It’s March and that means that everyone is having a tournament and I thought, why not do one for our column? Well, the answer is that I should not take on more tasks than I already have but that hasn’t stopped me before! Let us know in the comments below if doing some sort of March Folly of Webcomics we’ve covered before would be fun. Would “Dr. Frost” come out on top? Would “The Prince of South Land?” Or would we just cover our continuing ones? YOU make the call…and then we’ll make the call.
All this and an editor who definitely needs more sleep in The Webcomics Weekly.
Dr. Frost
‘The Psychologist in the Yellow Room’ (3) – ‘Tears of Princess Pyeong-Gang’ (5)
Updates: Saturdays
By Jongbeom Lee
Reviewed by Elias Rosner
After another palette cleanser with ‘The Psychologist in the Yellow Room’ (3) in which the author identifies mistakes in the art, a self-effacing task I always appreciate, ‘Tears of Princess Pyeong-Gang’ gets us back into the groove of the main cases. This time around, Frost is taking a more direct approach to teaching Seonga with regards to taking on cases. Granted, he didn’t want to but Seonga strong-armed him into taking on her friend as a client. Or, well, facilitating a situation that allowed him to assess and then offer assistance. Her friend seems to have terrible luck with men and while a different story would leave it at that, “Dr Frost” is all about the why of a character and so we go on a journey to discover just what it is that is causing Sihyun to lose all her BFs.
Since this is only half the case, we don’t get the answer but the shape is starting to form. I appreciate how Lee lays out the clues to a case without getting too bogged down in the details. Like, I didn’t know that Sihyun’s mom had a glass eye but I was able to put together that there was something related to that side of her body that would be important. In the same way that I have to sit on one side of my grandfather so he can hear me correctly, Sihyun’s father sits on the other side so she can see him in her periphery. The comic draws attention to it, yes, but the specifics remain a mystery until revealed, which helps build tension in an otherwise “normal” scene.
This occurs throughout these chapters of ‘Tears of Princess Pyeong-Gang,’ balanced out by the usual bursts of visual comedy Lee likes to indulge in – that rugby bit is classic – but the case feels a little more aimless than the last few cases. I can’t quite identify what is missing from the case so far but if I had to say it’s that the chapters are too brief. We aren’t dwelling as much with the subject (Sihyun) or with a secondary conflict as yet, and now that the parents have been introduced, the conflict seems like it’s almost over. Yet there are still 5 chapters to go and I wonder what twists could be left. I guess we’ll see in two weeks.
The Prince of South Land
Pages: Episodes 1-3
Schedule: Wednesday
By Chris Geroux
Reviewed by Michael Mazzacane
Last year before he began his run on “Batman,” James Tynion IV mentioned in his newsletter how a niece or nephew of theirs wasn’t all that blown away that he would be writing “Batman.” They were more interested in the new Webtoons they’d just found and following those artists. Tynion remarked about the missed opportunity to market to this rising demo of digital natives (which has been the story of the direct market for the past 15 years at least.) But things change fast and so when I came across a TikTok from Chris Geroux promoting their new strip “The Prince of South Land” I had to check it out. It also helped that Webtoon made it pop up advertisement whenever you opened the app as well.
Writer-Artist Chris Geroux makes a solid debut in the first three episodes of “The Prince of South Land,” but there are still plenty of rough edges. The titular Prince is a bit of a Bad Boy, especially after being caught kissing an android – one who happens to also present as male – who may have assaulted him. It’s the sort of trope I’ve read before, but maybe executed better. The supposed shock and moral panic of the act hinges on a stable, hegemonic, heteronormative view of difference that runs counter to the fluidity found in cyberpunk. The presence of life like androids fits the overall cyberpunk aesthetic and class narrative they’re telling; they just use a homophobic framing device as the “understandable” in for the audience. I don’t even mind it all that much, the first episode just throws a lot at the reader from multiple directions which makes for an awkward introduction. In the background Geroux creates several pseudo-panels and environmental storytelling that add texture and tell the story. It’s just that on top of two other angles that overwhelms the episode as a unit, and I’m left focusing on the latent homophobia of it all.
Geroux environmental art does a lot to sell the idea of South Land as a place. This shines in the second episode that takes full advantage of the vertical scrolling format to take us on a journey through the strata. The discarded body of an android just hanging out in a corner is an affecting site, created from the medium specific attributes of Webtoon or Tapas et al. Their color pallet is a delightful glowing pastel that manages to not overpower everything; it’s all reminiscent of Paulina Ganucheau. Where Geroux art runs into friction is some of the character cartooning as it goes from realistic-representational but has a few moments where it compresses into flatness. The bones of it are all there, the action in the second episode is solid with a dash of surprisingly brutal violence, it just needs to be refined a bit.
“Prince of South Land” has promise, and I’m kind of a sucker for queer SF romance. This isn’t an immediate recommend but maybe in a month or two it’s gotten enough reps in and built enough context that it turns out to be something.
