Webcomic Review
Steal This Comic
"Cue Junkyard Harmonica"

Roll opening credits- waitaminit, we need a junkyard harmonica! You know, something funky and upbeat, real streety but cheerful so you know it's comedy, right?

Not like you're going to be confused about THAT...

Carlisle Devonish's "Steal This Comic" kicks right off with flamboyant, cartoony art and flamboyant, cartoony characters who're immediately embroiled in heavy sitcom discussions like a particularly seamy Sanford and Son meets Three's Company.

And I'm not kidding about the seamy. Devon (our hero) has adopted a talking dog. Except it's a talking gay dog. But the dog lies about being gay- but then who can blame him with Devon talking obliquely about a peanut butter incident that happened because he was so lonely.

Yeek! And that sets the tone for Steal This Comic's limits (or if you like shame): there isn't any. It may or may not be loaded with jokes but like Mel Brooks, it rises BELOW vulgarity. Way, way below...

And that's kinda fun if you're very very not easily offended. You're basically watching for foul outbursts that aren't obvious- and they do turn up where you least expect them. Not every strip, but then sometimes you're knocked for a loop by some gag that no other strip would ever think of...

I chuckled when Devon's undesired would-be girlfriend came in, talking about King's tiara (King is the gay talking dog), and Devon interjected "crown" without being able to stop her. That was pretty straightforward comic interplay.

But I cracked up when she said what's hers is Devon's, he replied "then explain the tampons in my bathroom" and got, in return, "Hey. You could get a nose bleed." I totally did not expect the comic's twistedness to be expressing itself through her- and was unprepared for the remark, as unprepared as they come.

And that's the thing- though the strip is scandalous, though it is still finding its legs and at the time I write this is only at 64 episodes, though the characters are outrageous and cartoony and ridiculous, it's still establishing character well enough that I thought I knew what Gabby (the girlfriend) would say- and the comic played on that to nail me with a gag. It didn't even break Gabby's character to do so. She ain't the brightest bulb in the tulip bed, and she didn't mean anything by the suggestion- but it still got me, but good.

And that's how this sort of thing is done. The story, such as it is, can do anything and go anywhere as long as it's funny- but the characters, those are your reference points. You'll get Devon talking to a mean guy on the street who's telling him about an old crush of Devon's... she died two years ago, you should have dated her when you had the chance- and Devon is frozen, stunned, while the guy recounts a horrible bra-removing accident involving a banana peel, a door knob, and DEATH- and when Devon can finally speak, turns out he got stuck on the 'I had a CHANCE with her?' and pretty much didn't hear anything else.

This isn't the nicest guy you could meet- he's kinda horrible- but it's easy to understand him, and that's how the humor works. The world of the comic is ridiculous and can do anything, but Devon's reactions (and those of everybody else) are human. There's no inertia to the reality of the strip but there is inertia, reality etc. to Devon's feelings...

So you can have Devon naked, having just escaped a soccer referee who caught him by his assless underwear (the ass was shot off by God with a bolt of lightning) and was left holding nothing but the underwear- and you get a little 'censored' black bar for his penis in a frontal shot. Devon's aware of this, and appalled, so he gives a 'whaaaat?' look and is rewarded with a much BIGGER black bar. His dignity restored, he turns away haughtily, his dick far too good for the common folk now- at which point his bare ass gets a black bar, except it says '25 cents to enter'...

I don't think you could have a nice clean version of this comic. It would be like having a clean Richard Pryor... there's an edge here that comes from the merciless wrongness and though the art style gets better and better, it wouldn't be the same without the nosebleed tampons, the 25 cent asses, the relentless vulgarity.

Because the thing is, anything funny has to work in a zone- it's the general map of where you expect the comic is going to go. Steal This Comic takes great pains to stake out the zone of 'incredibly vulgar', but then it turns around and gets half its laughs from character interaction that doesn't have to be vulgar. The vulgar gets you going in a direction and then the joke or funny bit comes from somewhere else- but if it wasn't so damn vulgar, the gags would be more obvious. It's the incredible vulgarity and wrongness that set you up for unexpected gags and funny things.

And that gives you the feeling that Steal This Comic can be funny in a whole variety of ways, most of which are totally vile- but not all! And that is a fine thing- nobody wants to go stale and be predictable.

I don't know how hard it is thinking up gags for Steal This Comic- but the nice thing is, I don't care. I just sort of assume that the next comic might not be funny but within three comics or so there's going to be something that knocks me on my ass- or even cracks me up to the point that I laugh out loud at the joke- the highest praise. And since the comic managed that not just once but a couple times, I'm betting it'll do it again at some point. Don't know when, don't know how- but I do know that I'll be checking Steal This Comic out again. During the time I've been watching it, it's found its muse.

Okay, not "muse". It's got a gay dog, not cats. "Arfse"- sweetie.