Fit To Be Tied
Happy birthday pop, hope you are doing well and have a great day.
On Monday Steven Shinney and Jason Sigler of Digital Strips reviewed Woody After Hours for their latest podcast. They had some nice things to say about WAH, and they had some reasonable criticisms as well. Overall I really appreciated that they took the time and effort to read through the strips and give their opinions and feedback. Here are a few of their comments and my thoughts on them:
“The art to start off with was really really stiff.” This is fair, and something that is my fault. For the longest time I choreographed each strip in great detail before I handed it over to Paul. With time and help I learned that this was completely unnecessary and that I could trust Paul to make each strip look great. The comic has been getting better ever since.
“Throughout the run the writing has been fairly sharp.” That’s very kind and I really appreciate that. I would be a complete scumbag if I didn’t give Paul a fair amount of credit, however. Yeah, I write the scripts, but so far only two or three haven’t needed some sort of minor or major improvement. Who has been responsible for pointing out what needs to be fixed? Paul. Who has taken the time necessary to make sure those fixes result in the strip being as good as it can be? Paul. Who is better looking? Me.
“It’s a great comic to watch [Ben and Paul] grow.” It was really nice to hear this. We are trying to grow into something that people can rely on to be entertaining. To be recognized for the effort feels really good.
“Gag-a-day describes [WAH] better.” This is true, and I’m not crazy about it. I aspire for WAH to be like a lunch buffet, in that it offers entertainment for a variety of webcomic tastes. Do you want characters that have some depth? We got ‘em. Do you want to see characters in funny situations that take more than one strip to resolve? We got ‘em. Do you want single strip entertainment that doesn’t take back-story to enjoy? We got ‘em. We’re not there yet, but hopefully we will be someday.
“It’s got potential to be a big name in the future.” That’s very flattering. I wish Paul and I could take all the credit, but it’s been a group effort. We’ve collaborated with some great webcomic artists and have created some terrific strips together. We’ve also been fortunate enough to have family and friends whose support has been invaluable. I’m not a generous enough person to name them all, but without them WAH would not have been possible.
“I don’t think the monologue is the strong suit.” Yeah, it’s not, which is a bummer because I love late-night monologues. I want to mimic the kind of energy that people like Letterman, Conan and Ferguson create when they do their twelve minutes of stand-up. It’s pretty hard, though. Hopefully I can improve it and make it fun for people to read. I’m not ready to give up on it yet.
So, thanks Steven and Jason for your review, and please make sure to warn us if we start to really suck.
– Ben
Discussion (14) ¬
Happy Birthday Ben’s Pop! (Such fun to say).
You suck!
wait.. no you don’t .. dammit, you don’t suck!
@Phil Haha! Thanks for the ringing endorsement 😀 I knew if I told people on Twitter that they said we sucked, people would visit in droves to see why.
Appreciate you appreciating our thoughts and criticism! We’ll be keeping an eye on you guys and will be the first to let you know when things turn to crap.
Along those lines, shoot me a line if you’d be interested in a Digital Strips Adventures/WAH crossover. Could be fun!
Listening *is* an important skill.
I only wish you charged for the site so we could show our appreciation more concretely. Oh well. Much appreciate the good wishes!
I have followed the site since it began, and I totally agree that the writing has improved and the art is still great. I really like paul’s artistics stylings.
Just to throw in my two cents regarding the “gag-a-day” description – I personally like that the strips can be self contained and viewed this way. But if you can keep doing it with an underlying story arc as you have been, then i truly think this will be a very long lived and popular strip.
And don’t forget me when you are rich and famous…….
@agent-x
Thanks for the feedback. We promise to remember you when we’re rich and famous. It’ll probably go something like this:
Ben: Hey, we’re rich!
Paul: Yeah, and we’re famous!
Ben: Weren’t we supposed to remember someone at this point?
Paul: Yeah, who was that?
Ben: I think it was agent-q.
Paul: That doesn’t sound right.
Ben: I’m pretty sure it was agent-q.
Paul: Well, the point is that we remembered that we were supposed to remember that person.
Ben: Right. Now, onward with being rich and famous.
Paul: Groovy.
You don’t have to worry about remembering me when you’re rich and famous… I’ll remember you and I’ll be waiting.
“Appreciate you appreciating our thoughts”
And I appreciate the fact that you appreciate their appreciation”
Really like the blood rushing to the head effect you’ve got going, subtle but effective!
I just want to know if Paul went back to the trusty mirror before drawing this strip.
@AlsoBagels thanks for seeing that!