Saturday, August 30, 2008

For Better or for Worse

For what it's worth, For Better or for Worse ends its long-running story today. I didn't realize this, but the artist is going to continue the strip, but returning to the core characters and a return to her freer, more sketchy style of drawing.

64 comments:

Brett Schiller (Sage) said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Brett Schiller (Sage) said...

FSM I read where she is going back with more of an idea to how to tell the story and newer artwork, which i took as she'll take her current style and apply it to hte older strips. I guess neither of us will know until Monday :). I read FBOFW every day and it was a good narrative comic and the last daily was very good and touching (yes its wordy like CAD is wordy but with better more meaningful dialogue) It was the only strip that elicited actual sadness when Farly died and Lynn is very good at what she does. I'll look forward to Sunday's goodbye (as the articles I read stated there will be one) and see wht the "new-runs" as there being called will do anything interesting.

August 30, 2008 12:33 PM

Orchid64 said...

FWIW, Sage's assertion is incorrect (sorry). There's an interview with her on YouTube where she makes it clear that she's adding to the old storyline and using the same simple artistic style she began with. She said she figures to insert about 50% new content among the re-reruns of old strips.

Many people have been saying she's redrawing the old strips (including that she's mad at her ex-husband so she'll re-draw John with a pot belly), but that's not true. She's essentially pressing the re-set button on her universe and inserting in new stories.

Brett Schiller (Sage) said...

Like i said I took the comment as the new art was going to the old storylines, and would wait until monday to see if i was right. I didn't really care to go to Youtube to see an interview, i was just reading the AP story. I know i can be wrong, heck i thought the author of PVP was a nice guy ;P JK

I dont believe she is pressing reset in so much as revisiting and telling other tails outside of the main storylines.

Back before webcomics it was FBOFW, Foxtrot and Safe Havens that I read, now one is only sundays, ones reseting, and one is still going :). I think ALM is a very good narrative comic as well and Renee in her twitter said she has an ending planned relatively soon and it will be interesting to see how SHE ends it. :)

Anonymous said...

I just stole Kurtz's PAX cake!! :D

Brett Schiller (Sage) said...

Im surprised not one anonymus poster made the obvious "missing cake, obvious physical nature of the author joke" guess the trolls either aren't here or they are having a nice labor day off

Anonymous said...

About todays strip. Why am I finding it difficult to look at? There are all these vertical lines and everyone is fighting for a space in the panels. Oh and the door handle looks wrong, should have left it out.

Anonymous said...

If you go back through the archives it becomes clear that Scott has been drawing his characters much larger lately. Whereas characters typically used to be 1/2 a panel tall they are now closer to 2/3 of a panel tall. Unfortunately that doesn't leave a lot of real estate for dialog and scenery so you end up with characters peeking their heads into frame.

Anonymous said...

I forgot to add that I've had clutter on my mind after reading For Better or For Worse this weekend. How Lynn Johnston manages to cram all that text into each frame is beyond me.

Anonymous said...

All that is missing from today's strip is a "Wah-wah-wah-wahhhhh!" sound effect and SK's bland joke quota for the month would be filled to perfection.

Brett Schiller (Sage) said...

Btw FBOFW newer style of art with past stories. Whats got two thumbs and was right? This guy (points at self) :).

R.W.McGee said...

"All that is missing from today's strip is a "Wah-wah-wah-wahhhhh!" sound effect and SK's bland joke quota for the month would be filled to perfection."


That comment made me laugh, today's strip did not.

Unknown said...

Sage, are we reading the same Foob?

To me, it looks like the old art style (or at least a concerted effort to return to it by LJ), especially since Elly's nose isn't played by a potato in today's strip.

Anonymous said...

Hrm... Scott Kurtz's brother: Relatively average body type, makes cakes for a living. Probably needs "guinea pigs" for his cakes.

Scott Kurtz: A man of superior girth. Consumer of said cakes?

Yeah, I didn't take all of Labor Day off.

Anonymous said...

If you go back through the archives it becomes clear that Scott has been drawing his characters much larger lately. Whereas characters typically used to be 1/2 a panel tall they are now closer to 2/3 of a panel tall. Unfortunately that doesn't leave a lot of real estate for dialog and scenery so you end up with characters peeking their heads into frame.

I want to see frames that ARE the characters; word bubbles would have to overlap blank spots on their clothing, and the characters would be hunched into box-sized positions, like mimes (or, like old early 90s hip-hop promo pictures). It would be incredible.

Anonymous said...

Hmm. First time in a while I've visited PvP and the new strip isn't up. Guessing the buffer thing is still a bit of a pipe dream, even after all this time.

Anonymous said...

Seems Shortpacked has something to say about this site.

http://shortpacked.com/comics/20080902shortpackedblowschunks.png

Anonymous said...

Holy fuck, how does anyone spell Alan Moore's name wrong? "I know, I'm publishing a webcomic - I already can't be arsed to waste 20 seconds running my text through a spell-checker so screw firing up wikipedia to see whether I'm spelling someone's name right!"

...and B.A. Baracus, too. FFS.

Anonymous said...

Anon 12:58: NEEEERRRRRRRRRRD.

Anonymous said...

Jess, 12:28.

Unless there's another nerd posting here in the near future at 12:58.

Anonymous said...

You'd think someone who visits PAX and has his characters regularly bouncing around in the General Lee would consider themselves Nerd-ish enough. Nah, this is pure lazy-bastard territory.

R.W.McGee said...

"Seems Shortpacked has something to say about this site."


Like 99.99999% of the world I have never read shorepacked and never will...and thus whatever he/she/it has to say, positive or negative...is pretty much entirely irrelevant.

Anonymous said...

Wow. That's just how 99.999999% of the world feels about you, R.C. FuckGee!

Anonymous said...

That makes Anon 1:41 that 0.000001% that does care.

R.W.McGee said...

What it makes him is the same person as Anon 12:16pm (aka, the author of Shorepacked...the only person with any reason to write a comic about the site, and then link it here hoping to increase their traffic)

Brett Schiller (Sage) said...

For all the "crap" we give PVP can we all agree that at its worse its about 100X better then whatever that was.

I guess saying that breaking down the panels of a comic strip (which even people who read comic books do) which contain 4-5 panels total, compared to an animated show (Batman: TAS was awesome btw and brought me to the comic books and other Bruce Timm and Paul Dini projects) which has 32 per second.

Oh well Shortpacked got my one and only view.

Anonymous said...

You're an idiot.

Brett Schiller (Sage) said...

why thanks anonymus person, if you are addressing me :).

Jai said...

We’re all worried about Andy.: Brent's use of "but only" in the middle panel is terrible grammar. It should just be "but", or "except".

The entire strip's joke is sort of a failure. Is it funny that Brent thinks that guy is a bigger nerd than he is? Are we forgetting that Francis set up a campaign about characters playing a campaign, and that Brent played it? I guess it's hilarious that Brent only puts effort into playing ridiculously nerdy games, and doesn't actually create them. Or something. And that this Andy character has, somehow, gone too far and is too nerdy. He needs help, in fact. 'Cos he's such a nerd. Wow. Even Francis is agreeing, although I'd be shocked to hear someone under thirty say "woof" like that. Man, Francis is so cool compared to Andy. Poor, poor Andy. At this rate, Andy's going to be hanging out with his girlfriend in a MMORPG, with his boss in a Dukes of Hazzard car, and grow old with an imaginary childhood troll friend. Ugh.

Anonymous said...

Further proof that PvP is Garfield.

Anonymous said...

Sage: I wasn't-- that was to R.W. McGee. You managed to post before me.

Brett Schiller (Sage) said...

Ah ok fair enough 7:49 pm Anon

John said...

I wasn't as bothered by the stip as some of the other posters; Brent has always seemed to me to be more elite, or maybe above, some of the lower nerdiness of the other characters. On the other hand, he did bring a Superman shirt on his honeymoon...

My biggest problem is the art (again). The characters still seem too big; it's jarring and cramps the panels (as has been noted earlier).

It was nice though to be told Jade had a "deadline." When was the last time we were reminded that these people actually work for a living?

Anonymous said...

I've absolutely no idea what each of them does for the magazine, to be honest (it *is* a magazine, right?).

Anonymous said...

@anon 9:34

brent is the creative director, cole is the editor (?), francis is a writer (?), jade also writes -- but about ... girl ... stuff (????)

yeah i have no idea either

Anonymous said...

Cole : Editor, founder, publisher, father-figuring douche
Brent : Graphic design and creative director, smarmy ass
Francis : Tech Support, column cowriter with Marcy, the young guy
Jade : Lead writer, game tester, the hip chick
Marcy : Secretary, cowriter with Francis, young, hip chick
Skull : (when employed) Gopher
Robbie & Jase : (when employed) Lead game testers, beer and chip down-sizers

Wow, are there only four employees left there?

Anonymous said...

Brent has always at least thought he's not a nerd, but I wonder what the author's intent on the subject is. It's clear that if Brent was a real life person he would be considered quite nerdy indeed, and so I would assume that Brent is just deluded, but I often find that the image Kurtz has in his head of his characters is quite different to what I see in his work.

Anonymous said...

"Hide and Seek" - Heh. Fat jokes are funny.

Jai said...

We've gone straight into Brent DMing a tabletop RPG? Yeah, I don't think this is going to tie into how Brent doesn't think he's much of a nerd. This isn't a story arc, so what I said yesterday stands.

Nice artwork, today! Not much of a joke, but at least it holds weight (Unlike yesterday's).

John said...

Why is Brent DMing? Doesn't Cole normally do that? I miss the hat...

And why oh why can't someone read the strips before they are posted; the punchline is significantly weakened because the grammar is so poor!

Anonymous said...

Ever notice that when Kurtz is out of town or busy with some big project but the strips continue on FSM slows down his posting or stops all together? I'm just saying.
Clark Kent and supes.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Chris Dunning said...

I'm fairly certain that this is a "story line" in the sense that Scott is showing us Brent's perception of himself as not that big a nerd, while showing the contrast of just how much nerdery Brent partakes in.

Anonymous said...

Well since the other guy is pimping his blog, I will too.

Check it out:

Penny Arcade is Fucking Terrible

Penny Arcade just hasn't been as good lately, so I thought I'd try to help Mike and Jerry out with my critiques.

Anonymous said...

So it looks like I'll be co-blogging with FSM, as per one person's suggestion.

Anonymous said...

"Well since the other guy is pimping his blog, I will too."

I dunno. I can appreciate certain types of 'trolling' to an extent when there's a little finesse to it but your blog stuff is just a pure sledgehammer approach. No class whatsoever.

Anonymous said...

I love these guys that come in here trying to imitate FSM as a joke, but do it completely wrong.

Another Whiner said...

That was my suggestion. :D It's one I've been meaning to suggest it to FSM for a while, but since I wasn't willing to be the one to take up the reins as co-blogger, I never did.

Anonymous said...

I think the Penny Arcade thing was supposed to be more humorous than serious.

I mean, he's very obviously not suggesting that the storm troopers' helmets shouldn't have emotions or that the robot is actually eve.

Anonymous said...

This Twitter exchange just occurred between Kris Straub and Scott Kurts on Twitter: (read from bottom up)

"starslip @pvponline i know you're in front of twitter, delete delete delete 25 minutes ago from twitterrific in reply to pvponline

starslip @pvponline DELETE THAT IMMEDIATELY. that wasn't a direct message. 27 minutes ago from twitterrific in reply to pvponline

pvponline @starslip d I know. if anyone found out that I was really FSM they would flip a shit. 28 minutes ago from twitterrific in reply to starslip"

So is Scott Kurtz Really the Fake Scott McLeod???

Jai said...

Well, he deleted it. That's a strange thing to wrap one's head around. It doesn't make much... well, any. Any sense.

Anonymous said...

Well if true he's certainly put a lot of effort into it. And to just think if he had directed that effort elsewhere he could

1) Have a comic buffer
2) Deliver 7 PVP strips a week on time (not to mention Ding! and whatever other projects he's not bothering to work on).
3) Get his product shipping problems in order.
3) Actually draw something funny once in awhile.

Anonymous said...

FSM just twittered "Shit, Shit Shit" like 25 minutes ago. Holy shit. Is FSM really Scott Kurtz?!

I didn't believe it until I read FSM's latest twitter post.

10 bucks says he comes on here and denies it soon.

Anonymous said...

Hah, Scott's totally TFSM.

Anonymous said...

I reserve judgment, but this does look rather fishy...

I suppose if it's true, I'll kick up my blog again and anyone who wants can follow me.

Anonymous said...

Esoteric Scribe is probably Straub.

Anonymous said...

IT'S A CONSPIRACY.

KURTZ, YOU HACK! WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU???

Anonymous said...

Best troll ever if it's true.

Anonymous said...

And if it's not... doubly best troll ever!

Anonymous said...

Well, I just talked with FSM via gmail and he swapped out his internet pseudonym for what I can only assume is his real name, presumably to prove who he was.

I guess everything else is just Kurtz and Straub having a yuk.

Jai said...

I don't understand TFSM's twittering. Is he collaborating with SK, or not?

Anonymous said...

As I understand it, he was simply playing along for his own amusement. But I don't want to put words in his mouth, so that's all I'll say on the matter.

Brett Schiller (Sage) said...

Nope thread isnt closed

Anonymous said...

If TFSM is not Scott Kurtz, why would he try so desperately to cover his tracks here on the PvPMMS site? It makes no sense.

TFSM is OBVIOUSLY Kurtz. He should just admit it and drop the stupid act.

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