It Came From the Web shares the best of web comics, featuring a new list of recommendations for each month’s theme.
For this month’s Magic Issue we’re focusing on a well-mined trope in web comics: magical metamorphoses, supernatural transformations that throw characters into entirely foreign territory, so that even their bodies are strange and unsettling. It’s an experience that is relatable and surreal all at once, because who hasn’t been overwhelmed by unforeseeable changes in their lives?
By: Michelle Czajkowski
Created In: 2012
Genre: Science Fiction/Fantasy
Updates: Mondays and Thursdays with multiple “panels”
Ava’s life is horrible. The mysterious corporation Titian has bought her home planet and sent her and the rest of the students to a “teaching” planet where they can be taught to live in the new world, under Titian. She’s haunted by a recurring hallucination, a fiery demon that taunts her relentlessly and takes control of her at the worst times to make her say and do terrible things. Ava doesn’t have any friends, she doesn’t have any family, and after a fatal spaceship crash, Ava doesn’t have a choice: she makes a deal with the hallucination, Wraithia, who it turns out isn’t a hallucination at all. The two of them make a pact to share Ava’s body and mind until both have what they want. Ava just wants a life free of Wraithia, a new start, but Wraithia has unfinished business from a past life that Ava will have to deal with before she can be free.
The art is gorgeous and polished from the vibrant colors to the unique and flowing line art. Somehow Czajkowski has managed to do everything by herself- from the story to the art to the coloring- and release it at a pretty fast rate all without the look of the comic suffering, which is amazing.
Ava’s Demon is a really great example of how new technology has shaped comics. With a unique panel-per-page approach reading feels seamless, and along with the short animations that cap off each chapter, it’s a form that doesn’t really translate into print.
By: Joe England
Created In: 2000
Genre: Dark Fantasy
Updates: Every Saturday
In the beginning, Sandra was normal, but that was before her roommates discovered a magical tome in their attic, before an accident turned her into demonic freak, before the talking rabbits, before the visits to other dimensions. At first she only wanted to be human again, but that was years ago, and the normal girl she was before is gone now and her humanity is a distant dream. Who she is now – what she is now – is still being figured out.
Like a lot of web comics, Zebra Girl was obviously a learning experience for England, and the quality of the art and storytelling had gotten exponentially better over the course of years. For the reader this means that you have to read through a few years of lackluster material before you get to the really great stuff, but I swear your patience will be rewarded. Flat characters are developed, the world they live in gets darker and realistic, and the slice-of-life flavor the comic started with gives way to a dark coming-of-age story that never loses its sense of humor.
By: Kory Bing
Created In: 2006
Genre: Fantasy
Updates: Every Tuesday
Skin Deep is about Michelle Jocasta. Sometimes. Sometimes it’s about her friend and foreign exchange student Jim and his family, sometimes it’s about the angel Gabriel, and sometimes it’s about a bloke named Anthony who’s unfortunate transformation into a harpy is causing all sorts of problems. But Skin Deep started as a story about Michelle and about the discovery of her heritage: she’s a sphinx.
Which, understandably, was a surprise for her. Skin Deep takes place in a world where creatures of myth are real and most of them can take human form by use of medallion- which Michelle discovers when she picks up her medallion.
The first volume is about Michelle and her experiences, and then the focus shifts to England, specifically Liverpool, where a small hidden town of mythical creatures and monsters (called an “Avalon”) is. The rest of the web comic jumps around to tell the stories of other characters in the world, which means Michelle’s story is on hold for a while, but by changing the focus Bing fleshes out the world they live in to an extreme (there’s a wiki now) and steps off the well-beaten path and into territory that otherwise would go unexplored. It’s fun, it’s interesting, and it never fails to have expansive variety of characters and creatures.
Mallory Hagmann is a staff writer for Girls in Capes. Her interests include webcomics, poetry, fantasy and sci-fi novels, and whatever she’s fished from her local comic book store this week. She can be found in Denton, Texas.
Find Mallory’s reviews of mobile game Republique and Rat Queens, Vol. 1: Sass and Sorcery at Girls in Capes.
Interested in more web comics? Check out our interview with Maya Kern, artist of Monster POP!
