#Comicsgate - The Culture Wars Hit The Funny Books!

[Captain Manning]

You ALWAYS say the new book is your best book. If you didn't, why would people back it or look forward to it or care?

Boilerplate marketing language is easily identifiable by those who have seen enough of it, and summarily dismissed. It only works on n00bs.

To that end, maybe he believes it. Maybe he doesn't. Either way, based on what I've seen so-far, the hype doesn't match the reality.

 

[Miniluv]

I'm sorry, I need someone to explain to me how Zack could at all be the least bit enthusiastic about this book,

How can Richard be so enthusiastic about this?

Because Zack has awful taste in just about everything. Ever hear him talk about the stuff he likes? It's pretty much all shit.

Him praising brainless action films he consumes in 5 minute chunks because he's got the focus of a squirrel on meth (which is why he's going from project to project with no rhyme or reason to it) tells you all you need to know about what gets Zack's enthusiasm.

 

[MarvinTheParanoidAndroid]

>best thing either of us ever created
Do you think Narwhal is nodding in agreement with a shit eating grin on his face while slowly strafing towards the door leaving Zack to his crayon drawings?

The best part about this is there is an actual reason they used neon colors for this, Richard was imitating a certain look from other books mentioned in Octobriana 1976 PROCESS Zine over color stylings in comics. Here's some examples he showed.

This is obviously quite a far cry from 499's blob art.

Notice something apart from the awful fucking squiggles, do you see an absence of a certain color?

There's no black, those three examples all use neon colors as an offbeat to the otherwise fully black background, that's the major reason it has such a striking effect, because of the contrast, which is how the artist was able to convey a mood.

No such clever use of black as the default in 499. In fact, different colors are used as different shades of a single object in Octobriana, in Richard's 499, he literally just colors all the characters a single color and gives them each a darker shade of that color on shadows, with no use of different colors at all, other colors are merely used to demarcate a different object, and even then it's not consistent as in one panel, all objects are pink and in the other the two street lamps are blue. It looks like incomplete polygon work in early 3D software.

Richard literally only applied the most surface level takeaway he could from these samples and rammed it into the ground.

Because Zack has awful taste in just about everything. Ever hear him talk about the stuff he likes? It's pretty much all shit.

Him praising brainless action films he consumes in 5 minute chunks because he's got the focus of a squirrel on meth (which is why he's going from project to project with no rhyme or reason to it) tells you all you need to know about what gets Zack's enthusiasm.

That's really ironic coming from the guy who called Conan fans simpletons.

 

[Miniluv]

The best part about this is there is an actual reason they used neon colors for this, Richard was imitating a certain look from other books mentioned in Octobriana 1976 PROCESS Zine over color stylings in comics. Here's some examples he showed.
View attachment 2156211
View attachment 2156213
View attachment 2156215

This is obviously quite a far cry from 499's blob art.
View attachment 2156221

Notice something apart from the awful fucking squiggles, do you see an absence of a certain color?

There's no black, those three examples all use neon colors as an offbeat to the otherwise fully black background, that's the major reason it has such a striking effect, because of the contrast, which is how the artist was able to convey a mood.

No such clever use of black as the default in 499. In fact, different colors are used as different shades of a single object in Octobriana, in Richard's 499, he literally just colors all the characters a single color and gives them each a darker shade of that color on shadows, with no use of different colors at all, other colors are merely used to demarcate a different object, and even then it's not consistent as in one panel, all objects are pink and in the other the two street lamps are blue. It looks like incomplete polygon work in early 3D software.

View attachment 2156244

Richard literally only applied the most surface level takeaway he could from these samples and rammed it into the ground.

Yep, I pointed this out a couple of pages ago. Jim Rugg used these colors for a reason and designed his comic to look like an old blacklight poster. He knew what he was doing and Zack doesn't. Rugg built his comic around that color palette and Zack used it as an afterthought because he thought it looked neat, despite Narwhal's art not being a good match for the color scheme.

 

[MarvinTheParanoidAndroid]

Yep, I pointed this out a couple of pages ago. Jim Rugg used these colors for a reason and designed his comic to look like an old blacklight poster. He knew what he was doing and Zack doesn't. Rugg built his comic around that color palette and Zack used it as an afterthought because he thought it looked neat, despite Narwhal's art not being a good match for the color scheme.

Narwhal's art needs all the help it can get. This really just underlines how terrible it really is.

Jim Rugg's art is more 90's in my opinion than 70's, it looks like the artwork you find on Trolli gummy worm packages.

 

[KingofNothing]

Meyer mentioned that part of the reason he likes Narwhal is that he's fast in his new pitch. Speed don't amount to much if it means putting out this garbage. EVS needs to stop treating Meyer with the kid gloves and just tell him this is shit and he should start over instead of going to bat for him. You've shat on projects that look far better than this.

 

[Captain Manning]

Last night, a very inebriated Australian managed to (barely) do a live stream. @FROG was on it, and this thread was discussed.

Ethan comes on at 2:33:10 (video is cued to that timestamp)
I come in (on request) at about the 2:51:35 mark.

For what it's worth, when Ethan speaks, his opinions come across a lot softer than they do here. Some people will undoubtedly say I "didn't go in hard enough on him," but that's never really been my style. Sperging on Youtube is never a good look.

Anyways I think I might have convinced Ethan that nobody here is saying Captain Marvel is good. Only that the consensus seems to be "My God! What the fuck are Narwhal and Zach smoking?!" Furthermore, I think it's perfectly reasonable to debate that maybe 499 is worse than Captain Marvel in a relative sense.

Judge for yourself.

Yep, I pointed this out a couple of pages ago. Jim Rugg used these colors for a reason and designed his comic to look like an old blacklight poster. He knew what he was doing and Zack doesn't. Rugg built his comic around that color palette and Zack used it as an afterthought because he thought it looked neat, despite Narwhal's art not being a good match for the color scheme.

It almost reminds me of the old CGA 4-color palette used in early PC games. LOTS of cyan and magenta by design.

Problem is, nobody I know is nostalgic for that (and people can be nostalgic for some pretty weird shit). Most people I know couldn't wait to upgrade their video cards to EGA, Tandy, VGA, etc. The CGA palette was awful and headache inducing. Monochrome was debatably better than CGA.

 

[The Bovinian Derivative]

Richard literally only applied the most surface level takeaway he could from these samples and rammed it into the ground.

Octobriana also looks extremely sleazy, like those nightclubs whose entrances you can't see at first because it's on a wall plastered with porn ads and graffiti. So the slutty-nightclub color theming works there. 499 is supposed to be a Cold War era 80s slasher story, not a 70s porn trip.

The indigos and dark-pinks can work IMO, just look at every synthwave artwork, but the rest is a disaster, and yeah 80s are technically in the Cold War Era but the "bisexual coloring" of purples and pinks always reminded me more of sci-fi flicks not slashers.

 

[Captain Manning]

499 is supposed to be a Cold War era 80s slasher story, not a 70s porn trip.

The indigos and dark-pinks can work IMO, just look at every synthwave artwork, but the rest is a disaster, and yeah 80s are technically in the Cold War Era but the "bisexual coloring" of purples and pinks always reminded me more of sci-fi flicks not slashers.

CGA came out in 1981, so it better fits if you apply that comparison.

I dunno. I just know CGA looked like shit, and this also looks like shit. Both give me a headache. It's not stylish. It's garish.


red, yellow, green, black background


cyan, magenta, white, black background

 

[Newman's Own]

I'm sorry, I need someone to explain to me how Zack could at all be the least bit enthusiastic about this book, 499 is hands down the worst comic book of all time. It is to comics what Plan 9 From Outer Space is to film, it is to comics what Banana duct tape is to art, it is to comics what Lulu is to music, it is to comics what Food Fight is to animation. It is worse than every Squirrel Girl comic, every Ms. Marvel comic, every fem-Thor comic and every Mark Waid Spiderman comic ever made.

How can Richard be so enthusiastic about this?

It's ComicsGate. That's how they roll these days.

 

[MarvinTheParanoidAndroid]

CGA came out in 1981, so it better fits if you apply that comparison.

I dunno. I just know CGA looked like shit, and this also looks like shit. Both give me a headache. It's not stylish. It's garish.

View attachment 2156326
red, yellow, green, black background

View attachment 2156332
cyan, magenta, white, black background

These photos of parrots are so much easier on the eyes than any panel from 499.

 

[Miniluv]

Narwhal's art needs all the help it can get. This really just underlines how terrible it really is.

Jim Rugg's art is more 90's in my opinion than 70's, it looks like the artwork you find on Trolli gummy worm packages.

View attachment 2156272

Octobriana was something of a visual experiment. It doesn't really look anything like Rugg's other projects like Street Angel. I'm not a huge stan for Jim Rugg, but the guy knows the process of making comics and isn't afraid to experiment with them.

Funny thing, is I bought Octobriana when it went in demand after seeing Zack's video about the digital zine Rugg threw into the package detailing the process of making the book. The very zine Zack stole the color palette from because he couldn't think of anything original.

 

[Adamska]

So Richard is entirely dying on this hill on this because he thinks that a comic done in what he thinks is in giallo style, which he clearly doesn't understand from a lighting OR from a narrative perspective, is cool and unique. He's crowing about not understanding why the color composition of giallo was used and for showing off that he can't really write a mystery-thriller...

You know, that actually might top the delusional faggotry that Marlon Brando did when he began to think himself as too good to even try.

Or is he just trying to rip off the Blacklight concept mentioned earlier? I can't tell because Richard is being fucking retarded here. That 499 is supposed to be a slasher story and the bad color effects makes me think he thinks he's smart for copying Italian Schlock. But his sheer colorblind and retarded decision is closer to that.

All I do know is that he is a fucking idiot for picking this over giving people their previous 3 books, and should fucking stick to capeshit, since wow he sucks at this.

 

[The Bovinian Derivative]

I just know CGA looked like shit

*cracks open a can of Monster*

I remember firing up DOS games late at night for the first time and praying to God it wasn't CGA because that meant getting a facefull of bright cyan.

*sips*

 

[Captain Manning]

These photos of parrots are so much easier on the eyes than any panel from 499.

Probably because they used a lot of B&W as two of the colors in those two examples.

If you want a better example of how shitty stuff could look:

Commander Keen: Goodbye Galaxy - PC DOS CGA

Outrun - PC DOS CGA

This is I think closer to the artwork you posted.

Fucking awful. I hope you like magenta and cyan.

Looking at the full 16-colors you could select from, it kinda looks like the palette Narwhal/Zach are drawing upon for 499. CGA could operate in 4 or 16 color mode, depending on resolution.

Anyways, this is probably nerdy and autistic. I somewhat doubt they're intentionally making 499 like an early PC game. I just thought I'd mention it. The retro aesthetic isn't always cool. PC hardware lagged behind arcade and even some home console hardware in the 80s. CGA games looked like shit, and people couldn't wait for them to look better. Which, of course, they eventually did.

 

[MarvinTheParanoidAndroid]

Probably because they used a lot of B&W as two of the colors in those two examples.

If you want a better example of how shitty stuff could look:

View attachment 2156370
Commander Keen: Goodbye Galaxy - PC DOS CGA

View attachment 2156386
View attachment 2156387
Outrun - PC DOS CGA

This is I think closer to the artwork you posted.

Fucking awful. I hope you like magenta and cyan.

Looking at the full 16-colors you could select from, it kinda looks like the palette Narwhal/Zach are drawing upon for 499. CGA could operate in 4 or 16 color mode, depending on resolution.

View attachment 2156391

Anyways, this is probably nerdy and autistic. I somewhat doubt they're intentionally making 499 like an early PC game. I just thought I'd mention it. The retro aesthetic isn't always cool. PC hardware lagged behind arcade and even some home console hardware in the 80s. CGA games looked like shit, and people couldn't wait for them to look better. Which, of course, they eventually did.

The art and coloring in these examples are still better than 499.

"Better art than 499" is the new "better love story than Twilight."

 

[TiredAndInked]

"Best thing Zack has ever created" doesn't seem to be that high of a bar.

Selling Jawbreakers would probably be a good move for him and his backers. He can rid himself of the terrible burden of producing a well-received, popular, lucrative comic series and the backers can actually get the books they've paid for in a reasonable time frame without having to listen to him ramble on promoting ugly books with shitty concepts nobody but Zack gives a fuck about.

This update made me care a little less about ever getting jawbreakers.

 

[MarvinTheParanoidAndroid]

This update made me care a little less about ever getting jawbreakers.

At least now we know that the bar to entry in comics is lower than ever, it's amateur's hour.

Let's be real, the only reason why Narwhal gets away with this napkin art is because he's Narwhal. If 499's artwork had came from anyone else, that person would be a universal laughing stock, especially after shilling it for money.

 

[jspit2.0]

Learn to use the search function.

Unless you just like to post about sighing.

Forgive those of us tired of Lim simps spamming lies and propaganda.

There's your sigh.

So Richard is entirely dying on this hill on this because he thinks that a comic done in what he thinks is in giallo style, which he clearly doesn't understand from a lighting OR from a narrative perspective, is cool and unique. He's crowing about not understanding why the color composition of giallo was used and for showing off that he can't really write a mystery-thriller...

You know, that actually might top the delusional faggotry that Marlon Brando did when he began to think himself as too good to even try.

Or is he just trying to rip off the Blacklight concept mentioned earlier? I can't tell because Richard is being fucking retarded here. That 499 is supposed to be a slasher story and the bad color effects makes me think he thinks he's smart for copying Italian Schlock. But his sheer colorblind and retarded decision is closer to that.

All I do know is that he is a fucking idiot for picking this over giving people their previous 3 books, and should fucking stick to capeshit, since wow he sucks at this.

Apparently this is his Watchmen/Citizen Kane. He's wanting something that will last or whatever.

Last night, a very inebriated Australian managed to (barely) do a live stream. @FROG was on it, and this thread was discussed.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=ig_F8N3TVKk:9190
Ethan comes on at 2:33:10 (video is cued to that timestamp)
I come in (on request) at about the 2:51:35 mark.

For what it's worth, when Ethan speaks, his opinions come across a lot softer than they do here. Some people will undoubtedly say I "didn't go in hard enough on him," but that's never really been my style. Sperging on Youtube is never a good look.

Anyways I think I might have convinced Ethan that nobody here is saying Captain Marvel is good. Only that the consensus seems to be "My God! What the fuck are Narwhal and Zach smoking?!" Furthermore, I think it's perfectly reasonable to debate that maybe 499 is worse than Captain Marvel in a relative sense.

Judge for yourself.


It almost reminds me of the old CGA 4-color palette used in early PC games. LOTS of cyan and magenta by design.

Problem is, nobody I know is nostalgic for that (and people can be nostalgic for some pretty weird shit). Most people I know couldn't wait to upgrade their video cards to EGA, Tandy, VGA, etc. The CGA palette was awful and headache inducing. Monochrome was debatably better than CGA.

Actual CG happenings....

 

[A nameless trool]

So Richard is entirely dying on this hill on this because he thinks that a comic done in what he thinks is in giallo style, which he clearly doesn't understand from a lighting OR from a narrative perspective, is cool and unique. He's crowing about not understanding why the color composition of giallo was used and for showing off that he can't really write a mystery-thriller...

It's not even a giallo look.
Most giallo films had lush colours and saturation.
This is the Suspria look. But Suspiria was all about the character being trapped inside a fairytale world and most Horror movies who repeated that style did it to express how otherworldy the setting becomes.