tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-78967227937297851292024-03-13T03:13:42.788-07:00Red Right Hand's Bloody & Brutal ReviewsBloody entertaining and brutally honest reviews. All reviews are scored on scale of 0 pints of blood to 10, with 0 being anemic and 10 being bloody perfection. Think you can handle a review? Contact xxxredrighthand(at)gmail(dot)com and let him know.Red Right Handhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14300414719668840699noreply@blogger.comBlogger14125truetag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7896722793729785129.post-17012025900561760492010-05-15T08:23:00.000-07:002010-05-15T13:49:48.340-07:00Doctor Who: Series 5, Episode 1 - The Eleventh Hour (8 Pints)My first TV review will be of one of my all-time favorite shows - <i>Doctor Who</i>. In the future I hope to go back and review all of the new series episodes, but for now I'm just tackling this year's episodes, starting with the series premiere, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1577256/">The Eleventh Hour</a>.<br /><br />Our adventure begins with a newly regenerated Doctor (Number 11, played by Matt Smith) crash-landing the TARDIS in a little village called Leadworth after nearly blowing it up in the process of regenerating. He's landed it on its side, on top of a shed in the back yard of a house where a young girl named Amelia Pond lives. Amelia assumes he's been sent to help her, answering her prayers that something be done about a rather sinister crack in her bedroom wall, and the Doctor being the Doctor, he obliges and gives it a look. Upon inspection, he discovers that the crack is actually in the universe, in reality, not the wall, and he forces it open to see where it goes. A giant eyeball comes to the now open tear and declares that 'Prisoner Zero has escaped', then the crack closes. Before the Doctor and Amelia can begin to look for Prisoner Zero, the TARDIS alarms go off, warning the Doctor that the engines are going to blow. He rushes back to the TARDIS to fix it, promising Amelia that he'll return in five minutes.<br /><br />He returns, unwittingly, <i>twelve years</i> later.<div><br /></div><div>Now he must convince the grown up Amy (once Amelia) that he's real, and that the world will end in twenty minutes unless he helps her. Then he actually has to, you know, save the world.</div><div><br /></div><div>I found this episode to be beautifully shot and very fairytale-like in tone, which fits the story nicely. I think that the aliens in the episode - both Prisoner Zero and his captors - are a bit hit and miss, and really are only there as a device for the writer to introduce us to this new Doctor and his companion. Obviously that <i>was</i> the intent of the episode, I'm just saying that I found it a little too obvious as the actual plot is never really fleshed out much. Who is Prisoner Zero? What did they do? Who are the aliens (Atraxi) that are after it? All we ever get is the basics - Prisoner Zero escaped a prison somewhere, and the Atraxi will destroy the Earth before they let it get away.</div><div><br /></div><div>The other thing that bothered me was how Prisoner Zero found the coma patients in the hospital. I get that Amy's boyfriend Rory is a nurse there, and that they must have hitched a ride on him, but it's never really explained. And - spoiler! - if Prisoner Zero needs comatose people to imitate, why doesn't it just knock <i>anyone</i> out that it likes, as it can clearly do near the end of the episode? Also, if Prisoner Zero has been using these coma patients as covers to go out in public for <i>twelve years</i>, why the hell can't it figure out which mouth to talk with? Surely it's had to talk at <i>some</i> point by now, even if only with an annoying passerby. Also, in a small village like Leadworth, why is Rory the only one that notices that these people shouldn't be out walking around? Everybody knows everybody, right?</div><div><br /></div><div>These are just minor complaints, really. On the whole I found the episode to be rather good and it hides a lot of little Easter Eggs on repeated viewings. I'm sure there's even more stuff in there that will become obvious by the end of the series, as well. </div><div><br /></div><div>I <i>like</i> this new Doctor. Matt Smith is a quirky, eccentric, <i>alien</i> Doctor and a welcome change from David Tennant's moist-eyed, quivering-lipped, fuck anything that moves Doctor. Seriously. The Madame de Pompadour, Queen Elizabeth, two years of Rose wooing... I'm not a Ten hater, and liked his Doctor a lot, but Smith is bringing the Doctor back to his awkward, asexual and alien roots. Ten felt very human at times. Eleven is definitely not.</div><div><br /></div><div>Amy presents an interesting companion - a girl who grew up with an imaginary friend only to find out that he's real. It's clear, even without Prisoner Zero saying it, that she's still very much a child inside, that she never really grew up in many ways. She acts adult and has a moderately sexy job because she's <i>playing</i> at being an adult. She's doing what adults are supposed to do. We find out at the very end that it's all a show, and she really is still the little girl wanting to run away through time and space with her imaginary friend.</div><div><br /></div><div>I'm looking forward to it.</div><div><br /></div><div><div><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /></div><div><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /></div></div>Red Right Handhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14300414719668840699noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7896722793729785129.post-54307470660802704672010-05-15T07:33:00.000-07:002010-05-15T13:31:14.452-07:00Iron Man 2: 7 PintsMy first film review will be for <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1228705/"><i>Iron Man 2</i></a>, directed by Jon Favreau, with Robert Downey Jr., Don Cheadle, Scarlett Johansson, Mickey Rourke and Sam Rockwell.<br /><br />The movie is basically the story of Ivan Venko (Rourke), a Russian scientist and former spy whose father worked for Stark Industries and helped design the power core of the Iron Man suit many years ago. Dad dies, penniless and alone, and Ivan wants revenge. There to help him is Justin Hammer (Rockwell), a weapons maker and CEO of a Stark Industries rival. Amidst all of this, we discover that Tony Stark is dying because the power core is poisoning his blood. The more he uses the suit, the more sick he gets.<br /><br />That's the basic premise.<br /><br />Now, I was honestly surprised when the first Iron Man movie did so well. Let's face it, Iron Man isn't exactly one of the more commonly known superheroes, like Batman, Superman or Spider Man. Iron Man's more B-list, and I've always thought of him as Marvel's answer to Batman - a normal (but wealthy and brilliant) guy in a suit with gadgets. The first movie did so well because it had a solid script, solid direction, and the perfect star playing the perfect role. Robert Downey Jr. as a wild, egocentric but lovable alcoholic?<br /><br />Unpossible!<br /><br />I like RDJ, and I always have. I was bummed when he got busted again and went to jail, and I'm happy to see him doing so well now, both professionally and personally. Tony Stark is a great role for him. Perfect, really. I also think that <i>Iron Man 2</i> has more of a plot and a stronger, more interesting villain than the first film, and that it's a more coherent movie. So why did I enjoy it less?<br /><br />First of all, I think, because it was more of a superhero movie than the first. The first was about a guy who became a hero despite himself. It didn't have a typical hero/villain setup until near the end, and largely was the story of a guy utterly unfit to be a hero becoming just that.<br /><br />This movie sets up the good guys and bad guys right away and gets to work. I personally would have liked more scenes exploring the divide among the public over Iron Man - hero or danger? All we really get of this is Gary Shandling as a blowhard Senator (an interesting stretch), and Bill O'Reilly as a blowhard pundit (hardly a stretch). Everything else is pro-Iron Man, or ignores it all together. It's too bad, because it misses out on a lot of what I think made the first film work so well - playing with the contradictions that are Tony Stark/Iron Man. Instead we get 'Tony is dying' and some blatant advanced marketing for the upcoming Avengers movie. I've never seen a trailer for a movie actually in another movie, before. Here, it was a full-blown plot.<br /><br />Scarlett Johansson was good, as were her assets (why Happy acts like her wrapping her thighs around his head is a bad thing is a mystery to me!), but ultimately unnecessary, as was Sam Jackson. The whole Avengers and S.H.I.E.L.D. thing could have been left out, Tony could have discovered his Dad's message on his own, and more time could have been spent on Tony Stark's struggle to stay heroic. Or they could have given the very good but underused Mickey Rourke more to do than toy with Rockwell's character and play on a computer for half the film. <div><br /></div><div>Rockwell, himself, had <i>too much </i>screen time, and I say that as a fan. In <i>Galaxy Quest</i> the guy basically stole the fucking movie from Tim Allen, Alan Rickman <i>and </i>Tony Shaloub. That takes skill. In <i>Moon</i>, he showed that he can do serious drama, as well. Here, however, the character they gave him is a bit of a one trick wonder, and we get too much of him and not enough of the far more interesting and enigmatic character Rourke plays.<br /><br />In the end, it's still a pretty good popcorn movie and a good superhero flick. I just think that they went too formula and tried too hard to set up the Avengers franchise instead of building on the first movie. Most casual moviegoers know fuckall about Nick Fury and all of that, so why bog the film down with it? Putting the Avengers stuff as an Easter Egg to fanboys after the credits worked well in the first movie. It should have continued that way.<br /><br /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><br /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /></div>Red Right Handhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14300414719668840699noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7896722793729785129.post-20044385894636103192010-05-15T07:22:00.000-07:002010-05-15T07:28:10.391-07:00Just When You Thought It Was Safe!So I'm reviving this blog, but I'm going to start reviewing pretty much anything and everything that I want to. Movies, TV, comic books, games, novels... You name it, I'll probably review it at some point. I'll entertain requests - if there's something you really think I should review, drop me a note and I might consider it. No promises, though. <div><br /></div><div>As in the past, non-professional ventures like webcomics will only be reviewed at the creator's request - I'm not here to piss on people unless they make a lot of money doing what they do, or they ask for it. If it's a professionally published work, however, it's fair game. </div><div><br /></div><div>Keep an eye out for things to come. It's about to get messy around here.</div>Red Right Handhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14300414719668840699noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7896722793729785129.post-25009176945392073712008-10-09T20:12:00.000-07:002008-10-09T20:35:16.131-07:00Gilbert and the Grim Rabbit (6 Pints)<span style="font-weight: bold;">Gilbert and the Grim Rabbit</span><br />by Wendy W<br /><a href="http://www.gilbertandgrim.com/">www.gilbertandgrim.com/</a><br /><br />Fuck, shit, cocksucker, motherfucking Barbara Streisand!<br /><br />I feel better, now.<br /><br />After reading Gilbert and the Grim Rabbit, I felt the uncontrollable, Tourettes-like need to say a bunch of offensive words and stare at porn while slathering myself in bloody, raw meat and smoking cigarettes rolled in dried, dead baby skin. It was <span style="font-style: italic;">that fucking cute</span>. It may have actually <span style="font-style: italic;">raised</span> my purity score and I'm almost certain I'm a diabetic, now.<br /><br />Wendy's art isn't exactly polished, or even terribly consistent, at times, but it's more colorful than a Gay Pride Parade and more adorable than a baby kitten. You want to hug it. You want to buy plushies modeled from it. It is, quite simply, almost too cute to be allowed to exist. But thankfully, it does.<br /><br />The writing is also fairly hit and miss, with a few pages that are close to genius and other pages that seem almost pointless other than the cuteness factor. I think Wendy <span style="font-style: italic;">can</span> be a good writer, if she keeps working at it and focuses more, but it feels like sometimes she's just phoning it in. When the writing can match the charm of the art and characters, she will truly have a winner on her hands.<br /><br />To be honest, I've laughed more and laughed harder at comics I've rated far worse, but what those comics lack that this comic has in spades is charm. It jumps off the screen and demands that you love it, and you find yourself powerless to resist. It's original, it's adorable and it's unapologetic in its existence. Even a jaded, snarky cynic like myself is unable to resist it.<br /><br />The Borg have nothing on Gilbert and the Grim Rabbit.<br /><br /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><br /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" />Red Right Handhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14300414719668840699noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7896722793729785129.post-89360502142111909692008-10-07T23:35:00.000-07:002008-10-08T00:23:23.637-07:00Abandon: First Vampire (3 Pints)<span style="font-weight: bold;">Abandon: First Vampire</span><br />Wriiten by Greg Carter<br />Drawn by Elliot Dombo<br /><a href="http://www.abandoncomic.com/">www.abandoncomic.com</a><br /><br />Abandon has a decent following, so nothing I say is really going to hurt it - or help it. That makes it kind of like a sacred cow, untouchable. But just as McDonalds opened restaurants in India and is now serving up God on a bun, a McDeity with Cheese, if you will, I am not above taking shots at sacred cows, either. So allow me now to take a bite out of Abandon's soft, romantic, lesbian-happy flesh.<br /><br />The story is basically about a vampire - the first vampire, no less, cursed for all of time to be immortal and remember her One True Love(TM), who is cursed to be reborn forever and never remember her.<br /><br />And many emo boys wept.<br /><br />Said vampire is, as all hot female vampires should be, a total slut and jumps in bed with a human girl before we are even ten pages in. A human girl that has a human girlfriend that hates said vampire. Which she just fucked. And then she lies to her girlfriend and fucks <span style="font-style: italic;">her</span> while said girlfriend's brother goes missing with said vampire, who both want to fuck each other, and said brother may just be the aforementioned long lost love cursed to reincarnation for all of time, yeah verily.<br /><br />If that was disjointed or confusing to read, so was the back history provided that is supposed to explain the whole universe and the gods.<br /><br />The dialogue is so-so, with moments of cringe-worthy lines, like when the ancient slutty vampire chick calls someone a doofus. Shit, <span style="font-style: italic;">I</span> haven't said doofus since <span style="font-style: italic;">Lost Boys</span> came out. There are occasional clever bits of writing, mostly involving segues between scenes, like a line about landing on his feet followed by the brother tumbling to the ground, but these are easy to forget amidst all the emo romance, gratuitous lesbian action (never actually <span style="font-style: italic;">shown</span>, mind you) and head loppings. And seriously, if the writer has a hard-on for lesbians - we've seen all of five female characters, and four are at least bisexual - why play coy with the hot lesbian sex? We're not quite two issues in and there have been two <span style="font-style: italic;">completely gratuitous and unnecessary </span>sex scenes minus the sex. Why waste pages with them if there's no real story point and you're not going to show the rug munchers actually munching rugs? Fan service? Please, you don't need post-coital scenes to give panty shots or show girls in bras. I'm actually one of those rare males <span style="font-style: italic;">not</span> into girl-on-girl action, but even <span style="font-style: italic;">I</span> think the comic is a cock tease. Put out or stick to the emo romance and head loppings. I'm supposed to believe some chick, worried about her missing brother after disappearing with the vampire she despises, is going to go, 'Hey! Before we go look for my brother, I wanna eat some pussy! OMNOMNOMNOM!'<br /><br />No.<br /><br />As for the art, it's pretty hit and miss. Close-ups work best, but when characters are seen from a distance or in full-body, they suddenly become Hobbits and their proportions go all out of whack. Also, profiles: please learn to draw them. Thank you.<br /><br />I can't tell if this comic is trying to take itself seriously or not. If not, then go balls out. Let it rip. If it <span style="font-style: italic;">is</span> trying to be serious and tell a moving, interesting story... As I've said before, good luck with that.<br /><br />It has an audience, though. Any comic with sexy slutty vampire lesbian sex and heads flying all over will. It's kind of like the yaoi genre - there's an audience for it. That doesn't mean every single title is actually good.<br /><br /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" />Red Right Handhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14300414719668840699noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7896722793729785129.post-29736406615615190002008-10-07T22:31:00.000-07:002008-10-07T23:08:43.555-07:0067th Avenue (3 Pints)<span style="font-weight: bold;">67th Avenue</span><br />by Jamie Sawatsky<br /><a href="http://67thavenue.nfshost.com/">67thavenue.nfshost.com/</a><br /><br />They often say Seinfeld was the longest running TV show about nothing. If that's true, then 67th Avenue is the Seinfeld of webcomics.<br /><br />But only in that respect.<br /><br />As far as I can tell from the archives - and this comic goes back years - it's basically the ongoing story of a character named Jamie and his daily struggles and exploits. But the comic rarely has much of a story, or at least much beyond a simple thread of a story. This can work in gag-a-day comics, where jokes trump story, but the problem is that 67th Avenue can't seem to decide if it's a story comic or a gag-a-day comic, and as a result it does neither very well. There are often several strips in a row with little to no gag or joke, yet they don't exactly move the plot in any interesting way, either. Take the current arc - the Aqua Ranch Kit.<br /><br />Jamie sees an ad in the back of a comic book for one of those sea-monkey deals, and decides that he has to have one. Problem is, he has no money. We're 5 strips in - that's 5 updates, or basically a month's worth of strips - and the only thing that's happened is that Jamie opened his piggy bank for money. The strip where he breaks said piggy bank is done in a funny manner, but really - 1 in every 5 strips is not a good number. The rest are filler.<br /><br />Before this arc, there was an arc that lasted 35 strips - a year's worth of time. It's basically the same thing, but on a far more staggering scale. An entire <span style="font-style: italic;">year</span> of mostly pointless mediocrity with a few funny moments mixed in.<br /><br />A fucking <span style="font-style: italic;">year</span>!<br /><br />It <span style="font-style: italic;">could</span> have been epic. It <span style="font-style: italic;">could</span> have been a highlight of the strip's history. Instead, it's just more of the same.<br /><br />The art is decent when it involves characters, but too often backgrounds and action get muddled up, making it hard to follow at times. Jamie <span style="font-style: italic;">does</span> show a serious amount of growth over the years, but background problems still nag at the strip. Even fantastic art, however, couldn't change the fact that the writing needs tons of work. Jamie seems to be having fun, which is great if that's all that matters. If you have fun creating something, that alone is reason enough to do it. But Jamie is asking for a review, an outsider's opinion, and outsiders aren't impressed by self-indulgence and don't care if the creator is having fun. <span style="font-style: italic;">They</span> want to have fun.<br /><br />Basically, it's my belief that a gag-a-day comic needs to be relentlessly funny - which is one reason I don't like most of them, as few can pull this off. A story comic needs to be interesting and compelling, otherwise the reader won't care enough to come back. 67th Avenue is, alas, rarely funny or interesting, and hardly ever both at once. This comic really needs to decide what it wants to be when it grows up.<br /><br /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" />Red Right Handhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14300414719668840699noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7896722793729785129.post-20032317063376404112008-09-29T07:53:00.000-07:002008-09-29T08:34:59.920-07:00Monster Lover (0 Pints)<span style="font-weight: bold;">Monster Lover<span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span></span></span></span>by Eric Flores<br /><a href="http://monsterlover.comicgenesis.com/">monsterlover.comicgenesis.com</a><br /><br />In my few, limited interactions with Eric, he seems like an okay guy. Which makes me feel a bit bad about the fact that I'm about to spank him like a middle-aged fat man streaming Japanese schoolgirl bukkake at 3AM on a work night.<span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"></span></span></span></span> But just as Jesus lets kittens die and babies drown because he has to, some things simply must be done.<br /><br />Monster Lover isn't so much a comic as it is wank-fulfillment. Like all the leading men in his comics, Adam has a massive cock. We're talking torso-length, <span style="font-style: italic;">Freaks of Cock</span> (no, I'm not linking to them, Google if you're wanting to lose sanity points) shit, here. And of course, <span style="font-style: italic;">all </span>the chicks want it. He can't help it - he's a sex God. Life is hard, sometimes. Adam's hard all the time, like Chinese arithmetic. Oh, and there's some arbitrary story about him training monsters to fight monsters, but it mostly serves as an excuse to rescue new creatures and girls for Adam to fuck. That is, afterall, the <span style="font-style: italic;">real</span> point of the comic: four-breasted cat sex and female minotaur milking. I'm not fucking kidding. He <span style="font-style: italic;">milks</span> her every morning in the most personal of ways.<br /><br />Adam is everything a guy wants to be - manly, hung like a sperm whale and deadly with a weapon. Women - of the human and non-human varieties - are all easy, sex-crazed sluts just waiting to get naked and see what it feels like to be fucked by a telephone pole. Every. Single. Fucking. One. Of. Them. Dude, when the guy who has a webcomic depicting young, scantily clad college girls with melon-shaped breasts running around getting slaughtered by crazy serial killers says <span style="font-style: italic;">your</span> depiction of women just might be misogynistic? There <span style="font-style: italic;">might</span> be a problem.<br /><br />The art - the only thing that can save a comic like this, if you're doing porn comics (which is fine, if you do it well) the art needs to at least be sexy - is something I'd expect to see on a pro-life protester's sign. In clearer terms, it's an abortion. Not only is it not sexy, it's downright frightening sometimes. When characters are talking, we get to see molars and shit. Are they talking or trying to swallow my head? It's almost enough to give me nightmares. He seems to have <span style="font-style: italic;">some</span> grasp on anatomy and proportion, but his lines are messy, his colors are ugly, his shading is haphazard and he doesn't bother to clean <span style="font-style: italic;">any</span> of it up. There are spots, blurs and smudges on many pages that he could at least touch up in post-production. But he doesn't.<br /><br />By all statistics, he should be great at drawing by now. The law of averages suggests that the more you draw, the better you get, and this guy is fucking <span style="font-style: italic;">prolific</span> in the number of pages he churns out. And yet, there is little improvement. It's an impressive feat.<br /><br />Look, there's nothing wrong with porn. The internets wouldn't exist without it. There's also nothing wrong with porn webcomics. There <span style="font-style: italic;">is</span>, however, something wrong with <span style="font-style: italic;">bad</span> porn webcomics, and <span style="font-style: italic;">bad</span> webcomics of any kind. And this may be one of the biggest examples of why.<br /><br />Now excuse my while I go wash my eyes out with bleach.Red Right Handhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14300414719668840699noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7896722793729785129.post-50932746228452269472008-09-29T05:23:00.000-07:002008-09-29T05:53:57.866-07:00How Sweet It Is (8 Pints)<span style="font-weight: bold;">How Sweet It Is</span><br />by Scott A. Jenkins<br /><a href="http://www.howsweetitiscomics.com/">www.howsweetitiscomics.com/</a><br /><br />Not to beat a dead horse, but have I mentioned that I hate gag-a-day comedy webcomics? I do. I hate them with the power of a thousand burning suns. Why? Because they are - usually - unoriginal, poorly written and lame. Everything under the sun has been done, before. There is no such thing as a completely original gag-strip, and yet with all the vast power and freedom of the internets, so many people seem determined to make their <span style="font-style: italic;">own</span> version of bland, stale drek rather than something different and challenging. All you can really do is try to write better and think more uniquely than the thousands of others doing what you do.<br /><br />How Sweet It Is does just that.<br /><br />Yes, it is the very type of comic I profess to loathe, but Scott at least does something slightly different with it - he makes it about married life. He doesn't feel the need to mug for the reader, doesn't throw outrageous situations at his characters. Scott understands that the best humor flows naturally from daily life and sticks to that principle. Based loosely on his own marriage - I'm <span style="font-style: italic;">assuming</span> - he fills his strip with the real, everyday problems and situations married couples are familiar with, told from the perspective of a slightly clueless, slightly insecure husband with a long-suffering but devoted wife. He's the lovable loser, the everyman that, despite his faults, you can't help but root for.<br /><br />The art is on a professional level - this could easily be published in today's newspapers. His characters are consistent, his backgrounds clean, and nothing is every visually confusing. I admit that it disappoints me when he has several panels in a row with the exact same art, just new dialogue, as it seems lazy. When you're doing a webcomic strip once a week, how hard is it to change angles, at least? To be fair, this problem is practically a staple of the medium, so he's hardly alone in this, but with so much attention paid to the writing I feel cheated on the art every now and then.<br /><br />Scott has made me regain a bit of faith in webcomics, and for that I am grateful. If you're looking for a witty take on marriage and life in general, you can do much worse than How Sweet It Is.<br /><br /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><br /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" />Red Right Handhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14300414719668840699noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7896722793729785129.post-76512350058733866602008-09-29T04:52:00.000-07:002008-09-29T05:54:49.833-07:00Apple of Discord (9 Pints)<span style="font-weight: bold;">Apple of Discord<span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"></span></span></span></span><span>by Adam Smithee<br /><a href="http://www.theappleofdiscord.com/">www.theappleofdiscord.com</a></span><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span></span></span><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span></span></span><span><span><span>Discord,<br /><br />Discord,<br /><br />Discord.<br /><br />What <span style="font-weight: bold;">is</span> Discord?<br /><br />I always wanted to be Tom Baker. Anyway, Apple of Discord is a lot like <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/comedy/littlebritain/"><span style="font-style: italic;">Little Britain</span></a>, the BBC comedy that Tom Baker - the <span style="font-weight: bold;">best</span> Dr. Who <span style="font-weight: bold;">ever</span> - narrates. The show has no real point, continuity or direction, it</span></span></span>'s just a bunch of short scenes about a cast of recurring characters, mostly unrelated or connected. Little 3-5 minute slices of sublime, surreal silliness, really. Just like this webcomic.<br /><br />Like all things done in this vein, it has its hits and its misses, but where SNL, Mad TV and the like are often more misses than hits, few of AoD's bits miss the mark. Whether it's the archer and knight slaying webcomic cliches, the irredeemable Horn or even the neon pink Gayzilla, the mind behind the comics is almost always on top of his game, with references from Star Trek to Weird Al to Rocky Horror Picture Show. You may not get <span style="font-style: italic;">all</span> the jokes, but I defy you to not get <span style="font-style: italic;">any</span> of them. What's best is that the humor seems so random and yet is so perfectly placed and timed, it's clear that there really <span style="font-style: italic;">is</span> a method to this madness.<br /><br />The art is all over the place in terms of style - some strips parody other comics and do a damn fine job of incorporating those others' styles into its own. I wouldn't go so far as to say the art is <span style="font-style: italic;">great</span> as it really isn't trying to be, but it always fits the strip at hand. The given page's theme trumps continuity or consistency in art.<br /><br />Basically, I hate most comedy strips, especially gag-a-day wannabe Sunday Funnies. They're overdone, cliche and generally unfunny. Smithee seems to agree with me, and has made a fucking hysterical gem of a comic taking the piss out of them. If VG Cats and Penny Arcade are your kind of comic, AoD is out to make you cry.<br /><br />Cry, little Emo boy. Sweat out those tears.<br /><br /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><br /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img style="width: 50px; height: 86px;" src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" />Red Right Handhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14300414719668840699noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7896722793729785129.post-72564991113262417622008-09-27T08:53:00.000-07:002008-09-27T09:20:01.426-07:00E and Mu (1 Pint)<span style="font-weight: bold;">E and Mu</span><br />by Alasdair Tremblay-Birchall<br /><a href="http://eandmu.com/">www.eandmu.com</a><br /><br />Jack Handy's <span style="font-style: italic;">Deep Thoughts</span> amused me.<br /><br />I had coffee for breakfast.<br /><br />I like coffee.<br /><br />This webcomic?<br /><br />Not so much.<br /><br />Ahem. So, yeah, E and Mu reads like Jack Handy's <span style="font-style: italic;">Deep Thoughts</span> if Jack had been bored and existential instead of witty and funny. Each comic is a one-panel non sequitur about... well, I'm honestly not sure what. The About page - which has black text on a black background, I had to drag and select it just to read it - explains that it's basically the inner thoughts of the creator's mind. That's nice, but without the context of who the creator <span style="font-style: italic;">is</span> and what the hell he's <span style="font-style: italic;">talking</span> about, it makes precious little sense. Much of the time, I felt like a kid on Southpark, watching the adults do random, pointless shit and going, ...'kay. A few of the pages had a bit of humor or insight to them, but most just seemed pointless.<br /><br />To me, at least.<br /><br />To the creator, I'm sure there is plenty of point and meaning, but again, without any context I 'll never know. It was basically like reading a fortune-cookie script, spiting out random phrases that are supposed to sound wise and deep, but instead just make you shrug. In fact, I amused myself by adding 'in bed' to the end of each, just for shits and giggles, and was not at all surprised that it worked as well as it does on fortune cookies.<br /><br />That's not a good thing.<br /><br />Comics like this are insular in the extreme - the reader, given no direction, context or background, is left to marvel at the deep, philosophical mind of the creator, when instead they usually just go elsewhere. If one is writing only for themself, it's not a webcomic. It's a diary. In this case, a diary with art as vague and unformed as the writing. Maybe that's what the creator wants and is in fact going for.<br /><br />If so, good luck with that.<br /><br /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg">Red Right Handhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14300414719668840699noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7896722793729785129.post-50540142897332345612008-09-26T02:49:00.000-07:002008-09-26T03:05:15.374-07:00sIRC (4 Pints)<span style="font-weight: bold;">sIRC<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"></span></span>by Killersteak<br /><a href="http://sirc.comicdish.com/index.php">sirc.comicdish.com/index.php</a><br /><br />I look at people who still use IRC like Chris Rock looks at women that don't give head.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">'They still <span style="font-weight: bold;">make </span>you?'</span><br /><br />It's like beta-max, really. Or for you kids too young to know what that is, it's like Brittany Spears' music - it never really <span style="font-style: italic;">was</span> that <span style="font-style: italic;">good</span>, but you accepted that it was all you had. The moment something better came along, you jumped.<br /><br />Anyway, that's my view on IRC. My view on <span style="font-weight: bold;">sIRC </span>is a bit better, but again, compared to what? The art is serviceable, the site is easy to navigate, and the occasional bit can be funny - the guy fapping in the background for 4 or so straight strips was a nice touch - but this is, at its core, a comic written for a very select group of people about as common today as 568 modems. It's all one big series of in-jokes about things no one has even <span style="font-style: italic;">dealt</span> with, let alone <span style="font-style: italic;">cared</span> about since 1998. It would be akin to making a webcomic about dial-up bbs users.<br /><br />If this review seems short, it's because there really isn't a lot to say about sIRC. Those who actually know what IRC is will find it funny, at times. Those who have no clue what IRC is will stare blankly. As niche comics go, it's okay, I guess. Just be a part of that niche.<br /><br /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" />Red Right Handhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14300414719668840699noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7896722793729785129.post-50186403217679847422008-09-25T09:37:00.000-07:002008-09-26T03:06:43.559-07:00Mere Mortal (7 Pints)<span style="font-weight: bold;">Mere Mortal</span><br />Written by Marty Nozzarella<br />Art by Chris Johnson<br /><a href="http://duckandcoverstudios.com/">www.duckandcoverstudios.com</a><br /><br />Mere Mortal is the heroic story of a man with two first names and zero superpowers, Joe Marcus. In a futuristic Earth, where <span style="font-style: italic;">everyone</span> has at least a <span style="font-style: italic;">little</span> bit of power, Joe was born to a couple of Level Ten Powered heroes and yet has no powers at all. He is an aspiring cook forced to ply his trade at a strip club because powered cooks get all the advantages and perks, and lives in a run-down apartment with his childhood best friend who is now a cop. Life gets interesting for Joe when a villain team with a history tied to him breaks free and looks for payback. Will they kill him? Will he run and hide? Will he get into cooking school? These are the questions Joe faces.<br /><br />The writing is pretty damn clever, with solid dialogue and a good, steady pace. Things get unraveled a bit awkwardly at first as Marty tries hard not to hit us with tons of exposition, and suffers a bit as a result. In the early stages, not enough is explained to make everything clear, but in time the pieces come together. These early bumps in the road get smoothed out and the story moves along at a better rhythm for it. The characters each have unique personalities and voices - something lacking in many webcomics - and generally stay true to character as well.<br /><br />The art is stylized - not at all what you might expect for a hero comic - but fits this twisted take on the genre. The switch from color to black and white does nothing to harm it, and in fact gives it a more gritty, indie look and feel. Expression are solid, backgrounds are detailed, and basically it looks good enough to print. I've seen far worse from publishers like Image, believe me.<br /><br />There <span style="font-style: italic;">are</span> a few things holding it back, though, and one of them is crucial: fight scenes.<br /><br />To be blunt, the action sequences read like stereo instructions. Each panel cuts angles - and often pairings, in group fights - completely fucking up <span style="font-style: italic;">any</span> sense of continuity and flow. I don't know if it's Marty trying too hard to be flashy in his scripting of these scenes, or Chris is trying too hard to make it all seem like it's happening at once, but every single fight scene confuses the hell out of me, visually. Did Joe run <span style="font-style: italic;">through</span> the guy at the club? Can someone draw a diagram for the fight scene in Joe's appartment? I had to read them several times, and I <span style="font-style: italic;">still</span> couldn't tell you exactly what happens. It's all a big mess.<br /><br />My other complaint is if you're going to have characters that are strippers, and actually draw them wearing skimpy clothing, they need to be, you know, <span style="font-style: italic;">sexy</span>. The women can look a bit manly in the faces at times, and they all have the same exact body, and it isn't a very appealing one. I've never seen so many strippers with the exact same rack size and that rack size happens to be a modest B-cup at best. Chris draws men of many builds, sizes and ethnicities, but the women all look fairly alike. I'm not bemoaning the lack of bodacious tatas (I get plenty in my own comic, thanks!) but if you make a point of having strippers in your comic, at least <span style="font-style: italic;">one </span>of them should look like something other than a runway model looking starved and malnourished. Especially when their best friend is an aspiring cook. I know strippers often do speed, but these girls must be tweaking their tits off to be this skinny after he feeds them all the time.<br /><br />So yeah. The big thing hindering Mere Mortal is the plotting of the fight scenes. I asked myself early on why this comic isn't being <span style="font-style: italic;">published</span>, and then I saw the first fight and figured out why. With work, it <span style="font-style: italic;">could</span> be, though. Seriously. The premise is unique and the writing and art are pretty solid in most other respects. That's more than a lot of comics can say.<br /><br /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><br /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" />Red Right Handhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14300414719668840699noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7896722793729785129.post-92105048136408599632008-09-25T07:28:00.000-07:002008-09-26T03:07:24.483-07:00Review: Marooned (6 Pints)<span style="font-weight: bold;">Marooned</span><br />by Tom Dell'Aringa<br /><a href="http://www.maroonedcomic.com/">www.maroonedcomic.com</a><br /><br />Stop me if you've heard this one, before...<br /><br />A webcomic walks into a bar, and the bartender asks it what it wants. It says it wants a Comedic Sci-Fi. The bartender asks it how to make a Comedic Sci-Fi, and it answers:<br /><br />"I don't know, all I have is an interesting storyline."<br /><br />Not a funny joke, I admit. The jokes on Marooned are sometimes funnier, sometimes not. To be fair, some of them are actually <span style="font-style: italic;">very</span> funny, but far too many of them are the same, lame elbow-slappers you see all the time in webcomics. Take 'Dome Sweet Dome'.<br /><br />No, really. Please.<br /><br />And this frustrates me, because Tom writes some great dialogue and excellent plot twists. It's like he planned a gag-a-day comedy and a compelling story showed up, instead. Tom even seems self-conscious about his excellent writing skills when it comes to character and story. His latest update as of this review apologizes - <span style="font-style: italic;">apologizes! </span>- for being long and unfunny but deeply involving. What a heartless bastard! Making me <span style="font-style: italic;">care</span> when I could be laughing at the latest retread of a half-century old Sunday Funny gag! It's not like lame gags can just be found in webcomics everywhere! What was he thinking?!<br /><br />Seriously. The comic works best when he lets the jokes evolve out of the situation in the form of witty dialogue or brutal honesty, rather than planning a joke and writing around it. He's <span style="font-style: italic;">funny</span> when ASIMOV is taking the piss out of the Captain, and he's <span style="font-style: italic;">funny</span> when the aliens make unintentionally funny comments. It <span style="font-style: italic;">works</span>. But the rest of the time, he's just trying too hard to mug for the camera, so to speak, and it's a shame, because he seems to think if he isn't funny every single strip, he's losing people. No, Tom, your going to lose people with predictable jokes we've all heard before. Every gag under the sun has been done, before. Let them go and play with the fascinating toolbox you've created but seem afraid to use.<br /><br />This webcomic impresses the hell out of me, sometimes, and I say that as someone who generally loathes a vast majority of strip-based comedies. It has a heart and a soul, and it's actually funny when it's not trying too hard. Relax, Tom. You're good - <span style="font-style: italic;">damn</span> good. Listen to the pragon of Sci-Fi, Yoda, and simply trust in the force. Suck, you will not if hamming it up, you don't.<br /><br /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" alt="Photobucket" border="0" /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" alt="Photobucket" border="0" /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" alt="Photobucket" border="0" /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" alt="Photobucket" border="0" /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" alt="Photobucket" border="0" /><br /><img src="http://i498.photobucket.com/albums/rr349/XRedRightHand/Pint.jpg" alt="Photobucket" border="0" />Red Right Handhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14300414719668840699noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7896722793729785129.post-66927161365612894662008-09-25T00:28:00.000-07:002008-09-26T10:49:02.942-07:00The Rules Of The GameWelcome to my webcomic reviews blog. It's set 'adult content' because my language can get pretty colorful and I will review webcomics for any age, from children to teen to adult-only. I'm sick of all these 'respectable' review sites that only review 'family friendly' webcomics. One of the reasons I think webcomics are better - in theory - than regular print comics is that anyone can do it, for free, and say anything they like. So what do we do in the face of unprecedented freedom of expression?<br /><br />Clog up the internet with 'family friendly' webcomics, 'family friendly' webcomic newssites and podcasts, and 'family friendly' webcomic review sites. The same, tame, PC, spoonfed bullshit we get from Big Comics.<br /><br />Fuck that noise. Fuck it in the eye.<br /><br />The best art is not always created for the masses, or for casual consumption. Sometimes good art and challenging thought comes with the taboo, with the unacceptable, with the impolitic. Expression should have no boundaries save artistic integrity, and so unlike those 'family friendly' sites, I'm ready and able to accept that good webcomics can have graphic language, extreme violence and yes, even nudity and sex. I'll review it all.<br /><br />So, I'll pretty much review any webcomic I get asked to, with the following guidelines:<br /><br />* I WILL NOT review Sprite comics UNLESS IT IS DAMN GOOD. There are WAY too many shitty, lazy sprites out there, and not enough motivation in me to review them. If you put real effort into yours, I will review it. Otherwise, you are wasting your time.<br /><br />* I DO NOT HAVE TO review every single comic that I am requested to. There isn't enough time in the day or money in the world. You requested a review? Thanks. I'll get to it if and when I can.<br /><br />* Giving a damn gives you a better shot at being reviewed. I'll be honest. If your webcomic looks like a lazy attempt at art and you don't seem to take it seriously, I'm no going to waste my time. If you update randomly or seldomly, I'm not going to waste my time. If you have less than 20 pages, I'm not going to waste my time. Those comics that try hard get rewarded. If your art sucks but you write well, I'll likely review you. If you're really making an attempt to improve, I'll likely review you. Pretty reaonable, I think.<br /><br />* If you want a review, email me at xxxredrighthand(at)gmail(dot)com with a link to your comic and a quick description of what it's about. Also, ADD A LINK TO THIS REVIEW SITE to your links list. Note - I WILL CHECK to see if it's there. If it is, you're one step closer to getting reviewed, but without it, I can guarantee you will not get one. I will notify you within 7 days whether or not you will get a review. If you are told you will not be getting one, feel free to take down the link. PLEASE don't argue with me or beg me if I say no. If I tell you that you ARE getting a review, please keep the link up. Once you get the review, I'd request you keep the link up, and will note that webcomics taking the link down AFTER I review them, either because they don't like my review or just don't care anymore WILL BE ADDED TO MY WALL OF WANKERS. The WOW list is a list of asshats, poor sports and whiny babies that yank the link after I do a review, and contains links to said bad reviews instead of their webcomic. Please, don't be a wanker.<br /><br />* All reviews will TRY to offer constructive criticism. Try being the operative word. If I just can't find anything nice to say, I won't lie. My reviews will be honest, but they may be harsh. Request a review at your own peril.<br /><br />* I WILL NOT review ANY webcomic that hasn't requested it, themselves. I'm not going to go out looking for webcomics to bash or take suggestions, folks. It's just too easy. This is why I will never apologize for my brutal honesty - YOU asked for it.<br /><br />That's about it. So, request away if you think you can handle it. Don't say I never warned you.Red Right Handhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14300414719668840699noreply@blogger.com0