Is anyone else creeped out by Kevin and Kell?

[Kisai]

It just so happens that the people who colour K&K also do or did comics I read for a while too.

This is not true. Majority of people who are discussing about K&K are forum regulars who have never persecuted any comic actively.
Look, if K&K is a lighthearted comic, then this is a lighthearted discussion about it. STOP TAKING OUR DISCUSSION SO SERIOUSLY.

Um, what did you take out of context in that sentance.

I discovered K&K through two different means, one was the GPF crossover, and one was Namir Deiter(1999) and Unlike Minerva (2001, multiple artists)which was probably the first webcomic's I ever found. Given I haven't read ND in an even longer time than K&K

http://www.kevinandkell.com/about/
<i>Mr. and Mrs. Terrence Marks, the creators of the online comic strips Spare Parts and Namir Deiter, have partnered with K&K's creator to colorize the Kevin and Kell strips which now appear in color seven days a week. </i>

If you think I'm being totally dead serious, take a deep breath.

[The Neko]

I can't honestly believe that people can compare the discussion about the premise of a webcomic like K&K to religious outrage surrounding the Jyllans-Posten cartoons. Maybe this explains why people are so easy to go insane when someone criticizes art on the net if they compare this to religious persecution. Additionally the arguments that say "he's not hurting anybody, so stop saying stuff" is just retarded. NOBODY IS SAYING HE'S HURTING ANYBODY, THE CRITICS ARE NOT "OFFENDED". I don't think any one was claiming the author is really advocating murder and cannibalism, so why all these replies and responses under the premise that people are saying this? They are just saying that the premise of the comic, combining predation and human social constructs, is creepy and disturbing because it ideologically at odds with itself. This isn't a revolt, this isn't a revolution, this is an artistic discussion; so why are people treating it this way.

It's just surprising that, in a community of artists, nobody (or at least a very few) seems willing to either participate, entertain, or allow a discussion of a comic and its narrative merits and deficiencies. This is how you learn what works and what doesn't.

To me, the issue with K&K is that the author is trying out an idea that just doesn't make sense. Yes, it is a unique idea, as Buster argued earlier, but the uniqueness doesn't mean it's exonerated from its inherent problems and the uneasiness it has caused in more than one reader; their society, as portrayed in the comic, makes no sense. It'd be impossible for them to reach the Enlightenment period (let alone Modernism and all of it's social, economic, and consumer constructs) if their society is based off of predation. It probably couldn't progress beyond feudalism, if that.

Yes, it's a humorous comic and is meant to be taken lightly, but more often than not, a work creates more around it than it realizes. A deeper analysis could say that the world portrayed in this comic is a form of extreme racism. If all of these animal-people have equal levels of consciousness and are assumed to operate collectively in a mass society, and if they are able to breed with others that are different from themselves, they are no longer separated by species but by race. And this hierarchy established is very disturbing if put in human terms. The author cannot have his cake and eat it, too.

There are important matters that unintentionally become a part of the work, and it is important to look at these matters, both socially and artistically. People who tell others not to discuss something because it makes them unhappy or it disturbs their peace should grow thicker skin. And if you're defending it because you're a fan or have other vested interests in it, then come up with an argument that addresses the ideas presented.

[Kisai]

I can't honestly believe that people can compare the discussion about the premise of a webcomic
...
People who tell others not to discuss something because it makes them unhappy or it disturbs their peace should grow thicker skin. And if you're defending it because you're a fan or have other vested interests in it, then come up with an argument that addresses the ideas presented.

See the problem is, it's not a discussion unless someone is defending it, otherwise it turns into another "Let's bash (fill in the blank)!" type of thread that happens when the non-fans/never-heard-of-its outnumber the fans/have-heard-of-it's.

Let's try not to give a "Comicgenesis is full of crappy webcomic (artists) who are jealous of success" impression. We can do that by not ripping into successful webcomics not hosted here. Obviously Bill found something that works or he wouldn't be doing it.

There are no taboo topics on comicgenesis unless it runs into actually encouraging forum members to do illegal activity. I could care less if someone thinks something is immoral or wrong. The original poster stated they found something wrong with kevin and kell. which was immediately responded with

And yet you did not only want Bill to hear that you quiet the comic, but the entire world, and therefore took time to log into and entirely new forum just to talk about how badly treated your taste was in K&K?

Why goto an unrelated forum just to say you don't like a comic anymore? Why didn't he goto Bill's mailing list to say it, and then have the debate there? This isn't "something awful" where you bring comics you think suck to the table and rip into it.

[The Neko]

There are no taboo topics on comicgenesis…

We can do that by not ripping into successful webcomics not hosted here.

[LibertyCabbage]

I have a dream...

...where one day the Internet can have threads where people criticize and discuss things without the bulk of the discourse being whether or not people should criticize and discuss things.

Is this thread going to prompt Bill Holbrook to change the way he does his comic? No; his comic's been a success, and he isn't going to stop what's been working for him just because some people on a forum say it's bad.

Is this thread going to persuade current fans/supporters of K&K to change their minds? No; everyone who's responded to this thread seems to dislike the comic or be apathetic towards it.

Should this thread exist then? Yes, I think so. If people genuinely dislike a prominent webcomic, there's a distinct benefit gained from pooling the differing insights and observations that leads to a better understanding of the comic and comics in general as well, and this directly relates to what I understand to be at least one particular function of these forums as a whole, which is to benefit webcomic creators by allowing them to better understand comics via communication amongst themselves.

Is the possibility for useless, banal bashing there in these kinds of threads? Yes, definitely, but it depends on the people involved more than anything. Anyone who's been participating in these forums for a substantial amount of time should be aware of how easily threads change and evolve (or, more likely, devolve) as per the responses dictate (this thread itself being a notable example.)

I could see a problem if the forums (or just GD in particular) were overrun by threads bashing popular comics, but what notable instances have there been besides K&K and the Dominic Deegan stuff from a while back? It's not like there's an epidemic here that needs to be stamped out. If anything, GD has been getting increasingly anemic, with more and more attention going to the Off-Topic section. I'm sure I'm not the only one who's noticed a major lack of actual discussion about webcomics here, and to see an actually On-Topic comic discussion thread get smacked down by an admin is seriously fucked up.

I can't claim to have a solution to these problems or a complete understanding of why the forums have declined, but I think, on a most basic level, that comic discussion threads are a good thing, and that if someone feels like talking about or criticizing anything comic-related they should just do it without stifling themselves with worries about how important their ideas are or in what ways criticism really affects people. It might work out and get a few pages of responses, or maybe nobody'll give a shit and the thread'll disappear to page 2, but at least the opportunity and potential for discourse is there and available to people to seize upon.

[TheSuburbanLetdown]

I'm with Neko and Mr. Cabbage. Discussing something and needlessly bashing it for the purposes of fun are two different things. If anything, professionals laugh at us here for jerking each other off and patting each other on the back all the time.

I myself am a little disturbed by Kevin & Kell, but I don't really lose sleep because of it. I'm mostly put off by the deus ex machina type endings and so-so resolutions to plots. I read it out of habit for a while, kinda like how I used to watch the Simpsons.

[Kisai]

There are no taboo topics on comicgenesis…

We can do that by not ripping into successful webcomics not hosted here.

Did I say I was going to ban and lock the topic? Did I say it wasn't allowed? The intent there is not to start threads with the sole purpose of rounding up a posse of people to back up your opinion when almost nobody here said they even read the entire thing. That would be better served on Bill's mailing list.

Should this thread exist then? Yes, I think so. If people genuinely dislike a prominent webcomic, there's a distinct benefit gained from pooling the differing insights and observations that leads to a better understanding of the comic and comics in general as well, and this directly relates to what I understand to be at least one particular function of these forums as a whole, which is to benefit webcomic creators by allowing them to better understand comics via communication amongst themselves.

Let's go back to the beginning:

"Y'know, I just killed the Bookmark for Kevin and Kell tonight. It wasn't because of the art, or the topic, or any of the usual stuff.

It's because every single animal in Bill Holbrook's Domain universe is self-aware, as fully conscious as a human being would be.

And I just watched Rudy deliberately kill one of them in order to provide the buzzards with a 'Thanksgiving' feast.

As for the matter at hand, I do read K&K occasionally, and is aware of the cannibalism issue you point out, I just choose to ignore it, because in my opinion, Holbrook has created a world were it fits nicely together that such ARE things, and he tactically do not touches the subjects a more deepgoing analysis would provide.

Yes.

original poster, minus the nazi "if you don't like it don't read this thread" comment response to the second poster:
(original poster)

Doesn't work in the world I live in. We're supposed to care about the main characters and wring our hands along with the author when (horrors!) 'species-ism' rears its ugly head. Never mind that there ARE no separate species when they all can interbreed! No, it's that Bill wants to eat his cake and have it, too. We must care about his main characters, but ignore the fact that the deer talk, the insects talk; in fact, every creature is rational. And there is nothing but regret when murder occurs, if even that. Most of it is played off for laughs.

I read it. I like it. I think it's too wordy, every joke has to be explained because of how the world is set up, but I never put too much thought into the whole rampant murder aspect. I think that's its appeal.

All I know is I don't care about the comic. I attempted to read it a while back for about maybe long enough to see the child born but after that I dropped the comic cold turkey. Hell, I didn't even know the comic existed until it was brought up in that thread that McDuffies linked.

original poster

I guess you've got a point. The thing that got me riled was, here is this supposedly mainstream furry comic, popular with da masses (and, up until a month ago, me) and suddenly it's like everything comes into focus and the image just totally creeps me the hell out. Just from that one strip.

And no one notices! Spectacular thing going on here, subversive as hell, and it slides right past most folks. And when you bring it up, far from getting ' hey, yeah', you get folks scratching their heads or shrugging. Which is why I made the comment about most people being below, not above, such things.

Ahhh, I'm beating it to death. They went over it more thoroughly in the other thread, bless 'em. I didn't know other folks had stumbled across the creepiness until I came here.

Here the original poster made their point, they disagree with it from a moral stance. Every comment in between these were attacks directed at the original poster, or the second poster, followed by "WE CAN'T HAVE A SERIOUS DISCUSSION" comments.

I then say lets look the moral aspect of separating fiction from reality, more points to look at the moral aspect. The original poster brought up a moral point why he didn't want to read it anymore, so it's valid.

If you have nothing to add to the debate, and are unable to discern the sarcasm from the seriousness, stop posting to the thread about OMG this discussion is too serious.

Moderator, please split out the off-topic (about trolling or this discussion is too serious) posts from this thread if it derails further and make that it's own thread.

[Centurion13]

I appreciate you all taking the time to consider my post and respond.

I decided to drop K&K, listed the reasons and then came here to see how far off base I was with my assessment of Bill Holbrook's online effort.

Apparently, either there's apathy (which is fine; I'm apathetic towards camping but don't think it's a bad thing) or there's a shared 'ewww' for much the same reasons as I listed.

Anyway, I had not been back here for about a week (Battletech fanfic to write) and wanted to try and close this off the best I can. I had not expected it to run on for so many pages, and apologize to those of you who got caught in the crossfire.

It looks as though many folks here agree with me, in the main, and for much the same reason. I made the right decision, for the right reason, and can move on without any post-modern residual angst.

Thanks.

Regards,

Centurion13