Excerpt from interview:
I'm very interested in hearing cartoonists talk about the state of comics both online and offline. Where do you think comics are going in general? Are they taking a new direction or are we basically all rehashing what was done 100 years ago? | |
I challenge anyone to look at a comic like MS Paint Adventures (mspaintadventures.com) and say that it's the same comics that were being made 100 years ago. That's a comic with tons of updates every day, animation, user interaction, and so many crazy things happening that could only happen online. It may be the first true webcomic, in that it'd fail in any other medium. I love it.At the high level, I think the trend is towards gag-a-day stuff over long storylines, but that's probably just because there's more of an audience for "I need a laugh at work" than "I am planning to invest months learning this plot and characters". But that doesn't mean the two can't coexist. Questionable Content and The Adventures of Dr. McNinja both have (great) ongoing plots, but also a joke every day. I think that's a great combination.On the flip side, comics 100 years ago were doing some amazing things that nobody does anymore. Little Nemo was a daring newspaper strip that ran full page, full colour, and played with the limitations and conventions of the medium. Nowadays we get 3 panel black-and-white jokes about Mondays and lasagna. It's hard to imagine something like Little Nemo surviving today - except maybe as a webcomic? Here I am talking up my medium again! IT WILL SAVE COMICS. | |