But anyhoo, guess what I've got for you? Some stuff I like! Woo!
The other day I spent the majority of my time free of responsibility sitting on my duff transfixed by this webcomic I came across. Literally, I could not stop reading. It's been ongoing for five years and the author's artistic style has grown in leaps and bounds (warning, you will have to start at the beginning and plunk your ass down for six hours).
The story follows Fiona as she tries to navigate life at her Catholic high school and at home with her mecha-betch stepmother (keep "Cinderella" in mind, folks) and befriends, then falls in love with, her new neighbor, Lia. The author is herself a lesbian, and the issues that surface with coming to terms with being gay are addressed during the story.
Although some aspects of the story during the part one seem fairly overdramatized high-school kitsch, one: there is a very good reason for it, revealed at the end of part one, and two: C'mon, we all know that you still hoard one or two of the more juicy Babysitters Club books and your Dawson's Creek DVDs deep in your closet of shame. However, if you pay attention, you'll find that the author introduces incidents early in the story that come into play much later. I love this kind of storytelling; it means that the author has thought out the plot and put a lot of effort to surpise the reader, but also make it a cohesive unit. If you can make it to part two, the pay-off is great. She also goes in-depth exploring dreams (a primary theme); how they can affect our sense of reality, how they can seem like real life, and how they can become a place to escape to when life becomes too much to handle. This is probably one of the main reasons I identify with the comic; when I was in high school, as a way to cope with depression I would sleep a lot. It was a lot easier to do that than to deal with the fact that every day of the week felt the same and that I was so bored with everything, my brain was obsessing with the most insignificant details of my day. Sleeping and dreaming about those details, however, really didn't help. (Don't worry, I found some self-esteem at college, and things are (more or less) right as rain.)
One of the things I love the best (besides Fi's curly red hair and red hightops), is how the art has matured over the course of the comic. It begins in an amateur anime style...
then add a splash of color...
occasional dabbling into a different style...
It is good times, Charlie Brown. But it's really in Part Two that the author exercises her artistic ability and whips out all different kinds of styles, all of which make me squee.
Picture 'splosion.
It's entirely possible that you could just start at Part Two and read on from there; the author is kind enough to have little footnotes when something in Part One is referenced. But I would really encourage you to start at the beginning so you can appreciate how much the author has grown as a writer and an artist. She's absolutely an artist worth supporting, one of the few making her living doing what she loves, and doing it well. Not to mention that her deviantart.com shop has some goodies that I can already see my next paycheck going towards.
In other news, I went to see the new Harry Potter movie. I know you don't want to hear one more conflicting opinion on the subject, so I'll just say that me, personally, I enjoyed it very much, but was a little disappointed with three or four things. This is the kind of movie that everyone is going to feel differently about, regardless of the level of fan you are of the books or the franchise, so really, instead of listening to what other people think, you should just shell out the ten bucks and go decide for yourself.
And as a special treat:
"Kanske Ar Jag Kar I Dig"
"I'm Leaving You Because I Don't Love You"
Until next time!
