I think he ditched the whole “Faye doesn’t use contractions” thing quite some time ago.
Oh, that sucks. It was always a fun little thing she did. I wonder how I didn’t notice.
It’s been quite a while. I just checked some random strips and Faye’s been using contractions for over a thousand strips. 230
Okay, I really, really don’t get today’s guest strip. I enjoyed the first two strips by (I’m pretty sure) the same artist, both of which made some sort of sense as they were both Hanner’s dreams, but I can’t really make out what’s going on in this one. Here’s my confused summary:
Panels 1-4, Marten and Faye meeting on a street corner. Faye leers at Marten.
Panels 5-6, two men meet in a coat closet, one kills the other.
Panels 7-9, Faye ? gets possessed.
Panels 10 Faye? kissing someone (Sven?)
Panels 11-12 Sven? and Faye (holding someone) ? hear a noise?, Sven discovers the corpse in the closet.
Panels 13-15 Some guy goes to the same apartment from panels 11-12, goes in that closet, turns into a werewolf, fucks the corpse.
Panels 16-18, Faye and Marten looking at each other, Faye says “Batz Maru”, Marten replies with some other icon I don’t recognize that’s scribbled out.
What. The. Hell ?
According to Jeph’s comment at the bottom of the page, it’s a redo of the 1981 movie Possession.
I really really really hate QC guest artist weeks. I’d honestly rather see Yelling Bird than the stuff Jeph finds to fill in while he’s away.
I agree in most cases*, but I thought the previous two by this guy were beyond epic and pretty funny. This latest one will stay in my WTF? jar, probably permanently, as there’s no way I’m watching a 30-year-old cult horror film just to understand it.
ETA: Other guest comics I’ve liked:
- I thought the one by the Dinosaur Comics guy, the “this is the canon ending to Questionable Content, no really” one was a hoot.
- Also the one with Hipster Batman was pretty funny.
*and will those guest comics finally retire the “wow, one of the QC characters (who isn’t Pintsize) is a robot! Ha funny!” gag? I haven’t seen it in a while, but feel its destined to come up cyclically forever.
+1
Some of them are amusing but I don’t really read QC for the joke-a-day. I read it for the continuing story about these characters’ lives. I don’t know if the guest artists for QC are just incredibly consistent in NOT quite getting the vibe of each character or what, but I always feel like they’re all really OOC when a guest artist does them.
I don’t usually feel like that when, say, SomPos has guest strips. Although I equally disliked the Girls With Slingshots guest week, and breathed a sigh of relief when Jamie appeared as the Romance Detective again and this new arc began.
(Besides, when do you ever see a dickcissel on the webcomics list except when Yelling Bird shows up?)
I like Hanners drinking the psychedelic coffee bit. But almost all guest strips are pretty lame.
I haven’t minded the comics too much this week. I liked the German expressionistic one on its own merits, just because it was really weird and creepy and made no sense. But it didn’t work at all as a QC comic.
I would, however, be perfectly happy to read a strip that was nothing but Rippy and Yelling Bird doing horrible, horrible things with each other.
That was my least favourite - the only one I actively disliked, in fact - of the week.
The one after it with Pintsize and Momo was great and the one after that was entertaining (if OOC for Faye and Angus, and a bit confusing as to who the guy on the far right is).
The Possession strip is intriguingly weird (makes me want to see the movie, if nothing else), and the current strip is hilarious. (Randy always draws himself looking like he wants to die…)
The coffee one, though…reminded me of…I can’t remember the strip, but it’s not Dead Winter or by the same guy…but it was a strip of Mario (from the game) and the whole damn thing was just an overly long scroll through things getting increasingly weird. It was stupid, then, it’s just as stupid - but not as tedious - using Hanners and ending several screens earlier.
I hate guest strip week. When I was catching up on old strips, I usually just clicked through them without even reading them. Now that I have to actually endure them for an entire week, it’s excruciating.
And of course, after I say I hate guest strips, Randy Fucking Milholland goes and draws one I love. Damn you, Milholland!
Yeah, I had the same reaction. I’ve been reading and loving S*P for years now.
I’m pretty every time someone says that, Randy gets a stiffy.
Explains why he does the Penny and Aggie crossovers…
(FINISH THE DAMN THING, MAN!)
Hmm, what do you folks think of the most recent staff shakeup? I like the alcoholic friend’s disaster-prone girlfriend as an employee, but I’m still having trouble picturing Hanners as a long-term employee: she’s so sweet to everyone when she isn’t stalking, cleaning up after, or providing emergency medical aid to them, and I just can’t see her keeping up with the scorn and derision that the coffee house has become popular for.
Which could open up some conflict, when it turns out that while the place is popular for the angry chicks, people far prefer to deal with the the sweetness and light barista, turning the shop’s reputation around on itself.
That or Hanners turns to the Dark Side.
Hanners will end up opening up a business next to CoD selling boutique cupcakes, most likely buying out the entire commercial building that CoD is located in, becoming Dora’s landlord in the process.
A minor note, but Jacque is very meticulous about maintaining continuity over the characters’ appearances. So you’ll notice little details like the fact that Cosette changed his shirt after spilling coffee on the one she wore to work. And if you keep track of this, you’ll realize that Hanners changes her clothes several times a day.