Five Thousand Comics in a Row...

[seawasp]

... that's how many strips Schlock Mercenary has just reached. Howard Tayler has posted one strip per day, seven days a week, three hundred sixty-five days per year, for five thousand days, or more than thirteen and a half YEARS. That's a rare achievement in the webcomic world. Even rarer is his ability to write a military-themed space opera that SUCCESSFULLY combines humor, hard science, and dramatic plotlines, without falling into the ridiculous.

Comments

[terry austin (from livejournal.com)]

What's really rare is that while Howard has never served in the military (or so he told me at ComicCon), but his purely military SF strip is quite well liked by military vets (including combat vets - I know of two, at least). I can't think of a higher compliment for his work.

(And for the record, IMO it falls in to the ridiculous all the time. But only on purpose, and in the best possible ways.)

[scott-sanford.livejournal.com]

It really is that huge, isn't it? It's easy to forget that, even after archive-bombing the thing.

Also, his art evolution has snuck up on us slowly; it's easy to forget how much he's improved until you go looking back into those archives.

[howardtayler.livejournal.com]

Oh, it's ridiculous from time to time. I have to leave myself that particular "out" or I'd never get anything finished.

[seawasp]

Well, I mean that in a particular way -- the sort of ridiculous that falls afoul of its connection to "ridicule", and breaks the ability to take the story seriously. I've seen that all too often, and it's a PARTICULAR risk of things that try to be serious sometimes and comedic at others. It's a very delicate and impressive balancing act you do with comedy, space opera, mil-sf, and hard-sf tropes and I'm always impressed by how you pull it off.

[muirecan.livejournal.com]

That is so cool that Howard has hand pasted 5000 strips onto the internet one at a time. :) Yeah! !!!!!

[q99.livejournal.com]

And I am sooo glad I found it just a few years in and don't need to try and delve through the whole archive at once ^^

[bunny-m.livejournal.com]

Well done, sir!

I suppose I should go start reading it.

I do love a good archive binge. ;)

[gary-jordan.livejournal.com]

I bought the PDF ebooks from Baen and have been wondering when you'll add more. I want all 5,000 comics PLUS the ones that DIDN'T get posted on the net, but I don't want hard copy. If they didn't sell well enough for another contract, have you considered self-publishing?