Another fantastic webcomic - Starslip Crisis

I’ve linked to comics I’ve liked in the past, and have been meaning to do the same with this one for a while. Starslip Crisis is the cleverest web comic I read. Set in the year 3441, the crew of the Starship Fuseli take art and culture to the furthest reaches of the Galaxy.

The Fuseli is a museum starship, and its curator Memnon Vanderbeam is fussy, arrogant and rude, but also loyal, brave and a damn good captain in a pinch. Cutter Edgewise is co-captain (much to Vanderbeam’s disgust)

Some fantastic sci-fi staples are put to good use too. The adding of “space” onto normal words to add a “futuristic” feel. The liberal use of techno-babble.

If you have the time, start at the beginning and work your way forward. If you don’t, at least start with this guide to get an idea of what’s going. Then subscribe to the feed.

Godwin's Law Bites Me

The day after reading about Niniane’s brush with Godwin’s Law, I had my own internal conversation cut short by it…

Godwin’s Law states that

As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one.Excerpt from Wikipedia on Godwin’s law

Now, when someone does make the comparison to Hitler their opponent is declared the winner and the discussion is over.

Well, sadly I invoked Godwin’s Law on myself today. I was thinking about how weird it is that I used to be so certain that I would always be a Christian. I made promises to God that I would always be His, so certain that no hardship would ever make me doubt Him.

I tried to think of other situations where kids have made promises that might have been misplaced. That’s when I thought of the Nazi’s and their brainwashing. Then I had to invoke Godwin’s Law and exit my own conversation. You know how humiliating that is?

Regarding
        Mussolini

For good measure, here’s an xkcd comic about Godwin’s Law

Top Five Perry Bible Fellowship Comic Strips

The Trial of Colonel Sweeto Cover

The Trial of Colonel Sweeto Cover

The Perry Bible Fellowship is the comic strip of Nicholas Gurewitch. It’s at times very dark and always absolutely hilarious. There are around 200 strips on his site, and it’s well worth the time to read through them all if you have time, but today I’d like to introduce you to him with just a couple of the ones that I find very clever.

He doesn’t have a very easy way of embedding his strips into other pages and it’s not clear that he wouldn’t mind me embedding them in my page so I’m gonna link you to them on his site instead - please click through and read them.

Here they are counting back up toward my favourite one:

Number 5 - Les Douleurs de la Morte. This one I like because in the second panel the Grim Reaper is acting so smug, waiving goodbye and almost chuckling to himself. In the final panel you just know he’s thinking “Well… Shit.” It was actually a toss up between this one and Lord Gloom for fifth place.

Number 4 - Falling Dream. Reading this one again made me want to share PBF with you, so maybe it should be higher in the list. It’s simple and elegantly done - the joke is perfectly executed.

Number 3 - Hug Bot. Hugbot has elements of the best PBF comics - an innocence corrupted, a devastating twist, and dreadfully effective art that conveys exactly what it needs to and no more to make the point. If I had to show you only one PBF comic, it’d be Hugbot. The next two just tickle my fancy a little more.

Number 2 - Freaking Vortex. As a sci-fi fan (especially of the paradox/corruption of time-space variety of Sci-fi) this one is enormously rewarding. Note the extra knife twist at the end.

Number 1 - Guntron Alliance Force. I find this one particularly hilarious because of how well he captures the essence of Voltron - where he got his inspiration. This is the best explaination I can give of why I find him so clever - by the third panel he’s managed to convey enough information that I can figure out exactly who these people are and why the green guy looks so worried, without having to explain the history of Guntron/Voltron or who Skorpex is.

Hopefully that’s enough of an introduction - do have a read of some of his other strips. Check out Colonel Sweeto in particular for the strip that seems to have inspired the title of his new book The Trial of Colonel Sweeto and Other Stories(THE TRIAL OF COLONEL SWEETO AND OTHER STORIES: A COLLECTION OF THE COMIC STRIPS OF THE PERRY BIBLE FELLOWSHIP). The book contains a bunch of new strips that can’t be found online either.

Have Fun.

I'm sorry, I swore I'd never do this

I told myself this blog would not just be made up of snippets of other people’s work co-opted and written into mine. So I’m very appalled at myself for what I’m about to do - namely: stick someone’s web comic into a post and call it a night.

But damn if this one isn’t really funny. More than that it’s a comic about a future that I feel is really possible and it scares me to death.

<a href=“http://www.smbc-comics.com/index.php?db=comics&id=691”>

Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal comic

I’ve only just discovered Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal (RSS), but it’s hit-rate is high and I find myself laughing loudly to more than every second one.

It reminds me a little of The Perry Bible Fellowship (RSS), and both of them are kind of crueller, surreal-er versions of The Far Side - what you might get if Garry Larson had regularly maimed his characters or left them devastatingly emotionally scarred.

If you find any of these comics amusing, you might try some of the others I enjoy (click on RSS to immediately subscribe if you trust my taste):
Ctrl-Alt-Del (RSS) - the lives and loves of gamers and their robot.
Dilbert (RSS) - life in a cubicle.
Dr. McNinja (Unofficial RSS) - He’s a Doctor, who’s also a ninja. And he wants to be Batman (but who doesn’t?)
Joy of Tech (RSS) - geek comic.
Wondermark (RSS) - old Victorian era drawings given new life.
xkcd (RSS) - probably the cleverest comic on the web. It’s about romance, joy, maths and velociraptors.

Enjoy!

Why Fred Basset is the "Dumbest Comic Strip Ever".

Update: 2007-06-02 I don’t care if you like Fred Basset. If you were thinking of commenting read this instead and then go away!

Update 2: 2012-05-20 I still can’t figure out why people are still commenting on this post. I’m closing comments. Read why here.

Many of you already know that Fred Basset is close to, if not the dumbest comic strip of all time. I know for a fact that there are whole religions based on pondering the worthlessness that is “Fred Basset”. For those that do not know, Fred Basset is a comic strip featuring a basset-hound that does ordinary dog things, and comments about them as though they are remarkably funny. They aren’t.

Now there never was much debate about it being a good comic, but in case there were any remaining basset-hound loving comic-readers with the sense of humour of a toasted marshmallow that thought Fred Basset was an amusing slice of suburban doggy life - I present the following.

Reader Beware! Before you click, you must know your immortal soul will be in jeopardy as you read it. It will cry out as though stuck by the very pitchfork of Satan himself. Hold on, and pray to whatever gods you must. I take no responsibility for it’s hideousness.

Fred Basset bringing pain to
        millions

Fred Basset bringing pain to millions

Dear reader. I apologise for that, but I feel it is my duty to inform the world that Fred Basset is the worst… comic… ever…

If you need something to ease the pain, I will provide you with an example of the greatest comic of all time:

Calvin and
        Hobbes

A better cartoon