Websnark

Comment from: Wednesday posted at March 12, 2005 8:40 PM

Brent's kinda hot in that last panel.

NO NO NOT THE POKERS NOT THE RED HOT POKERS

Comment from: MasonK posted at March 12, 2005 9:58 PM

*tries to picture Daredevil with a ponytail*

It... doesn't work.

Weds: Don't fall in love with a comic strip character. These things never end well. Trust me on this.

Comment from: Grumblin posted at March 12, 2005 10:46 PM

It's coffee... Give in to the Coffee..

You are all american... you haven't got a clue about the *kneejerk* reaction you get when you even *think* of [shudder] starbucks [/shudder] and the mention of a possible connection of anything *remotely* resembling to the substance called "coffee" in europe.

Wednesday is english and *should* know the difference. If she's half human. :p

Then again, she is of the Isles, and not wholly a Believer :P

Comment from: DanShive posted at March 12, 2005 10:49 PM

I saw this coming from a plot standpoint, but nothing could have prepared me for that last panel O_O It is an impressive inking job.

...although I can't help but wonder how it will need to be edited if this winds up in one of Kutz's comic books... a whole page to itself with no other comic above or below it? Brent's head is taking up valuable real estate!

Comment from: Wednesday posted at March 12, 2005 11:10 PM

I AM SO NOT ENGLISH!

Born in Canada! Raised in Canada! Canadian accent! Kraft Dinner! Acadien French speaking! Mitsou! Men Without Hats! CBC Radio One!!!one!!1

Comment from: Montykins posted at March 13, 2005 12:27 AM

If PVP were a Marvel comic in, say, the 1980s, that last line would clearly be the blurb on the cover.

I can practically see it already, with Francis and Jade dying in the background, and Brent looking to the sky. Probably a regular caption saying "Only one man can save PVP, but there's one problem . . ." And then Brent saying "I must have CAFFEINE!"

Comment from: Kris@WLP posted at March 13, 2005 1:51 AM

To me, this seems like a cop-out.

I was interested in seeing Brent decaffeinated. I thought I saw hints of it with his quieter, less pretentious but still somewhat sarcastic self over the last couple weeks.

But tell me again, why is Brent- a character we've established as less than fiscally responsible- an employee of PvP whose main function is art director- why is Brent even INVOLVED with the numbers? What makes Cole think Brent is better qualified to find the magic bullet to save PvP?

Yes, it's a clean and snazzy bit of inking on that fourth panel, but to me this strip is a MASSIVE downer. In one blow, Kurtz has turned a potentially cool story line into a LAME excuse to get Brent back on the bean-juice... AND, at the same time, thrown away a cool failure to return to status quo and rejected numerous possibilities to contrast and compare juiced Brent with decaf Brent.

I'm getting a distinct Marvel feeling from the writing here.

And I *HATE* Marvel comics' writing, in general.

I hope there's one hell of an improvement on this in the strips to come next week.

Comment from: Scott Kurtz posted at March 13, 2005 2:01 AM

Brent and Cole are old and dear friends. Brent's helping with the numbers because he's been there from the beginning. He started the magazine with Cole.

Comment from: Phil! posted at March 13, 2005 2:14 AM

Heh. I read this and said to myself "Man, I can't wait to see how Burnsie reacts."

But I love that last panel, too. I say it reminds me more of Fantastic Four than Daredevil. You know what it is?

It's the sunglasses.

Because the sunglasses remind you of blind Matt Murdock.

Am I right?

Comment from: Eric Burns posted at March 13, 2005 2:34 AM

"Burnsie?"

It's the glasses, yes -- and the fact that it looks like something Steve Ditko or Jack Kirby would have done. I love the effect of it.

Comment from: J. Stoncius posted at March 13, 2005 4:03 AM

I also like the fourth panel, since it is dramatic and cool, but the lettering in the first two panels is so sloppy. Note that in the first two panels, none of the I's are the I's with the bars...this is what you get if you don't capitalize them. The pronoun "I" always needs to be capitalized in comic fonts so it'll have the bars...also beginnings of sentences need to be capitalized, so you would basically just write a comic script like you would type a normal sentence. There is clearly inconsistent capitalization going on here, and maybe nobody else notices, but it drives me NUTS. Kurtz is a professional, so he should know better than that!

Comment from: Rothul posted at March 13, 2005 5:12 AM

If we'd really want to split hairs, Stoncius, I think the three Ts in "Gettin'" in panel one is a riper target. :P

Comment from: Shaenon posted at March 13, 2005 6:10 AM

Man, when you're as big as Kurtz, people get on you for every damn thing. LET THE MAN TELL HIS STORY! HIS STORY ABOUT CAFFEINE AND DRAMATIC BACKLIGHTING!

Also, I don't think something earns a comparison to Jack Kirby until it incorporates some kind of grotesquely proportioned floating lumpy head.

Comment from: Wednesday posted at March 13, 2005 11:04 AM

Shaenon: at least it's not a pie-shaped head.

Comment from: Kris@WLP posted at March 13, 2005 11:07 AM

"Burnsie?"

Could be worse- he could have called you Frank. }:-{D

Comment from: Tangent posted at March 13, 2005 12:58 PM

Very true, Shaennon, which is why we absolutely love to nitpick your comic to death... ;) (Personally, I think Narbonic is a funnier comic than PvP but that might also have to do with the fact Helen is cuter than Brent *wry grin*)

Comment from: The Archon posted at March 13, 2005 1:05 PM

Multiple rant time!

Re: The lower-case Is.... Kurtz does that a lot at times. To wit,

the start of the budget crisis plot. "i'll be in my office" vs. every other "I" or "I'll" in the strip.

Or, Francis and his shirt get diluted. He capitalizes all the "I"s but misses two start-of-sentence "it's"s. A quick skim of the archive revealed he's been doing this inconsistent I-ing for at least two years. (Maybe more. I got bored.) I also realized just how horrid his spelling is, even in supposedly "professional" things like that Matrix parody that IIRC was published in dead-tree format. Man, his dad must have a warehouse of #9 boots to the ass.

Re: The caffeine plot.... I was a bit disappointed to see the status quo returning, but this might not be the end of it. I mean, assuming it's been a few in-strip months since Brent switched to decaf, he might make the mistake of going right back to his standard drink instead of working his way up, get wired right out of his head, have a brilliant revelation, scribble it down before completely succumbing to the overdose, and finally come back to his senses clutching a paper that reads "Save money with the hoppy bunny wheee! Hoppy Hoppy Hoppy Hoppy Hoppy Hoppy Hoppy Hoppy Hoppy Hoppy!" Which will be enough to make him decide to give up the dark drink permanently. I'm waiting for the end of this one to see what happens with the status quo.

Re: Wednesday's heritage.... As a fellow Canadian, all I have to say is... w00t! :)

Comment from: Kris@WLP posted at March 13, 2005 2:04 PM

Or maybe Mr. Kurtz could just start using a comic font that doesn't have separate upper and lower case lettering.

Comment from: Ray Radlein posted at March 13, 2005 4:21 PM

Why is everyone pretending that he is being at all inconsistent here? Every 'I' is lowercase, except for the word "I" itself. This cannot be an accident. He obviously made the decision that, in the font he is using, the non-serifed "I" looks better and is more readable within the confines of a word, but that the word "I" needs the serifs to make it stand out on its own.

You know what? He's right, too. It does look better, and it is more readable that way (on the other hand, Francis' "I'm" is an exception to this trend, isn't it? Oh well).

Comment from: Sundre posted at March 13, 2005 6:09 PM

gogo wednesday go!

tim hortons! toques! arrogant worms! poutine!

Comment from: Eric Burns posted at March 13, 2005 7:12 PM

Kris--

'Non-status-quo' enough for you? ;)

Comment from: DanShive posted at March 13, 2005 9:36 PM

*reads Sunday comic - eyes become wide* Brent? NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO~!!!! WHY NOT BIZARRO BRENT?!

Comment from: Kris@WLP posted at March 13, 2005 9:48 PM

Eric-

Presuming it's Brent taking the ride, I'll back off a little, although I still think this plot twist is premature. This would have more effect after a few months of decaf Brent... at least, so far as this has gone.

I still find Brent's involvement on this side of things unconvincing; this hasn't been set up as well as Scott Kurtz is capable of doing. I still think having PvP's solvency issues be used as a lead-in to Brent's return to caffeine cheapens both concepts.

But he's a long way from losing me yet; let's see where this is headed.

(Besides St. Somebody or Other Hospital, that is... )

Comment from: Robert Hutchinson posted at March 14, 2005 10:07 AM

Everyone calling a sans-serif "I" a lowercase "I" had me scanning those comics for five solid minutes. Dammitol. Lowercase Is have dots. iiiiii

That is all.

Comment from: 32_footsteps posted at March 14, 2005 10:13 AM

For the most part, I agree with Kris@WLP, except it made sense to me that Brent would help with the finances (Jade is the only other person I could even remotely see helping on that front).

I kind of knew that there would eventually be a "Brent returns to caffeine" story, but I personally was hoping it was a couple more months, so we could get a better feel for Brent without caffeine.

Still, I give Kurtz full credit by bringing some very black funny in Sunday's strip. Not at all what I expected, and it took me a full minute to get over the shock before laughing.

Also, as someone who can't stand the "percolated caffeinated cinders" that Starbucks puts out, I find it a bit humorous to hear people from countries that don't produce coffee beans to comment on coffee sold in America. When I see someone from Jamaica or Papua New Guinea, then I'll take that seriously.

Comment from: Prodigal posted at March 14, 2005 12:44 PM

A mutual friend of ours described the last panel as having great Kirbosity.

I share it with you because I love that phrase. :)

Comment from: jpcardier posted at March 14, 2005 1:55 PM

"Also, as someone who can't stand the "percolated caffeinated cinders" that Starbucks puts out, I find it a bit humorous to hear people from countries that don't produce coffee beans to comment on coffee sold in America. When I see someone from Jamaica or Papua New Guinea, then I'll take that seriously."

Three items from an admitted coffee snob. First, Jamaicans don't drink JMB. It costs too much. This tends to be the case in many coffee producing countries, but especially in Jamaica. They tend to go for Nescafe and Folgers. Horrible, but true and understandable.

Second, Continental Europeans have a great tradition of Espresso and Cappucino. Also they tend to still home roast or microroast, which will give you a much better experience than stale beans. But I have come across some straight coffee that was nigh undrinkable from European expats here.

Finally Starbucks has gotten a *lot* better when it comes to straight coffee in the last year. Simple policy, profound change in quality: They put timers on the pots and dump them after every hour. Wow, drinkable coffee from a coffe house! Great, no. But very drinkable. And until they roast daily and offer vac pot coffee... Well it's as good as it's going to get.

Comment from: Eric Burns posted at March 14, 2005 2:02 PM

That's what always drove me nuts when I lived in Seattle. Coffee houses on every corner, of many many different chains or even standalone Mom and Pop operations, and not one of them had a decent cup of straight drip coffee. It got to the point that they created the "Americano" to approximate drip coffee for people who just wanted regular coffee.

An Americano, for those who don't know, is espresso combined with steamed water instead of steamed milk. In other words... it's weak espresso that's near-boiling when it's served to you.

And for those places that did have drip coffee? Boiled down and burnt is about as good as you could get. I would love trips out to the East Coast so I could drink some well brewed drip coffee.

On the other hand, I did find a kickass teashop there....

Comment from: 32_footsteps posted at March 14, 2005 6:11 PM

Ah, when coffee snobs collide.

Yes, I know full well that the nicest beans aren't often sampled by the locals for various economic reasons. But still, nothing beats it fresh, and I sincerely doubt they've never had the local brew.

I know of those traditions; I'm just dismissive of them for flavor reasons. I find that both are more hype than actual promise. I'll take a straight pot of drip any day.

Even with their recent policy changes (I also hear they're better about cleaning up after each pot brewed), I still find it too bitter. I actually find myself going to Dunkin' Donuts for coffee most often. If I'm going to pay for bitter swill, I'm going to buy it on the cheap. When I do spend more than two bucks on a cup of coffee, either it's good or the proprietors are going to hear about it.

Comment from: morguerat posted at March 15, 2005 10:45 AM

Since it has drifted into a coffee discussion: http://www.ucomics.com/foxtrot/2005/03/13/

I think Brent would be completely correct about saving PVP with caffiene, if his overdose kills him (it hasn't as of the latest update) and he has Cole as the beneficiary of his estate, the life-insurance money could give a fresh injection of life into PVP.

Personally I don't think Kurtz has the short and curlies to kill off a well loved (and love to hate) character like Brent, and it looks like he'll be fine.

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