Self-contained short fiction is a rarity in webcomics, and with good reason. It requires a special kind of talent to devise a new concept for each episode and, wasting not a word or gesture, to realize complete characters and situations in the confines of a brief scenario.
Add writer Imre Mehesz and artist Ruby M. Uazo to the list of creators brave enough to take on the challenge.
Their new series Shorts is a bracing, dark-hearted take on short fiction. Mehesz’s stories are often distopian, forecasting future societies where one self-inflicted disaster or another threatens to destroy humanity. Some of the stories are about ordinary people who are revealed to have demonic motives, and some are strange mysteries where reality falls suddenly out of kilter. All of the stories have a stinging edge to them, and all of them are fantastically brief.
Uazo’s vivid realistic art adds enormously to the gravitas of the series. The renderings are imbued with an unsettling, enigmatic atmosphere. The artist’s intense coloring resembles high-dynamic-range photography with a psychedelic slant.
Under the moniker BizzBuzzComics, the creators list earlier projects which are also in the short fiction category. Interestingly, these pieces are much more humorous and casual. Clearly these aren’t intended as showpieces, but it’s a fascinating contrast to see what happens when the team lightens up a bit.
