Title: The System
Author: Ross Nover
Start Date: 2008
Genre: Comedy
Update Schedule: Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays (Note: May miss updates.)
Website: http://www.systemcomic.com

Synopsis:

There’s no real plot or set characters. The comic uses AIGA pictograms (known under other names worldwide: “Helvetica Man,” “Bathroom Sign Guy,” “Isotypes,” etc.) and constructs them into gag strips. A majority of the strips tend to be based around the author’s life, either his career as a graphic designer or his own personal observations. Others are random or recurring gags.

Recommended Age Group: 15 and up. There’s lots of cursing in this comic.

Strengths:

The way Nover manipulates the pictograms makes them amazingly expressive. There are several pictograms that don’t exist in reality, so his use of PhotoShop to get the desired effect works to his advantage.

It’s also very easy to make guest strips! The author welcomes the use of them at every opportunity. The pictograms are available for free (see the above link in the synopsis), so if you have PhotoShop or even something cheaper, you can have your guest strips featured on his site.

Weaknesses:

This comic can be very easily compared to another popular webcomic, XKCD. I’m willing to excuse this problem, however, because aside from the obvious difference in aesthetics (stick figures versus sign figures), the comics are actually far more distinct than one might expect.

XKCD assumes its readers are smarter than they need to be. It focuses on humor relating to complex subjects such as math, philosophy, and science. Readers with minimal knowledge in these fields may be stuck without context of the jokes being told, forcing them to use Google or Wikipedia just to understand a single strip. The System is far more simplistic with its subject matter, avoiding much of the terminology that would require research.

Verdict:

I give this comic a wholehearted recommendation. If you’re a fan of XKCD, you might actually come to like this. If you’re not, you may actually find this comic easier to transition into. The art is easier on the eyes and more consistent (let’s face it: even for stick figures, XKCD is rather ugly) and it’s funny without being confusing.

Title: Evil, Inc.
Author: Brad J. Guigar (writer/artist), Ed Ryzowski (colorist)
Start Date: 2005
Genre: Superhero, parody, comedy, satire
Update Schedule: Daily
Website: http://www.evil-comic.com

Synopsis:

Evil, Inc. is a corporation run by supervillains, whose goal is to provide evil-doers everywhere with the tools and services they need to thwart superheroes and enact their plans of crime and world domination. Rather than focusing on a protagonist (this comic contains a large cast of central characters, which include staff members as well as the superheroes they face), the comic instead chooses to focus on the politics in and surrounding the corporation, providing an analogue and satire on real-world business practices.

Recommended Age Group: 12 and group. Most of the comic’s content is safe, although there is some sexual humor.

Strengths:

The comic’s art style and format are very reminiscent of newspaper comic strips. The characters are sympathetic and likable and it contains well-written nods to the tropes of DC and Marvel heroes and villains.

Weaknesses:

This comic contains a lot of filler, usually one strip per week. To their credit, many of these are gut-bustingly hilarious, but the author prefers to keep many of these strips in the exact same format. He basically copies and pastes them and just changes the dialogue. They tend to break the flow of the storylines, and they begin to feel redundant after a while.

Also, the author has a habit of including a bio page for EVERY SINGLE CHARACTER in the comic. It’s fine if you want to introduce main, major, or even secondary characters into the story, but here’s the problem: Guigar also gives bios to background characters who don’t even deserve them. Thankfully, Guigar rarely does this anymore, but it can make for a very annoying read when catching up through the archives.

Verdict:

I give this comic a wholehearted recommendation. In the same vein as Atomic Laundromat, Evil, Inc. provides a unique take on the superhero genre that isn’t necessarily about good guys fighting bad guys. Instead, it’s a cleverly crafted social commentary that’s definitely worth a look.