Webcomics

My first encounter with digital literature was by proxy, through watching my older brother play computer games and allowing me to guide the action through asking him to explore different areas of the storyworld, though never through interacting with the keys myself. I was scared of the power to control a character, knowing that his fate would be in my hands. Especially if those hands would have to hold guns. Simulation looked and felt too real to me, and I couldn’t face in-game enemies, accompanied by sinister music, without anxiety and a flight response, making it impossible for me to advance the storyline on my own. The first time I had a hands-on experience with digital literature, it was in the form of webcomics, a piece of illustrated fiction that, depending on the author, updates every week with a comment section, and at times involves flash animation that the reader can either click on or view as interacting with the static comic frames in a way that would not be possible with printed comics. I was already an avid consumer of printed fiction, and I was thrilled to be able to interact with a text and its formation through commenting on a piece of fiction as well as forming a community with the other readers to engage in topical discussion. Choice was emphasised in these forums, in where characters that were formerly only names on a forum could become characters in the comics, or the comment section would create running jokes, such as one commenter always commenting first, that became part of the webcomic itself. Hypertext was also utilised to add to the comic format. The webcomic Never Satisfied has a ‘cast page’ of the characters, and if the reader clicks on the character illustration, they are taken to a Youtube video of a song that the author feels is relevant to the character. Hypertext also appears in the format of ‘character tags’ that contextualise comics outside of a linear movement of time and instead allow the reader to navigate the narrative through the perspective and appearances of the character. Through my experiences with webcomics, the digital medium became something I was incredibly grateful for. I always wanted to get involved with illustrated narratives, that had both beautiful images and well-written dialogue. However, I was often too intimidated of the culture around, and price of, printed comics, as well as their seeming focus on hero narratives. The comic culture seemed to require a certain amount of knowledge of lore and of the canon printed narrative to secure membership. Webcomics, however, were accessible upon one click, and included its discussion and community as an inextricable attachment to it, that allowed me to interact with the stories I found important and captivating, from seeing a college student go through the same crisis of faith I had, to science fiction involving interplanetary communication. They included representations of characters that I identified with, including a lot of female characters that were not sexualised or part of the male hero’s narrative, that found a space for publication in a fluctuating space where a printing press and its price did not need to be involved. These stories became alive in unique ways, enabling me to skip through its journey through time, as well as see the characters move outside of their frames.