It Came From the Web is a monthly column that shares the best of webcomics. This issue the theme is problematic favorites, and so we’re focusing on webcomics that point out all of the plot holes, poorly thought-out characters, and strange logic that never quite made sense in your favorite geeky video games, movies, TV shows, and books. Parody webcomics are hugely popular, maybe because everyone has at least one thing that they love to geek out about and with these webcomics the experiences that are for the most part solitary – video games, movies, and so on – become shared experiences, creating a sense of community.
Because parody tends to be a really popular genre of webcomics in creating this list I’ve inevitably left off more than a few notable comics, like Weregeek and Awkward Zombie, that deserve to be mentioned at least in passing. If you think I’ve left any important names off the list let me know in the comments.
By: Tarol “Thunt” Hunt (Art, Story) and Danielle Stephens (Colors, Editing)
Created In: 2005
Genre: Fantasy/Parody
Updates: Irregularly
The tabletop game Dungeons and Dragons fostered an entire generation of geeks in the 70s and 80s, so it makes sense that there are more than a few D&D webcomics floating about the ether now that those kids are all grown up. Goblins is one of the best, winning out against Order of the Stick (which you should totally still read) to make it onto this list. Goblins started as a deconstruction of D&D, specifically D&D’s alignment system*, but it’s since warped into a dark epic fantasy where your favorite character could die at any moment. It’s great.
(*Sure, at first the alignment system makes sense, but then you realize that there are entire species that are resigned to “evil” alignment. Does it really make sense for an entire race of intelligent beings to be evil, and isn’t this the kind of thing Tolkien gets called racist for?)
By: David Willis
Created In: 2005
Genre: Slice of Life/Parody/(occasionally) Science Fiction/The List is Endless
Updates: Monday, Wednesday, and Friday
Shortpacked! is about the people who work in a toy store, and so a lot of the parody does have to do with toys (Transformers mostly, some action figure stuff) but a lot of it has to do with popular culture in general, like this recent page about the new TV series Gotham.
Maybe this one is cheating since Shortpacked! isn’t strictly parody — what with its habit of veering off sharply into slice of life and drama (or maybe it’s a slice of life comic that veers sharply into parody?) — but I feel comfortable putting it on this list if only for Willis’ blunt critiques of male-gaze and privilege in geek culture. For example: this. And this. Also this.
The Non-Adventures of Wonderella
By: Justin Pierce
Created In: 2006
Genre: Superhero Parody
Updates: Saturdays
I’m not really sure what inspired Wonderella. While it’s pretty obvious that Wonderella is a parody of Wonder Woman, where Wonder Woman is basically perfect, Wonderella is a psychopath in a cape. In a world of superheroes, Wonderella is the worse-case scenario: she’s irresponsible, lazy, and has probably murdered a few people.
The Non-Adventures of Wonderella is what the superhero genre must look like to those that don’t read it. Wonderella fights a super Nazi and is friends with Jesus. She “helps” Sherlock Holmes solve mysteries. She time travels. She does TV infomercials for extra cash. Sometimes she fights Richard Nixon. It’s ludicrous and sometimes stupid but none of it is untrue to the superhero genre — which, out of everything, I think might be the most terrifying thing about this comic.
Moképon
By: Rebecca “H0lyhandgrenade” Pugh
Created In: 2008
Genre: Video Game Parody
Updates: Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays
Anyone who watched the cartoons or played the games as a kid knows it takes some serious leaps of faith to believe in Pokélogic — that kids would leave home at the age of 12 to explore the wilderness, capture wild animals, then use those wild animals to win cage fights against other 12-year-olds — but as kids, it just seemed like a grand adventure. If we even noticed the shoddy world-building taking place, we didn’t care.
Atticus Brent, the oddly named reluctant protagonist of Moképon, cares slightly more then we did, maybe because at 14 his mother has finally kicked him out to fulfill his potential and become a Pokémaster.
I wasn’t really expecting much when I started reading Moképon. In my experience webcomics that only parody one specific franchise tend to be one-note to the point of repetition. Moképon very neatly avoid those pitfalls, mostly through good storytelling and character development instead of just relying on gags and non-sequiturs, and really that’s where Moképon’s strength as a webcomic comes from.
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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.
Check out last month’s edition of It Came From The Web, where Mallory laid out some fantastical favorites, or find more in the Problematic Favorite Issue.
