Comments

1
Thanks for the response, but I could have done without being called a nerd AGAIN at the end there.
2
I think if they wanted a full page ad, maybe they should have paid for one.
3
please cancel dinosaur comics and bring back blecky yuckerella, thanks.
4
Les, what happened to that whole "we're taking back the word 'nerd' and making it cool to be a nerd because we're nerds and that's cool" thing? I thought that was all the rage these days? Granted, it may not be your thing (not my thing, either; and I certainly could be rightly accused of doing nerdly things).
5
What an overboiling crock of self-important horseshit. Even as--or maybe especially as--a gigantic comics fan, I'm embarrassed that a small group of people who spend their time writing and/or drawing comics lack the ability to laugh at themselves. I mean, seriously, your genre is called COMICS.

Lastly, just because you've thrown some doodles into your stupid little emo diary doesn't make you a comic creator. Oh, Portland.
6
I really can't believe anyone thinks nerd is an insult anymore.

7
I don't really know why this bugs me so much. I'm really just a cartoonist who lives in Portland; I don't consider myself part of the scene, and I'm not involved with the show in any real way.

It just seems in poor taste to me.

I work hard at my job and I prefer not to be denigrated for doing something I love for a living.
8
Ha ha, nerds..
9
"...an anti-Stumptown agenda"

That's pretty funny. As someone who reads indie comics, I thought the feature in the Merc was just sort of "meh". Not that good, but not enough to get upset over.

The cover however was priceless. One of my favorites of all time.
10
There was a total of two comments as of 5 pm today directly blaming the Mercury for "dissing comics." The rest dealt with the content of the offending comic itself. We are just trying to make a living at a difficult and often disrespected profession, and a smear job coming from within the community itself is an unusual and noteworthy event worthy of addressing. Hallett's defensiveness does nothing to address the core issue at hand. Not everyone who works their ass off making comics sees themselves, or wants to be addressed in a general way as, "nerds and losers." We take this seriously. Obviously the Mercury's response to well-founded criticism is "I know you are but what am I?" but it doesn't dismiss the issue at hand. I don't think the Mercury hates comics; I think Main and Parker do, and that was from where this community response arose.
11
I'm really curious about the intent of the piece.

If the purpose was to inform your non comics-fan readers about the local comics festival, then it was a failure. The comic does little to communicate what the show is about and frankly does not make it seem appealing for a non comics-fan much less a comics fan not plugged into the local scene.

The relative humor of the piece is subjective but I doubt many of your non comics-fan readers are going to get any of the inside jokes. Take those away and all that's really left seems to be sarcasm which is not necessarily funny on it's own.

While I personally wasn't offended by the work, I didn't find it to be a very effective piece of communication especially coupled with the cover. I appreciate that you've given ample coverage to comics elsewhere in the issue but the cover and comic muddy that message. I think clarity was sacrificed for edginess and neither was achieved.

Lastly, while the Mercury has been very kind to the local comics industry in the past, it doesn't make it okay to disparage them as you've done with your cover, the comic, and this very blog. I feel like the tone of this blog is very dismissive of the comics industry and your desire to hear from non comics-fan readers leads me to believe that you are underestimating how many comics professionals and comics fans live in this town not to mention comprise your readership. It would have been polite to apologize for offending them despite disagreeing with the reaction. Posting a blog like this is bad business.
12
So this is a bunch of nerds getting super-offended that they're being called nerds? It's not like the creators of the comic are tough to track down. Maybe you should try contacting them, instead of acting all butt-hurt on an alt-weekly blog.

And for those who're all, "this is my art and my livelihood"; if you can't take criticism, then maybe making art isn't the best line of work for you to be in. People are going to denigrate what you do. If you're this angsty about a comic that takes the piss out of your genre, what are you going to do when someone with real teeth rips in to your work?
13
Damn, I was actually planning on volunteering at the comics fest this weekend but after seeing how some of these "comics people" think, I wonder if I've made a bad choice. Hopefully they are in the minority, I guess I'll see tomorrow. Lighten up and get over yourselves.
14
"And for those who're all, "this is my art and my livelihood"; if you can't take criticism, then maybe making art isn't the best line of work for you to be in. People are going to denigrate what you do. If you're this angsty about a comic that takes the piss out of your genre, what are you going to do when someone with real teeth rips in to your work?"


They'll do exactly what they're doing right now and speak their minds when they disagree.
15
Atomic nailed it. If the nerds wanted a full page ad showing what their convention was all about, they should have ponied up the money and bought one. It is not the Mercury's job to sell your convention.
16
I agree with iwouldprefernotto. I'm a big fan of the fest, but none of this strikes me as very professional.

Most comics, given time, are going to wind up "denigrating" something or other people care about. That's how it works. You don't get a Persepolis without pissing off some Persians.

This just seems like a huge glass house situation.
17
i'm a comics fan in general; the comic ran in the paper was just bad and the article was boring.

nerd is a compliment if you are gainfully employed.
18
@Alison, so how did your nerd summit go? Was there outrage, tears, placation of the horribly wronged?
19
I sincerely apologize if I came off as accusing the Mercury of being anti-comics or anti-Stumptown. Along with other comics folk, I appreciate your coverage and support over the years. Yet I have to agree with commenters such as Martha Dumptruck, who pointed out that the combined intent of the Mercury’s Stumptown strip and cover is confusing. What are they intended to communicate?

By contrast, the piece you ran on the comedy festival in the same issue was a clearly delineated description of the events, personalities, and venues involved. The message is: Go to there. When juxtaposing these two pieces (as the Mercury did on its own cover), the reader is left with a clear conception of the comedy fest as a well-organized, professional event and a murky notion that there may be some cartoonish mayhem at the Doubletree Hotel.
20
I thought the comic was brilliant! A well-deserved "roasting" of the comic scene.

And also because pseudo-nerd in-jokes about nerds who are so nerdy they're cool? Brilliant! And so fresh. OMG, it's fresh... I've definitely never seen it done better 8,000,000 times before. Mmm hmm.

Now I can't wait to see next week's Merc. Maybe run a joke about how the gals hate it when us guys leave the toilet set up. Ha! Right, ladies? Yeah, you know what I'm talking about.

Ignore the whiners. Most cool Merc readers will LOVE this Stumptown comic. (The ones "hip" enough to get it at least) Right?! Because it's just...so fresh!
21
I found it to be completely unremarkable. Not funny, not offensive, not interesting in any way.
22
What happened to all the comics at the back of the Merc comprised of half-nekkid ladies and their phone numbers?
That shit was money.
23
Comic book fans and Mercury readers -

As a co-creator of the comic currently causing so much ruckus on this website, I have no obligation to explain or justify any of the content that you find so objectionable, but as a friend of Carolyn Main and Alison Hallet, I do in fact feel the need to jump into this conversation. Alison approached Carol and I to make this comic because she knows of Carolyn's deep-rooted connection to the Stumptown event itself (you have no doubtedly seen her handing out awards to all of you professionals in past years), and our love of independent comics. We were honored that she came to us to do this feature, and excited about including as many references to our favorite characters and artists that we possibly could, while still making something that was entertaining and self-contained as a story. We went through a lot of ideas, and the one that jumped out at us as being the most fun to make was the one where all of the comics came to life and fought some unkown enemy, as it would make for a lot of unique pairings and give us lot of room to show off the character designs of our favorite artists and comic creators. However, we were in no way interested in giving all of these artists visual handjobs - we buy their books, we promote their work among our circle of friends, they have our support - so we thought instead of blowing kisses up their skirts that we would make harmless little jokes at their expense, some of them a tad meaner than others, but all of it out of respect. For example, the meanest joke in the piece is made at Jeffrey Brown, and I personally am big fan of his work and own all of his books. I love Jeffrey Brown, all three of us do, which is why Carolyn and I mention his name and give him his own panel that he shares with Nicole Georges and Greg "Clutch McBasterd," two more journal comic artists (local) that we love to pieces. You should also know that the second panel in the comic, the one about Craig Thompson, originally contained the line, "Blankets... how appropriate, all the damn thing did was lull me to sleep," a line that was cut to apparently protect you, the reader, from what most consider mild snarkiness (now that I've whitnessed all this hubub over nothing, I can see why it was cut). This is what we call a joke, people. You can say it's dumb, or cheap, or too easy, but I think it's funny, and what makes it even funnier to me, is how much I love that book. I have purchased Blankets three seperate times in my life but don't own a copy, because I keep giving it away to friends who need it. That's how much that book means to me. I give it to people I care about when they are in a bad place emotionally. If Craig Thompson sees this, and is offended by this joke we made, well then fuck Craig Thompson. As much as I like his work, if he can not take a joke, and if his fans can not take a joke, then I want nothing to do with any of them. He's famous, he sells lots of books, I've bought three of them at twenty-nine bucks a pop - I think I've paid the price to make a joke, and one would think the boy could handle it.

Through the process of making this comic, Alison Hallet was very supportive of both Carolyn and me, and clearly understood what we were going for. She knows where we are coming from and gets the joke of the piece, and she believed, as we all did, that the general audience would see through the schtick and recognize how much we like, respect, and care about comics. Our first draft of the story was 32 panels, and it had a lot more references, positive and "negative", and made more sense as a story, but we had to cut it down for space. It was out of our hands, there was no more space to give us, and because of that none of us could publish the comic we wanted to publish the way we wanted to publish it. Carol and I even turned in an alternate comic to try and eliminate the problems with sizing, but it just didn't have the same zip (and believe it or not it was even "meaner" than what's in the paper now, but you must remember, this is when we assumed that the Portland comics crowd had a sense of humor). So with no other options, the three of us took a hatchet to our original comic and ended up with what is displayed before you. Not our best work - it says "Words by Riley Michael Parker" but that is hardly even the case anymore - but considering our limitations, I feel like we did a swell job (and there were MANY limitations, in size, content, et cetera, from sources outside of mine, Carolyn's, and even Alison's control). Now I'm not about to get it tattooed on my back or anything, but I am proud of the comic, and everyone involved with it, and feel no need to apologize to anyone about its content or tone. It could have been better, but that could be said about just about everything. And here we are.

Also, it's pretty. Carol did a fine job with her line work - Fone Bone looks like Fone Bone, Boilerplate looks like Boilerplate - and they all fit together fairly well. I noticed that some of the people leaving rude comments about our comic are other comic people who already don't get along with Carolyn and/or me for other reasons, and that just cracks me up. The Mercury didn't ask you, they asked us. You don't like our comic, we don't like yours, or you, and that's why you didn't end up in one of our panels. Get over yourselves. Move on.

And keep the insults coming, if that's what you feel you need to do. We have a sense of humor and can laugh it all off, and we all know internet fanboys have nothing better to do, which is how you became internet fanboys in the first place. We know our intentions with the comic, the respect that we hold for the industry and for the creative people working within the medium, and we stand by our work. My only regret is that we cut most of the "mean" jokes from the final product, as I now wish we would have left them in and really given you something to bitch and moan about.

So long Mercury readers, I'm off to have a cocktail and get on with my life, as I suggest you do as well. And to you my dear Carolyn Main and Alison Hallet, if either of you wonderful, talented, and accomplished young women want to join me for a drink, well you know where to find me.
24
And yes, I know I spelled Alison's name wrong. I know how to spell it. Hallett. See? It's an inside joke between me and her to spell each other's names wrong. You wouldn't get it.
25
"If Craig Thompson sees this, and is offended by this joke we made, well then fuck Craig Thompson."
"We know [...] the respect that we hold for the industry and for the creative people working within the medium,"

My goodness ... how did none of us see that before? Don't know about the rest of y'all, but MY face is red. There's respect all over the place-- we just mistook it for juvenile, face-palming poor taste. An easy mistake to make, given that they are so similar.

Our bad! ^_^
26
If the fretting few can name a single Peanuts or Foxtrot or Family Circus that's funny or well drawn, then I will do you the favor of de-virgin-izing your tight asshole.
27
I actually really like Foxtrot.
28
@Graham: Would you be offended if I called you a boring douchebag? If not, I accept your point.
29
That cover is totally amazing. I wish Tim got to do a strip in the Mercury instead of those crappy comics they run every week.

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