RE: Webcomic Deer Rectory
05-14-2016, 05:23 PM
This is indeed a very bad comic to begin with! It's disappointing as a reader to see the author dwelling on the most facile and sexiest aspects of the subject matter her work explores; I haven't read the entirety of it yet obviously, but it seems like what starts out as a tedious focus becomes more of a trapping as she becomes more familiar with the medium and storytelling techniques.
I actually really enjoy the composition of the newest strips; the character design and expressions are well-crafted too (except for a bit of a tendency for all the young skinny dark-haired characters to be hard to tell apart), and the story is pretty followable when read backwards which speaks to good pacing. The dialogue is probably her weakest aspect right now; it's not so much bad as still inelegant, I think, just not caught up to her level of development with other aspects of the strip. You can see the characters' character and relationships implicitly, but there's a level of artificiality to it because it tries a bit too hard to be clever and punchy. Feels a little overwrought.
I am interested in reading more than I have yet, though. Partially because I am a sucker for stories about various weird people coming to terms with their weirdness and finding a place for themselves in the world outside of the boundaries of the social scripts they're given, and partially because it includes a lot of things and people you don't see much in other media. I am glad to see the work matured with the author, and hope she and it continue to mature.
I actually really enjoy the composition of the newest strips; the character design and expressions are well-crafted too (except for a bit of a tendency for all the young skinny dark-haired characters to be hard to tell apart), and the story is pretty followable when read backwards which speaks to good pacing. The dialogue is probably her weakest aspect right now; it's not so much bad as still inelegant, I think, just not caught up to her level of development with other aspects of the strip. You can see the characters' character and relationships implicitly, but there's a level of artificiality to it because it tries a bit too hard to be clever and punchy. Feels a little overwrought.
I am interested in reading more than I have yet, though. Partially because I am a sucker for stories about various weird people coming to terms with their weirdness and finding a place for themselves in the world outside of the boundaries of the social scripts they're given, and partially because it includes a lot of things and people you don't see much in other media. I am glad to see the work matured with the author, and hope she and it continue to mature.