Sundays Comics Done Differently 6/22/08
I know we usually just bring you the best of the comic strips here on Sundays but I wanted to mix it up a little and talk about what I see as the biggest problems with the Sunday funnies. But first I wanted to point out a great strip that is running for its last day today:
Single and Looking 6/22/08
If you ever enjoyed this strip, as I did often, visit the website and drop Matt Janz a line and some appreciation for his hard work over the years. I personally hope he continues publishing the strip in different format like a web comic so that I can continue to follow the adventures of his great characters. Now on to our other Sunday feature.
As formulaic as most daily comic strips are, Sunday comics offer more space and less restraint of creativity than the other 6 days a week. Unfortunately, many comic artists either too lazy or just don't know what to do with the space.
Adam @ Home 6/22/08
Adam@Home is a classic example of a strip that poorly uses it's space. The giant throw-away name panel and then four dialog-free panels that could have been minimized in to one good perspective shot, but instead we have a lot of filler with a lazy punchline about gas prices. Haven't heard that one before.
For Better or For Worse 6/22/08
Another strip that recycles the same thing almost every weekend is FBOFW. Tons of short action panels with the joke in the last frame. When you have an identity crisis like this strip does with never knowing if it's a humor strip or a soap opera, having the same old formula for big old scary Sundays must give some comfort. At least you can go back and read the strip again and it's almost funny if you think he's getting a blow job instead of sitting in a massage chair in the mall.
Alley Oop 6/22/08
Alley Oop is another example of how many ancient strips slack off on the weekend. All this week we have already been reading this story, and now on Sunday we get the entire previous weeks-worth of panels in one condensed form. Maybe the artist does this because the strip is run in lots of papers as a Sunday only strip, but do you really need to give continuity to people who only read your strip once a week? It's not like they're going to remember what happened last week. You should either continue pushing your storyline ahead or do a Sunday comic totally unrelated to the on-going story and be creative with it. I guess your strip still has to have some life left in it to do that though.
The Norm 6/22/08
Here is what the Sunday comics should be about: mixing up the style and making lots of jokes. Yes you've got a large name panel, but there is a great utilization of the rest of the space and it's not done in a cookie-cutter frame style either. The jokes are many and spread throughout the strip. The Norm really shows that if you delve deeply in to a subject, in this case the ridiculousness of flying right now, that you can get a lot of humor spread all through your comic and it actually makes for a good read, unlike the short, trite coverage of gas prices seen in the Adam@home example above.
Maintaining 6/22/08
Comics don't have to be that hard! Take a silly/absurd idea and build a well illustrated conceptualization of that idea, then color. Maintaining has only been running in syndication since spring 2007, but Nate Creekmore has shown immense talent and I look forward to his comic every day of the week. If Maintaining isn't running in your local paper, contact them and urge them to add this great strip.
