Click Here for Comics - Questionable Content

Questionable Content www.questionablecontent.net
Written and Drawn by Jeph Jacques
Updates Monday - Friday


Questionable Content starts out as a story of a Marten Reed, a recent college grad, who has moved to the East Coast in order to be with his girlfriend and find a new job. Once he gets settled, his girlfriend promptly breaks up with him and he is stuck at a job he hates. Away from home and his only roommate being an Anthro PC, named Pintsize, Marten navigates his way through life and comes across some very interesting people in the process.

What I like about this strip?

There is so much to like about this strip, I am not entirely sure where to start.

I love how relate-able each of the characters in the story is. Jacques has an uncanny way of making you see your own personal world in the world that he has created for Questionable Content. Either you know someone like the characters you are reading, or you see yourself in them while following along with the story. Being able to connect with the comic in that way was what drew me into this strip and  kept me there after reading the entire archive. The jokes are funnier, the situations feel more real, and the reader is more invested in the story, because it is something they can internalize easily.

Jacques has succeeded in making a cast of characters where you can easily pick one that is your favorite. While it seems that the face of Questionable Content has become Hannelore, Marten's OCD upstairs neighbor, I have to say my  personal favorite character is Marten. He is that overly nice, lanky, overlooked, indie-nerd that was everyone's friend but never had the stones to become more than that. Dark haired, blue eyed, easily flustered, Marten is the kind of guy I would play a prank on and then treat him to ice cream afterwards. Marten is my favorite because he encapsulates some of my best guy friends from college. And this further drives home the point that Jacques does a great job of making the cast of Questionable Content believable. From ex-goth girls to introverted gamers, there is someone that you, as a reader, are bound to connect with.

The pacing of the story is what Jacques has described himself as "glacially slow". One day in the story can last for several strips. Personally, I am not at all bothered by that. The story moves at a good pace. Not so slow that I forget to read it and not so fast that information was sacrificed in order to move the story along. Jacques' scripts are fun and have a lot of light hearted whimsy, whether he is using Marten's awkwardness, Faye's sass, or Hannelore's OCD behavior, it all pans out in good humor and memorable storylines. There are a few story arcs that have a more serious tone to them, but not many. Jacques adds just enough seriousness to make the characters feel real and not simply cardboard cut out stereotypes needed to set the stage for the next punch line.

Even the filler strips that Jacques puts up are great reads. Yelling Bird, Sweet Tits, Randy the Bandicoot, and now Shelby the...I'm not sure what type of dog Shelby is. She is huge, fluffy and white. Most of Jacques' readers have agreed she is a polar bear. When questioned about this, Shelby gave no comment. That is all that needs to be known about Shelby. These strips are what Jacques puts up when he isn't able to get the regular strip out. These fillers are hilarious. Yelling Bird has to be my favorite, since he is the vocalization of every angry and perverse cell in Jacques' body (I'm just guessing on this.). I have no idea how Jacques strings so many perverse words together into insults I could not even dream about creating. It is an art, a very uncomfortable and scary art.

What I dislike about this strip?

There are times when I get lost in the punchline of the strip, because I don't have the background knowledge needed in order to make the joke funny. Usually it is a sarcastic quip about music, since Jacques is very much into lots of different types of music. But, since I am not familiar with the bands or the music styles that are being used to set up the joke, the whole thing goes over my head.

Questionable Content is a gem among gems. I can't say enough good things about it. Head over there, read it and fall in love with it. QC does have drinking, partial nudity (though not too often) and some happy sexy times. So it get's the PG-13 stamp.

Internet Extras!

Jeph Jacques twitter is @jephjacques and he has also created twitter accounts for all of his main characters. The list can be found in its entirety at www.twitter.com/jephjacques/qccast Though I will warn you that anything posted by Yelling Bird and Pintsize are NSFW.

He also Livestreams all of his strips. He doesn't talk to the chat, but he does play some pretty awesome music. So whether you tune in to watch him draw or just to use it as a late night radio station, it is a good time regardless. He doesn't have a set time when he streams, however it is usually very late at night. You can either check Jacques twitter feed or just log in and wait.

Jeph does record some of his guitar music and actually plays music for the band, Deathmøle, a post metal band that started up in 2005 (in the comic). "They" have several albums out so far and the tracks can be heard and downloaded from Bandcamp.

Click Here for Comics - Starslip

Starslip www.starslip.com
Written and Drawn by: Kristopher Straub
Updates: Monday, Wednesday, Friday

This strip follows the adventures of Captain Vanderbeam, a foppish captain who is more about art and culture than anything remotely resembling running a ship. He is accompanied by his pilot, Cutter; a former pirate and a man who can drink anyone under the table several times over; Mr. Jinx, who is a basically Vanderbeam's insectoid indentured servant; Holiday, the head engineer, Dr. Dahk Torr and Falton Quine. This team does everything from hosting the lastest art collections, to diplomatic missions to fighting a war with time travelers.


What I like about this strip

It is definitely the Trekkie inside of me that latched onto this strip in the beginning with the setting of the story being on a space ship in the future. Everything down to the slick looking uniforms worn by the characters reminds me of the days that I would sit in front of the television and watch Captain Picard sit in his command chair and say "Engage". And while Straub admits to Star Trek having a large influence on his work, Starslip is in no way a copycat or rehash of the television show.

The characters that Straub has created for his story are very well done. In the beginning it seemed to be a very simple cast: the long winded captain, the pirate pilot who never saw a drink he didn't like, the overworked and under-appreciated lackey, etc. But as the story line progressed, the characters started to develop and each one had an interesting back story that comes into play in the overall microcosm that is Starslip. They are more than just funny stereotypes that Straub uses to make a joke. They are 3 dimensional characters who have goals, wants, pasts and events that shaped them into the persons they are right now. I have to say that my favorite dynamic is between Captain Memnon Vanderbeam and his pilot, Cutter Edgewise. These two men could not be any more different and the dialogue between them is very amusing to say the least. It is relationship that should never work and yet feels quite organic and believable.

I really like the vocabulary that Straub uses when he writes the dialogue for Vanderbeam. Vanderbeam is usually seen giving long winded, verbose speeches littered with words most people don't use on a day to day basis. These longer pieces of dialogue do not feel forced, as if Straub is trying to shoehorn a 64 million dollar word into a sentence in order to make Vanderbeam sound smart. The words actually fit and flow in a way that the reader actually believes that "Yes, that does sound like a sentence that someone would actually use." and not "I think he just made that up." So, if you don't read the strip simply for the pure enjoyment of the story, you can at least expand your own personal vocabulary.

Straub takes some of what is going on in the present and inserts it into his futuristic strip. In the way that Futurama had the talking heads in order to comment on current events, Straub uses the finding of historical artifacts and art pieces in order to make his comments about what is happening in the here and now. It was an inventive move on his part and I for one like easter egg style insertion of Straub's take on the current events.

What I don't like about this strip

With most strips, you watch the art slowly evolve over time. This doesn't particularly happen in Starslip. Instead, one day the strip looked one way and then suddenly the style changed over the weekend. While it is a change for the better, it was  quite abrupt. I can only fathom a guess as to why Straub chose to make adjustments to his art in this abrupt manner. Along with the change of the art came a significant change of the story that was being told as well. It could have been that Straub was overhauling everything at one time, in one fell swoop.


Overall, I really enjoy this webcomic. Straub does a wonderful job of mixing story telling with his personal humorous style, never sacrificing one for the other. Definitely a good read for all ages.

Internet Extras

Kris Straub Twitter is @krisstraub

Straub fields many questions from his fan base by using FormSpring (http://www.formspring.me/krisstraub). Type in a question and he may answer it. Read the numerous amount of questions that he has already answered. And if he really liked the question, you may see your question and his answer in his Twitter feed.

Straub was part of the two man impromptu show Tweet Me Harder (www.tweetmeharder.com) with David Malki of Wondermark (http://wondermark.com/). Set up like a radio show of sorts, Straub and Malki talk off the cuff about whatever comes to their minds while taking live tweets from the listening audience.

Straub is part of the two man show Blamimations with Scott Kurtz of Player vs. Player (www.pvponline.com). Blamimations are short comedic skits set to mediocre flash videos made and drawn by Kurtz and Straub. They are hosted on Penny Arcade TV (www.blamimations.com) and come out once a month.

Click Here For Comics - Girls With Slingshots

Here we are again with another issue of Click Here for Comics, where I find a webcomic and give you my thoughts on it. This issue, I am going to review the one and only Girls with Slingshots.

Girls With Slingshots  www.gwscomic.com

Written and Drawn by Danielle Corsetto

Updates Monday - Friday

Girls with Slingshots centers around the lives of several 20 something year old women doing what women do. You know, drinking, dating, yelling at their talking cacti, the normal stuff. Hazel, a sarcastic red head who has gone from journalist to...well not being a journalist any more, and Jamie, a sweet brunette who works in a florist shop, are the two main characters in this parade of personalities. And the moral of the story seems to always be that there isn't anything that can't be cured by alcohol.

What I like about this comic

Let me start about by saying that I am so happy to find a comic that is written by a female that isn't so overly girly and pink that I am choking on glitter and fairy wings. But the comic isn't so overly sexual that I'm not sure if I should if I should feel dirty or light a cigarette. Girls with Slingshots is the perfect balance of acknowledging the female perspective, but not running it into the extremist pitfalls that female characters in comics seem to find themselves in.

Danielle Corsetto does a wonderful job of bringing the female voice into the world of comics. These characters are women who we see everyday. They act like most women act, think like most women think, and talk like most women talk. I can't tell you the numerous times I have looked over a female character and thought, "Is this person serious?" or "No self-respecting women would ever say something like that." So thank you Ms. Corsetto for creating a comic with a cast of believable female personas.

Girls with Slingshots has a quirky wit about it that makes it a fun read. From Jamie's bubbly demeanor to Maureen's painfully shy nature to Hazel's biting sarcasm and everyone in between, there is a character for everyone to enjoy and identify with. The characters are smartly written and therefore have very interesting solutions to the situations they find themselves in. And Corsetto is not above going for the low brow joke every once in a while. I mean, let's face it, who isn't going to laugh when someone gets a dildo thrown at them?

The strip did a lot of changing as the story line progressed. The art changed, the personalities of some of the characters changed. Going through the archives, you can see the progression and development that has been going on through the years that the strip has created. Corsetto has definitely found her place as a writer and artist and I, for one, like the place she is in.

What I dislike about this comic

There were a few story arcs where the topics weren't much to my liking. Usually the topics were sexual in nature. While Corsetto does a good job of keeping it tasteful, I personally would rather have not read it at all. Also, in these arcs, Corsetto takes stances on some issues that tend to divide readership. Personally, I think the comic would have been just as good if these issues weren't brought up at all. However, I do give Corsetto points for the way she did it. It was very "this is the way I feel about this, you don't have to agree with me". And that is something I can respect.

All in all, I like Girls with Slingshots. It is a humorous read, with just enough storyline and drama to keep my interest. While most strips are pretty benign, there is a lot of innuendo, use of alcohol and sometimes, just good ol' sexy times to be had by all. This comic is definitely geared toward an older audience.

Internet Extras!

You can follow Danielle Corsetto on Twitter @dcorsetto. Every once in a while, Danielle will Ustream her work. She is one of the people who do their work in traditional media, scans it in to be fixed in Photoshop and then posts it to the web. Since her Ustreams are very sporadic, the only way to catch one is when she announces it via Twitter.

Click Here For Comics - Looking For Group

Click Here for Comics was a short review article that I ran on The UnSung Heroes
for a little over a year. I thought I might as well place the review here as well. I hope that you all enjoy them.

With the advent of the internet, many modes of entertainment went on the web. Comics were no different. The Land of Interwebs is teeming with copious amounts of comics waiting for people to read them. I am one of those people who gets their comic fix from the click of a mouse. I want to share with the rest of you what I have found and hope you enjoy them too. So let's dive into Click Here For Comics with my first webcomic review. This webcomic was the one that started it all for me. Looking For Group.

Looking for Group www.lfgcomic.com

Written by Ryan Sohmer

Art by Lar DeSouza

Updates Mondays and Thursdays at 12 am EST

This fantasy comic is centered around an elf named Cale A'non and his offbeat band of friends: Richard the warlock with more inventive ways to kill than anyone could imagine, Benny the healer who can only be described as green and stacked, Krunch the hammer swinging intellectual who is probably the most even keel of the whole group, and Pella the axe swinging bard who...well, let's just say she is pretty special.

From the beginning, Cale and crew have been on one adventure after another while the world around them gears up for war. Looking For Group is the perfect story of someone just wanting to do what is right, the hard decisions that come with wanting to do what is right, and the slow build to great destiny that lies in wait.

What do I like about this strip?

Ryan Sohmer does a very good job of bringing in not only the fantasy crowd, but the gamer crowd as well. Specifically those who play MMORPGs like World of Warcraft. While the strip is not based on any game in particular, the similarities are very striking and thus makes for a very sturdy fan base. The character types are something familiar while the characters themselves are novel. The writing in this strip balances drama, action and comedy. And there are even splashes of sultry romance in the more recent issues. Sohmer does a fantastic job of storytelling, with well thought out characters, plot lines, punch lines, and continual development of the world that he has created for his story.

Sohmer also has ways of surprising the readers with plot twists and outcomes that seem to come out of nowhere, which is extremely fun. There is nothing I like more than trying to guess what will happen next and not being certain if I can. Though the readers may believe they know what is going on, Sohmer has a way of pulling the rug out from underneath all of us and showing us something we never expected. Sohmer's foreshadowing and attention to detail is second to none. There is never anything that is said or shown that doesn't have some type of meaning or use later on in the story. And characters are never forgotten, no matter how long it has been since you have seen them last.

The art has grown right along with the writing. Lar DeSouza has been the artistic half of this strip ever since its conception. Some of the things that DeSouza is able to do, though subtle, is quite amazing. For instance, Richard is always wearing a cowl over his face, making the only thing you see his yellow eyes and green eyebrows. However, Richard is one of the most animated characters in the strip. This is a testament to this man's ability with a brush/stylus. I also like how there is just enough realism to the art that it is not hard for the reader to be serious when the story gets serious. Some cartoony strips are not able to pull that off.

What do I not like about this strip?

There is very little to dislike about this strip. I just wish it would update more than twice a week. The story arcs are so good, I want to be able to read more. Twice a week is only enough to whet my appetite. Most of the time the story feels like it is crawling along, but only because I am crazy giddy to see what is going to happen next.

This strip scores high marks from me. The writing is excellent. The story is unique and reads just like any fantasy novel. Looking for Group is full of wit and cleverness. I highly recommend this anyone. My only reservation is for younger children. There is violence and alluding to adult situations. I would put a PG-13 rating on it.

Internet extras!

Sohmer and DeSouza both have Twitter accounts, so if you are ever wondering what is on their minds, you can read their tweets at @sohmer and @lartist.

Lar has drawn quite a number of LFG wallpapers. His latest ones are pretty interesting. They can be found on the LFG website under Extras.

Because Lar loves his fans and we (the fans) love nothing more than to watch him draw, Lar allows us to do just that via the internet. Every Friday night at 8pm EST (barring something else being scheduled) you can catch Lar on Ustream TV on Lartist at Work. He turns on his webcam and gets to work drawing while fielding questions from the chat room, listening to some of the best music out there, and telling us some great stories. Some times, he even takes requests from the audience or gives art lessons. It is good times with Unca Lar at http://www.ustream.tv/channel/lartist-at-work  And don't worry if you can't see him live, he records all of his sessions. You may also want to check out Lar's art on his Tumblr and if you feel so inclined, check out his Shopify and make some his art your own.

How To Make Webcomics (book)

The guys who make up Halfpixel; Dave Kellett, Brad Guigar, Kris Straub, and Scott Kurtz, put out a book a few years ago called How To Make Webcomics. It is a thorough "how to" guide on how to take your comic idea and put it on the net for everyone to see in a professional manner.


Though my aspirations in life don't really lie in being a cartoonist for a living, I found this book to be a very interesting read. It gives very sound advice on everything from how to interact with readers to settings in Photoshop needed to have your strip look nice on your site and in print. The authors do not boast that they know everything there is to know about the medium. In fact it is quite the opposite. They tell the readers what has worked for them and it is up to each individual whether the advice is taken or not. The authors do their best to share what they feel is the best route of action and explain why they feel that way.


I really like the fact that the advice given in this book is practical. It is not something that can only be achieved by a handful and the masses are just left to figure it out for themselves. It is for anyone who aspires to be a web cartoonist. And in some cases, a cartoonist in general. I also like that they do not make astronomical promises similar to those late night infomercials where if you just follow all the steps in their book, you will be on the money train in no time. The book is very plain in saying that being were the authors are right now takes a good deal of effort, but it is not impossible. 


I was also very entertained by the tips that were given for the actual setting up of the strip. There were things that I had seen in comic strips, but didn't really pay attention to. Things such as: having gutters, spatial arrangement of characters, use of shadow to confer a point, etc. These were all things I had seen before and my subconscious mind had made sense of the set up. But I had no idea that the artists were making the conscious decision to place things on the page in a certain manner for readers to pick up subtle hints and clues in order to make the story more dynamic. I was quite impressed when I learned that fact. I gave comic and cartooning art another dimension


So, for those out there who wish to try your hand at making webcomics, this book should become your bible (or at least one of your bibles). For others, I think it is was pretty cool to get a peek into the inner workings of a webcomic. I definitely advise picking this up. It is a great read.

The Witch of Cologne (novel)

The Witch of Cologne by Tobsha Learner has definitely made its way onto my favorites list. It features a very strong willed Jewess named Ruth bas Elazar Saul and a Catholic priest named Detlef von Tennen. Ruth is pressing against the constraints of being a woman by increasing her knowledge in science (specifically medicine) and practicing as a midwife. Detlef has given up his privileged position in order to be part of the Catholic Church, but questions the inner workings of his station.


Without giving too much away, there were a number of reasons why this book was a huge draw for me. One, Learner's use of language to paint the imagery of what was going on was very good. I like when authors are creative with word choice, but not so overly florid that it feels as if they are trying too hard. I also give bonus points to any book that makes me reach for a dictionary (more likely my iPod Touch now) and look up a word that I have never seen before.


I also give points to any book that can meld science, religion, and mysticism. I think it is easy to have science vs. religion and take a stance (or leave it open for the reader to take a stance). But I personally feel like a character is more identifiable with when they strongly stand on the scientific but have not let go of their religious beliefs entirely. Through the character of Ruth, Learner is able to put together this situation where medicine, Judaism, and mysticism all have to come together in a comprehensive and logical way in order to make the story that much more interesting. And Learner does a great job. 


The character of Detlef VonTennon was very interesting to read. How he changes from beginning to end is quite amazing. However, as a reader, I barely noticed it until I went back and thought about it. The change was so natural and organic, I did not pay attention to it until I realized how different his actions at the beginning were from how he acted at the end.


I do not read much historical fiction, but this one was a very good find. If you are looking for a good novel, I highly recommend this one.

What is this blog?

Growing up, I was definitely what you would term as a book worm. I read just about anything I could get my hands on. Well that has not really gone away for me (not that I want it to). And whenever I can get a free moment, I try and read something, whether it be comic books, traditional novels, short stories, what have now. 

Then I decided, why keep the good finds to myself? I should put out what I thought about what I read. It will give my blog some type of direction (where my personal blog is nothing but whatever topic of the day happens to enter my head that morning).

So that is what this blog is. My thoughts on written work that comes through my hands. Hope you readers enjoy.