On the other hand, it makes very little sense in the context of the strip. If Brent is offering his hand, it would only be in order to hasten the agent's departure by hurrying along the "well, thanks for coming" phase of the conversation, which isn't reflected in his dialogue. I guess I can see it, but it's a stretch, and obviously wasn't my first thought.
2. Has PVP jumped the shark? Possibly. I would argue that Brent has mos def jumped the shark and every other fish in the pool. We know him too well. We have watched him grow and mature the last few months, through the wedding, through learning to deal with the parents, through saying goodbye to Skull.
But this kind of growth is hardly conducive to freeing Kurtz to make any new and novel uses of Brent (unless a baby is on the way), or even to using him in the same old ways. New Brent™ is now a straight man, a Dean Martin, or at least more Dean Martin than he used to be. But: Brent has no Jerry Lewis. Brent used to be the Jerry Lewis, so now we're a straight man heavy.
It's time for other characters to step up, fill the wacky shoes.
3. The gray background in the
18 comments:
It's grey? All I see is, well, nothing. Just white. Or are you using some kinda technical art term here?
Oh, and I meant to say yesterday that there seems to be more Brent now then in the past, not the other way around.
Woo-hoo for me, Fake Scott used two of my thoughts for bullet points! (...okay, maybe pathetic, but a victory for me none the less)
@orionfury
Nope, actually gray, though it is just a few shades above white. What might have been better would be more, much thicker action lines as well. The thin ones don't seem to add enough 'umph' to the quasi-"Gone With the Wind" line.
1. I still think the hand is being offered, whether coming or going; the agent has never liked Brent, seeing him as a threat to Maul (the panda), and his 'chosen habitat', and is equally dismissive of him. Brent wanted Maul gone, but the agent enacted a emanate-panda-domain act anyway. Cole wasn't on board either, but he was easily placated by money.
I think the agent has a thing for pandas...sicko.
2. Agreed. But I highly doubt Scott will bring in a baby. Remember how he reacted to Ctrl+Alt+Del and their baby arc? He ripped it when it first started, then crowed when his prediction of miscarriage came about.
He'd be pretty hypocritical to have a baby-story himself, even if it was "Hey, I'm having a baby arc too, but mine is going to be born. REALLY."
~J
4:58 Anon said: Remember how he reacted to Ctrl+Alt+Del and their baby arc?
Since when has that stopped him from doing things Ctrl+Alt+Del did before him?
Whether it be as ironic commentary (the Wintereenmas thing...) or more sincerely (the animated show, the concept of irreverent departures...) Kurtz have never been one to shy away from getting inspired by Ctrl+Alt+Del.
And before people get their panties in a bunch, I'm not scolding him or thinking what he did is wrong in any way. It'd be one thing if he ripped off jokes or characters, but merely re-using concepts of the competition I don't see anything wrong with at all.
I believe the NEW Francis can be the wacky Jerry Lewis type if his exploits in college with Marci are explored.
Brent can play the "yeah i've been there" part while Francis is going through it
4:58 anonymus
You are wrong!!! :) Scott didn't complain that CAD was doing a pregnancy strip. He was railing against the fact that he knee he wasn't going to follow through and couldn't make a long term change. Also, much like Yahtzee said, it was a sobering to have a miscarraige storyline in a wacky comic.
Even though I admit CAD is doing better with the aftermath of that.
@orionfury : FSM obviously meant the fifth panel and really, I'm guessing you probably knew that.
As to the too-much-Brent aspect - it does seem that everyone else is being relegated to mere 'also in the room' status, where they occasionally appear in the odd panel to add one-off comments/reactions.
Jesus Christ. Today's strip is awful. Just plain fucking unbearably awful. I'd rather read Doonesbury.
One of the worst things about the comic today is that god-awful title-and-description bubble beneath it. I DON'T NEED THAT. The titles are stupid. Just plain dumb stupid and unfunny. Plus, it almost seems like he is writing the descriptions for the retarded. LOL PANDAS WATCH PORN NO LIE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Let's recap the story so far, shall we?
Monday: panda.
Tuesday: panda is horny.
Wednesday: panda must get laid.
Thursday: panda must get LAID!
Friday: panda must mate / get laid.
That's a five panel strip right there. It only took five days to tell it.
On that note, today's strip actually works better if you remove panels 2 and 4, but replace the art in panel 3 with panel 2. That way, we move from Brent's disappointment to a more sarcastic "Now what?", without that eager expression on his face.
Panel 4 is completely worthless, because we're just repeating what the agent already said. It also spoils the punchline, because Cole says it not once, but twice.
@reader
There is nothing wrong with similar concepts. With a lot of these "slice-of-life, with a hint of lime" strips, there seems to be a general pool of thought used. Timing may vary, but there's the same undertones for the most part.
@sage
You think I'm wrong? NOOOO! I'll never post here again!! :P
I'll admit, I probably based that on what I read on the boards, and didn't take my grain of salt.
I almost hope that Francis doesn't go to Brent come college time. He earned 'bravado', or something, when he leveled, he'd think he wouldn't need his old mentor's help. Then a new, maybe slightly older, character can be introduced as a new hero for Francis to admire.
Or even better, he goes to Reggie. Brent would feel neglected, and try to buy back Francis' attention. Reggie wouldn't care, and just let Francis decide for himself... and Cole would whine about not being considered at all.
*quick comments about new strips*
If Maul turns out to be gay, would that be a cop-out or brillant?
And why do I see panda-Ashton Kucher and panda-Renee Zellwigger, WHY?!
~J
@anonymous 10:46 (J)
Yeah, like I was saying in my third paragraph, I agree with that. What I said wasn't meant as criticism.
On another note: You do know you can leave comments under a name without being signed in, right? Just select "Name/URL" and enter whatever you want. That's what I do.
@reader
*looks under identity*
....shaddup. -.-0
6:42 AM Anonymous... where PvP Makes Me Sad turns from constructive criticism to outright trolling. Can anyone delete abusive posts?
Building on what reader said at 5:18 AM, since when was a 'baby strip' a solely CAD thing? It's hardly the only comic strip in the world to ever have a baby strip - or even a miscarriage strip. There are very few original concepts out there (which is why so many t.v. soaps seem to blend into each other) and huge amounts of people regularly use other people's ideas. For the record though, I don't think Scott is going to try a baby strip, at least for some time.
"I'd rather read Doonesbury."
Don't you ever, ever say that again.
Hey Fake Mcloud any opinios on this
http://www.halfpixel.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=14253
dj coffman vs scott kurtz
I find it funny because it basically shows who Scott is.
1) he is right to try and protect his creation
2) his overreaction and bringing it to the forum led to more attention than it would have gotten otherwise
3) the way he went about it made him look bad in the process, not as bad as the offending guy, but worse nonetheless
The funny thing is that his own forum called him out on it to. Now I don't think that Kurtz is a horrible human being. Hoever I still think hes on the spectrum of the "sensitive artist". He is no where near as bad as say Buckley and other people but from interactions here and on his own boards you can obviously see that things that annoy him set up off. That is a human thing, but the way you present it determines how people look at you, it ranges from diplomat to raging lunatic and Kurtz has shown some tendencies to "flail" to borrow his own termanology.
I would have never known DJ from adam had he not mentioned it. At least Scott has somehwat of an inner voice to realize that he does overreact sometimes, maybe when a myriad of people TELL him, but at least he can be self-aware of it.
Whenever Scott has a beef with someone, he always manages to lower himself to their level (and beyond in most cases). I don't think I've ever seen him sling mud without also being covered in it by the end of the escapade.
Hmm. Does anyone have a copy of that Coffman drawing? After having read that thread I'm curious to see it.
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