A few of my favourite things

March 11, 2009

Well it’s been a long time since I posted a NON-Comic entry. So here’s a list of webcomics I like. In no particular order. This list will also prevent readers from complaining that there have been no comic postings for a long time.

I’ll do Indian webcomics in another post. Feel free to add your own review and favorite webcomics in the comments. (Links open in a new window)

Cyanide and Happiness

It’s dirty, non PC and sometimes so lame it’s totally funny. And unlike some webcomics, it updates nearly everyday.

Cyanide and Happiness, a daily webcomic

Subnormality

“The weekly comic for people with undiagnosed brain injuries!” says the tagline. It’s occasionally funny. I like the illustration style. Although some comics have more text than a short story. A Wall of Text as it’s known in the comic world.

We the Robots

They’re robots, but face the same problems as humans. And they’re bored.

P.H.D. Comics

Piled Higher & Deeper: Life (or the lack thereof) in Academia – This one is quite popular. But I dont like it too much. So when I describe it as “Funny things that happen in the life of research students”, some may not be happy…

Savage Chickens

Cartoons on Sticky Notes by Doug Savage – This one is great! It’ll would have been great if there were humans in it, but since it has chickens, it’s even better

XKCD

Well XKCD is way too popular for me to be describing it. It’s a webcomic of romance and math humour. And it has stick figures.

The Perry Bible Fellowship

This one closed down. But it’s by far THE most weird, funny, sad and deep comic on the net. You’ve got to stop scrolling down. Head over to PBF and go through the archives. Then come back after an hour and resume.

Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal

Also great. Specially those ones which are in reverse. Check out the archives… you’ll know what I mean.

Wondermark

By David Malki! Yes, the exclamation mark is part of the name. Wonderful concept and funny panels. Victorian people, modern talks… I like the whole thing. Inspires me to do a similar thing with Indian miniature paintings.

Penny Arcade

This one is also quite popular with on the internet. A video game comic… I think it’s OK. Don’t check it regularly. Maybe once a month I’ll go through the archives. Quite OK. Although if this was Digg, I would’ve been dugg down into oblivion by now.

See Mike Draw

The author kind of stopped and started a new webcomic (Urf (below)). But go through the archives… some of them are just great.

The Rut

Same guy(s) from See Mike Draw and Urf (still below). Also nice.

Basic Instructions

This comic is “Your all-inclusive guide to a life well-lived” and will tell you how to deal with stuff and life.

Hyper Death Babies

No babies are harmed in the making of this webcomic. Similar to Wondermark in execution. A few panels are really funny. Hasn’t been updated in some time (like a few other webcommics you may know).

Wulffmorgenthaler

Wulf what? It’s created by Mikael Wulff and Anders Morgenthaler. Get it? And if you thought only badly drawn comics deal with offensive topics, well here’s a nicely drawn one. Love the art.

Garfield minus Garfield

Garfield Minus Garfield is a site dedicated to removing Garfield from the Garfield comic strips in order to reveal the existential angst of a certain young Mr. Jon Arbuckle.

This is the best thing that ever came out of the whole Garfield franchise. Actually this did NOT come out of the whole Garfield franchise. But Jim Davis (author of Garfield) did not mind when this webcomic became popular and even agreed for a book.

Why the one star? I hate Garfield. And although He/She/It is gone, the memory remains. Did you watch the Garfield movies?

My Life In A Cube

“Daily Drawings on Office Supplies from my Work Cubicle”. We’ve all been there. In the cubicle, waiting for the clock to get to 6PM on a Friday. Some are fun, some are sad. All are drawn on experimental material.

Abstruse Goose

The poor man’s XKCD. Sometimes its about maths, sometimes romance and sometimes Higgs Boson particles. It’s cool and it also has stick figures. Server tends to die out pretty fast when dugg.

The PC Weenies

It’s a family of computer geeks. And proud of it. If you’re the kind of person who has his hard disk hanging out of your PC cabinet (I have) you would totally appreciate this. (I do).

The Joy of Tech

Apple fanboys. But a funny tech comic nevertheless.

Urf

The planet URF is a strange place. It’s inhabited by a Human like species. But some things are different. Very nice.

Us the Robots

Not to be confused with We The Robots. The species is the same, but Oh the artwork! Now I’m a great fan of stick figures running a webcomic and my own comic needs treated photos because of the lack of my drawing skills… but Us the Robots is a visual treat. Wonderful 3D robots.

Buttersafe

Don’t let the weird name fool you… the comic is even weirder. This guy has surely been smoking some of that good stuff… Four stars for weirdness.

Truck Bearing Kibble

Get it? Truck Bearing Kibble. Hehe. Nudge, nudge. Wink wink. Truck Bearin…. Ok, even I don’t get it. But the comics funny, and that’s a fact.

Married to the Sea

Another strange name, another comic which captions old illustrations. But does it nicely. Go through the archives. Hours of fun.

Superpoop

Instead of old illustrations, you have modern photos. Funny remains the same.

AmazingSuperPowers

I haven’t come across any super powers on this comic. But it’s funny and well drawn. That’s a good enough super power to have. Don’t miss this one.

Shoebox

Shoebox is nice. In between comics and news, you’ll get a robot with a different feature every time. And then comics again.

Monkey Fluids

No precious simian bodily fluids here. Only the best set of fucked up captions for old illustrations. This trend is really catching on. I must do that Mughal miniature comics now.

Maneggs

Recently discovered this one. Another twisted comic with random topics. I like.

- – - – - – - – - – - – - -

So those are some of the good webcomics on my list. Next time I’ll do Indian webcomics. Not very many, but we’re growing. If you are making an webcomic or would like to start, please join the Indian Webcomics Google group.

If I missed a good one, please add it in the comments. If you don’t agree with the micro-review, feel free to correct me.

Update: Got a few more from the comments people posted. Do check them out. I’ve uploaded an OPML file of most of the webcomics I’m subscribed to. You can download it and import it in your feed reader. It has some Indian webcomics also. Feel free to share your own OPML file. (WTF is OPML?)

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{ 21 comments }

1 Sandeep 03.11.09 at 1:30 AM

Nice list

My favourite ones are:
Cyanide and Happiness
Savage Chickens
XKCD
Wulffmorgenthaler
Abstruse Goose
Buttersafe
Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal: http://www.smbc-comics.com/
Super Effective http://www.vgcats.com/super/
Dinosaur Comics: http://www.qwantz.com/

2 Raoul 03.11.09 at 3:44 AM

As a former grad student, I would have to disagree with your rating for PHD comics. I think it’s one of the funniest comics ever. Oh, and I would also highly recommend Jesus and Mo (http://www.jesusandmo.net/) and Dinosaur comics (http://www.qwantz.com/)

3 Kunjel 03.11.09 at 6:14 AM

Great list.
I love Savage Chicken.
I got to meet the Penny Arcade guys
a few weeks back. They were really witty
and smart.

4 Kannan 03.11.09 at 7:20 AM

I love PBF comics, it’s a pity it’s no longer running. It’s very bizarre, and funny in a weird sort of way. Even the artistic style looks schizophrenic, because there’s a few different styles which are entirely consistent within themselves; as if there are a few people who draw the comics.

5 AGeekStory 03.11.09 at 10:47 AM

A few other than the ones you mentioned that I like are:

LICD (your site mostly has an ad to it :) )
Simulated comic product ( http://simulatedcomicproduct.com/ )
Indexed ( http://thisisindexed.com/ ) LOVE this one.
Dog hates ME ( http://doghatesme.com/ )
Mordant Orange ( http://www.mordantorange.com/mo/ )
The Chalkboard Manifesto ( http://www.chalkboardmanifesto.com/ )

6 Bhaanu 03.11.09 at 10:47 AM

That flower seems to be talking to me :(

7 @AravindJose 03.11.09 at 11:45 AM

Great list. I wanted someone to do this and am very happy.

8 Crucifire 03.11.09 at 12:57 PM

Awesome list man! Cynide, Savage, Joy of tech, PBF and Married to the sea r my favs.. here r my two cents -

1. Fredo and Pidjin – http://www.pidjin.net/
2. Elftor – http://www.elftor.com/
3. The guy who cannot draw comics – http://www.i-mockery.com/comic/listcomics.php
4. The Book of Biff – http://www.thebookofbiff.com/

PHEW!!

9 Sree 03.11.09 at 3:20 PM

WHAT?! You don’t like Garfield? WHY? HOW? You hate Garfield, I hate YOU! What’s not lovable about that lazy fat cat? He’s like you.

Hmmm… I think I’ll bookmark this page.

10 Rockus 03.11.09 at 6:44 PM

Awesome list! I love Garfied minus Garfield and the original one! Yeah, the movies too! :P
Abstruse Goose reminds of certain somebody, so I dont go there at all these days. Basic Instructions is a comic I feel really underrated.

11 Chirag Gupta 03.12.09 at 1:04 AM
12 geebs 03.12.09 at 8:57 AM

How do you guys find time to go thru all of them!!!

I find it difficult enough to track XKCD, PhDC and FYF…

sigh…

13 saima 03.12.09 at 5:19 PM

nice list! :) i hate Garfield too !! lol

14 AGeekStory 03.12.09 at 6:42 PM

@geebs: one word for you – RSS !
try google reader if you haven’t, and you’ll be following hundreds of blogs/comics :)

15 Saad Akhtar (Author) 03.13.09 at 12:03 AM

Hey Thanks! Got a few more to add to the RSS reader. I forgot to mention Toothpaste for Dinner. Strangely no one else mentioned it too. People, check out T.F.D. it’s bizarre.

16 geebs 03.13.09 at 5:29 AM

I have an RSS feed collector in FF, Sage. Thats how I track most.

But so many????

17 AD 03.14.09 at 4:59 PM

I find your lack of pictures for sad children disturbing…

also, a softer world

18 Saad Akhtar (Author) 03.14.09 at 5:33 PM

@geebs: All you need is time. You have internet at office, dont you?

@ad: Ah yes, I recently unsubscribed to P.F.S.C. and A softer world, although is great, I wouldn’t label it a webcomic in the strictest sense of the term. (I might take some flak for this, but SCREW YOU FLAK GIVERS, it’s my list!).

19 KaustubhT 06.27.09 at 5:45 PM

Very cool list. I got some more names on my reader thanks to this post.

Here are some other comics that enjoy the prestigious position of sitting in my Webcomics folder in my reader (harr!)(along with Flyyoufools, FYI):

Questionable Content: Don’t know how you missed out on this one. I think its one of the most popular webcomic strips out there. Basically its a totally modern, explicit, no holds barred mixture of Seinfeld and Friends. (www.questionablecontent.com)

The Fart Party: If you’re a fan of the comics published from the house of Drawn & Quarterly, The Fart Party will surely be to your liking. It accounts the day-to-day happenings and rantings of the author, Julie Wertz, a struggling cartoonist living in the big city. (http://www.fartparty.org/)

Creative Time Comics: A great comic put out every month by various people all over the world (http://creativetime.org/comics/)

VG Cats: I enjoy this more than Penny Arcade. (http://www.vgcats.com/)

Truth Serum: An awesomely hilarious take on the superhero genre. (http://citycyclops.com/comics.php)

20 sajal 11.12.09 at 3:53 AM

userfriendly.org <– the only webcomic i read daily religiously….

21 Abhinav Garg 12.22.09 at 12:54 PM

Questionable Content is another great webcomic

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