Webcomics Recommendations

Also possibly A Miracle Of Science.

Even though it's not related to most of your requests, I'm just going to plug Captain SNES: The Game Masta. It's a spiritual sequel to Captain N (an eighties cartoon) with much, much better plot, which is Darker and Edgier. Unfortunately, the comic suffers from schedule slip, and it's currently updating about once a month. Still, it's been running for thirteen years, there are 846 page atm.

edited 1st May '14 9:27:48 PM by Smurfton

how about a webcomic featuring a strong relationship between two brothers or two sisters. Even if it's not the main focus of the comic, I'd like to see as a secondary plot.

You'll have to be more specific as to what you mean by "strong relationship". (I'm still not sure why it has to be two brothers or two sisters, but that's secondary.)

Well, I guess a relationship where they actually get along instead of hating each other's guts like a lot of fandoms do. For example, the brotherly way of the Elrac brothers in Full Metal alchemist, the sistery way of Anna and Elsa in Frozen...etc.

Do the siblings have to be of the same gender? If not, I don't know about comics that feature such a relationship to a significant degree, but the following have brother-sister pairs, as I recall:

El Goonish Shive: Few of the sibling pairs are seen often, given the number of named characters that this comic has, but it does have Elliot and his sister/Opposite-Sex Clone Ellen, as well as Nanase and her little sister Noriko (if I recall the latter's name correctly).

Cucumber Quest: While the relationship isn't a main point at the moment, two of the main characters—Cucumber and Almond—are siblings.

Everblue: The main character, Luna, has a brother who has thus far appeared a number of times (and who may be plot-relevant).

I'll look into those, thank you.

I really like the sibling dynamic in Cucumber Quest. The two leads do bicker, but it's entirely believable and it's clear that they really do love each other. It's a very cute story all around, but not cloying, and I second the recommendation with great praise.

Now, to me...

So, I've been thirsting after a long narrative comic. Good art with an interesting style is preferred, but strong writing, particularly character writing, is a must. "Realistic" fiction and science fiction are fine, but "other world" fantasy and harder-to-pin-down stuff is better. I like non-human characters for aesthetic reasons, but any intriguing art style will do, as noted.

I have completed Digger, which I consider my platonic ideal here, and I have finished Epiphany and caught up with Homestuck, Gunnerkrigg Court and Zoophobia, all of which exemplify at least a few of these attributes, if not all of them all the time. I am also a big fan of Emily Carroll, who works more in short stories; and I have read most of what Cate Wurtz has put out, which is irresistibly bizarre.

It should be noted that I really like experimental fiction, odd colour palettes, cosmic horror, and droll humour. I dig weird stuff, is what I'm saying. But also cute stuff. Gore does not bother me, nor does sex (even weird sex), although a complete dearth of them is fine and dandy.

A few LGBT+ peeps would be nice, although their absence isn't a deal-breaker, particularly in the complete absence of romance.

P.S. Long but completed stories are best, assuming that the ending is conclusive. Ongoing comics are fine, however... but they should have a solid archive. I'm open to newer stuff, of course, but what I'm looking for is what I would look for in a graphic novel: Plenty of story already.

P.P.S. In terms of gag comics or less story-based sorts, I am extremely fond of A Lesson Is Learned But The Damage Is Irreversible—the art style and humour are basically perfect—and have a definite affection for Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal, The Perry Bible Fellowship, Heavenly Nostrils and xkcd.

edited 18th Jul '14 4:20:32 AM by JHM

(First of all, I'm afraid that I don't have many suggestions that involve non-human protagonists.)

Hmm... It's perhaps not quite what you're looking for, but for an interesting, complete fantasy story with excellent art I highly recommend The Phoenix Requiem.

If you want something a little stranger, but still highly recommended and with a strong, unusual art style, you might try Rice Boy. It's also the only one of my suggested completed comics that doesn't involve human protagonists.

If you don't mind incomplete stories, the first suggestion that jumps to mind is Unsounded: strong art, intriguing story and a setting that I at least find fascinating. (In all fairness I feel that I should note that my liking for the setting comes in part from my love of magic and the otherworldly, and this comic having a particularly unusual, interesting and intelligent magic system, combined with—and connected to—a delightfully weird "underlying reality".)

Finally, slightly below that might be Earthsong: decent art and an interesting story and setting. It also has the recommendation that almost all of the protagonists are non-human (albeit largely humanoid).

edited 18th Jul '14 9:15:25 AM by ArsThaumaturgis

Come visit Broodhollow, my friend. :) It's barely a year and an half old so it isn't very long yet, but the first book is finished. And also it is beautiful in every possible way.

You might also read Nimona (cute, oddball, silly), Lovecraft is Missing (exactly as labelled), The Watcher Of Yaathagggu (wait, that's been taken offline :( ), or No Rest for the Wicked (eerie fairy-tale that unfortunately updates quite slowly).

I'll second Unsounded.

Have you read Order Of The Stick? It's very long and has quite a solid story arc to it.

I'll also recommend Paranatural, which is tied as my favourite with Unsounded. Kinda goofy, bright art style, humorous dialogue, about 4 chapters worth of archive.

edited 18th Jul '14 6:55:47 PM by LoniJay

Paranatural is good also. :D It and OotS aren't really what JHM was asking for, though, I don't think.

...but as long as I'm second-guessing that, though, I'll also add Freefall.

edited 18th Jul '14 8:43:11 PM by Noaqiyeum

Possibly not. But they are good webcomics people should read anyway =P

I admit Paranatural is probably not really long enough for what they were wanting *shrug* And I can't think of many webcomics I've read that are actually finished, apart from Digger. There was Phoenix Requiem and the previous one by the same author/artist, but neither of them left a very strong impression on me to be honest.

I have been meaning to get back to Paranatural, actually! Also, I liked Order of the Stick, but it's not *quite* what I am looking for.

I have heard good things about Unsounded, Rice Boy and Broodhollow elsewhere, so I will gladly check them out. I'll also look into the others mentioned.

Nevertheless, more suggestions are always appreciated! I like having a nice long list.

Oh, and I need to catch up on Freefall, too; it's been years, ye gods...!

So I just archive binged Broodhollow and it was great! Scary but great. It's interesting that it's a horror comic done in such a simple, cartoony art style; I mean, in book one, the sudden switches to the more detailed style worked well, but in the second book it didn't seem to do that so much and it was still scary.

There are so many things I love about Broodhollow. The art style is one of them (Kris has mentioned that his elevator pitch for the series is "Tintin goes to Innsmouth"... accurate). I also love how well it flows between silly and scary without actually really changing in tone. The balance between cosmic and psychological horror. The many strips which appear completely innocuous to a new reader but are horrifying if you've been reading along. The attention to ambiguously meaningless background details. The handling of Wadsworth's mental issues, and Dr. Angstrom's characterisation. All the characterisation, really.

I love it all.

How about Skin Horse? It's a gag a day story comic written by two people and has nice art. There are about 1,760 (daily) strips as of today (August 9th), not including the filler every Sunday. Despite the artist being on maternity leave right now, they have never been late for an update in 6.5 years.

The premise is that an extremely underfunded branch of Black Ops Social Services called Project Skin Horse finds a place in society for the creations of mad science. The five members are Sweetheart, a transgenic dog, Unity, a multi-racial zombie, Tip, a crossdressing psychologist, PSH nun's token human, Mustachio, a clockwork robot and their receptionist, and Gavotte, a sentient swarm of bees.

Unity is probably asexual, Sweetheart is attracted to human females, and Nick, a sentient helicopter is attracted to women.

I... think... that covers everything you asked for?

edited 10th Aug '14 12:10:20 PM by Smurfton

Actually, The Mansion of E also works, and is much longer (Daily since 2003). I don't feel up to qualifying how it fits, though.

edited 10th Aug '14 12:14:32 PM by Smurfton

Ava's Demon is incredibly good and the art is gorgeous. Radiowave Communication is also worth getting into, both are relatively new though and are just starting to get into the meaty parts of their plots

I have tried both and I'm not sure if either is my bag, unfortunately.

I have been meaning to pick up Ava's Demon for a while now, actually! I had not previously heard of Radiowave Communication, however, but it looks promising.

Not really in response to a request, but I just finished a binge of Lavender Legend and am quite enjoying it so far. Low-fantasy political intrigue and character humour, basically.

Is there any recommendations of webcomics about intercultural/interracial relationship? I love Joseph And Yusra because the protagonists' friendship (and Implied Love Interest) is very adorable, so I'd like to know such comics.

Quick question: are we talking mundane races/cultures only, or do more fantastic ones work?