01-20-06

Consistent Inconsistency
Before I actually start the review, I'm going to do a mini rant to my fellow webcomickers.  There needs to be a division of sorts between the amateurs and the professionals in this game.  And I dont mean the in-fighting about sprite comics and manga knockoffs; that's just a distraction from the real problem, which is the readers' inability to tell the difference between a weekend project and a professional production.
          We obfuscate the definitons ourselves.  We ask for money and support when we have no realistic intention of updating according to schedule, and frequently, comics that have many followers and have received substantial funds (comparatively) go off-line without warning or apology.  This has to stop.  We all have to ask ourselves, are our comics what we really would like to do professionally, are they our career, or are they simply a hobby?  Because if your comic is your hobby, and you intend to treat it as such, then you have no right to ask for money to continue doing it.  By the same token, if you expect your comic to become your career, then buck up, rent a sense of duty, and maintain the comic as best you can.
          Even before he was able to do it as a job, Howard Tayler of Schlock Mercenary made a point of maintaining regular updates, including an extensive backlog to accomodate emergencies.  I don't think he's even published guest art or strips in lieu of his regular comic.  That's professionalism.  If you can't at least aspire to that sort of practice, then take the Paypal button off your comic's front page and make your money through swag.  At least then your readers will have something for their investment.
The actual review
Now that's off my chest, let's talk about Chris Daily's StripTease.  Oddly enough, he falls well within the hobbyist category, but he knows it.  There's not a Paypal button on his front page, and while there may be one more deeply into the site, he doesn't highlight it with flashing arrows like the rabbit-hole in a Bugs Bunny cartoon.  I'm sure Daily would like ST to be his career (I couldbe wrong, he may not want to limit himself to just the one comic), but right now he knows he can neither support himself with the comic, nor fulfill the obligations to scheduling that asking for support demand.  He has a life; he has a job; the comic, whether he wishes or not, is his hobby.
          That does not mean that it isn't good.  It's damn good.  And it's gotten better in the five-and-a-half years daily has been doing the strip.  Starting as an almost Tumbleweeds-esque gag comic focusing on the lives and relationships of the operators of a start-up comic book publisher, Striptease has grown, and while the cast has only slightly expanded, the art and the story-telling have have gone from kind of good to excellent.  Much of that has been developed by Daily admitting to himself (and slowly, to his audience) that he is not comfortable with traditional giant-head comic art.  Sure, his characters still have some exaggerated proportions, but they are, by and large, much more realistic than they began, and certainly more realistic than anything else out there.
          And that realism has developed along with the realism of his story-writing.  It's interesting to note that the bodies started filling out to match the heads at about the the time that the first serious story arc (Inker Search 2001) started developing beyond a simple "audition gag" and into a real story.  From there it's all unicorns and bunnies, and the happy readers dance in the vast amazingness of the perfect comic.
          Okay, not really.  For one thing, Daily has an annoying habit of increasing tension by pulling a Ross-and-Rachel with his primary love interests (and here I mean the Max/Allie relationship; the Emily/Tommy relationship has been rock-solid until just recently, and they will either get over their current difficulty or not).  I mean, sure, that's a tried and true method of maintaining dramatic tension and preventing the relationships from becoming "stale" (without, gods-forbid, introducing a totally unnecessary new character), but after a while it gets old.  After a while a comet's elliptical orbit will draw it forever into the primary or fling it out into space, but it cannot keep orbitting erratically forever.
          The other difficulty is the irregularity of Daily's schedule (ironic, considering his name).  Every summer—especially—is filled with irregular updates, some of which are comics, some of which are fan art or just pictures he drew.  But, as I said, Daily doesn't ask anyone to support him, and he generally warns his readers when a particularly spotty season is coming up.  It's not his job.
          But read his strip and you will wish it was.

StripTease by Chris Daily

Updates: MWF
Caveats:  Sugestive humor, inconsistent updates, Ross-and-Rachel syndrome.
Rating: