Comic Links

Comic Links

Online Comics
Theory and Criticism
Manga
Professional
Commercial
Miscellaneous

Online Comics

Zark: http://www.zark.com
"Argon Zark" is, according to its creators, the first "virtual comic book." It's designed exclusively for the Web and presented installments as a serial story. The title character somehow developed a method for physically transporting his "aquaintences" (sic) around the Internet. It looks like a typical video game but the content is somewhat sophisticated and satirical. For instance, Argon Zark's world is controlled by "The Nine or 10 Guys Who Secretly Run Everything."

Goats: http://www.goats.com
On the other end of the spectrum, the online comic-strip "Goats" presents more modern narratives. In what appears to be some sort of skull-and-gun store, one of the characters announces his interest in "an official 'I want James Earl Jones' cock up my ass' t-shirt." It kind of makes you miss Tommy. "Goats" has produced a spinoff called "Diablo," which is about, as far as I can tell, a chicken and a hippie.

Fried Society: http://www.fried.com/pics
"Fried Society" is a weekly strip by Chris Kelly. The artistry is rather pedestrian, but the text is hilarious. There's no narrative connection from one week to the next. In one episode, we're introduced to Tomorrow Man--a hero whose super-power is the dubious ability to procrastinate. In another, two guys at the "Think Institute" argue about the linguistic possibilities of the word "ass."

Megaton Man: http://www.megatonman.com
This site provides great links and lessons on how to draw cartoons. "Megaton Man" is a genuinely hilarious parody of super-hero comics. Trent Phloog was bitten by a radioactive frog, consequently developed super-powers, and turned into the immensely exaggerated Megaton Man. The innocent, kid-friendly animation is deceptive, because suddenly, a character will blurt out something like, "Fuck you, old man! Give me back my horse!"

Sluggy Feelance: www.sluggy.com
Sluggy Freelance is by far my first choice of online references to comics and comic strip sites. Sluggy (as it is often called) is not significant in terms of highly developed story lines or narrative voices; its only real claim to fame is a good synthesis of dialogue, artistic representation and references to cultural events such as Star Trek, Alien, and Survivor (all of which are phenomenons that defy any real explanation).

Dangernauts: www.dangernauts.com
A relatively new site that has only now released its first episodes online. The storyline attempts to examine the origins of popular science fiction during the Golden Era of the early 1950’s and 60’s, when science fiction was seen as merely entertainment for children. Interestingly enough, the plot line and narrative forms tend to emphasize the mature nature of the background to these programs and examines, albeit briefly, some of the motivations that created these programs.

Clown Squad: www.clownsquad.com
Based on the theory that clowns actually are genetic mutations rather than costumed entertainers, Clown Squad is one of the visually most stunning sites I have seen, with a wide expanse of hypertext and Java modules which create a very interesting reading atmosphere. The comic strip strives for a sense of interactiveness, even going to the point of having a pull down menu at one point to insert the correct pithy response for the "comic" hero. New postings for the comic strip are only found irregularly; however, due to the technical nature of the pages themselves, they are well worth the time. Due to the high level of web features, this site is only worth your time if you have a high speed Internet connection.

Helen: www.peterzale.com/helen
Helen, Sweetheart of the Internet, receives my vote for one of the most intelligent and well written comics I have found during my search. The artwork is very minimal, using only inks to express the characters and their emotions, yet the strip has a very strong visual content to it. The focus of the strip is on Helen, a network administrator and technogeek icon. The content of the strip is VERY well though out and the artist’s portrayal of Helen is, in my opinion, incredibly accurate and sensitive. The archives also contain biographical information and authro’s notes about each strip, it’s impact and other interesting tidbits. The only problem I see with the site is the constant mantra about Peter Zale’s desire to become syndicated; almost every other author’s note makes some mention of his desire to be more open or risque and his choice not to do so in order to be more appealing for national serialization.

Utropolis: http://4.17.177.161/UT/Utropolis/utrpagea.html
Utropolis is a dark sci-fi vision of the future. It subtle use of shadow and shading techniques tends to underline the author’s view of human potential. Although the storyline is incomplete at best, the artwork alone tends to show that this comic has a lot of potential as an action comic.

Beekeeper Cartoon Amusements: http://www.beecomix.com/index.htm
This is Jason Little’s site, he is a comic artist/writer as well as a commercial illustrator. Jason has a number of original comics and comic excerpts on his site. Bee is by far his coolest comic; it features a photo-mat monkey/detective, Bee. While Bee is not an online comic per se, it is mainly distributed on the internet. Little is using his webpage to sell Bee to alternative print newsweeklies. He’s got an interesting section where he shows Bee in full color, black and white, 2-color, and 3-color process.

Robot Stories: http://www.robotstories.com/
Robot Stories-While Robot Stories looks a lot like other online comics (four frames of equal size and rough, yet computer assisted, illustrations) there are a lot of things that set it apart. First of all it is created using partly transparent images over a paper bag texture, and it also occasionally uses scans or photographs of actual objects. It is the tale of a very unrobotic robot working customer service, think robot Dilbert.

Zentoons: http://home.earthlink.net/~twelvepm/zentoons/morgue.html
Zentoons-Created by Paul Murray, a self proclaimed "big-time advertising geek," Zentoons are simple four panel strips about everything and anything. They are drawn out on lined notebook paper, scanned, and put up on the web. Murray says he is just killing time and sees no money in his doodling. Murray is smart and witty; his drawing style is sketchy if not charming. Zentoons is a good example of doing it for the love of comics.

Art Comics: http://www.artcomic.com/
Art Comics by Bebe Williams-Art Comics claims to have the longest running comic on the internet. But man is it bizarre; Comics Daily (a daily strip) seems to be a text driven story about alien abductions that utilizes found photographs. Another equally as weird comic from Art Comics is Bobby Ruckers. I can’t tell what it’s about (other than Bobby Ruckers and a fly) but it uses illustrations, found images, and photography to make a strange black and white mix.

Exercises in Style: http://www.indymagazine.com/comics/style.shtml
Exercises in Style-Matt Madden writes and draws this "comic." It is inspired by a work of the same name by the French writer Raymond Queneau. "The goal of this project is to apply the same principle to comics by creating as many variations as possible on a simple one-page non-story: different points of view, different genres, different formal games, and so on." Hosted on Indy Magazine ( www.indymagazine.com ), which is also worth checking out; it’s a "guide to alternative comics."

Queer Nation: http://www.queernation.com/
Queer nation, The online gay comic: A self titled "utterly uncensored superheroic gay soap opera satire". This comic is full of political and social commentary. Plus, it’s also really funny.

Comicazee: http://www.comicazee.com/
Comicazee, alternative comics online: Alternative comics for gays, lesbians, ultraliberals, and other subversives. Will western civilization survive?

Big Panda: http://www.bigpanda.net
This site contains tons of on-line comics. The list itself is pretty big and includes comics about various subject matter (including adult subjects and video games) as well as a number of Japanese inclusions. There is also a search function in order to identify on-line comics by category (comedy, daily, weird, adventure, adult, etc.).

The Joey Zone: http://www.geocities.com/boojumhaus/HOMEPAGE.htm
Home of "The Joey Zone" and his wife. Joey is a long-time indie press contributor and occasionally a publisher.

The Adventures of Muggs Mulcher: www.muggsmulcher.com
Bruce Allen Wallis Presents the Adventures of Muggs Mulcher. Online versions of the graphic novel adventures of Muggs Mulcher, an African-American "Shaft-like" superhero. Colorful and vivid, the site is interesting but lacking in any interesting links. Has kind of a satirical edge, as Muggs fights alien badguys.

Eternity Axis: www.io.com/~khc/eternityaxis/
The Eternity Axis. An online graphic novel by Kelley Cain about people who rise from the dead and "ascend to a position between mortals and angels". Lots of links, GREAT artwork, though the story seems a little silly.

The Sixth Seal: www.geo.fmi.fi/~tmakinen.cartoons/t6s/index.html
The Sixth Seal. Another online graphic novel by Teemu Makinen (from Finland) with all black and white artwork. Seems to have Egyptian art influences, even has little Egyptian icons on the home page. Reviewed to be "an intellectual, futuristic psychological journey".

Deadman: www.billustration.com/webnoir.html
Deadman. A graphic "webnoir" in 37 pictures, surrealistically rendered by Bill Russell. It is based on the short story by James M. Cain which seems to be intriguing. Unique artwork, and pictures of Russell’s 2-year-old son Liam make this quite a find.

Before Sunrise: www.sickbaby.hypermart.net
Before Sunrise. A series of Japanese online graphic novels. Black and white illustrations, many without words, though the few words given are in Japanese, and this makes it difficult for an English speaker to know what’s going on. One of the coolest I’ve seen so far, though.

Sequential Tart: www.sequentialtart.com
Sequential Tart "A webzine about the comics industry published by an eclectic band of women". Interviews, reviews and links trying to "raise the level of awareness of women’s influence in the comics industry". Well organized and very cool. Manga, graphic novels, comic strips and arrant feminism pervade.

Lemon Custard Comics: http://www.lemoncustard.com
Lemon Custard Comics. Mark Badger has a long history in the printed medium of comics and displays his work with a bit of flash modification on the web. Many of the comics are an interesting blend of flash technologies and traditional panel layouts. Some of the comics are clearly comics, while a number seem more like animation. The site wants to marry the more "profound" approaches to comics as seen in the overwrought "Imagined Freedom" with quirky superhero type stories like "Hauted Man." There’s even a biographical comic.

Crater Kid: http://www.craterkid.com
Crater Kid. Funky retro style that harks back to the sci-fi comics of the fifties. The stories are about as compelling as the old Mandrake the Magician comics due to the limitations of a three panel set up.

Astounding Space Thrills: http://www.astoundingspacethrills.com/
Astounding Space Thrills. Much like Crater Kid in its set up. Straightforward Flash Gordon type hero told in 3 panel stories. The comic use some flash effects, but has the heart of a traditional comic. This has actually made the transition to the printed medium. Thus lending it some legitimacy.

Toozeday Komix: http://www.word.com/komix/
Toozeday Komix. This site is really fun to browse. New comics go up every Tuesday, and these are good, old, underground comics drawn by some of the most well-known and cutting edge comics artists working. The archives are huge, and easy to browse. While we don’t see any web-specific comics here, there are a lot of good ones.

Doonesbury: www.doonesbury.com
A very political comic. Standard newspaper layout. Inovation lacking in recent years, but in past frequently posted strips without character images, simply voices behind a landscape shot. Site has a lot of features, store, archives, games, cast info, FAQ section, but no comics related links.

Too Much Coffee Man: www.tmcm.com
Too Much Coffee Man. A minorly political cartoon. Strip has some overtly political overtones, but is mostly a societal critique. Combines strips with single panel layouts, frequently takes advantage of options available in an internet presentation. Site has archives, store, downloadables, and a couple sets of links.

Liberty Meadows: www.libertymeadows.com
Liberty Meadows. Another humor driven strip. The artist Frank Cho has a technique that occasionally reminds one of Bill Waterson, the artwork blends between stylized realism and strong iconics. Cho is an impressive artist and frequently takes the advantage to demonstrate it. Site has many features and a good link section, especially to Cho’s work beyond Liberty Meadows at Insight Studios.

Non-Sequitur: www.non-sequitur.com
Non-sequitur. Another social critique strip. Site features an archive, info on the creators, a store, and all the usual goodies.

Zot: www.comicbookresources.com/columns/zot/
Zot, Scott McCloud’s cult hit has an online chapter. There are sixteen episodes of the chapter. The site also has character info, a message board, and the ever-present merchandise.

E-sheep: www.e-sheep.com
E-Sheep. A multicultural digital comic site. Very interesting, with non-traditional stories. Suggest reading "The Jain’s Death." Site has many separate stories, and only stories, no links, no merchandise, only comics.

This Modern World: www.thismodernworld.com
This is a political comic depicting a talking penguin that speaks the voice of reason (it is hysterical). It illustrates the classic use of the messenger speaking the truth when all others involved can’t realize what is before their eyes.

Tedrall: www.tedrall.com
This is another political comic that I absolutely love. The site is user friendly and the drawing style is simple so don’t look for high artistic praise from your art people. The site is big on laughs and the political message is great.

Shoe Comics Page: www.shoecomicspage.com
Very crudely drawn comic strip that only has 3-4 frames per strip. It is a grate site that has a very extensive archive.

X-mun: www.xmun.com/xmoon/fun/sog.html
This is a bizarre site full of S&M style of comic strips. The site is in black and white with links to other sites that are also adult in nature. This site goes to prove that not all comics are meant for children.

Misc. German Comic: http://svenk.de/index01_a.htm
This site is in German and it goes to show that language is more than just spoken/written. Even though I don’t speak/read German, I can still understand (basically) what is going on in this color online comic.

Funny Inside: www.funnyinside.com
This site has roughly five pages of dirty comics and about four pages of clean comics. The pages look as if they were scanned in and the stories are incredibly silly and lack anything close to intelligence. But, they’re still funny.

The Tradesmen: www.thetradesmen.com/trd2401.htm
The Tradesmen is an online comic book by Fred Chung about pairs of people who work together to cast a spell. Ciphers read the spells and only their voices can activate the magical body part(s) of their partner called a Channel. They have traded in for these magical voices and body parts with a Trader for whom they now run errands and render services. The traders are essentially businessmen/merchants that use their tradesmen to do their dirty work like mercenaries. Cipher, Channel, Trader – no heroes or bad guys, it's just business.

Crosswinds: www.crosswinds.net/~offlineonline
Stranded in the torturous environment that is a Midwestern university, a group of five characters discover life and ways to escape it. Created and updated weekly by Jason Hill and Aaron Lindburgh, this online comic has five main characters, including Frisco, Scott, Tyler, Mackensie, and Dave (an "undead rabble-rouser). Dave is responsible for nearly all the evil in the world over the past few centuries including tyrants, geological disasters, and the television show "Friends."

Mooloo: www.mooloo.com/index.html
A cheesy little relationshippy comic. One interesting thing is that the author tried to combine photos with 'story telling' with a 'comic' style layout, and a 'trail' as a guide to lead your eye along. Nothing spectacular.

Natacha: www.sunflower.singnet.com.sg/~etienne/natacha/natacha.html
Weborders – The Belgian Comics: This online Belgian comic is about Natacha the air stewardess who is both "adventurous and sexy. What more could you ask for? Also there is a link to Sophie, a site which has much more information about an "adventurous young girl" named Sophie.

Merv Magus Cartoon: www.mervm.com
Merv Magus Cartoons: Painfully "clever" cartoons about a variety of subjects including home improvement, golf, hockey, travel, cars (referred to as "CARtoons), education and computers.

Amy Pond, USA: www.amiplasse.com/portfolio/windows/wn_pond
Any Pond, USA This is an unusual cross between hypertext and online comics. It really isn’t so much a story as an interactive visual display, where the animals perform, and I do mean perform, certain actions when selected. After a while, the background noise gets kind of annoying, but is worth a visit if you’re ever really bored with nothing to do online.

Astrochimp: http://www.scifi.com/astrochimp/ac1000/
Astrochimp – by Xeth Feinberg. This comic tells the story of the space race from a slightly different perspective. It is a strange combination of sarcasm and visual humor, but is fairly amusing.

Hey Potato: www.heypotato.com/index
Hey Potato. This site has a large index of online animation and comics, with information and links to each one. Most of the links are interesting, if extremely odd.

Rice Patooties: www.spumco.com/entertainment/whimsy/index
Rice Patooties: Starring Wally Whimsy. This is a parody of a cereal commercial. It’s really pretty funny, but it smells of Ren and Stimpy, since it is by their creators.

Sinfest: http://sinfest.net/strips_page
SinFest – by Tatsuya Ishida. This is an online comic strip and is pretty funny. It has its bad moments, but is definitely worth checking out, especially episodes "Devil Puppet," and "Bestsellers."

Swankytown: www.swankytown.com
Swankytown. Once you get through the formalities and actually get into the site, it is definitely worth several visits. The comic shorts alone are hysterical. I highly recommend "Who Wants to Marry a Maniac" which is a parody of a certain Fox show that will remain nameless, and the "The Four Horsemen" which follows the story of Hell’s house band and their adventures on earth.

Ozy and Millie:http://www.ozyandmillie.org/
This comic strip was described as being like your life but with foxes and stuff, and that was correct. The strip published on the fourth of March was dealing with downloading music off of the internet, and the characters, though foxes, could have been anybody on this campus. A very entertaining strip, it was the first one that I found done in color.

Galgpagos: http://www.bznet.com/me/uagman/galapagos.html
This site was the introduction to an entire world of comics called Galgpagos by David Gau. The initial site give you the choice to what strips you want to read, as well as a synopsis of the basic plot lines followed. The majority of the characters were animals, and they did interact with humans at certain points, but I did not find a pattern in this communication. The comic strip itself was cute, but not something that I would normally read.

College Roomies from Hell: http://www.crfh.net/new.htm
This comic was near to my heart. It was about college roommates from Hell (hence the title College Roomies from Hell) that live together in the residence halls. And because I now work in the residence halls here at the UI, I could take the situations that were described as strange and unusual, and relate them to the people in the halls right now.

Alice in Pimpland: http://my.voyager.net/happosai/
This has got to be my favorite comic I found online. "Alice in Pimpland" is a comic created by a variety of people. According to the website, "Alice in Pimpland is a round robin comic. Every week, a different person is allowed to draw and write the next chapter to the comic. Use the Alice in Pimpland Forum to sign up, and you too can have your chance on changing Alice's fate! You get one week to do and send in your submission." This sounds like a pretty cool idea, however it leads to a variety of ability levels. There were some weeks where the art was not so good, but the words were excellent, and some that were the exact opposite. But it is an interesting comic strip that follows the Alice in Wonderland theme with a few, well, unexpected plot twists.

Brian Clopper : http://www.brianclopper.com
Brian Clopper – Elementary School Teacher and Cartoonist. "Dead Guys In Space" is an oddly sensitive comic about two zombie space marine buddies sent out on suicide recon missions to the unstable parts of the universe. One thing that’s readily apparent is Clopper’s great sense of design, and his quirky sense of humor. He features sketches he’s drawn for his students and an ongoing strip, "Space Babies," about a group of instellar daycare kids who save humanity from the universe. Forthcoming is a series called "Heebie-Jeebies," and his stuff seems to be migrating from online to print. The site design is very simple, but gets the job done. The artwork doesn’t really take advantage of being online, mainly restricted to scans of pages.

Kyle Baker: http://www.kylebaker.com
Baker has a cool, updated-retro style that hearkens to the 30s and 40s. He has some cool comic strips, cartoons, animations, and lots of other artsy-type stuff on his site. His fine art gallery is a pretty cool Flash sequence, but overall it’s fairly derivative. But high quality derivation. The whole site is really snazzily put together and the presentation of the comics is top-notch.

Bob the Angry Flower: http://www.angryflower.com
The Official Bob the Angry Flower Homepage. An online classic, one of the first Web comics I ever encountered, "Bob the Angry Flower" has sustained its popularity. Although never exclusively web-based, it’s fun to read. But the comics are mainly laid out as single images that look like scans of the original artwork.

Cheap Paper Art: http://www.cheappaperart.com/menu.html
Cheap Paper Art. This site contains several online comics, as well as graphic novels and weekly comic strips. The reviews here showcase indie comics, as well as information where to buy the recommended material.

Dope Dragon: http://www.dopedragon.co.uk/
Dope Dragon. This site hosts a Flash-based comic called "Wayz of the Dragon." It’s a sci-fi, surrealist comic put to house beats (lots of drum and bass). It kind of reminds me of the first Heavy Metal movie.

Monkey Fun: http://www.monkeyfun.com
Monkey Fun. This site has several different interactive comic-type-things to do. Mostly using Flash and Java, these are pretty fun. Highlights include Big Head’s Amazing Comic Strip Adventure Game and the Joe Cartoon Blender.

The Boondocks: http://www.boondocks.net
The Boondocks, "inciting angry black children since 1998," or so says the webpage. Aaron McGruder is a comic artist who is unafraid to tackle racial and political subjects. The result is bold and hilarious. This website offers character sketches from "Because I Know You Don’t Read the Newspaper." It also has comic strips online. The featured characters in this strip are: Huey Freeman –the radical scholar, Riley Freeman—hardcore knucklehead and Huey's little brother, and Caesar—the lyrically rambunctious Brooklyn MC. All of these characters are no more than 12 years old and they’re more badass than Calvin!

Femfans: http://users.erols.com/psmonsky/femindex.html
The Femfans Page. The Femforce is online and kicking ass! From the female artists responsible for Femforce, comes a website brimming with superwomen. Unfortunately, it also comes with a somewhat shoddy layout. However, this page also includes many interesting links concerning other comic resources and photomanipulation applied to comics. This page has pictures of all the artists in superheroine garb, which are interesting and pretty amusing. It also features illustrations from the front page of Femforce magazine. Also a member of the Comic Arts Alliance.

40 oz Comics: http://www.40ozcomics.com/
40 oz. Comics. Jim Mahfood, hero of 90s youth, has an enormous and well-designed web-page. The site contains all his comics, including my personal favorite "Grrl Scouts." It also has "Live Mural Art" (Graffitti) which is surprisingly good.

Keenspot: www.keenspot.com
A collection of more adult-oriented comics, very extensive links list to some very funny comics.

The Monkey: www.china-on-site.com/literatu/classic/west/index.html
The Monkey. Not a western comic, but rather a series of 100 paintings relating the legend of the Monkey King. The art is woderful, more painting than comic. The site also has links to other stories presented in similar form.

Dela the Hooda: http://www.comnet.ca/~foxtrot/dela/
Dela the Hooda. An online comic, the misadventures of a "fantastical, sentient vixen," created by self-described fantasy buffs and gaming nerds, Style Wager and Greg Older. This comic is not mainstream by any means and it contains jokes that may not appeal to non-gamers. This site is important to note because it is yet another example of comics as a fore-runner among a subculture. The comic was circulated by friends until it began to gain more notice in the gaming community. You can actually purchase a copy of the comic if you wish. The website also contains fan art which is surprisingly good.

PVP: www.pvponline.com
Another more traditional comic strip (in form at least), PvP is a computer game magazine and the strip follows the work and personal lives of its employees. Nothing particularly shocking or ground-breaking, but still quite funny.

A-Dora: http://lorenz.zapnet.de/a-dora/start.html
More designed like a PowerPoint presentation than a traditional comic, including small animations. The form shows how internet comics can be more than just paper comics available on line. Unfortunately, the content isn’t as interesting as the form.

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Theory, Criticism and Reviews

Prodigy: http://www.pages.prodigy.com
This site provides reviews of books about comics, including Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics. As is often the case with Web text, the reviews aren't carefully edited. But it's fun to find the dangling modifiers, such as: "By being a comic book, of course, McCloud is able to exemplify his points excellently." It must be great to be a comic book.

Salon: http://www.salon.com/comics
"Salon" is a useful source for political commentary in the world of comics. Some of them are funny, regardless of the reader's political persuasion-Tom Tomorrow's "This Modern World," for instance. However, they're often overtly preachy and more concerned with political statements than laughs.

The Comic Reader: http://www.thecomicreader.com/
This site, intended for present day affcianados of contemporary comics, has a lmited selection of online comics. There is an interesting Opnion section about a limited number of titles currrently on-line (I only saw two). The site does, however, have an excellent preview section for a few comics publishers (Dark Horse, DC, Claypool Comics) and a fairly good Links section.

History of Comic Art: http://www.comic-art.com/history
The history of sequential art-from Paleolithic cave paintings to "Spawn"-is compellingly illustrated on this site. It provides a substantive, albeit brief, history of comic art.

Sample Comic Syllabus: http://www.wam.umd.edu/~djkay/syllabus.html
This proposed comic syllabus looks at one of the most important issues when examining comic books. Comic book heroes, especially those that have been serialized for some time, have an immense amount of history behind them in oterms of their adventures, personal histories, and their interactions with other characters. In order to be able to appreciate their current actions, it is necessary to examine their pasts. This course offers a survey course of manuy of the pivotal moments in the lives of many of the most noteworthy characters in comic strips today.

Online Comic Encyclopedia: http://www.melriks.com/superhero/index.html
Along with the Comic syllabus, the Online Comic Encyclopedia offers a vast amount of information about superhero activities and history. This particular site offers web searches and archival searches for information about past characters, villians, and general histories of many of the most noteworthy figures in the comic book world.

Comic Research Libraries: http://www.lib.msu.edu/comics/director/comres.htm
Comics Research Libraries-This site is a straight forward listing of many (US and international) libraries with substantial comic collections. Listed alphabetically the entries are short giving contact information and a few words about the scope of the general collection at that institution.

Comic Citation Guide: http://www.sp.uconn.edu/~epk93002/CAC/cite.html
Comic Art in Scholarly Writing: A Citation Guide- This site is basically what it says, a citation guide. It gives information about how and what to cite as well as examples.

The Comic Book Galaxy: http://www.comicbookgalaxy.com/
The Comic Book Galaxy-Comic Book Galaxy is a web magazine that includes comic reviews, previews, news, editorial articles, and interviews. The primary focus is on mainstream comics, but the site is very good at what it does.

The Grand Comic Book Database:
http://navigation.helper.realnames.com/framer/1/1/default.asp?realname=
Grand+Comic+Book+Database&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Ecomics%
2Eorg&frameid=1&providerid=1&uid=17424702
The Grand Comic Book Database: An ever expanding database that catalogs comics by writer, penciller, inker, publisher, character, and title. It also includes international chapters in Italy, Sweden, Germany, and Norway. This site has an unbelievable amount of raw data on comics.

The Dreaming: The Neil Gaiman Page:
http://www.holycow.com/dreaming/academia/sandman_psychoanalysis.html
The Dreaming: The Neil Gaiman Page: This site contains criticism of genuine academic quality. Of particular interest is "The Sandman and Psychoanalysis" in which author Dave Mockaitis offers a psychoanalytic reading of The Sandman and, among other things, takes issue with Scott McClouds concept of the frame/time relationship. The site also contains many other articles and M.A. thesis’ relating to comics.

Comics Scholarship: http://www.hoboes.com/html/Comics/Scholarship.html
Comics Scholarship: This site has no original content, but it has a very impressive list of articles relating to comics in scholarship that have been previously published elsewhere. This is an excellent and interesting resource.

The Comics Page: www.comicspage.com
This site has links to several comics-page and editorial comics. It is well organized with a history of each comic it features, including a brief character description and idea summary of each of the characters featured in the 30 or so comic strips spotlighted on this website. It is easy to navigate and has e-mail addresses and links to nearly every artist’s personal site. It also includes billboards and forums for avid fans of each comic. Comics found on this site: Mother Goose and Grimm, Shoe, Spooner, Annie, Dick Tracy, and others.

Comic Vault: www.ryaninteractive.com/comicvault/
Comic Vault – Run by Ryan Interactive. This site reviews specific issues of different comics, as well as different series, again each divided into genres. Each review contains a brief summary, a discussion of the art and writing, some interesting facts regarding the comic, and some suggested reading for those who enjoyed the comic being reviewed.

European Comics on the Web: http://lcg-www.uia.ac.be/~erikt/comics/welcome.html
A really cool guide to lots of different European comic websites in all different languages. It’s just a huge link site, but from what I could tell most of the links are active and annotated with some helpful information. The site also lists publishers and comics sellers. The site covers both online and print comics.

Comics in Germany: http://www.nrw-forum.de/deutsch/mutanten/htm/i01econ.htm
A fairly short overview of the growth of the comic industry in Germany in the 90’s, mainly interesting because it offers a look into a different comic culture than Japan or America.

Ernst Stuff: http://www.mcs.csuhayward.edu/~malek/Ernst.html
The first thing any historian of comix has to realize is that everything comix has done, tried to do, and hopes to do, was realized and theorized by the Surrealists of Paris in the 1920s-1930s, under the guidance of Pope André Breton. Of the Surrealists, the master sequentialist was Max Ernst. Here’s a page with plenty of Ernst images and links, all choked together by a really nasty interface.

Core Theory Class: http://ntpaul.sprog.auc.dk/comix01/read/core-readings.htm
A reading list for a "core theory" class, apparently in Australia, and obviously deeply concerned with comix as a form of communication. McCloud tops the list, but he’s obviously not the only, and maybe not the best, theorist of comix.

Maus Review/Essay: http://voyager.learntech.com/catalog/maus/indepth/
Linked to the above page, this is a review-essay of A.Speigelman’s Maus. Gene kannenberg Page

Gene Kannenberg, Jr: http://www.sp.uconn.edu/~epk93002/
Medievalist and Ph.D. candidate at U. Connecticut Gene Kannenberg has written extensively on comix and reader reception.

Comic Annotations: http://theory.lcs.mit.edu/~wald/comics.html
Not unlike Finnegans Wake and other "difficult reading" comix too have there annotators. Sandman is a name I recognize here.

Discover Comics: www.discovercomics.com/graphicnovels/
DiscoverComics.Com. "The Graphic Novel Knowledgebase"- wish I had been here 2 hours ago. Everything from comic strips, headlines, Maus, and From Hell is here. Site is currently under construction, but a good resource even still.

Annotated Watchmen: http://www.msu.edu/~whitero2/watchmen.html
Annotated Watchmen. A comprehensive annotation of Alan Moore’s The Watchmen—one of the most influential comics of the 20^th century. Nearly every panel of the series has been annotated as well as a fairly comprehensive overview of the characters involved in the work. There are no illustrations accompanying any of these annotations, which may have added to the effect of the work. The author also includes Not a flashy site, more content oriented.

Sandman Annotations: http://theory.lcs.mit.edu/~wald/sandman-index.html
Sandman Annotations. The annotations for Neil Gaiman’s Sandman are incredibly helpful for anyone doing a critical response to this work. Gaiman’s work is so packed with historical and mythological allusions that readers might find it a helpful starting place. The detailed commentaries open up a number of possible fields of research. Note issue #19, A Midsummer’s Night Dream, the authors of the annotation not only comment on the comic, but also on some of the theories about Shakespeare’s life.

Comics Girl: http://comicsgirl.home.mindspring.com/
ComicsGirl – Run by Eden Miller. This site contains reviews that address the female comics reader. The reviews are divided by storyline, cartoonists, and current and expired series.

European Comics: http://lcg-www.uia.ac.be/~erikt/comics/
Wow, this site has all sorts of great information on it about European comics. Several hundred comics and criticism pages are listed here in alphabetical order. Be sure to bring along a translator if you don’t speak every European language. Very impressively organized, although quite boring on the visual side.

Comics Research: www.comicsresearch.org
A site built by Gene Kannenberg Jr of University of Connecticut. Has links to all sorts of comics from caricature to book-length works as well as publishers, cartoonists, and a comprehensive list of critical anthologies. This site is mostly a bibliography of comics and comics studies. IT actually contains very few comics in itself, but the search engine and links pages are loaded with additional sites.

Comic Art: http://www.comic-art.com/
This web site consists of a virtual museum and encyclopedia of comics history. The site gives many selections of topics to explore. It provides a section of links to comics related sites as well as sections dedicated to the history of comics of the past as well as current comics links. There were also sections for those interested in buying comics and comics related merchandise. These came in the form of a link to stores as well as a link to a site that sells comics on CD-ROM. This web site was constructed very well and was easy to use.

Comic Chronologies: http://www.psu.edu/dept/inart10_110/inart10/striptime.html
This web site is dedicated to the Chronology of Comic Strips and Comic Books in America. It gives a verbal breakdown of the history of comics beginning in 1865 and ending in 1973. I am assuming that this site was constructed to aid in a class in integrative arts taught at PSU. The information provided is concise and somewhat difficult to completely understand without a background in comics. The information on the page is in outline form and basically states in incomplete sentences the main happenings in the world of comics throughout history.

Comic Info: http://www-personal.umich.edu/~cmarx/resources.html
This is an intense site that contains a huge amount of information related to the study of comics. The author of the page states that he created it because "a few people had approached [him] with some basic questions about comics scholarship, and because [he] was learning html." The database located within this page covers information ranging from bibliographic materials to conferences to critical reviews. When the creator of the page realizes his limitations, he provides the users with other addresses that may contain information that would be helpful to them. I am impressed that this much information can be found within one site.

Form, Function, Fiction: http://www.sp.uconn.edu/~epk93002/fff.html
This site contains the dissertation proposal entitled Form, Function, Fiction: Text, Image, and Design in the Comics Narratives of Winsor McCay, Art Spiegelman, and Chris Ware. Not only is the entire proposal online, but there is an extensive list of sources.

The History of Superhero Comics: http://www.geocities.com/Athens/8580/
The History of Superhero Comics. This is a pretty good site with a definite academic slant. The focus is on superhero comics in America, and the site is nicely illustrated and includes some cool extra material. Especially interesting is the full text of the 1954 Congressional report on comics and juvenile delinquency. This site also has a good list of links.

Fredric Wertham Article: http://art-bin.com/art/awertham.html
Fredric Wertham Article. This guy was an anti-comics crusader who eventually switched sides. He published a book called Seduction of the Innocent in 1954 that led to the original Comics Approval Code. It’s an interesting piece.ces that Gene Kannenberg, Jr., the author, has used.

Bibliography of Jewish Comics: http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Acropolis/5756/JWISHC.HTM
http://www.geocities.com/safran-can/bergson.htm
Select Bibliography of Jewish comics Compiled by Steven M. Bergson. This site is a comprehensive list of Jewish comics and Jewish comic artists and it has its own annotations. Bergson has done a thorough job of finding comics that explore Jewish culture. His explanations of each comic strip expose the interesting and sometimes surprising dilemmas of Jewish heroes. It also includes an interesting comic called "Did You Know Superman is Jewish?" Bergson’s site has also won awards and mentions from the Atlanta Jewish Times, LA Jewish Times, The Jewish Tribune, Western Jewish Bulletin, Baltimore Jewish Times, Current Events Jewish Week and iNTERface.

Post-War Years Comics: http://tv.cream.org/arjcom.htm
"Comix. From the post-war gung-ho years to the post-modern Brett Ewins era. Enough said." A selective history of comix, none of which I’d heard of in the two histories presented in class.

Illustrated History of Comics: http://mdcm.arts.unsw.edu.au/Students98/LimL/innovate/comictheory.html
Theory-wise, this is a lame student site which nevertheless is useful for its illustrated history approach to comix.

Comic Page: http://www.dereksantos.com/comicpage/index.html
This page provides an excellent summary of the history of comics, beginning with 1896 and going to the early 1980s. There is also a small list of message boards as well as an exhaustive links section to sites about auctions, biographies of comics producers, conventions, the history of comics, images, comics-related organizations, and much more. This site represents a decent resource for those doing research on comics.

Comic Creators Survey: http://www.nidlink.com/~dempsey/inking_survey/
This page is the home page for a Internet resource centered around a survey created and maintained by Larry Dempsey. The site holds no indentification of Dempsey, but he has so far received responses from 265 professional comics artists, so the information is valuable for those wishing to examine the preferred techniques professional comics artists employ in their work. The site also has a list of links to art supply manufacturers and retailers, inking-related articles and tutorials, inking-related books, schools and instructional courses, and submission guidelines for inkers wishing to submit their work to specific comics publishers. The site also contains e-mail addresses for many of the survey participants. (Scott McCloud's responses to the survey questions were somewhat humorous, I thought.)

British Cartoon Centre: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/00/3/1/ixgall.html
This site, produced by the British Cartoon Centre, is an excellent resource for those who wish to know about the world of comics in Great Britian. Cartoons are listed according to an index of artists which appears quite exhaustive. The Interesting Photographic Links was a rouse, linking the user with a European news site, most of which was about anything BUT comics. However, the numerous links to the Gallery's collection, both present and previous displays, are in good order and include a brief text blurb to accompany the graphics.

Comix Zone Online: www.comixzone.com/comics.html
Comix Zone Online. Super-hero based, mainstream comics featured and reviewed here. Has an Anime link as well as Manga links. DC, Marvel, Dark Horse, etc. There’s also a feature on the Jay and Silent Bob comic book, which I didn’t even know existed.

The Masked Bookwyrm’s Comic Book Nexus: www.geocities.com/SoHo/study/4273
The Masked Bookwyrm’s Comic Book Nexus. Reviews and links to graphic novels all over the web. Categories include comic book reviews, reviews of non-fiction books about comics, and "They ain’t trade paperbacks… but they should be". A good resource.

Beek’s Books: www.rzero.com/books/
Beek’s Books – Run by Todd Verbeek. This site basically contains reviews of different comics. The reviews have been separated into genres and cross-referenced, and then each one is summarized briefly and given a rating. The genres included Superhero / Action, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Humor, and Adult, and are tailored more to the alternative lifestyle.

Scott McCloud: www.scottmccloud.com
Scott’s web site continues where his book leaves off in the examination of the comic book as literature and art. His site continues to work on the same educational style as his book, using visual elements to illustrate his theories and concepts, as well as offering concrete applications of these ideas in the form of new online comic strips and links to other sites as well.

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Manga

The Anime Spider: http://www.animespider.com/
The Anime Spider. The Anime Spider is a gigantic resource for all anime in existence—except for the kind that doesn’t exist on paper yet. Even so, the site accepts submissions from amateur comic artists. This site is a hub of activity for people wishing to meet other fans, people wishing to download games, wallpaper, video, mp3’s and images. This site has an alphabetized websearch feature and webring. This is the anime site for people who want to know more about anime. For the already-obsessive anime fanatic? There are myriads of ways to interact with this site and myriads of new and lesser-known artists available on the site via links and fanpages. The website greeting? "Konnichiwa, let’s find the anime stuffs!"

Tezuka Ozama World: http://ja-f.tezuka.co.jp/
Tezuka Osamu World. Although this is a Japanese site, they have a great English version of their Flash animation about Tezuka, his life, and work. Plus, the Japanese just make such dang cute websites.

Gilles Poitras’ Service: http://www.sirius.com/~cowpunk/#anchor107136
Gilles Poitras’ Service to Fans Site. Poitras has written several books about anime and manga (Japanese animation and comics). There is a lot to explore on this site, but highlights include the recommended reading and viewing lists, as well as the Librarian’s guide to anime and manga. If you want to get into the Japanese tradition, this is a good starting point.

JAI2: http://www.jai2.com/
JAI2: The World of Frederik Schodt. Schodt is one of the foremost scholars of Japanese manga. He served as translator to Osamu Tezuka, a true master of manga, and his books, Manga! Manga! and Dreamland Japan, are required reading for any fan of the genre. This page is especially useful for its hand-picked links and features by Schodt.

Manga Art: http://www.mangaart.com/
This page contains few comics itself, but is a gallery of anime, or manga, the Japanese word for comics. This site has all sorts of links to artists, the typical forums, chat rooms, and free e-mail accounts for the interested. It also contains links for purchasing manga and other paraphernalia. This website is full of visually stunning artwork and some interesting information.

Anime World: www.animeworld.com
Anime World: An incredible resource for anime. Lots of top ten lists, a search engine by title or production company, plot summaries, reviews, etc.

The Room O’Manga: http://members.aol.com/umataro42/manga.html
The Room O’Manga-Put together by a bilingual fan, this site is simply (and crudely) manga in translation. It mainly features Crayon Shinchan, the rude, potty humored, five-year-old hero of Japanese comics. Crayon is famous in Japan, but officially untranslated here in the US, and that is why this site is so neat. The site is poorly organized and the translations are rough, but it is well worth it to read about Crayon and his parody-type adventures in Japan.

Behind the Rose of Versailles: http://www.geocities.com/Paris/Arc/8639/
Behind The Rose of Versailles: This is a fan site dedicated to the historical manga "The Rose of Versailles", which is a love story set in France during the reign of Louie XVI. The site contains historical background as well as event and character summary. An excellent example of fan dedication.

Dragonball Z: www.dragonballz.com
Official Dragonball Z website. This website has a store, information on the various sagas, characters, trivia, f.a.q., and news. Some pretty cool graphics and flash browser animation.

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Professional

Darkhorse: www.darkhorse.com/
Darkhorse Comics. They have taken a number of their print run comics and "flashified" some of them. Hellboy is particulary striking with how the panels move about the screen. It is a really interesting approach to marrying the printed and electronic forms of this medium. Some of the comics take a much more traditional panel by panel approach. There is a fairly high comic to advertisement ratio, so you only get a few panels before you’re enticed to by some related merchandise. There aren’t any complete stories. These seem to work more like mini comic trailers.

Stan Lee: www.stanlee.net/
Stanlee.net. The father of 90 percent of Marvel’s creations has his own website. Techinically not comics, these are more flash cartoons. Interesting just to see how much or how little Lee’s approach to storytelling has changed in the last thirty years. The style seems heavily influenced by the simple line work seen on the Batman and Superman cartoons.

Batman: www.dccomics.com/batman/
I had to put this one in. It isn’t a site where you can view online strips but it is great for information concerning the history of Batman and his transformations. This site provides excellent historical information concerning the changes that occurred in Batman from conception to modern day.

Marvel: www.marvel.com
Marvel Comics Online: Marvel Comics main online website with tons of information about the company, their characters, and all the comics they produce. Links to Spider-Man and X-Men as well as some online comics and all sorts of links. It is also a place to get updates, buy merchandise, and subscribe to newsletters.

Calvin and Hobbes: www.ucomics.com/calvinandhobbes
The Official website of Calvin & Hobbes has a complete archive of comic strips, one re-released every day. Also, info on Bill Watterson, free e-postcards and sales of official prints.

Les Cartoonistes Dangereux: http://www.lescartoonistesdangereux.co.uk/
Home of "les cartoonistes dangereux" a British comix publisher. Looks like they’ve published a small forest of stuff…

The Fifth Panel: http://www.5thpanel.com/
This is the homepage of another independent comics publishing company. It too contains links to some previews of the half-dozen comics artists and their work. Again, this website emphasizes its individuality and stresses its realism and true to life cartoons. It is a small site with few links, but for anyone who wants to stay apprised of the comics "trend," it may be helpful. Of course, the mission statement and personal values section of this site is warm and inviting.

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Commercial Sites

Fandomshop: http://www.fandomshop.com/comics
While this is largely a merchandise forum, it provides thorough information about comics. The description of Scott McCloud's latest work, "The New Adventures of Abraham Lincoln," for example, makes it impossible to resist reading the book. Who wouldn't be interested in a super, impostor Lincoln battling the actual, flawed, human Lincoln? It reveals the endless possibilities of comics.

Next Planet Over: http://www.nextplanetover.com
Nextplanetover.com. This is probably the leading comic retailer on the web. They have an incredibly varied supply of current and recent publications. They can be somewhat lacking in materials more than a few months old. The site features regular articles, message boards, and comic previews.

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Miscellaneous

Kaboom: http://www.collection.nlc-bnc.ca/100/200/300/ktaylor/kaboom/index.htm
This is an intelligently written, endlessly amusing site that provides definitions to comic sounds, such as "Voosh!," "Bap!," and "Zoink!," as well as comic symbols, such as two exclamations points above a character's head and this time-honored thing: "#@*$!!" "Ka-Boom!," while devoted to comic-book principles, is suspiciously bereft of animation.

The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund: http://www.cbldf.org/
-This site is the web arm of the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund. It was "officially incorporated as a non-profit charitable organization in January of 1990 from the money left over from donations raised to defend Friendly Frank's arrest for selling ‘obscene comics’ in Lansing, IL in 1986." It’s been fighting the good fight for over 12 comic book retailers and professionals. The website includes news, articles, and resources for your comic law needs.

Math Comics: http://www.csun.edu/~hcmth014/comics.html
Bamdad's Math Comics Page: This is a collection of comics about math. Many of them are single frame comics, some are comics from well know comic series, and others are more obscure. All of the comics are about math. To each their own.

Medical Journal Comics: http://www.nature.com/nm//web_specials/comics/
Nature Medicine - Vol. 4 (1998) The Reincarnation of Biomedical Journals as Hypertext Comic Books: This isn’t so much a web site as it is a journal article on the web, but its unique enough to warrant a read. It explores the benefits of printing medical journals in comic form in order to increase retention.

Dillwall: http://members.nbci.com/dillwall/
This site has a number of desktop wallpaper images available for free download. However, the website itself is poorly constructed. Advertisements take up half the space, and the other half (occupying the middle portion of the screen) require the user to use scroll bars to see all of the available options and even the sample wallpaper image itself. Many of the images themselves, however, are pretty cool, so it's worth a trip to visit just to look at the pictures.

Showcon: http://www.showcon.com
This site is an excellent reference for those interested in learning more about comics-related conventions. Links are to all 50 states, Canada, and a feature for on-line conventions. There is also a pretty good list of sites related to comics and comic-related topics. The page also has a translator function so that any page in the web site can be translated to Spansh, German, French, Italian, or Portuguese.

The Altair Accretion Homepage: www.geocities.com/area51/Crater/1908/
Features include "Pulp and Dagger Fiction", a webzine which advertises: "Remember the days when adventure meant something? When The Shadow, Doc Savage, Conan… strode the pages of pulpdom with blazing pistols, flashing swords and a comely maid in tow? Those days live again in Pulp and Dagger (cue trumpets)". Also, the Great Canadian Movie Guide, and Canada’s greatest comic book superhero, Captain Canuck. Who knew those Canadians could sling such a good phrase.

Wahoo: Comicbook Websites: http://www.comicbookwebsites.com/
Wahoo: Comicbook websites. Particularly helpful for their links to online comics. It can be somewhat difficult to find links going through traditional search engine methods. The site also features a search engine and the expected fan boy drooling of stereotyped on-line comic fans.

G.I. Joe Comic Book Archive: www.yojoe.com/comics/
The G.I. Joe Comic Book Archive has every series of G.I. Joe comics archived including the main series, the yearbooks, the order of battle, special missions, G.I. Joe with the Transformers, European missions, action force, and 3D. Makes me proud to be an American.

Markomics: http://www.markomics.com/lottalinks.html
This website is a great one for links to hundreds of comic strips, all alphabetized with a daily dose of their best work. This particular site is a pretty good place for someone to start looking for comics if they want to waste a lot of time while they are at work. It’s almost as if it were a never-ending Sunday comics page. It is considerably more interesting than several of the other sites with dead links and worthless search engines. Nice and simple, even for a beginner like me.

Comics Conspiracy: www.comicsconspiracy.com
This site advertises itself as "not just another mutant comic site" and has some interesting eye candy. The website focuses on selling a few (8 or 10) independent comic books with such intriguing titles as "Bastard Stew," "CyberMedic," and "Operator 99." Some of the links include reading a few off the wall comics and some spoofs on the ever-popular mutant comics as well as the Simpsons and Ren and Stimpy. This website seems to be doing its part in furthering the cause of the "reality genre" of western comics.

Periodic Table of Comics: www.uky.edu/projects/chemcomics
This website contains a periodic table of comics. IF you are a comics buff and a chemistry student, this page should head your bookmarks. This site contains very little factual information about comics, but is well designed and fun if you want to see how all of the elements are used by comics artists throughout the world. The comics contained in this site are predominately centered around "Metalmen" comics, with most of the illustrations dating back from thirty to fifty years. Note: no full-length comics are found on this site, but it only contains comics pages containing the element in question.

Dame Darcy Shrine: http://www.drizzle.com/~dyslexia/darcy-bkup/
Dame Darcy Shrine. A fansite dedicated to the odd comics of Dame Darcy. Coincidentally, Darcy is from Idaho Falls, and her comics have been an underground mainstay for over 10 years now. This is a fansite, but very complete, and it features links to readable versions of her most well-known comic, Meat Cakes.

Negative Space Text Archive: http://www.hoboes.com/pub/Comics/
Negative Space Text Archive. This site is text-only, and not too pretty, but really informative. It’s got everything from circulation stats for comics since the 1930s to lists of theses and dissertations written concerning comics. It also features lots of interesting articles and archived forum discussions, as well as pages about individual artists.

Love and Rockets Page: http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Zone/9923/luvrock.html
Love and Rockets. A great page about Jaime and Gilbert Hernandez ("Los Bros"), creators, writers, and artists for Love and Rockets. L&R is a continuing series that centers around two hispanic communities. The brothers trade off duties, one creating a book, and then the other, and occasionally mixing up books to include stories from both setting. This comic has a huge fan following and is pretty interesting.

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