Welcome back to Webcomic of the Month! It’s the end of the year and I decided that instead of showcasing another comic to bring back all 11 comics from before and remind you that there are some fun comics to be reading. Enough of this, let’s get to it.
We started the year with Death Springs . A western horror story of a town hit by a zombie curse and how the survivors are trying to keep that precious title seemed like a good January. It has the feel of old EC Comics so if you like horror, cowboys, zombies, or any combination thereof, then I recommend you go give it a look. Writer Brady Sullivan has a graphic novel called Doing Time that’s also out now.
February is the shortest month, sadly, but it’s also my birth month so I was so happy to have Kyle & Atticus getting the spotlight. Watching young Kyle deal with all the trials and tribulations of being a young genderqueer kid was touching and made all the better knowing Atticus was there waiting. Who wouldn’t want someone like that as friend? Creator Sfé Monster also has a story called Eth’s Skin coming out next year that I’m looking forward to.
I made March into a sort of Gorillas in comics appreciation time and what better way than to show off Glam Rock Gorilla? This comic has all sorts of amazing things in it; robots, talking apes, shapeshifters, Santa Claus, and music. I have this constant reminder of Tom Waits for some reason.
April showers bring strange creatures that threaten humanity so it seemed like a good idea to showcase the Boston Metaphysical Society. Using real-world figures with fictional ones to fight off, maybe even create, some nasty monsters is a lot of fun. Spirit photography and detective work together again for the very first time. Writer Madeline Holly-Rosing has a Kickstarter coming out next year to fund the final chapters’ printings.
Achewood would be our first “great comic that no longer updates” spotlight that appeared in May. Then something wonderful happened, it came back. Since August, the comic has been updating every Friday and it’s still wonderful. I’m so glad it’s back and you should be too.
Another in the “no longer updating category” showed up in June. While Awesome Hospital may not be returning full time we did get a special Halloween guest comic. You can also still get a lot of cool stuff from the people who made Awesome Hospital. Subatomic Party Girls and Down, Set, Fight! are two that come to mind.
In July we went to outer space with Starslip Crisis. A completed science fiction comic that went for several years and took us all over the place in scope of what stories Kris Straub wanted to tell in sci-fi. It ended but now Straub is focusing on horror over in Broodhollow and that is a wonderful series.
August gave us DAR! the autobiographical comic of Erika Moen that she ended to continue onto other great comics. DAR! was a series that have many peeks into Moen’s life and how wonderful, sad, strange, funny, sexy life can be. Currently doing the NSFW series “Oh Joy, Sex Toy” with her husband and several special guests, Moen is doing sex-positivity right.
September ended our look at great comics that aren’t currently updating with Nothing Nice to Say. This was a comic I grew up reading in my teens and Glam Rock Gorilla’s writer was inspired in part by this series. Comedy about music and just all around looking at the absurdity of life in general, this comic will always be one I check to see if an update has occurred.
Halloween is in October and all of October is Halloween so it seemed like a good idea to pick a comic about ghosts so why not go with A Ghost Story? It’s a lot of fun with two people who are mostly terrible but also in a relationship trying to make it as small-time ghost hunters. The ghosts are very real and Jack and Maxine are very awful at it. You should check it out, the Black-Eyed Child is terrifying.
Finally, in November we had Drunkards of the Cosmos a fantasy series with lots of punching. So much punching it has a “Punch in the face” counter. That’s pretty rad. You got satyrs and cyclops hanging out and a murder mystery all set up. A champion is on the rise so who knows what could happen next?
There you have it! All 11 months worth of comics and the spotlights given to them all in one neat little article. Hope you had a great year and if not, then I hope that the next will be better for each and every one of you. Happy holidays!
Dr. Alexander Bustos
drbustos@comicattack.net
