Open Thread: Graaaaah!

The Strip: Graaaaah!

The I-Can't-Be-Bothered Review: Very little reaction. I like the center panel.

G-g-g-g-Ghosts?

I suspect Scott is right, Ghosts is probably funnier to him than everyone else. I also suspect there are many ways it could have been made funnier.

It's not that the joke isn't clear, it's just presented in such a milquetoast manner that a lot of the funny is sucked out of it.

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A couple people have commented on Francis' expression in the last panel -- I'm pretty sure I understand what's going on:



The line across the eyes aren't eyelids, or at least they aren't his top eyelids. If you look closely you can spot very small pupils looking off stage right. The lines are Francis' bottom eyelids, pulled up as he makes a pinched-face "I'm frightened" look.

A quick recap.

So, I was away a few days, and missed not very much as it turns out:

Friday (He's Comin' Right For Us): Brent accidentally shoots Cole with paintballs.

Monday (That'll Leave a Mark): Miranda accidentally shoots Francis with paintballs.

Can't wait for Tuesday.

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BTW, from now on when I miss a day, or have nothing to say, I'll try to create open threads, a la Daily Kos, so folks have somewhere to talk about the latest strip.

Hrm.

My only reaction to the current strip (Marines, we are LEAVING!) is that, as the last panel suggests, it would have been better had it been at the beginning of the story. I feel like I lost a bunch of the momentum that Scott successfully built up.

(Update: I wasn't moved to say much about this strip, but Evan was.)

Ok, I'm a little spooked now.

Not by the story, or the newly nighttime setting (which is very nice: Alone in the Dark), but by my enjoyment of this storyline. I still wish we'd had more paintball (and I'd argue to Scott that more paintball strips would have both satisfied expectations and given him some easy strips to write), but the continuing story in the forest is very worthwhile.

(One thing: I don't understand the "painting troll tonight" line -- I understand it means they will be going after Skull with the paintball guns, but is that line a particular reference to something?)

I know it seems like I've been shitting on PVP for the sake of shitting on it, but I have seriously/honestly had problems with every other strip and story I've commented on since I started this blog (and for a long time before that).

But the past week or so has been much better than average, very enjoyable, and I'm actually looking forward to the next days' strips.

PVP did not make me sad this week.

Alone in the Light

While I think the latest strip (Alone in the Dark) is good and does its job, it's hampered by some limitations of the art and strip structure.

1. While the last panel is nice, and Kurtz may have been trying something new (based on his blog post), I was confused for a moment and thought that the last panel had failed entirely:



I was looking for signs of Francis running away or something, which is what was set up in panel four.

With PVP, unless I get signals otherwise, I'm always expecting a punchline. It's totally fine to skip them sometimes, really, but it has got to be hard to set up a non-gag strip in a world of punchlines and it didn't work out for me here.

Update: This is embarrassing, but I didn't understand what was going on, at all. I thought the hands in panel 4 were Francis' hands as he backed or fell into the branch, snapping the twig, scaring the birds. Obviously, there is more going on than that.

2. The art doesn't lend itself to darkness or nighttime. Francis' line "Won't you get scared all alone in these dark woods" or even the title of the strip weren't enough to get across that feeling that I think Scott was looking for; they feel like artificial attempts to add atmosphere to an illustration that looks like any other day in PVP.

PVP's art is very well-defined, but without color or any shade of grey, "darkness" is really hard to find.

(Note: I don't actually know if it's supposed to be "night", just "dark". Woods can be dark and creepy during the day too.)

I LOLed. I really did.

The direction the story is headed is really good.

Rescue Party was fine -- I'm so over the main characters right now I don't even want to see them, but the final panel was very nice.



Please pull the camera back more often!

Trippin made me LOL for real. By the third panel I was all set to try and predict what would be happening with the Woodland Creatures, but to have them be a shroom induced hallucination made for a great last panel.

I look forward to hallucinatory adventures with Skull, but even if we don't get them this strip was worth Skull's getting lost.