Can you believe we’ve been doing this for three years? OK, it’s not exact but next week’s issue will already be into our fourth year, even counting the mistaken date we titled the article with. Ah, youth. We’d never make a mistake like that again…right? No matter. We’re here to read some reviews. Join the intrepid “Dr. Frost” as he goes on some “Adventures with God” thanks to a new “Covenant.”
All this, and hopefully many more years to come, in this issue of The Webcomics Weekly.
Adventures of God
Pages: Episodes 66-73
Schedule: Fridays
By Teo Ferrazi and Corey Jay
Reviewed by Devin Tracy Fairchild
The biggest theological question for me, is not “why is there evil?” I do have that question. But that’s not the big one. “Do we have free will?” This is also an important question, but not the “big one.” Other questions are also important like “why is there suffering” and “why is there something rather than nothing?” But these are not the most important questions as far as I’m concerned. To me, the “big question” is “are there animals in heaven?” Or even more specifically “do all animals go to heaven?” Well, episode 66 of Adventures of God by Teo and Corey attempts to answer that question.
Apparently, all animals do go to heaven, except cats. To me this is a dealbreaker. Certainly not that most animals will be there, but that I won’t be greeted by a chorus of purrs after I shuffled off this mortal coil. I want most cats to greet me in the afterlife. Does it matter what dreams may come, if my fuzzy feline friends aren’t there? I say most, because some cats really are really evil. Okay. Most are. But part of their charm is that they are the punk rockers of the pet kingdom. Also, apparently God appears to each animal, in their own forms, except with dogs. Apparently, God is a dog person. I’ve always thought it was a false dichotomy to say that everyone is either a cat person or a dog person. I like both. I’ve had both. It can happen. Even at the same time.
One of my favorite episodes of this batch, perhaps of all that I’ve read up to this point, is one that features a comedian. He’s not necessarily a comedian at first, but the episode begins with him telling an off-color joke to a friend that’s punchline is “Looks like you’re going to need another kid.” Then the would-be comedian, whipping tears of laughter from his eyes utters something perhaps most of us have said flippantly “I’m totally going to hell for that.” God plays the video back to the poor guy and says, “heaven can’t handle that kind of edgy humor.” And poof! He’s in hell.
Gabe wonders if maybe that’s too harsh. God tells him to turn the TV to channel 666. We see a building with a sign that says, “Divine Comedy Club.” A play on Dante’s classic poem. Where the newest resident of hell is holding a microphone and delivering the same punchline that damned him. And Lucy and company are hysterically laughing in the audience. God quips “you gotta know your audience.” And that makes sense. I don’t picture AC/DC playing harps within the pearly gates, they’d be shredding on a leopard print Gibson V-Neck guitar in the place of fire and fry. The comedian ends his set saying “thank you. I’ll be here for all eternity.” A guy in the audience says, “Ha-ha so true!” and the other guy says “#relatable.” And truly Teo and Corey know their audience. The duo is one half religious and one half irreligious and their audience can comfortably fall on either end of the spectrum and still laugh their asses off. The only people who wouldn’t like this would be who think they’re so devout because they get super offended by the slightest thing, which are not my kind of people anyway.
The next episode features a man put to death for murder whose defense was the Devil told him to do it. Lucy is laughing hysterical at the man who swears he heard him say it, but Lucy’s defense is that because he didn’t bother to remove evidence or establish an alibi, Lucy couldn’t possibly be responsible for it, because he is not that stupid. The next episode features a sole survivor of a plane crash thanking God for saving him, which God takes pride in, only to be tapped on the shoulder and turn to see the rest of the passengers angry in front of him. God’s consolation for them is unlimited breadsticks, which they grudgingly accept. Because who doesn’t like unlimited breadsticks?
Continued belowAnother classic episode is when Gabe points out to God certain “bugs” in the human design. The super-relatable bug is that we lie awake at night, unable to sleep, thinking of embarrassing things that happened years ago. Gabe wonders how they would have these defects if they were made in his image. Then we see God lying awake in bed with an intricate thought bubble of him with a crazed look in his eye, shouting at Abraham not to go through with killing his son Isaac, like he had originally commanded him to do. There is great attention to detail on what could have just been a simple image of God’s memory. The expression on God’s face is of terror. Isaac tied to the altar is also detailed and Abraham has his knife raised and is turning to react to his vision of God. Apparently, in this universe this act of convincing Abraham to kill his own son, only to stop him partway through is something that haunts God and keeps him from sleeping. Truly only a grade A douche nozzle would command his devoted follower to do that. And the fact that this God truly regrets that makes him more likable than the God of the Bible both Old and New Testaments.
This batch is birdie for the course. A delightful batch of quirky, zany goodness from the masters of religious satire, Teo and Corey. I suggest you read on and think deeply about the themes of the comic and learn to laugh the hardest about the things you cherish the most. Otherwise, they are not worth cherishing. What good is it believing in something, modeling your life based on principles, if you can’t laugh about them, laugh at yourself, or allow yourself to be challenged about them in anyway.
Covenant
Episodes 1-3
Schedule: Sundays
By LySandra Vuong aka explodikid
Reviewed by Michael Mazzacane
Sometimes a new webcomic kinda just falls in your lap and you’re wondering how I did not know of this before. That’s what happened with LySandra Vuong’s strip “Covenant.” Vuong’s profile was raised recently after an excellent Harley Quinn and Poison Ivy redesign went viral, which in turn helped raise the profile of their strip. “Covenant” is sort of a reversal of previous series like “The Magdalena” or “Warrior Nun Areala” of Hot Nuns and their Frank Miller-esque idea of Catholic Guilt™. Hot Nuns are replaced with Hot Priests of all sorts and guilt is replaced with comedy and questions of faith even when interacting with the supernatural. While the tonal balancing act isn’t perfect in the first three episodes, the raw energy and craft in that first HarlIvy image is present in these early strips.
Vuong does action very well, somewhat to the strip’s detriment. Their use of black gutter space to literally hide space and emphasize the small wisps of white-grey that connect panels in the first episode is plainly smart. Ezra’s battle with a demon at the start of the series goes through all the right moves as he recites his prayers and draws the demon out. As it begins the smart lettering choice of making the font too big for the balloon helps to emphasize their billowing liturgy. It’s all such a plainly macho cool introduction … and then the first comedic shoe drops as Ezra forgets the words. The sudden hard shift is jarring, but Vuong’s cartoony and manga influenced expression work sells the moment.
Ezra forgetting the words also helps to foreshadow the crisis of faith he is going through. Ezra is an exorcist working for the Church of Providence, a sort of BPRD of the off brand Catholic Church in this series. This church is inherently queer with masculine presenting sisters, who duel wield assault rifles, to non-believers like Ezra, together they bump back at those things that go bump in the night. It isn’t perfect, but Vuong does a good job of demonstrating the character of the core cast efficiently. Ezra might act a little too carefree at times but the crisis of faith he is experiencing is interesting. How can you not believe when you’re literally powered by angels and fighting demons?
Continued belowThe excellent action storytelling also highlights where this strip falls short in this batch of episodes. The more conversational sequences don’t flow as well with overly large gutter space and the lack of a background. The figure work within the panels is effective but the sense of a geographic space is lost as people stand around and talk.
“Covenant” isn’t a perfect series but shows a lot of promise and is an interesting spin on such a fetishy genre.
Dr. Frost
‘Is There a Light at the End of the Tunnel?’ (7) – (Case Closed)
Updates: Saturdays
By Jongbeom Lee
Reviewed by Elias Rosner
‘Is There a Light at the End of the Tunnel’ confronts the aftermath of one woman’s death by suicide and asks, but does not judge, why she felt that it was the only way forward. It asks how we, personally, societally, can prevent these tragedies from occurring in the future and then explores it through the perspectives of her brother, her friends, and the intersection between councilors and their patients. It’s another tough one but takes an alternate trajectory than “A Solar Eclipse Between Two People”. Whereas that one had a foregone conclusion, transforming the story into a tragedy, this one ends on a more hopeful note, with the prevention of another death.
Because both Seon & Frost have grown as people and counselors, they are able to help Jeongyeon’s brother grieve in a healthy way once they talk him off the ledge. It’s done in a rather dramatic fashion, with Frost bursting out of the roof door, cracked phone in hand, but this is a drama series after all, despite its attention to taking a nuanced and realistic look at mental health and counselling. Actually, because of that nuanced look, we are shown how different,and how similar, Seong’s death, Jeongyeon’s death, and Jeonghyun’s almost death are. All three may have stemmed from different mental illnesses, some temporary, others chronic, but they are linked by the pointlessness of asking why.
The ‘why’ is irrelevant not because understanding the chain of thoughts and events which led to their deaths isn’t important -they are – it is irrelevant because the catalyst is not one singular thing. Asking “why now” or “why” at all belies the fact that brains are not always rational and that the thing which ultimately set these characters to their deaths is merely the final domino in a long chain of them.
‘Is There a Light at the End of the Tunnel?’ is a metaphor for life, laid out pretty explicitly by the end. It’s been the hardest to talk about for me, so much so that I didn’t even mention Moon’s super shady attempts to take Seong away from the University AND the ending stinger which makes me fear for Jeonghyun’s new found happiness or the art itself. I would say the next set will be easier but seeing as we’re covering the end of “season 2,” I suspect things are going to get much worse before they get better.
