Month: January 2023

In the late 1920s, singer/actress Helen Kane had an act in which she behaved in a childish fashion and used the line “Boop boop-a-doop.” Around the same time, the Flesher animation studio was developing a flirtatious cartoon character for older moviegoers, and decided to base it on Kane. When Betty Boop became a success, Kane sued the Flesher studios and lost. During the trial, Fleshers’ lawyers forwarded a baseless claim that Kane had stolen her act from another singer— a dick move, to be sure.

Fast-forward to the 1960s.  Underground comic Air Pirate Funnies featured Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and other Disney characters engaged in sex and drug use.  Defying Disney’s cease and desist orders, creator Dan O’Neill engaged in an epic legal battle, a classic Little Guy vs. The Man conflict which became a cause celebre of the Counterculture.

Advancing to the present day. Alec Robbins’ webcomic Mr. Boop chronicles the author’s fantasy marriage to Betty Boop, and Bugs Bunny’s nefarious intentions of killing Robbins so he can have Betty for his own. Evidently there have been cease and desist notices from the owners of characters Robbins has used, though he is vague about the details.  In any case, we are living in different times, when it is much more difficult for copyright owners to defend their rights. Parts of Mr. Boop are featured at the Webtoons portal, the rest posted elsewhere because it is “too NSFW.” The Ignatz-award-winning print version of the series is orderable on Amazon.  What was once truly “underground” has gone mainstream.

Copyright issues aside, Robbins writes in an artless style with an otherworldly, surreal quality. The title character wears a t-shirt stating “I refuse to divorce my wife Betty Boop.” When confronting our hero, the villainous Bugs simply says “I’m gonna kill you,” without any clever euphemisms. This utter absence of guile and cunning allows Robbins to launch into topics like insecurity and impotence without any foreshadowing or pretext; his writing is truly free.

Milo Neuman is a professional storyboard artist, and it shows in his webcomic Dimitra and The Silver Mask. The shadowy, textured images are cunningly arranged to evoke the quiet and subtle movement of a nighttime raid of a walled fortress. Though he is a talented wordsmith, the artist needs no captions to explicate the action— the scene unfolds in an entirely cinematic fashion. Neuman seems to have absorbed influences from action directors like Akira Kurosawa, Ang Lee and Zhang Yimou, and he uses this knowledge well.

The sprawling saga commences at ground level with a bloody battle between soldiers and primitive masked invaders, a spectacle with a cast of thousands. But this earthly combat is in the context of a stellar phenomena, an ominous, vast presence that blots out a patch of the star-field. One of the invaders uses the swipe of a hand to move clouds down to cover the moon, implying levels of supernatural power that are enormous. It plunges the scene into a haunting darkness that strikes terror in the hearts of the soldiers.

Particularly striking is the scene of the slaying of a young soldier who was earlier shown to be rather foolish and talkative.  A masked attacker plunges a sword in him, and as the man dies, he seems to perceive and merge with the vast presence in the stars. The reader is left gasping, and confounded as to what it all portends.

Neuman’s storytelling is as excellent as his visual art. The soldiers behave like credible human beings, led by a vainglorious general in an elaborate mock-worthy helmet. The prologue sets a grim philosophical tone— “And so, far away, across the endless sea of stars, a tiny blue world continued to spin on in its ignorance, its kings blinded by the shine of their vestments, its wisemen deafened by profound revelation, and the rest, the masses, occupied by their lot, the sure and constant distraction of Living and Dying.”

LiarCat recently premiered a new series, and since there are only a few episodes so far, I looked back at earlier work for further enlightenment.

In the new series Justice and Heresy, a young woman named Xeri is actually a powerful hellspawn creature doomed to live in a desolate region called the Severed Lands. The story follows a young female knight named Palladin Priscilla whose mission is to slay Xeri. For her part, Xeri thinks Priscilla has cute freckles and consequently she declines to incinerate her as she has earlier antagonists. We wait to see what will become of this relationship.

An earlier saga, Flowers for the Arsonist, follows a naive young woman named Lucia who is banished to Wheskering Hills because she has been marked as demonspawn; indeed, her left hand has transformed into a claw. The other residents of the town resemble insects, except for a punky blonde counterpart named Paige who wants nothing to do with her. The series is filled with funny, ironic episodes, such as showing the girls go trick-or-treating in Wheskering Hills, or Lucia visiting a hair stylist who is a giant spider; but the central focus is the evolving relationship between Lucia and Paige.

Both stories involve the tender attraction between two women who are opposites; our interest is enlivened by the barriers they must cross to come together. Flowers for the Arsonist is further deepened by the alienation both women feel from the society that has shunned them.

LiarCat has a real flair for minimalist compositions that are well-composed and atmospheric. The writing is also slimmed-down, clever and subtle. There is a striking evolution between the two series– in the most recent series, the art and writing have become more simplified and elemental, the tone less serious. I can’t decide which I like better, but LiarCat is a creator to watch, no question about it.

The Hotel is an entry in the Brain Anthology on Webtoons.  The Heart and Brain anthologies are outstanding collections of works taken from Webtoons’ 2020 short story contest.  The site has moved on from its previous creator rewards program, but these anthologies are treasure-troves of passionate experimentation and new ideas.

Frank Calico’s four-episode story is a masterful exercise in style that evokes unease when a professor takes an after-dark taxi ride with a talkative driver.  The unsparing exaggeration of Calico’s drawing style and the Cheshire-cat grin of the driver carry unacknowledged menace as the two discuss the weather. The lanky professor relates everything to the local legends he has respectfully studied, foreshadowing supernatural developments to come. When he arrives at the hotel, events take a turn for the bizarre and spectral.

After reading so many webcomics that attempt to evoke horror with carnage and disfigurement, it is refreshing to encounter an artist who understands the quiet terror of a nocturnal taxi ride and the foreboding of a hospitable country inn.