by Joe Zabel

Drew Weing's series Pup is one of the crown jewels of Serializer.net, and a has become a touchstone of quality for the entire webcomics medium. This is largely because of Weing's rich, full-color art style that combines a cartoony look with a meticulously rendered realistic background. But it is also certainly because his endearing animal characters project a curious depth.

The canine character Pup and his two feline friends Kitzel and Kratzer have elemental qualities about them. Pup represents the intellectual and adult temperament. White-furred Kitzel embodies innocence and gleeful youth. Black-furred Kratzer harbors a more cynical, destructive temperament.

The series obviously owes a debt to George Herriman's classic comic strip Krazy Kat, and Weing himself refers to his series as a "rip-off." Indeed, Weing's characters can be equated to the classic strip: Kitzel to Krazy Kat, Kratzer to Ignatz, and Pup to Offissa Bull Pup. But while the characters' temperaments correspond, Weing is obviously departing from Herriman's themes. The three characters in Pup react to one another, but are not locked into co-dependence the way Herriman's are. And while Herriman's series is a work of pure absurdity, Weing's characters are more psychologically autonomous and exist in a more physically realistic environment. Furthermore, the lines of attraction are completely different-- Kitzel is attracted to Pup, baking a cake for him, assembling a sentimental Christmas present for him, and becoming concerned when he refuses to get out of bed. Kratzer in turn is mildly attracted to Kitzel, wanting her to join him in playing outdoors. And Pup seems more or less indifferent to both of them, tolerating them like a parental figure who has weightier topics on his mind.

But this scheme of attraction seems incidental to the series, no more than an expected byproduct of thinking creatures living in proximity. The series is less concerned with their relationships with each other, and more concerned with the relationship of each of them to their surroundings and to the universe. In service of this theme, each of the characters has in turn been given first-person point of view treatment.

Furthermore, the series features another character of sorts who is of equal prominence or moreso -- the character of the four seasons. More than half the episodes have seasonal themes, beginning with the first episode of the series, which focuses on Autumn.

Repeatedly, Weing contrasts the attitudes of Pup and Kitzel towards the seasons. In the first episode, Kitzel is playing in the leaves, only to be brought down by Pup's benediction, "Autumn... the season when nature reminds us of the inevitable conclusion of our cycle of days. The question arises: how many more springs will you see?" In episode 14, Pup expresses a perverse wariness towards Spring, "Ah, Spring. four months of bitter cold, four months of unbearable heat... and a few perfect days, balanced between, just to taunt you." But this time, the episode is capped by showing Kitzel happily sniffing a flower.

The series seems sympathetic to Kitzel's attitude, especially given Weing's gift for portraying the natural world. In episode 6, she rhapsodizes about the first snowfall of the season, and playfully melodramatizes while trudging through the deep snow in episode 9. Weing has carried the theme into his other works; for instance, he portrays the changing of the seasons on the cover of the print edition of his Journal Comic. And on his website, an unfinished serial titled Little Trees features a Kitzel-like child in a forest-bound setting.

As for Pup, Weing gives him a broad canvas to play out his pessimism about the natural world in episode 15, titled "Pup Ponders the Heat Death of the Universe." The idea of Pup's astronomical musings first shows up in episode 4, where Kitzel remarks on how deeply Pup thinks, and imagines him contemplating a galaxy; that episode's ironic twist is that Pup is actually thinking about lunch.

In the "Heat Death" episode, Pup's contemplation literally takes him out of the immediate reality and sends him drifting into space and hurtling forward in time. He sees the sun go nova and consume the Earth, then collapse into a pulsar. Then he sees the skies go dark as all the galaxies of other stars exhaust themselves and burn out. Pup drifts then in empty, dark space, until he comes out of his reverie as Kitzel and Kratzer show up, inviting him to play baseball. Says Pup, "Did either of you realize that eventually the universe will be nothing but a thin, cold gas spread across infinite, lonely space?" Replies Kitzel, "Oh... we'd better hurry, then."

The "Heat Death" episode has been widely praised for its superb artwork and advantageous use of the infinite canvas format. The sequence begins with a horizontal sequence of panels, but by the time Pup reaches outer space, the panel borders disappear and the images are separated by the black void itself, suggesting unbounded infinity. The return of panel borders corresponds to Pup's return to awareness of his immediate surroundings.

In fact, almost all the episodes of Pup use infinite canvas, and Weing often employs it in surprising and creative ways. For example, episode 2 consists of a single large panel shaped like an inverted L, which requires scrolling to see in its entirety. It depicts Kitzel sitting in a tree, and Kratzer standing on the ground. Because of the size of the graphic, we tend to view it as a sequence, our eyes first lingering among the branches, then following the trunk of the tree downward to where Kratzer is standing. In episode 9, Weing again presents us with a single jumbo-size graphic, though this time the sequence is portrayed by multiple instances of Kitzel struggling along a snowy trail.

Episode 5 is an elaborate infinite canvas setup titled "Choose Your Own Misadventure." After Kratzer dumps pepper in Kitzel's cake mix as a prank, the story breaks off into three alternate time-lines, showing how several eventualities will have the same result, Kitzel running home in tears. The story suggests a playful pessimism that the forces set into motion to upset Kitzel cannot be overcome. This is a rare instance of Weing assuming Pup's bleak temperament instead of critiquing it.

Missing from the series so far is an in-depth exploration of Kratzer's darker characteristics. He has usually been portrayed sympathetically; he plays a prank on Kitzel in episode 5, but then in one alternate time line feels guilty and tries to undo it. And in episodes 10 thru 12, he plays the hero, forcing Pup out of bed when Kitzel is too timid to do so.

Oddly enough, the last, uncompleted story of the series (episodes 18 and 19) begins to reveal him in more detail, as he's obliged to play outside by himself for a change. Swinging around a stick, he fantasizes himself on a bloody battlefield. Then he turns his attention to a fish in a nearby pond. He looks down at the creature, an evil flicker running through his reflection in the water. Then he uses a rock to upset the water in the pond, so that the fish is left flopping on the bank. He pokes the fish with the point of his stick, intent on skewering him...

But Weing hasn't updated the series since, and it's been eight months! We're left in suspense, wondering if Kratzer will kill the fish, or show it mercy. Perhaps Weing himself hasn't decided yet. One choice could take the series into darker territory where its celebrated light-heartedness might no longer be possible; the other choice could mire the series in irredeemable sentimentality.

We hope in any case that Weing will complete this story sometime soon. After all, the Heat Death of the Universe is just around the corner.