But the Water Main's Busted

New American Ninja Underground strip is up. "Water Main" is probably my favorite ANU strip so far and I think is the best portrayal thus far of what I'm trying to do with the comic. ANU is meant to be a humanized Xiao Xiao. Although the stick figure fights will be cool and stylish, my interest is more in telling a comic story about a bunch of ninjas trying to be ninjas in a world not made for ninjas.

I hate punchlines (gag frames and what-not) in comic strips. Alright. Let me correct that with a convoluted story. In the first strip of my short-lived series, In Pictorium, I wrote three frames of solid text about how the comic was never going to have a punchline; the fourth frame said, "Oh. How about a picture?" It was a stick figure sketch of a drunk man and a crow and a chicken on some grass. This is to say: I'm not necessarily opposed to gag frames or punchlines, but I don't think a comic strip should read like a joke. A regular-running comic strip depends on the notion of each strip being just a piece of a large body of work. This is true even if there are not regular characters persay, because the narrator and the themes become the continuity. With In Pictorium, the worst strip I ever did was one where the intrusive self-analyzing writing of the narrator was replaced with thought bubbles of the comic's central figure. Although the structure of the humor and the visual style were exactly the same as in previous outings, I had lost the strip by thinking each In Pictorium could depend on those two principles and stand individually. I was wrong.

In a continuing comic, there is assumed story around a strip and to be most effective, the author needs to depend on this story in structuring these individual parts. Calvin and Hobbes is the example I keep thinking of... Bill Watterson used the continuity of his strips to ground his humor. i.e. He didn't have to force a joke on the surface; instead he depended on his characters' natural responses to create the humor. The way he structured strips could change dramatically day-to-day, but each strip acted as just a part of something bigger.

To put it most clearly, though... A strip didn't make sense just at it's conclusion; it made sense in every frame. And that's what I like about "Water Main". The final frame is the climax of a joke and the strip is at some root level a build-up to that gag. Even if you haven't read any other ANU strip though, you know there is more than "Water Main" going on. The apex feels good, but all the other frames are doing more than leading-up to that point. We are getting a better idea of who the characters are, as well... Cyd's as-of-yet-unamed wife, continues to be confrontational towards the ANU's boys club behavior, Cyd himself continues to be a guy getting pushed around by these two powerful halves of his life, and we meet Peter Travers for the second time... Cool and deadly serious about his craft. It just has a great sense continuity while pushing the story critically forward.

What Gary Larson did in the Far Side is a different creature altogether though. The major difference being that The Far Side was gag strips. Larson, however, managed to establish strip continuity in ways which I have not thought about hard enough to fully explain. But, his strips were not simply jokes, and anyone who has read the strip can probably attest to each piece really feeling like a piece of the entire body of work. If you have any thoughts on this, please post in the forum and I'll be sure to respond.

A Modest Destiny is a neat strip that I think is structured very well; if you're ever looking for something fun to read on a boring day go back to day one and read the catalog thus far. Anyone who would enjoy it has probably heard of it, but Penny Arcade is another online exclusive that generally works well at deemphasizing the final frame gag.