Review: Stoopitz

I have a text file stored on my computer. It contains a list of webcomics that I have considered posting a review for, although I sometimes wonder why I even bother keeping the list, since I don't see myself doing anything with it in the near future. The major factor in this is probably laziness, since reviewing a comic from the list would require me to actually keep reading all of those comics so that I could note which of them have built up enough of an archive that I can actually review them, rather than making a few comments about the art. Instead, I end up trawling through the usual places every week, looking for a new comic to review.

This past week, the comic I came accross was Stoopitz, a webcomic by Brian Gibson which was a pleasure to find in more ways than one. Yeah, it meant that I would be able to get a review done that week, but there's also the fact that Stoopitz is quite possibly better than some of the big-name comics out there. In fact, I had to constantly check to ensure that this comic was, in fact, a newer comic and not something that was read by approximately half of the webcomics community.

Okay, I'm exaggerating a little up there... sort of. Stoopitz isn't a shining utopian vision (which is what it'd take to get such a large reaction from webcomicers, since in my experience there are only a few titles out there that would be universally recognized, and that doesn't necessarily mean that everybody has actually read them). The comic is, however, very well-done and professional looking, and I have no doubt that Mr. Gibson can be a force to be reckoned with amongst webcomicists a few years from now.

One of the things that makes Stoopitz good is that it's fairly easy to relate to. It's a slice of life comic revolving around Tim, a young man living in a big city. There's no suspension of disbelief required, and for the most part things he experiences are things that we can understand, probably because the comic is loosely based around experiences that Gibson himself had while living in New York. Things are mostly humourous, and the comics that I didn't find funny can probably be chalked up to my having a sense of humour roughly equivalent to that of a birch tree. At any rate, the humour is more or less always present without being completely over the top or tacked-on, which is certainly a good thing.

The other thing that grabbed my attention in Stoopitz was the artwork. The art is completely in black and white at the beginning of the archive, then switches to greyscale after a few strips, while a single comic to date has been posted in colour. No matter what the palette is, Gibson's panels have an immersive feel to them that I wouldn't expect from anybody less than Makoto Shinkai. It was this kind of thing that made me wonder how I'd never heard of this comic before every time I loaded a page. If you don't believe me, then see for yourself.

Beyond that, Stoopitz is solid but not exceptional in other areas. The story is solid in the sense that you can't really assign a plot to somebody who is simply living out their life, and the characters are likewise just as balanced and realistic as you'd expect from your next door neighbor.

Now, as I look back on my review I notice that there's a severe lack of criticism in there. Since I'm usually all for the idea that no work is either the shining example of it's genre and medium nor a complete and utter piece of crap that the world would be better off without that particular artist, I feel a little hypocritical in the fact that I can't think of any honest criticism for this comic, and if I weren't running a day late on this review I'd go back and scour the archives until I notice a glaring flaw that I somehow forgot about in the week that passed between when I read the comic and when I actually sat down to write this review, or I'd go through and nitpick the comic to death about things such as the art being "Great, but not Excellent". Since I haven't got the time to do so at the moment, I'll instead look to the future.

Usually, I keep a positive mind when I look to the future. In terms of the quality of the work, it usually tends to be accurate, since few artists actively try to produce work of lower quality as they continue with a project. There are, however, a few things that can be seen as a step backwards by some people simply because those people are not part of the group of people who see the change as a step forward. In this case, I am talking about Cerebus Syndrome.

Cerebus Syndrome is the trend of serial works that originally dealt in comedy to slide towards drama the longer they run. This is usually because nobody, no matter how talented, can continue to think of jokes at a constant rate for an indefinite period of time. Since a joke usually will only work for one comic while a dramatic story can be dragged out indefinitely, this can be an attractive action once it gets harder to stay funny. In comics where things are based on real life events, it can be even worse, since the writer can run out of experiences and suddenly realize that they themselves have absolutely no talent for writing humour. Since Stoopitz is lightly based off of real occurrances, it's a prime candidate for the Syndrome to set in.

This isn't a given, of course, nor is it necessarily a bad thing. Dramatic storylines can be just as good as comedy, and the two can even be worked together without sacrificing story integrity. Still, such a change should have forethought put into it, and it should happen because the writer wants for it to happen, not because it's the only option left to them.

Once again, though, this is all just what could happen, and I think that even if it's inevitable for all works, it'll be a long time before Cerebus Syndrome takes over Stoopitz.

The comic can be reached here.

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Art: A-. In my eyes, there's really nothing that needs improving with the artwork in this comic. More colour strips would be nice, if such a thing is practical.
Story: C. There's not much that can be done with this one, unless one is willing to sacrifice a bit of the realism in favor of establishing an overriding purpose to the lives of the characters
Writing: B. Well presented and clear.
Characterization: C+. As with story, not much is possible with this, unless the comic were to take a serious turn and start delving into the character's psychology
Humour: B+. Not overly hilarious, but enough that I keep coming back day after day.

Arbitrary Overall Rating: B+. I was extremely tempted to give this comic an A, but was wary of setting the extremes of my standards so early after establishing this blog. A comic that will be checked weekly for updates, at any rate.