Raising Hell

Raising hell follows the misadventures of two young boys, Adam and Noor as they cause their father headaches by sneaking onto his computer and getting up to all sorts of mischief.
It is not fair to judge a comic by it's first page, but raising hell certainly doesn't do well at creating a good first impression.
The first page opens with a "You're a noob" joke.
http://raisinghell.smackjeeves.com/comics/437757/intro/
Argh! To open your web comic with one of the most tired internet expressions does not bode well for Raising Hell.
The humour of the comic is largely based around the boys doing something cheeky to frustrate their dad.
The comic suffers from being something of a one note joke, as variations of this joke play out multiple times, for example-
http://raisinghell.smackjeeves.com/comics/437768/sometimes-i-wish-i-lived-there-alone/
Unfortunately this strip also shows off the second aspect of the humour in this comic- pop culture references.
The name dropping at times becomes difficult to bear.
We have references to second life, world of war craft, puzzle pirates lookalike contest (I have no idea what this is!) as well as movies like Hancock, Wanted and probably several others I didn't get.
Much like the initial "you are a noob" comment, these give the feeling of an attempt to make the comic seem cool and contemporary, but have the opposite effect.
Simply naming things from pop culture is not funny unless you can put some sort of clever twist on them. Just dropping names is meaningless.
This gets especially bad when in issue 5 we go into a fantasy world of the boys day dreaming they are characters in movies (odd that they only imagine themselves in adult films, not kid films. No wonder they are so badly behaved if they are watching poorly made but violent movies like these!) The humour here appears to rest on the fact that we are seeing familiar characters appearing in odd settings, but since this is done 5 strips in, the characters are not familiar at all, I barely know them, so seeing them pretending to be in films is meaningless.
Another minor niggle is that for the beginning of the comic's run, the father remains unseen, we hear his voice and hear him spoken of but never see him (a funny concept, rather like the grown ups on charlie brown). Rather weirdly, this is dropped without warning part way through, in strip 22, where he is revealed to very little fan fare to complete a relatively unclear joke.
http://www.drunkduck.com/Raising_Hell/index.php?p=469217
The art of the comic is fairly consistent, it won't win any awards but it is clear and serves to deliver the jokes effectively. Personally, I found the large heads and tiny bodies of the characters a bit freaky, but that is just personal taste.
Raising Hell just isn't snappy, edgy, exciting or engaging enough.
The characters are simplistic, the jokes sign posted well in advance and the pop culture references are tired.
I have loads of kids of my own, but nothing here reminded me of the experiences of being a parent with bratty kids.
Kids causing mischief to a long suffering parent is well trod comedy terrain and Raising Hell has so far failed to do anything new with this medium.
Final score-
2/10

hmm well this is certainly a weird comic lol!

ART
the art is really subjective here...cartoon-ish-ness takes the place of trying to be anatomically correct

good news
-the whole thing is pretty remarkable if its all done on MS paint with a mouse, but if not, then...eh. cuz it looks like it was done on MS paint.
-the colors really arent just slapped in there there is actually an awareness of trying to create the illusion of depth which is nice.
-the artist couldve been really lazy and doen no backgrounds, but there is a slight sense of environment, which is great.

bad news
-this might just be a style thing that bugs me, but theres no way i can see those kids holding up their massive heads with the little stick bodies theyve been given.

Story
the story is a simple premise...kids raising hell. all parents know how that is.

good news
-some genuinely funny ideas.
-the writer has a great sense of how to set up punchlines through multiple strips.

bad news
-the funny ideas fail in actual execution...along with the punchlines.
-I thought the first strip was awful but read it through expecting significant improvement and funnier jokes...I got neither. like this strip
http://www.drunkduck.com/Raising_Hell/index.php?p=466706 uh...what? is she saying "my man"? and the repetitive noob joke isnt funny. especially when its used in spots where it doesnt make sense. I mean, do people even know what a noob really is anymore?
-I cant help but get the feeling we are supposed to be liking these kids and laughing at the dad, but rather, i feel sorry for the dad and wonder why he hasnt flayed his sons to an inch of their life....i mean seriously, they are jerks! like the whole going on his computer and stealing his money to buy an ipod.


OVERALL
Its a funny premise that every parent can get with, but the reason this strip fails is due to poor execution and just an overall sense of 'trying too hard"
3/10

Raising hell, or "those darn kids" which would be a better name, revolves around some kids that cause trouble much to the despair of their father. To me it's certainly not the best premise for a comic but you never know.

STORY
To begin with the comic is a hopeless mix of non-jokes and inside humor and as the title continues not much change. Some punch lines are explained via the author notes but otherwise the reader is pretty much left in the dark. Some strips follow a brief storyline but there's not much of a plot going on.

ART
The artwork is interesting however. Perhaps a bit odd looking but definitely interesting. The big heads and the strange perspective in the backgrounds gives it special look. Almost creepy, at least to me.

CONCLUSION
Sadly it feels like the comic isn't meant to be read by anyone outside the authors inner circle.

The central premise of "Raising Hell" is two eight-year-old boys causing mayhem that their father has to deal with. To me, the best word to describe this comic would be "average". Nothing about it leaps out and grabs me, nothing stands out about it. Everything is just... average.

THE ART. The art is better than anything I could do, but then, I draw a stick figure comic, so that pretty much applies to 90% of DrunkDuck. Certainly a unique art style (big heads with small bodies). Not really my kind of thing, but hey, that's just my opinion.

One thing really irks me about the art: the expressions on the characters' faces rarely if ever alter from their perpetual blank look. Oh, yes, you get the occasional attempt at anger and despondency, but mostly they're just a generic "I-couldn't-decide-how-these-people-are-feeling" expressions.

THE STORYLINE. OK, it's a gag comic. I understand that. I draw a gag comic myself. But when you decide to incorporate a storyline into a gag comic, please, AT LEAST try to give it a definite sense of closure. The "Fantasia" storyline just... ended. One minute, we were in an Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless mind parody, and the next it was back to the gags. There wasn't even anything to tie the story together. Just random pop-culture references.

THE CHARACTERS. Are all pretty much interchangeable. The two boys could both be replaced with girls, or identical twins, or tentacle monsters from the planet Glorb, and it would still be the same. They have the same personality; the only attempt to differentiate them is that one has brown hair and is shorter than the othe rone.
Also, I must say, if those are eight-year-old boys, then they are two of the most literate, intelligent, erudite boys I have ever seen. The author just seems to have arbitrarily decided "these boys are eight" and never bothered to give them appropriate language for their age. Oh yes, except for "noob". You know you have a problem when you use the word "noob" twice in a comic with a perfectly straight face.

THE HUMOUR. Is flat. Didn't even raise a giggle out of me, because it's the same joke over and over: two kids annoying the hell out of their father. It wasn't even endearing childish antics, it was "let's sell some of Dad's property to buy my brother an iPod". Frankly, there is nothing that makes me sympathise with those boys, because they're just malicious little monsters.

SUMMARY. "Raising Hell" clearly wants to be funny and beliavable, but it just can't quite grasp the necessary concepts. The dialogue is wooden, the jokes aren't funny and the characters are one-dimensional. Still, I'm not a parent, so maybe there's something actual parents will be able to identify with in this comic and laugh at. The art is decent, too, other than the characters' expressions. Perhaps if the author focused on the characters' expressions, and differentiated the two boys more, it just might make a half-decent comic. As it stands, however, it's just... average.

2.5/10

hah well you can clearly see that author put a lot on effort in his drawing and dialogue.The comics is made more to improve artist's skill than to attract readers I think...

1.Art. The artist definitely has some ideas how to draw perspectives and feels the anatomy, but its too wierd looking for me ;/

2.Story.Not much of that, well yeah, I know its a strip comics but you still need to tie it together to look right.And there is not a single good joke, from like 30 pages, so maybe you should try writing other styles...And there's no "hell" in comics for the father, these kids are pretty normall to me...

3Summary.Raisig Hell is definitely not the name for the comics.Two average kids unsuccesfully trying to be bad fits better, and that would summarise all pages.