No, that’s not a typo. The organization that deals with disasters, monsters, and other insanity is called “SUEPR;” I’m not quite sure what the acronym stands for, but the “Sue” aspect was deliberate, and several of the characters would be Sue-like characters, except for the deliberate deconstruction of the trope in general. Nor are the Sue-like characteristics universal with the entire cast; instead, it almost seems to be an innate aspect of the natives of Reality, in comparison with characters who emigrated from another world to live in Reality. Perhaps the best example of this lies with the leader of SUEPR 4, the teenage boy Todo.

Todo is, for a lack of better words, perfect. He’s handsome, articulate, compassionate, skilled, assumes the best of people and doesn’t judge them if they don’t meet those expectations. In short, he’s the type of character you’d hate (well, initially) if you stumbled across him in a fanfic or the like. But as the comic unfolds, it becomes obvious that Todo’s “perfection” is a veneer, and that the very aspects of him that appear so “perfect” in Reality end up hurting him (and his companions) when facing problems from other less utopian realities.

The two outsiders of the group are immigrants from worlds outside of Reality; A.V. is a young verbose lady who has a lot of talent and heart, but freezes up in social situations, while Hawk is an anthropomorphic dragonfly with a chip on his shoulder and the need to prove himself. It is these two that truly help the comic shine, with their reactions to the eccentricities of their new world (such as a sock puppet rabbit being the mayor of the City of Reality, or how everyone is just so nice to each other, even in the face of infidelity or being robbed.

Of course, A.V. and Hawk won’t be the only ones who’ll give double-takes at times. There are subtle and not-so-subtle images that will suggest how things could go; take the infidelity (which was told as a flashback story): when the guy is confronting his girlfriend after catching her in bed with another man, there is an one-panel flash to a handgun in the bedroom drawer. It’s never touched, and the two manage to talk things out (with the guy that was caught in bed cowering behind the bed looking quite nervous the entire time). Likewise, one of the very first things that happens in the comic is that a young girl is given a ride home by a shadowy complete stranger, taking a different route home than is normally taken… and she gets home safely and untouched. The entire world reeks of the Uncanny Valley effect; the inhabitants of Reality are (for the most part) human… and yet somehow not.

In many ways we’re being given a glimpse of the alien nature of a utopia. In order for a utopia to exist, people would have to resist those darker impulses that are a part of all of our lives… and do so consistently. And they do, with the exception of some of the immigrants from other realities where things are not so perfect. We’ve not seen A.V. react adversely to some of the almost inhuman decency among the citizens of Reality, though there are moments when you’re sure she’s going to comment, only to back away. Hawk, on the other hand, spends an entire chapter trying to break through their veneer of civility, only to finally conclude that somehow, Reality itself is one huge family (and not one of the more typically dysfunctional ones in our own world).

The rest of the cast plays primarily a background role; Froggie, a giant intelligent anthropomorphic frog is the scientist of the group, while Victor is the final member of SUEPR 4 and is, if anything, even more perfect and decent than Todo. Little has been done to date to expand on their personalities or backgrounds (though Victor is hinted at having a “mysterious past” which will undoubtedly become the basis of some future storyline). Finally, there’s Mayor Rabbit, a sentient sock puppet rabbit who single… um… handedly runs the entire government of the City of Reality. Much like the other natives of Reality, when he appears and talks about various things we catch brief glimpses that suggest things aren’t quite as perfect in Reality as appearances might suggest, but outside of a few disasters (all of which have been (indirectly?) caused by interactions with another reality called Magic World) we’ve had few glimpses at the possible darker side of Reality.

After the first two chapters (which introduce both A.V. and Hawk), the chapters tend to flow into each other. Indeed, the problems caused by Magic World products ends up being the motivation behind the CoR storyline that just concluded, where SUEPR 4’s three core members had to travel to Magic World to stop their own brethren, who are trying to eliminate the threat Magic World poses for Reality. Cartoonist Ian Samson manages to portray the members of SUEPR 1 as well-intentioned extremists that know what they’re doing is wrong… but that it’s for the greater good of Reality. Chapter 5 may be the best storyline yet in CoR, and undoubtedly we’ll see more of Magic World in the future, especially once Mayor Rabbit admits to the rulers of Magic World that some of his own were responsible for their own recent troubles.

Another interesting aspect of CoR is its update schedule: the comic is released twice a month with sizable multi-page updates. This helps create a better sense of story and continuity than even a daily update schedule would do. Samson has stated that this update schedule will be changing soon, but hopefully he’ll continue some form of multi-page update (perhaps similar to the update schedule of Sarah Ellerton’s The Phoenix Requiem).

City of Reality is one of those comics that will amuse, charm, and at times disturb you. It may also make you sit back for a moment and consider what Samson is saying here… and on the state of our own reality. For that alone I’d recommend it; the interesting deconstruction of just what a utopian world is and on the nature of “perfect” characters is just icing on the cake.

Addendum note: It appears CoR is switching to a MWF update schedule, for the time being.

When I started reading the anthropomorphic comic Better Days (found thanks to a TV Tropes link), I had no idea of the ride that was waiting for me. The TV Tropes link seemed innocuous enough, and I’ve encountered teachers who let their beliefs bleed through into their teaching (I suspect many of us have). Unfortunately, those strips were the brief breath of levity in what was going to be a long and bumpy ride. BD has rape, tweenage sex (and that’s not a typo!), consensual incest between siblings (well, one instance that we know of), adultery (on more than one occasion), the depiction of armed military conflict, a man going into a mafia safe house and killing pretty much everyone there to save family, and more. If you’re easily offended, religious, or not conservative, you’re probably going to get offended by the content of the comic.

And yet, even with the growing Sueification of one of his main characters (Fisk) and the multiple injections of Drama in the comic (to the point that the mother once shouted “Is my life just a big lighting rod for drama!?” which I must admit I found quite amusing), there are some decent elements to the comic. For instance, when Sheila (the mother) was attacked and raped by an ex-boyfriend and her son (who was nine, and just starting to get his Sueification injections) went after the guy with a baseball bat, both Fisk and Sheila went into counseling afterward. Likewise, the incident of incest between Fisk and Lucy was intelligently done, and had long-lasting consequences, though perhaps not as severe as they could have been.

As for the adultery? Each time adultery occurs in the comic, divorce follows. Friendships are destroyed by it. Less realistically (perhaps) is how each incident results in a new stable relationship (Sheila ends up marrying the guy she slept with, though it takes a while for Fisk to forgive his eventual stepfather, and Elizabeth and Fisk end up together after she catches her new husband in bed with another woman… and possibly cheats on him in turn with Fisk). Likewise, while not technically adultery, when Lucy steals away a guy from his cheating girlfriend, that relationship ends up stable and happy. It’s a minor quibbling point, I know. The situation behind the adultery in the first story was logical, reasonable, and sad. The marriage wasn’t depicted as a healthy one, and the story itself was handled with considerable maturity. It’s just the end-result almost seems to say “adultery results in happily-ever-afters” which I’m sure was not the cartoonist’s intent.

Less forgivable is the “Sueification” of Fisk. He went from a “Crowning Moment of Awesome” in defending his mom from a rapist to James Bond (and I kid you not on this). The presentation of him fighting both in Desert Storm and in Bosnia were fairly well done, though the depiction of him in Ranger training fighting off a bunch of Marines in a training exercise was… pushing the boundaries. But once Fisk got recruited into a private intelligence agency to literally become a Bond-type… well, if you turn off your brain and go along for the ride, then you’ll probably enjoy it. Just… don’t think about it too much or you’ll start to find it annoying. Fortunately, outside of his initial recruitment into this corporate intelligence group and his taking out a bunch of Mafia (who admittedly were not expecting an ex-Ranger to invade with guns and grenades) to save a cousin they were using as a prostitute, we don’t see anything about his Bond activities. That’s likely for the best.

Amusingly enough, a couple years back cartoonist Jay Naylor pulled an April Fool’s prank by stating he was going to recast the crew as humans. The drawings he did were quite good (Naylor’s a talented artist who makes a living on his art, though sadly enough it’s the porn he draws that is how he makes his money) and I’m left to wonder just how much of an impact Better Days would have had if he’d drawn his characters as people instead of anthros. There is a degree of separation (similar to that found in science fiction and other forms of fiction) that comes with drawing the characters as non-humans. Just imagine the impact of seeing a nine-year-old boy taking a baseball bat to the man raping his mother… or of the brief images of the twins when they had sex that one time? Or the utter anguish of Fisk as his best friend was forced to move away because his mother slept with his best friend’s dad? Would these not have deeper meaning and more immediate impact if these characters had been human?

Then again, that degree of separation might help readers from becoming too offended by the story. It’s easy to say “it’s just a story” when you’ve cat-people and mice-people and the like as your cast. But seeing them as people… and it might have been too much for Naylor’s readers. And that’s a shame, because even with this degree of separation the stories hit hard. Better Days is one of those comics you’re either going to love or hate. It’s not easy remaining ambivalent about it. And while some aspects of the story could have been told better, and Fisk seriously could have been toned down… it’s worth reading. (Small note – Better Days concluded last year. Its sequel, Original Life, focuses on Fisk’s three kids and is a far more light-hearted tale which I’ll review later.)

Needless to say, both Mordred and Wiglaf bear little resemblance to their literary counterparts. Mordred is a moody and apathetic would-be villain, while Wiglaf is a hero who is perfect at everything he does (except for keeping friends). Of the two, I find Wiglaf to be far more interesting because of the dichotomy of the character. Here we have a character that could easily be considered a “Mary Sue” style character. He’s extremely handsome (to the point that women swoon over him). He’s very strong. He’s able to do amazing feats, up to and including learning how to play the piano on the fly and in a matter of minutes outplay a professional pianist. And yet Liliy manages to keep Wiglaf interesting by giving him one significant character flaw: he can’t keep friends.

If you think of it, this makes perfect sense. The one aspect of the classical Mary Sue character that readers can’t stand is their very perfection (and how they outshine even long-established characters and yet win the respect and admiration of others while doing so). But outside of girls swooning over Wiglaf, he lacks this trait. People grow to dislike him rather quickly because few people enjoy being second-best, and Wiglaf can’t help but be better than other people. It’s in his very nature. The very friendship between Wiglaf and Mordred began when the latest bunch of Wiglaf’s “friends” dumped him while Wiglaf was talking to Mordred. As for his and Mordred’s friendship, it’s… complex. It started out as desperation by Wiglaf and Mordred’s manipulations and evolved from there.

The funny thing is, of the two characters, I like Wiglaf far more than Mordred. Perhaps part of this is due to the apathy of Mordred, which lessens his appeal to me, or the fact I’ve not seen much character growth in Mordred. Ironically enough, the apparent Mary Sue has shown considerable growth over the more flawed of the duo. Maybe that’s because Mordred doesn’t try and yet not only has a deep relationship with Wiglaf, as well as the affections of a childhood friend who’s head-over-heels for him for no reason I can identify, along with being the focus of a sibling rivalry by two of his older siblings (both of whom dote on him to the point he has restraining orders against them during family events).

As time passed, the cast for WaM has likewise grown. We’ve met pretty much all of Mordred’s family by now (with nearly all of them villains as well), and much of the extended cast tends to work for them. However, there is one character who has proven an enigma and is described by Liliy as a “running gag that got out of control,” with that being Security, a tall blonde chap with an armband with “Security” on it who can appear anywhere at any moment. In many ways Security reminds me of Q from Star Trek: The Next Generation, with the exception that where Q was often judgmental, Security is mostly whimsical and oddly helpful. I’ve long said the best stories write themselves; likewise, the best characters write themselves… and Security took the pen out of Liliy’s hands soon after he first appeared, and has become its most delightful element. It is aspects such as this, and the artful creation of an enjoyable perfect character (who is still very flawed when you look closely) that makes WaM well worth adding to your reading list.