Achewood is a comic about the lives of a bunch of animals who walk and talk and live anthropomorphic lives under the feet of humans.  However, nineties Saturday morning cartoon this is not.

Achewood is stark, absurd slice of life; and pretty funny too.  Well, once you’ve been seduced by it.

Most webcomics have a habit of producing characters who serve only as fleshy vehicles for punch lines.  This isn’t necessarily a bad thing- provided authors don’t treat their gag-machines as anything else, like trying to inject some hapless drama with a miscarriage storyline, for example.

Two of my favourite webcomics buck this trend, and one is Achewood, which manages not only to have deep characters, but diverse characters.  The cast of Achewood spans a number of demographics, and feels a whole lot more organic as a result.

The amount of dedication and detail put into Achewood, It’s no surprise.  The characters have each their own complex web of relationships, motivations, goals and habits- something backed up by the character blogs that Chris maintained.

I have a cutout like this for keeping schoolchildren off my property

This is a little bit of a double-edged sword though- Achewood doesn’t have the same kind of cold-start funnies that a majority of webcomics aim for- humour is generally character based.  Newcomers to the strip have a bit of an uphill struggle as they acquaint themselves with Roast Beef’s depression and Todd’s coke habit before the strip fully comes to bloom.  Similarly, there’s a certain degree of cultural awareness thrown around in Achewood; so non-US citezens, beware.

Like kung-fu and karate, trenchcoats and trilbies only look cool in films

These are all things I’ve heard said by people before me, and more eloquently too.  So let me try a fresher tack.  Achewood is a fever dream.

While not a fully coherent theological view, it does solve the problem of evil.

Achewood is watching the tragic march of characters trying to manufacture their own happy endings in a desolate life; some with more of a head start than others.

This is sharpest in a social setting, so we never see anyone really ‘working’.  Ray pays lip-service to the notion of making money, and later we see Molly working shifts; but this serves mostly as a device for conflict.

Roast Beef has it particularly bad- every success he has is dwarfed in comparison to Ray’s effortless achievements, and he has to die a number of deaths before he meets the woman he loves.  All the while he’s betrayed by his family, and struggles with the black dog.  Once he has Molly, he struggles not to push her away.

The rest of the cast live lives similarly- Pat spends his time in furious denial, Lyle and Todd whittle away their lives with substance abuse, and Cornelius has become so inoculated to creativity and inspiration that he spends his days producing paperback mockeries of what he once held dear.

Trivial is a relative term

Philippe’s innocence and playful nature are even turned on their head more than once.  I’d tell you more, but y’know, spoilers.

The Cartilaginous Head strips are thick with this kind of atmosphere, and contains possibly my favourite end of arc in all of Achewood.

Turtlenecks and gramophones.

So yeah, Achewood.  It’s dark, it’s delicious, and I love it- so those of you who haven’t had the chance, go have a look.

Of course, Sam and I couldn’t pass up the opportunity for an Anti comic here- something bright, florid and highly strung in contrast to the dreamlike monochrome of Achewood-

So with an abrupt end to this review I give you Blueballs.

Once again, I've had this ready to post for about a month. PROFESSIONALISM