Comic 985: That's a looooot of alt-text.

Hey everyone, this is SoRCFs (on Randall's Comic Forums: Schadenfreude) (SoRCFS) here with some more reviewage and whatnot. Since Gamer_2k4 has decided to bugger off to parts unknown and leave miscreants such as myself in charge here, I'm mourning his passing by doing a somewhat timely post. Don't count on this being a regular occurrence. At all.



title: Percentage Points;alt text: Grayton also proposed making college scholarships available exclusively to sexually active teens, amnesty for illegal immigrants who create room for themselves by killing a citizen, and a graduated income tax based on penis size. He has been endorsed by Tracy Morgan, John Wilkes Booth's ghost, and the Time Cube guy.

You know what I occasionally enjoy doing? Pretending I'm Robin (the Burt Ward one) from the old campy Batman series. And by saying that, I mean I enjoy imitating his overused "Holy [something fancy], Batman!" catchphrase. That said, don't look at me strangely when I say this:

Holy four lines of alt-text, Batman!

I did something weird a few days ago: I reread the early archives of Xkcd. Okay, so there's not too much to say about it. It was way back before Randall had a huge fanbase to pander to and otherwise appear nerdy at. I've alluded to reading a lot of webcomics before, so what I saw was nothing unexpected for a fledgling artist--a little less consistent art, less of a feel for what the comic is about, that kind of thing. But you know what struck me most? Brevity. The first comic's alt-text is three words long. Tiny. It added a little something meaningful to the comic, but didn't distract the reader from what they had just read.Compare that to today's. Ew. 985 shows up as a whopping 4-line, 50 word, 317 character (268 excluding spaces) monster.

The joke isn't one I find funny, but humor's subjective so I'll let that one slide (in this case). Even if I found this joke humorous, I still wouldn't laugh. Why? Because I had no clue where the comic was going. My eyes followed, in order, the title, text in panel, the caption under it, and finally the monstrous tooltip.

Here's a brief view of what's going on in my head at that point:
Title: "Percentage points" Okay, so it's all about--
Panel: um--drunk drivers? Drone strikes on Christmas? I what is going on--
Caption: Wait polls now?
Tooltip: What is going on??!?!?!
Afterwards: Okay, I need to reread this. Dammit.

The Alt-text is busy. So is the panel. In fact, it's so busy that I forgot about the title (which foreshadowed the allegedly funny caption) on the way down. It's not that I have ADD or something--I just couldn't see how it was funny through the thicket of other jokes. When the focus of the comic--"Percentage points" as the now-forgotten title had told me about--hit, I was just confused because it seemed like the joke hadn't been set up everywhere.

One thing I sincerely hope Randall will learn is that you can't always fit more than one joke into a comic. Of course it's possible: see this Brawl in the Family (and commentary!) for an example of a secondary joke in the background that doesn't detract from the what the author's been building up the whole strip. But in this Xkcd? The extras distract from the joke that the title indicates he wants to make fun of or complain about or something. As a result, the actual joke feels underdeveloped or, in my case, not there at all.

Here's a "Sucks (not that much) Less" from me:


title: Percentage Points;alt text: Don't we all.

Okay, Still not funny. But it's clear on what joke it's trying to get through. That's at least a step in the right direction.

tl;dr: the alleged joke is buried inside a mountain of other jokes. The two parts are bad for each other.

Addendum: The sharper-eyed members of the audience will notice that I reused the til-now solitary "list comic" tag. Well, to be fair, the list isn't exclusively on the comic. It extends through the tooltip as well.

And another thing: The tooltip! I just realized I started talking about the tooltip and didn't really go back to it. Uhm, that's totally intentional. See what happens when you start with one thing, distract the audience with something else, then go back where you started? They're confused as hell! This was totally a self-demonstrating article! Right, guys?

....

Guys?

Comic 975: The Non-Event Horizon

Well, the masses are empowering me to be a lazy bum and not write my own reviews. Works for me, I guess. This one was submitted by one "anon."


Title: Occulting Telescope; alt-text: Type II Kardashev civilizations eventually completely enclose their planetary system in a Dyson sphere because space is way too big to look at all the time.

Simply put, this strip is just plain stupid. There's nothing insightful or witty about the presented situation. So there's a guy who wants to block stars from being seen with a telescope. Why doesn't he just put a lid on the telescope? No, instead he invents an elaborate system where the telescope inserts small discs between the lens and the stars. How quirky and idiosyncratic!

Now that we are here, why not have a microscope that prevents seeing bacteria? Or a rocket that does not move? Oh, how hilarious that would have been!

This cartoon is like a shaggy dog story except it finishes before getting past the first step and there's no joke. Randall didn't even bother to think how the discs could really block the stars. In fact, it's almost like he didn't understand at all how telescopes work. Unfunny, uninspiring. Clumsy writing, too. "I thought the Point was to image extrasolar planets." […] "He has a Point…". And there's no joke.

The idea suggested in the alt-text, that a planetary civilization might be so advanced that it has blocked others from seeing them, could've been a more amusing scenario. But no, Randall chose to depict the less interesting idea and mention the better one in passing. Although no doubt he would have messed that too.

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P.S. from Gamer_2k4

Explain xkcd actually came in handy this time around. It doesn't actually help the fact that the comic is completely retarded, though. As the alt-text demonstrates, the punch line "stars freak me out" is interchangeable with many, many setups. The fact that Randall chose a slow, unnecessarily complicated one just shows what a hack he is (not to mention that "I'm scared of stars" is a really, really lousy joke).

Maybe, with a little comedic timing, this could work. Maybe if it was told in person instead of in a webcomic, the slow buildup to the punchline could have some merit. But, Randall isn't a stand-up comic (thank God). He uses drawings for his humor. And he uses them poorly.

Comic 960: FedXkcd

Title: Subliminal; alt-text: Once you see it, you can't help seeing it every time. Until your body finishes metabolizing the mushrooms.

You know what, let's start this thing off on a good note. Randall shows instead of telling! The guy sees crazy stuff, and Randall shows us the same thing! Oh. And then he has to tell us what we're seeing. Well, scratch that, I guess.

The main problem with today's strip is that it has no substance. This is essentially equivalent to someone saying, "What do you think that cloud looks like?" and someone else responding with something wacky. If Randall had started there, he would have realized that that's no joke. Problem is, he didn't start there.

No, this joke likely came from Randall discovering the FedEx arrow for the first time and thinking, "I bet I can make a comic about this!" (You can tell by the way he tries to hide it with the line, "I thought everyone knew about it.") Further evidence for this theory comes from the fact that the setup, focus, and punchline of the joke are all distinct from each other (and I'm giving him a lot of credit by not counting the "medication" line as post-punchline dialogue).

Think about it. Subliminal messaging (in this case, the FedEx arrow) is one distinct concept. Seeing shapes and images where they don't exist ("pareidolia" for those of you interested in the so-called "soft" sciences) is one distinct concept. Blaming medication for something is one distinct concept (seriously, think of how many jokes that punchline could finish). Ever seen the "Cartoon Wars" episodes of South Park, where Family Guy jokes are constructed by manatees matching up several random "idea balls"? That's what this is. This is a manatee joke.

Comic 939: Brick Joke

Or, Alt-Text: The Works of a Man Who Sucks at Movie Titles. A man who can't see a joke when it's right in front of his face, COMING FROM HIS OWN THOUGHTS.


Title: Arrow; alt-text: 'The Return of the Boomerang' would make a great movie title.

No, Randall. No, it wouldn't make a great movie title. BUT IT WOULD MAKE A GREAT FREAKING TITLE FOR THIS COMIC, YOU HACK! Look! You have this idea, and in the right context - THIS context - it would work for something! You have a TRIPLE meaning here and you just threw it into the alt-text! What's wrong with you?

1) The comic is about a returning boomerang.
2) The comic is a return to the boomerang comics.
3) "Return of the..." is a common title that you'd be parodying.

Wow.

There's no avoiding it: This comic is awful. It's what Jon Levi would call a Brick Joke; way the heck back in Comic 475, a guy threw a boomerang and it never came back. Where did it go? Well, ladies and gentlemen, here it is. Isn't Randall smart?

Well, no, no he isn't. The original boomerang strips were so bad that they triggered one of Carl's angriest rants. This one is no better. I'm not even going to give him credit for keeping the word count down, because UNNECESSARY DIALOGUE SHOULD NOT BE AN ISSUE FOR A SEASONED CARTOONIST. The last strip put him in some serious debt that he's not going to be out of for a while anyway, so screw that.

So what's the joke here? Simple: There is no joke. There is a reference to an older strip, and referential humor is not humor at all. Remember how everyone was all "The cake is a lie!" when Portal came out? Remember how it wasn't funny? Remember why? It's because simply quoting or otherwise referencing something and not adding into it means you're doing jack in the way of humor. Randall's no stranger to doing jack in the way of humor (counting this post, we've reviewed 27 strips, and 11 of those have had the no joke tag), but somehow, that hasn't ceased ticking me off yet.

There's really not much more to say than that. A guy shoots an arrow and a boomerang comes back. He acts surprised. Why? Was he expecting an arrow to return instead? Did the arrow turn into a boomerang midway through its flight? Did it just drop out of the sky? WE'LL NEVER KNOW. All we know is that a guy shoots an arrow (not a joke) and catches a boomerang (not a joke). That makes it WORSE than the original boomerang strips, which were already all kinds of bad. At least there, the punchlines (something wacky returning, or nothing at all returning) were set up by a guy throwing a boomerang and expecting it back by the last panel. This doesn't even have a setup.

Look. Randall. Referencing old strips that weren't funny will not make you funny. It's a sign of laziness. It's a sign of a poor (non-existent?) sense of humor. It's a sign that you're a freaking hack.

Stop writing drawing posting this garbage.


P.S. Prolific commenter UndercoverCuddlefish notes on the other hate blog:

honestly what makes a brick joke entertaining is the sense of looking back and realizing that the comedian planned for the punchline well in advance

there is a sort of enjoyable release associated with being outwitted by the comedian as the punchline to the brick joke arrives mere moments after you completely forget about the setup

this shit is not even close to comparable

He goes on to make some more decent points, so take a look at the link. I should get him to write guest reviews.

Comic 929: It's Impossible to Speculate at This Time

Evening chumps.


Title: Speculations; alt-text: 'I was pretty good at skeet shooting, but was eventually kicked off the range for catching the clay pigeons in a net and dispatching them execution-style.'

Well, I'll say one thing for Munroe's craft - I initially thought the subject matter of the conversation had anything at all to do with the joke. More fool me, however; it is just chat to fill time and establish that they're playing catch. Which is good because if it was actually important, the fact that the guy facing right suddenly becomes the guy facing left would wrong-foot us (are some motion lines to show him turning too much to ask? Oh well).

But that's not the joke. What is the joke is that instead of catching the ball as one would be expected to do in his situation, Mr. Hat takes 'catch' to mean 'hunt, obtain' and shoots it with a crossbow (because crossbows, like Google+, are nerdy and cool)*. This is an idea which is extended in the alt-text. It isn't a particularly funny idea, but you can't have everything.

He shot the ball. So what? He's Mr. Hat, he's not the 'catch' type, he's a classy asshole, remember? This is assholish and it's, er, classy? (because it's a crossbow?) so it's in character so it must be funny. No. The alt-text is a more amusing situation - in clay pigeon shooting you are actually expected to shoot them, so his finding a circuitous way of shooting them is more amusing than completely misinterpreting the meaning of the word 'catch' - but it's not very well written (it's the juxtaposition of 'skeet shooting' and 'the clay pigeons' I don't like - think for instance of the sentence "He threw the ball at me, and I caught the orb." Orb and ball do mean the same thing, true, but the use of synonyms means the two halves of the sentence don't seem connected. So yeah I'd rewrite the alt as 'clay pigeon shooting' and 'catching the targets in a net') and in any case it comes attached to a comic that might fool you with its 'nerdy' conversation but is, in fact, incredibly slight and, incredibly, not funny.

But never mind. jpk rides to the rescue:

Maybe he just couldn't come up with a punchline. Cancer's a bitch, he's got stuff on his mind. Happens.

Sigh. Goodbye now.

*And he does it without looking, too! That's like so megacool crowning moment of awesome Mr. Hat is a BadassNormal etc etc aaaaargh killllll meeeee

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Ed. Note:
I know I'm pushing this in every medium I can find (xkcdsucks, the xkcd forums, and now here), but we can't let the second panel off easy with just "the character positioning is wrong" as the criticism (though it is). The thing that gets me, as it's possibly the worst part of the comic (except the total lack of relevance between the setup and punchline), is that Randall's making an awful analogy while being completely oblivious of the fact that he just admitted to having no social life in the real world. That's our Randall!