Inkmonkey
Personally, I can't stand a comic that takes itself seriously all the time. If nothing else, it doesn't feel real to me. Real life has a mixture of humor and drama, and even the most horrible events can have a hint of humor to them, or at the very least I can understand the surviving characters trying to relax after a traumatic experience with something humorous. There's a way to blend the two, and when it's done sloppily it's a real problem.

But maybe I'm just reading what you meant wrong. Do you have an example of what you're talking about?

I think the problem with injecting humor into otherwise extremely serious stories (to me, anyway) is when it seems completely out of place. If it's not done carefully, it can feel "cheap", like the author just stuck it in to get a rise out of the audience or to satisfy their craving to stick in a personal joke where it didn't really belong. If a character delivering the joke has proven themselves otherwise not prone to making them, it just makes it seem even more awkward.

That said, I don't think humor is a bad thing at all in comics, and I prefer the ones I read (even serious ones!) to make me smirk, or even laugh out loud, once in a while. If it's one of those stories with absolutely no humor whatsoever and it's all doom and gloom, I tend to get bored with it after a while, unless there's a pretty damn good reason that there's not even the slightest hint of humor in any of the characters. (The same can be said for all-humor comics, though (save gag-strips, obviously (wow, parentheseis inside of parenthesis, wooo)). I guess what I'm saying is I prefer a mix of both. But that's just personal preference, so I think I'm getting off topic.)

Inkmonkey
Personally, I can't stand a comic that takes itself seriously all the time. If nothing else, it doesn't feel real to me. Real life has a mixture of humor and drama, and even the most horrible events can have a hint of humor to them, or at the very least I can understand the surviving characters trying to relax after a traumatic experience with something humorous. There's a way to blend the two, and when it's done sloppily it's a real problem.

But maybe I'm just reading what you meant wrong. Do you have an example of what you're talking about?

Yes, real life has a mix of serious and humorous moments, and I don't have a problem with that. It's when you have moments that don't fit within the landscape of the story, where it seems like out of left field the creator decided to throw in some character falling on his face in reaction to something simply as a forced attempt to lighten the mood of an otherwise serious story, for the reader or themselves.

Two characters arguing in a kitchen. Serious interpersonal relationship comic. Then one character says, "and your cooking sucks, too." Still plausable. In reaction, with the two characters being drawn in a little more cartoony fashion, the other character hits the first one with a frying pan. Then everything is fine, that was the release, and the story goes back to its regular programming. No. Everyone may WANT to do something like that in such a situation, but we don't, because it doesn't make for teh funneh. Because someone hits someone with a frying pan and then the anger rises, the other person hits back, or the person with the pan spends the night in jail for assault or is thrown out on their ass with the locks being changed.

It's the intent behind it. You have two guys cracking jokes at a funeral, okay...that happens. When things get heavy around you, humor helps the mood. When your story gets heavy, you let the characters lighten the mood with their own jokes. It's their world, you're god, generally you should be invisible. You have one of the guys creeped out by being in a cemetery and the other one cracking wise, that's fine. You suddenly have the other guy sprout symbolic fangs, horns, and a devil's tail while doing it, that's when it's annoying. Yes, he's being mean. He's taking humorous, though mean-spirited, shots at the other character. I got that. I don't need it spelled out for me like a sign with an arrow over a character's head that reads, "being mean".

If you have a light-hearted story to begin with, something tongue-in-cheek, or outright comedy, sure, fine, make with the humor. But if it's serious, well, humor comes in its own time, when the characters are in the proper place; it doesn't need to be shoehorned into the story every couple of pages for fear things are getting too dark.


Now the reasons behind my personal feelings regarding such things aside, are we talking about my comic, Kirsten? Is that what inspired the thread? Because your first post seems to pretty well synch up with the comments you left in Sune.

maybe i've read too many garth ennis, azzarello or warren ellis comics to deviate my stance on dark humor in serious situations

from ennis's "preacher"

subcultured
maybe i've read too many garth ennis, azzarello or warren ellis comics to deviate my stance on dark humor in serious situations

Oh man, I remember reading that line for the first time. That was the funniest line from the entire comic.

Darth Mongoose
...And if Shakespeare does it, I don't give a crap what anybody else says. I'm gonna do it.

This is a good rule of thumb when writing ANYTHING.

People are funny. People will make jokes all the time in almost any situation. When you write a story where none of the characters really have a sense of humor you remove an element of realism.

I have alot of problems with Quentin Tatentino's writing, but thats one thing he does right. Any character, regardless of his purpose in the film, finds certain things funny, tries to be funny, or makes jokes during the downtime in the film. I'm not saying characters should drop gags for no reason, but if you want a character to be realistic you gotta give him some kind of sense of humor.

When a comic has more text than visuals. This is a comic... not a newspaper!

If you want to express something, you should do it with more action than words. I saw a comic's panel. A guy surrounding by speech bubbles.

When you place a fucking filler in the middle of the damn chapter or issue. The best solution to put in a filler is after the issue or chapter is complete. Another thing, you shouldn't choke us with fillers between after a completed chapter. 2 filler pages, I'm fine but 10 before the next issue is wrong!

Gee... practically all my work is tongue-in-cheek.

There's a few tips I know to mixing humor and seriousness.

1. You can be as funny as you want before something bad happens. Just like real life where things can be so carefree until ---- happens.
(Realized this from an episode of Fushigi Yugi. The main characters were having fun, walking home, making fun of each other... then, when they made it home, they looked inside the house and the main character's family was in there all dead.)

2. When the situation is serious already it can sometimes be harder. When the situation becomes too dramatic it can be made fun of. There's other ways too ,but can't think of any.

I say just make sure seriousness doesn't end with some deformed chibi saying something stupid unrelated to the situation. That's the kind of humor I don't care for.

My 2 biggest pet peeves would have to be:

1. WAY too much filler. One filler page for every regular page gets a bit much.

2. Spelling errors. If I'm unsure of something's spelling, I tend to look it up first.

Those kill it for me...

well, for me, what kills a webcomic is its inability to make people click that "next" button. It's that simple.

Posting them on the internet, thats mistake #1.

rainingbells
Now the reasons behind my personal feelings regarding such things aside, are we talking about my comic, Kirsten? Is that what inspired the thread? Because your first post seems to pretty well synch up with the comments you left in Sune.

no, silly! it wasn't a DD comic, it was one that I found on buzzcomix. sorry about the comments, I was just trying to give constructive crit! I really like sune, I gave positive comments too, right?
sorry if I insulted your comic, I think it's very professional!!

marine
Posting them on the internet, thats mistake #1.

That's a fatal error of a webcomic? I thought that was the definition.

I guess philosophically speaking, the first true fatal error of life is being born. As soon as you're born, you're pretty much destined for death...

usedbooks

marine
Posting them on the internet, thats mistake #1.

That's a fatal error of a webcomic? I thought that was the definition.

I guess philosophically speaking, the first true fatal error of life is being born. As soon as you're born, you're pretty much destined for death...

oh how emo!! XD XD

Kristen Gudsnuk

rainingbells
Now the reasons behind my personal feelings regarding such things aside, are we talking about my comic, Kirsten? Is that what inspired the thread? Because your first post seems to pretty well synch up with the comments you left in Sune.

no, silly! it wasn't a DD comic, it was one that I found on buzzcomix. sorry about the comments, I was just trying to give constructive crit! I really like sune, I gave positive comments too, right?
sorry if I insulted your comic, I think it's very professional!!

No-no. It was simply that the initial post contained comments along the same lines of the ones you left in Sune, and I was just going to explain why I took the approach I did if that's what you were talking about.

The biggest mistake a webcomic can make is being drawn by me.

The major turn-offs for me were mostly all mentioned
Lack of updates(my specialty)
Illegible text
extremely bad art where its hard to tell what is going on
reads right to left


and I'm going to admit to this but by all means it is not a mistake
but I get turned off by comics with huge archives
there i said it
If I see a comic with 1000+ pages It's gonna have to a be a pretty damn good comic for me to read all of that. Otherwise I just say "welp I'm too late". That may be more of a mistake on my part than the webcomics though of course.

Nergal
and I'm going to admit to this but by all means it is not a mistake
but I get turned off by comics with huge archives
there i said it
If I see a comic with 1000+ pages It's gonna have to a be a pretty damn good comic for me to read all of that. Otherwise I just say "welp I'm too late". That may be more of a mistake on my part than the webcomics though of course.

well, idk, there's a bookmark function, so you can just read maybe forty pages or so, and then come back later... that's what I did with edepth angel (and now I wish that edepth's archive was longer!!)

I'm going to agree with Nergal, I don't have the attention span for those 1000+ page comics.

One thing I really hate with webcomics is when the banner doesn't match up with the style of the actual comic. It's so annoying! Yes your banner should look good so that people click on it but if it doesn't get the tone right you're only going to end up disappointing people when they actually do visit.

Personly i love a lot of text in comics, i hate when you can read a whole 200 page graphic novel in ten minutes.

My all time favorite series is CEREBUS, which if you have read it, you know just how much text is involved in it!

I think the biggest problem with webcomics is that an awful lot of them are actually terribly executed! I have seen comics on drunk duck which have been drawn on lined paper, comics with terrible spelling and grammar, or have frames/panels that have been drawn without the use of a very basic instrument: a ruler! (i'm not talking about styled borders, just the badly hand drawn ones!)

And i don't think that a webcomic needs humour. I don't think any story NEEDS humour! thats a very limiting view of the art of story telling!

Boring, bland, uninteresting characters turn me off terribly... I can take bad artwork and a unfocussed storyline as long as the characters have engaged me and have made me care about what happens to them. I've read a few things where all the characters seem to be is eye candy or comedy fodder with no real personality or spark. :/


Expanding on what Tommie Kelly just said; poor execution is another big thing... it's like the artist isn't taking their work seriously if they don't take care over it. And if they don't take it seriously how can the readers? You can be a wonderful artist but if you draw in red biro on the back of your shopping list or something it just shows a lack of respect for your own work.


Other things I can't stand XD :
- I have to agree with the long LONG archives thing... if it's 250+ pages I'll be hard pressed to even attempt to read it unless I'm sucked in from the beginning
- Gag comics turning serious
- Careless spelling mistakes
- Too many "talking heads" bits... no establishing shots or variation of camera angles
- Large flowery chunks of text which say something that could basically be said in about three words XD
- Two characters meet each other then suddenly....... SEX. O_O At least leave the readers hanging a bit and resist the urge to draw smut within the first few pages... ^^;

I hate it when a comic has like 50 characters who all regularly appear in the comic and each one is just used for the same basic joke over and over again and... wait...

Tommie Kelly
And i don't think that a webcomic needs humour. I don't think any story NEEDS humour! thats a very limiting view of the art of story telling!

I wouldn't say that every comic needs "humor", per se, but I think a good comic needs to have variety and, occasionally, a bit of "breathing room" amongst the drama. There doesn't have to be "gags" or "punchlines" and the like, but a sense of lightheartedness makes the drama/horror/action/etc. seem that much more intense because of the contrast.

Fatal errors of a webcomic? Well lets see. Too much dialogue bugs me. When there is only 1 character that the entire comic focuses on and the character is BORING or emo. Long winded monologues about boring flashbacks. Inside jokes that the reader has no idea about, keep those between the people that actually know/understand the joke. Incredibly morbid comics, I dunno that just kills it for me, I read comics to get entertained not depressed.

You wanna know what i think the fatal flaw of DRUCKDUCK is?

The fact that no one rates pages honestly.

Everyone is afraid that if they give a honest rating people will turn on them and give them a bad rating! I have only ever given a number lower than 5 once( it was when i joined first!) isn't it strange to note that i have had one comment muted, i wonder which one?

Not every page deserves a five, but unless ALL of us rate the pages honestly, those who give 4's or god forbid a 3 will look like egotistical dicks!

If a page is really bad i usually don't leave a rating at all, just a comment.

Inkmonkey

Tommie Kelly
And i don't think that a webcomic needs humour. I don't think any story NEEDS humour! thats a very limiting view of the art of story telling!

I wouldn't say that every comic needs "humor", per se, but I think a good comic needs to have variety and, occasionally, a bit of "breathing room" amongst the drama. There doesn't have to be "gags" or "punchlines" and the like, but a sense of lightheartedness makes the drama/horror/action/etc. seem that much more intense because of the contrast.

I see your point...

Nergal
and I'm going to admit to this but by all means it is not a mistake
but I get turned off by comics with huge archives
there i said it
If I see a comic with 1000+ pages It's gonna have to a be a pretty damn good comic for me to read all of that. Otherwise I just say "welp I'm too late". That may be more of a mistake on my part than the webcomics though of course.

I have to agree with the long LONG archives thing... if it's 250+ pages I'll be hard pressed to even attempt to read it unless I'm sucked in from the beginning

It's really sad ,but it is true. I set up my 230+ page comic The Planet Closest to Heaven up for reviews last year. All the reviews was nice art nice art oh the art improved, but NO NEW PEOPLE ACTUALLY READ IT. Long comics with bad art/writing from the beginning have trouble getting new readers.

Mmm... Well, I noticed a lot of people mentioned funny comics that suddenly get serious. I disagree. Unless the characters are developed at all, it's interesting to see them go from light hearted and without depth to someone who is meaningful and has inner thoughts.

I worry that PA has suddenly gotten too dark, but it was intended to be like this fromt he beginning.

There's no better drama than making a main character. Let's call him Bob. Bob is cool. He's funny. He's animated. He's got friends.

Bob is... kinda boring.

Now, let's throw in a hostage situation, and angsty past and you've got my attention.

But I think what we've found is it's all a matter of preference.




... Am I the only one who gets happy about a long archive? I get so frustrated reading one page at a time... ;_; *lament*

reidavidson
... Am I the only one who gets happy about a long archive? I get so frustrated reading one page at a time... ;_; *lament*

You're not the only one, I also love seeing long archives if the comic is something that I'm enjoying reading. It's not like you have to sit down and read it all at once, that's why the internet gods created the option to bookmark pages.

:kitty:

Tommie Kelly
You wanna know what i think the fatal flaw of DRUCKDUCK is?

The fact that no one rates pages honestly.

Everyone is afraid that if they give a honest rating people will turn on them and give them a bad rating! I have only ever given a number lower than 5 once( it was when i joined first!) isn't it strange to note that i have had one comment muted, i wonder which one?

Not every page deserves a five, but unless ALL of us rate the pages honestly, those who give 4's or god forbid a 3 will look like egotistical dicks!

If a page is really bad i usually don't leave a rating at all, just a comment.

hey hey, I disagree. I think that rating's bogus and shouldn't be there in general. I mean, what are we, in school? why are we grading each other's pages? I feel like a numerical value doesn't add anything to a critique of a comic, and.. etc.

omg though, you gave me a 4! a really long time ago... XD why do I still remember this? but it was on the page that had my characters, Tom and Bertha, and a poem... around page 100-ish... and yeah I didn't mute it! (though my soul did cry some emo tears)

*stalkstalk* I think we're here to encourage one another, not grade one another.