

WE AT FLEEN EAGERLY AWAIT WHATEVER PROJECT DIABLO THE CHICKEN ENGAGES IN NEXT.

When I was a kid, like most kids I imagine, I spent something like 6 hours in front of the television on Saturday mornings watching cartoon after cartoon until the sports commentators came on. Cartoons these days disappoint me in such profound ways because of how I remember my generation’s treasure chest of animations. The reason I mention this little corner of my childhood is because the comic Chili’s World by Santiago Casares reminds me of cartoons that I used to watch. Characters and story snippets that used to leave me in stitches.

It’s partly the coloring and partly the character concepts that ring nostalgia in my head. See there’s this penguin Chili who is in love and has all the wonderful goofball characteristics of a boy in love and he has a friend name Lenny who is a Lemming who apparently missed the great cliff run-off so Lenny hangs out with Chili and contemplates life. There’s also this cat who kind of scares me and yet I’m pretty sure he’s my favorite character, his name is Mac and he’s magically insane. There’s also a determined turtle and a head strong hare and a white rabbit and Alice who has abandoned wonderland for Chili’s World where it’s not quite as crazy and she can just be her tomboyish self. It’s like the Hundred Acre Wood if everyone just did a little bit of acid first.

Well, the call has been answered. Yesterday I bowed my head to the great intarwub, and prayed that she would deliver unto me Irish web comics. The great intarwub is kind, and did verily answer my prayer.

Ahem. Anyway. Needless to say, I was quite excited to get my grubby little browser all over Press Start To Play. Northern Irish comics get bonus points from me simply for being Northern Irish, but PSTP gets super mega bonus points for being a Northern Irish comic that isn’t about all the typical crap that goes on over here and ultra uber platinum plated points for making me laugh out loud.

Okay. So it’s another gaming comic. I know we have lots of those, but can there really be too much of a good thing? Press Start To Play reminds me a lot of VG Cats with a hint of Penny Arcade, which nobody can even remotely consider a bad thing. The humor is also subtly less American. I find it hard to put my finger on it, since I’m from here and I consume so much American media, sometimes I find it hard to tell the difference. If you like gaming comics then there’s really nothing for it, you’re going to have to read PSTP, but when you do, remember these handy tips:

1. Northern Irish people do not say “Feck�? the way they do on Father Ted. We are much cooler.
2. “Crisps�? are what Americans call “Chips�?.
3. “A-levels�? are what you get when you finish high school. I have 3 and a half.
4. The staff in the Game in Belfast actually do this.

I love huffing up some Natalie Dee. This web comic is comprised of what I love about a comic: it’s original, the art is vibrant and clean, and it never ceases to amaze me.

I enjoy Natalie Dee so much because I love it when artists, or people in general, don’t give two shits about what other people think. Her humor can be crude and offensive, and at other times blunt and to the point. Insert joke here.

This comic is one of the things that got me through being stuck in a horribly oppressive college where I certainly did not fit in.  Plus, it was hilarious when I gave out her special brand of valentines to my professors and friends.

 I think readers should check her comic out because it is a fun, quick read that will keep you coming back for more. Basically, Natalie Dee is the balls.

It was on a friend’s advice that I checked out The Book of Bob because she told me, and I quote, “You’re going to love the pants off this comic.”

When I checked it out I couldn’t exactly figure out what part of it I was suppose to be head over heels for. It seems a little bit funny and the art is nice on the eyes, but I just didn’t feel swept off my feet by it. I seem to be in the minority though, because this comic gets nothing but positive comments from its readers who are just blown away by it. It sort of has a Perry Bible Fellowship or ThingPart feel to it, but I don’t know. It’s like the time when Pulp Fiction first came out and all my friends were crazy about it and I was the only naysayer who thought it was overrated. Maybe the truth is I’m just not cool enough.

The greatness that is Bob is over my head, I suppose. But the website design is superfun and I anticipate Bob’s following to continue growing. It’s just that kind of comic.

Well I figured that today would be a good day to bring up Bad Shape by Wiz Rollins. When I’m down and out I navigate myself to this comic for some raunchy, gangsta humor. I think that any comic about two thug-like geometry shapes is worth my while.

It stars a circle named Blue, and a rather thin rectangle that goes my the moniker SlimKillah. This site is basically gag-a-day, with a few plot-lines interwoven through out the strip. A couple examples are when Kitt from Knight Rider attempts to have his way with Slim, and when Blue attempts to go back to work to pay off student loans.

The one thing that bugged me about this comic that there seems to be no archive, which can be frustrating at times. Other than that, there are some interesting extras including Slim’s own MySpace account, and a Bad Jams page where you can listen to Blue and Slim’s very own grooves.

If you’re into foul-mouthed shapes and stress titties, I suggest stopping by Bad Shape. If not, then shame on you. Not really, I just felt like saying that.

Ok, so I love zombies. What I love even more are web comics about zombies. That’s why I’ve decided to chat up a little unknown comic called The Undead.

This comic is basically about a group of twenty-somethings who are stuck in a city suddenly overrun with zombies. They are frantically trying to get the hell away from the flesh-eating foes, which is what the plot-line is driven on.

 What I enjoy about reading this comic is that it references and pokes fun at all the zombie-movie cliches that we all have come to know and love. I see it running along the lines of Shaun of the Dead.

 The comic is fairly new, with only about forty strips to it’s name. This is a good time though for plenty of feed back and growth from readers and the like. It holds plenty of potential, and hopefully with some support, will grow into a full-fledge powerhouse of web comic domination.

If not, it’ll just eat your brains anyways.

Much like Allison, I’ve come down with some nasty sinus infection that has me writing in misery. I’m painstakingly trying not to misspell anything, or use “its” instead of “it’s” or “further” instead of “farther”. This was supposed to go up yesterday, but I didn’t surface from unconsciousness until 5am when my alarm went off for work this morning.

 The comic that I found to be a very funny, very political comic was Candorville. It’s sort of a Boondocks-esque comic through the eyes of adults. Some of the perspectives the comic offers are so spot on they become disheartening. Politics not your thing? No problem, there are plenty of issues to go around.

Candorville has its eyes on syndication and is not ashamed of it. I recently purchased the book and am eagerly waiting its delivery. The creator, Darrin Bell, emailed me when he got my order to promise a defacing of the book with an autograph and sketch. I’m so excited.

It shows up in 30 day groupings through comics.com so unless you get your hands on the book, the archive is off limits. That’s too bad, but Bell makes up for it in his regular blog posts. His writing style reminds me of the journalists from the SFGate. I wish I could invite Bell over for dinner once a week so that we could talk politics and his clever banter would make me a smarter commentator. I live vicariously through his journalism. 

So San Antonio Rock City now has a page to call it’s own. That’s nice. The new(est) comic by Mitch Clem has made the jump from Live Journal to it’s own little corner of Mitch’s site.

So the question is, is it any good? Well, that depends. If you liked Nothing Nice To Say, then the chances are you will like SARC and you should just go read it all now. Actually, if you liked NN2S then you’ve probably already read all of SARC and continuing to read this article will prove to be quite unfulfilling.

If you just didn’t “get�? NN2S because you had no idea what Blake and Fletcher were talking about most of the time, then SARC may well be for you. It’s still a comic heavily influenced by punk rock and the punk rock lifestyle, but it’s also a comic about having a relationship and a sucky job and, for some reason, Al Pacino. So why not check it out. It won’t take long to read since it’s a fairly new comic, but it’s less likely to suck than most new comics since it’s by an established artist. What’s the worst that could happen?

P.S: Up the Punx!

Political comics are a dangerous place to make a stand. In general, I feel that political commentary in comics isolates people who both agree and disagree with you and then runs the risk of not making a sticking point or being uninformed. It feels too much like grandstanding and its’ rarely funny.

Monkey Law is a fairly old (as far as online comics go), fairly unknown comic about monkeys and the lives they lead living together under the fascist regime of the U.S. White House. The comic has clearly defined character concepts, archetypical heroes, stoners, little girls and hipster girls. There is a continuation in all the storylines that is predictable and relatively well scheduled. Without handing out adjectives like a Pez dispenser, I can say that Monkey Law is a good comic. This is a good liberal comic. It takes everyday political woes out of the op-ed section of the newspaper and puts it into the everyday lives of a household of monkeys who represent the basic framework of the every-man.

There is no doubt that the creator of Monkey Law, Brad Hawkins, is smart. His brain is integral to the play out of his comic. I’m concerned about his political commentary though. More than one storyline is a rehashing of something I read on Google news or in someone’s Livejournal. Very little of the actual political commentary is a unique perspective when it should be a microcosm of the whole U.S. political problem in the living room of his monkeys. At its most generic it resorts to Bush-bashing, a sport I am not unfamiliar with, and at its worst I’m not even sure what issue he’s trying to stick. Sometimes it feels like he doesn’t know either. During Hawkins’ most shining moments though, I know he gets it. I’m just not sure why it feels so muddy in the interim.