Friday, July 18, 2008

Oh my aching back

I have cash money that says that the girl panda is about to find Brent-chun* the most attractive thing evar. (Wax off) Someone please take me up on it, 'cause SK might change the story line if he knew it was going to cost me money.

As a side note, and trying to get in the panda spirit, I think we should all chip in and buy SK this book. I've spotted 2 other apostrophe use errors since he let one slip into a recent strip (the other errors weren't in a strip).

* "chun" is apparently Texan for "I'd rather make stuff up than put some effort in." (Ugh -- sorry. That was a cheap shot; lately they've been too easy to resist. While I work on my own personal demons, I hope everyone can see through my horseshit -- PVP is some high quality shit, yo! At least I know Kurtz isn't reading this. (oh snap!))

51 comments:

Linda Shaver-Gleason said...

Ugh. People who are too PC-conscious often annoy me, but so does the half-assed Asian stereotyping in this storyline. On the one hand, I know that SK isn't being mean-spirited, and he's not racist, and he probably knows and is friends with several Asian people and so on.

On the other hand, I agree that the "-chun" thing and the fact that he can't differentiate between Chinese and Japanese cultures (as well as another poster's displeasure at how Mr. Miyagi is drawn) is pretty insensitive. It's laziness to the point of insult.

The thing about these kind of situations, though, is that when someone calls SK out on the insensitivity, he's likely to be offended. He probably thinks that, because he didn't intend it to be insulting, people shouldn't be insulted.

Of course, I'm putting words in his mouth here. Knowing how stubborn he is, though, I think his reaction would be closer to, "The PC Police is calling me racist! It's just a comic! Jeeze!" rather than, "Oh, you know, maybe I should do my research better next time."

Anonymous said...

What if it is all being done on purpose? The racism and the incorrect cultural references are being used to create a negative publicity, giving the comic a bit of "edge" and break away from the full main-stream appeal that has been commented on this blog beforehand.

And the improper use of apostrophes, well, he may just be doing to get a rise out of Scott here.

Also, with the way the storyline is going right now, Brent may be getting a different kind of "Panda Attack", which may be a way of giving the people who were complaining about Brent having to much face time a bone, pardon the innuendo.

So if the above happens, Brent may not be around for a bit, but just talked about, because if that happened to you, would you show your face anywhere if that happened?

Anonymous said...

I'm going to be the first to introduce a rating for the strips.

The panda series so far I'd give it two stars out of five, but todays strip is so poor I'm giving it one out of five.

It's just not doing it for me and I'd rather Scott moved on to something else. It's even worse because it's Friday and that means this panda series continues after the weekend into next week.

Anonymous said...

And I just had a random thought: How do we know if SK is not reading this still, and even more so, how do we know if Fake Scott here is not, in fact, SK?

Anonymous said...

Fake Scott donated a lot of money to Achewood. You can see his name in the contributors page. I don't think Scott Kurtz donates money, especially to other webcomics like Achewood.

Kurtz still visits the blog, along with Paul Southworth, Kris Straub and a few other popular cartoonists.

Anonymous said...

But how do you know that he doesn't donate to Achewood, and how long as Fake Scott been donating to Achewood?

Anonymous said...

What?! But I've been extra insulting with confidence that Scott Kurtz wouldn't be reading it!

Oh well. Somebody said it before, but this storlyine is in some ways similar to an episode of The Mighty Boosh except The Mighty Boosh was actually funny (it was an episode from when the series was still good.)

Anonymous said...

@orionfury

Scott has never said anything positive about Achewood, only Kris and Dave.

FSM donated once, I think it was over $100.

You have to remember that Scott Kurtz is always after free stuff and spend as little money as possible. He was just asking for someone to sell him a cheap Wii Fit just now on Twitter.

Anonymous said...

It is possible he grew to like it. Also, are Wii Fits still hard to get? If you can't find one under normal means, like shopping in stores and such, and had access to twitter, wouldn't you do a call out on it (btw, I did see the twitter call out).

Anonymous said...

My brother actually said they were still hard to get here. So yeah maybe it was worth him asking on Twitter if he can't find one round where he lives.

Jai said...

I thought it was obvious that SK still reads this blog. He only made a point out of taking it out of his bookmarks because he wants TFSM to know that he's got the URL either memorized or set to his homepage.

"Brent, behind you PANDA!" is the worst excuse for dialogue I've read on PVP in a long time. It's terrible. I'm sorry. I'm sorry that it's terrible.

I'm also sorry that there is no consistancy of character for Brent. The previous strip had Brent unable to speak properly and adamantly opposed to whatever forces stuffed him into a panda suit. Today, we see him able to speak clearly and putting a good deal of vocal effort into hitting on the female panda (Which will work. She is used to pandas that talk, and speaks fluent English herself). And then Cole and Brent freak out when Maul appears - because he might beat up Brent? Which was the entire point of this setup?

Hijinks!

Anonymous said...

Maybe it is possible that the helmet wasn't on right yesterday, and had the muffle speak. And I agree with the notion of Brent talking to the panda not making any sense, but that might of been the point.

The warning was silly and didn't make any sense within the context of what was supposed to happen, but SK need a way to have Brent sucker punch the panda and that was what came to his mind when he was trying to think of a way to progress the story in a way that I theorized above. ("Panda Attack", so to speak)

Jai said...

I'm also peeved about how Ms. Panda seems to be sitting down, while Brent and Maul seem to be standing up. That Maul is standing up is a separate issue that I'm not comfortable with (It doesn't look right next to Brent); the real beef is that Brent is only slightly taller than a sitting panda. That can't be right, and I'm not going to bother retconning the situation so that it will work - i.e., "Maybe Brent is on his knees."

Not only would it be more "correct" for Brent to be crawling around on all fours, it would also look funny.

I think his panda costume would look better if he was wearing his sunglasses on the outside, too. Not only would THAT help him look funny, but SK could draw some emotion into the lenses (Ala the Scratch-in-lap strip) and I wouldn't be irked about how you can't tell a damn thing about what Brent is feeling by looking at him. This is not simply due to his face being concealed; his body language could also be vastly improved upon (Because there's nothing going on there at all) and there are a whole host of ways to draw "beaded sweat" that SK hasn't bothered with here.

Anonymous said...

I agree with the emoting, or lack there of, with Brent, but the panda size thing made sense to me. Maul always seemed to be as big as Skull to me, and since there is already one above average size panda is out there, why not two?

Ti Chan said...

This whole strip was a rather large disappointment. He starts making up all these little tiny facts, and then screwing them over in the next comic. And it's gotten to be realllly annoying.

BTW, I completely believe that SK stills reads this blog. BUT he wanted to seem real manly and say he wasn't so that he looks like he doesn't care. BUT, it's against his nature to put so much attention into it and then WAM ignore it.

PS. Why is Pandora's tongue sticking out and under her hand? It just looks a little awkward. And that IS nitpicking.

Anonymous said...

Meh. People complaining about the cultural accuracy of exactly how a guy - coming to help a panda, living in a game review magazine's offices, reproduce - make me sad.

PVPMMS has jumped the shark.

Anonymous said...

Isn't he doing the strips the day before now? Maybe that has something to do with the overall quality of them, since he feels rushed to get them up and is currently planning to go to SD Comcicon he is currently being stretched thin.

Maybe a couple weeks of guest strips will let him recharge himself, and thus the comic itself, because while I think that the idea of it is funny, it seems forced.

Anonymous said...

And by idea of it, I meant the Panda Mating thing going on right now.

Anonymous said...

You know, I mentioned a while back how PvP was getting closer to becoming a weekly visit as opposed to daily...

Today's strip made me drag the bookmark from "Daily" to "Weekly" in my Webcomics folder.

I know me mentioning it here doesn't really matter, but I'm hoping that SK does indeed still read this site, and I'm hoping that maybe this post will do a tiny bit towards making him wake up and realize that his writing is just as important as his art - which, it must be said, is very nice and is consistently improving.

The shark has been jumped, and it was a panda. Or was it a wedding? Not sure.

Jai said...

SK should devote an entire week to "PVP Makes Me Sad Guest Week", where he challenges us to come up with enough guest strips to fill a week of vacay for him. That sounds like fun, although admittedly it's simply an "off the top of my head" idea. And it sort of depends on enough of us (And SK) being willing to try that.

Jai said...

@Reader: It's going to be a panda wedding!

Anonymous said...

If people keep saying that Scott is still reading this, and Scott really is reading this, he might stop reading this just to prove you wrong once and for all even though nobody will be aware of his victory. Maybe he will then only come back every month telling himself that he's just checking to see if it has become worthy of his attention again.

Or maybe he will read this post and decide not to boycott the blog for real just to prove me wrong. Or maybe he will read that addendum to this post and firmly commit to continue coming here so as to prove the later part wrong. He's a complex guy so it's hard to predict just how his pettiness will manifest itself.

Anonymous said...

Let's just hope he doesn't make a spin-off like "The Pursuit of Happy Days". Though an interlude like that may be funny to see.

Brett Schiller (Sage) said...

*spoiler*
If you guys wanted to look ahead to see the results of that little hit on the nose put this in your web browser


http://www.pvponline.com/comics/pvp20080721.gif


*spoiler*
Eh i dont think us writing a webcomic would be that good.

Anonymous said...

@sage

Is that really the punchline?
I mean, normally I can see Kurtz trying to be funny, and falling flat on his face, but this time? It's like he's not even trying.

Anonymous said...

I wonder why he didnt go along with that panda AIDS punchline.

So does this mean the end of the panda story arc? All those strips just to get up to that weak punchline.

Brett Schiller (Sage) said...

Well he is actually written ahead since he is a SDCC.

If you add a type in 722 and 723 instead of 721 at the end of http you see the strips for Teus and Wed.

Anonymous said...

To say the ending is surprising would be like getting thrown by Sunday following Saturday. Saying that, I'm not sure how any ending could have been worth the past two weeks of panda-themed dross.

Anonymous said...

I miss storylines that actually reflected the humor of a gaming magazine run by multi-generational nerds.

So far this summer, We've had three superhero hero movies, a trailer for a new star wars CG movie, Watchmen and The Sprit.

And what are you doing, Kurtz? Another panda story.

Anonymous said...

I think I'll wait for the comics to come out normally, but I do agree with the statement of "Where are the game references?" Though, years ago, he did do a week long story based on the fact that there are no gaming references.

Anonymous said...

I personally have ran out of things to say about disappointing this comic strip is now. I will continue reading it because I have nothing better to do and I continue to hope it will improve. But after seeing the conclusion to the panda storyline I would just prefer if SK ended the strip forever.

Anonymous said...

Some of you may recall in interviews where he was asked to make a strip about videogames, but he thought that would be really boring. Because there's only so much you can say about videogames.

And to a certain extent, that's correct. There's only so much you can say about any subject. But the fact that he seems to have an outright aversion to it means that most of his references feel tacked on and clumsy.

(See his recent Diablo 3 reference.)

In fact, one of my favorite game-related stories he did was when Jade was having a secret romance in Everquest, and when she went away to meet him in real life, the mystery man is revealed to be Brent.

Brett Schiller (Sage) said...

Its not to say his strip should SOLEY be gaming references, but if you mix in reference like "commercials" to his storyline I think he would do etter with his overall product.

Anonymous said...

maybe its the beggining of a new recurring joke once a month instead of a panda atk brent will be raped
probably just kisses and death hugs to be family friendly

Anonymous said...

Good god, just when I thought it couldn't get any worse:

http://www.pvponline.com/comics/pvp20080724.gif

Seriously, THAT'S your joke?! I thought maybe it's just a set up for the next strip, but no...

http://www.pvponline.com/comics/pvp20080725.gif

Oh god, just get it over with and bring back Skull so we don't have to sit through 2 weeks of Scratch
crap. I'm all for Kurtz trying new things, but this just doesn't feel like trying at all.

Anonymous said...

Dear Scott,

Copying and pasting Cole in three panels with something funny happening to his face in the last one was not funny the first time. Why would it be funny now?

Sincerely,
Scott Kurtz

Anonymous said...

Oh god, it's so depressing seeing how poor next weeks strips are. I was kinda hoping things would pick up. I suppose on the plus side atleast Scott finally has a buffer so he can play Tetris all day and watch old movies.

Here are next weeks strips.

Monday's Strip

Panda aids would have been funnier.

Tuesday's Strip

So no more panda attacks? FSM will love this one, it's hilarious.

Wednesday's Strip

The background keeps disappearing and I still think Marcies hair looks god awful.

Thursday's Strip

*cough*

Friday's Strip

This ones not too bad. Maybe we could have had some decent ones of Stewie finally realizing that Skull is gone instead of that panda series.

Another Whiner said...

I'm not even sure what the hell is going on in Thursday's strip. I assume the light fell on his head (OMG!LOL!) but the art makes it look like there was a rip in the space/time continuum or something. All I know is that Wednesday doesn't seem like a one off strip, though it apparently is, and Thursdays strip is the weakest stand alone anything I have ever seen.

John said...

I want to know where Scott gets away with charging for sketches at Comic Con. I've had free ones from people like Daniel Clowes and Mike Mignola. And Kurtz is nowhere near those guys in terms of popularity or ability. Not that I'd really want a PvP sketch, but still...

Anonymous said...

It's up to the artist if they want to charge for sketches. After all, they don't draw themselves.

Of course, it's up to the consumer if they'll pay for them.

But hey, at least they're not charging for autographs. Those guys are dicks.

Ti Chan said...

Looking at the buffers the SK has, I am REALLY disappointed. It's a another case of "I don't really know where I am going with this bus, so I'm just going to stop in the middle of the road." He picks up a storyline, either makes it good or make it seem like it SHOULD BE, and then doesn't know how to end it so either pulls it out his ass or just shrugs it off.

And then his filler comics are horrible. It's true. Tues and Thurs are really just HORRIBLE. And Wed seems to be going somewhere but just runs off into nowhere. Also, why the HELL is Francis talking to COLE about his college of choice BEFORE his mother/father? And if this is what Francis really wants, maybe his parents will say yes... Why is Cole naysaying it instead of telling him to talk it out with said real parents?

That comics really disappoints. I would have loved to have a kinda college tour storyline for Francis. Once that DOESN'T constantly involve Brent.

Chrysee said...

oh god I just saw the rest of the week's comics and the college one with the Good Will Hunting joke(???) is just.. awful. I can't even believe it. The moment the panda story arc started I just sighed to myself and wondered how long until it would be over.

Ti Chan said...

It gets worse people...

http://www.pvponline.com/comics/pvp20080728.gif

That's... That's simply a horrible joke. Period.

Another Whiner said...

....

Surely that's a joke. Kurtz knows that we all read ahead so he put something in Monday's date that won't actually show up, right? Please?

Ti Chan said...

Julia, let's hope. Let's hope.

Otherwise, I am totally joining his board just to tear THAT specific comic apart.

Gay jokes. Didn't we already say how childish they were?

Anonymous said...

It's not the best time for him to make fun of another comic (i.e. Family Circus) when he's so far from bringing his A-game lately. Skull never bothered me before but for some reason he's starting to get on my nerves in a Jar-Jar way.

bk said...

Personally, I think it's a fabulous joke, perhaps the best one in weeks. For once, Scott's not making a gay joke, but social critique; he's poking fun at the status quo clusterf@ck that is Family Circus while at the same time taking to task the current resurgence in anti-gay marriage/adoption sentiment.

Look at the way Skull's turned towards the kid, and not looking in the same direction as him. This indicates surprise on his part for hearing that nonsense. So, this time the focus is not on a gay person, gay actions, etc., but on a homophobic little boy and what he said. The fact that it's through the lens of Family Circus reinforces the critique and shows that Scott is saying that the problem here is nothing but this ridiculous statement that is held by far too many people.

I mean come on, he actually shows someone _praying_ to "fix" someone else's sexuality. The only way this could be funnier is if it were a Chick Track, and we knew the "artist" was not being ironic (because laughing at actual stupidity is way better than the hypothetical variety).

I think the only problem with this is that, unlike Family Circus, it's actually funny.

Anonymous said...

Just a mild tangent, re: next Wednesday's strip.

I find it hard to believe that the editor-in-chief of a computer gaming magazine has never heard of DigiPen, and has a negative attitude toward it.

Jaap said...

Holy shit! PVP takes place in a computer gaming magazine office?!

Anonymous said...

There are more video game related jokes in Ugly Hill than there are in PvP.

Scott if you're fed up with people wanting to see strips about video games, then maybe you should cut out of the fact that they all work for a video game magazine.

Unknown said...

Not funny to me, but I don't know anything about this Family Circus thingamajob. That might hurt the punchline a bit.

Anyway, I don't think it's something particularly clever or original. Oh well.

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