OOTS #600 - The Discussion Thread

[Eric]

Still this is his job, he left his original employment to do this full time. It is not unreasonable for those supporting his career and his livelihood to complain if the product is not up to standards Burlew himself set

But nobody CARES if you're going to leave.

Bye.

If you had just left it at "I didn't like X because of Y" then that is information that Rich may be able to use.

But then going on to say "And I'll not be back" is wrong in two ways:

1) why change when the ones wanting that change have left? You're only going to risk alienating others with the change.

2) We don't respond to threats. So no matter what your reasoning is, why should we listen to someone so self centred or someone who just wants to threten people.

Nerfed your point.

Nobody Cares.

[chiasaur11]

I came in at strip number 7, it still serves as my bookmark for this site. I remember laughing so hard at Thor-Prayer™ that I was incapacitated for several minutes. Sadly it has been some time since I’ve done much more than crack a faint smile at OOTS.

I have decided to not check in daily here ( I will be for Erfworld updates…but not OOTS.) I will do a monthly read of it until either the story line actually resumes or I completely loose interest entirely in OOTS

Cue "Twisting" by They Might be Giants.

It seems on topic.

[Laurentio II]

Still this is his job, he left his original employment to do this full time. It is not unreasonable for those supporting his career and his livelihood to complain if the product is not up to standards Burlew himself set

Wrong. A comic is art, and standards are susceptible to evolution and interpretation, both by readers and by the author. You can't possibly make everyone happy, so the best thing you can do is to be yourself, and hope this is paying your bill. When it doesn't, you have to compromise, or left comics.

Mr. Burlew is writing a very famous and successful comics, and it sells. This means that lot of people are happy with his art. Some is not. Why bother?

[Scarlet Knight]

But nobody CARES if you're going to leave.

Bye.

I may be wrong , but I always thought the purpose of a forum was to get people’s opinions. If you don’t want poor reviews, just cut & paste “great comic!” over & over again. But true approval means a lot less without true disapproval.

I may be wrong in my opinion of this comic’s quality; many people enjoyed #600. Maybe I just didn’t get it. Perhaps the wait added to my disappointment. I cannot argue with the number of people who loved it. It is only my lone opinion. Perhaps if we keep seeing the recycled joke, it will become a running gag.

But no one will know if I am in the minority or majority unless we give our opinions.

[Warren Dew]

I suspect people are annoyed at this strip because it's not what they expected. As Brian Clevinger once wrote, a joke is a disruption of your expectations. On that definition, #600 succeeded wildly.

I suspect you are exactly wrong. I think the people who are nonplussed or even annoyed are the people who did in fact expect an unexciting strip. For those people, #600 fails miserably by the standard you quote since it contains no jokes for them. It's only the people who expected an unusually action packed strip who seem to find this result unexpected and therefore funny.

Me, I preferred the jokes in #100, which were at least somewhat funny and also went much further in terms of adding to the characterizations of the protagonists.

Now, what remains to be seen is whether #600 might be better in terms of advancing the plot in some as yet unobvious way. I'm not particularly expecting it to, though.

[Taekwondodo]

YAY Roy!!LOL'ed at silence at end. need to go back to Hayley now. In relation to the strip 600 dissapointment I have to say that I don't pay attention to twhat number the strip is at.

[Krelon]

I suspect you are exactly wrong. I think the people who are nonplussed or even annoyed are the people who did in fact expect an unexciting strip. For those people, #600 fails miserably by the standard you quote since it contains no jokes for them. It's only the people who expected an unusually action packed strip who seem to find this result unexpected and therefore funny.

...

So you are saying that the disappointed people are those who found it funny?

Anyway, what does that strip mean to plot development? Time in celestial real passes quite fast, does that mean the time since the Kubota incident has been moved by a week or so?

[KilltheToy]

I get the feeling Rich took a level of Ranger, then selected "4th wall" as his favorite enemy. Only a ranger could be this good at breaking the 4th wall.

Also, if that mombalya is of the sausage variety, I want some. Preferably sometime between now and very soon.

[Nu]

For some reason, I find the expression "woosh-woosh of little wings" to be exceptionally cute.

[Manoftyr]

I'm half hoping that in the next couple strips when we see the mortal realm again, the ENTIRE Order is re-united with absolutely zero explanation to how it happened other than vague references such as "Wow!, what an eventful past eight months!", Roy is resurrected and the order resumes their quest to save the world.

And then The Giant releases an 'OOTS 'the lost chronicle' book which details what happened during those eight months.

I know, a strange thing to want to happen...but, I suppose it's largely motivated by how much I want this friggen arc to end already so I'd be willing to accept such a cop-out.

[Red XIV]

Remember, people, while OotS certainly has a dramatic story to tell, it's also a comedy. Some strips are more serious than others, while some are more joke-oriented. 599 was SERIOUS BUSINESS with jokes mixed in. 600 was jokes with minor bits of possible plot importance mixed in. If you don't see a place for both kinds of strips, I'm not sure how OotS can appeal to you enough that'd you read through all 600 chapters to date.

[Caleniel]

Remember, people, while OotS certainly has a dramatic story to tell, it's also a comedy. Some strips are more serious than others, while some are more joke-oriented. 599 was SERIOUS BUSINESS with jokes mixed in. 600 was jokes with minor bits of possible plot importance mixed in. If you don't see a place for both kinds of strips, I'm not sure how OotS can appeal to you enough that'd you read through all 600 chapters to date.

Well put, Red Fourteen. Very, very well put, and I agree completely.

I totally loved this strip. "Woosh-woosh of little wings", and Mombalaya... and the elevator scene made me laugh so loud that my husband came running (it was PARTICULARLY funny, because I had wasted too much time on this board while I waited for the strip to be posted!)

On an unrelated note I also have to say: Taekwondodo - your nick and your avatar are terrific. I want to award you something... how about enough melons to see you through the next ice age?

[SPoD]

I came in at strip number 7, it still serves as my bookmark for this site. I remember laughing so hard at Thor-Prayer™ that I was incapacitated for several minutes. Sadly it has been some time since I’ve done much more than crack a faint smile at OOTS.

I have decided to not check in daily here ( I will be for Erfworld updates…but not OOTS.) I will do a monthly read of it until either the story line actually resumes or I completely loose interest entirely in OOTS

But nobody CARES if you're going to leave.

Bye.

If you had just left it at "I didn't like X because of Y" then that is information that Rich may be able to use.

But then going on to say "And I'll not be back" is wrong in two ways:

1) why change when the ones wanting that change have left? You're only going to risk alienating others with the change.

2) We don't respond to threats. So no matter what your reasoning is, why should we listen to someone so self centred or someone who just wants to threten people.

Nerfed your point.

Nobody Cares.

Eh, compared to some of the other complaints we've had around here, IronBear's is downright civil. He's basically saying, "I don't enjoy the strip, I'm stopping," and that's it. He's not loudly and repeatedly calling for Rich to alter the comic to better suit his tastes, as so many others have. He's not holding his readership hostage, as a way of trying to enforce changes in the story. He's not demanding Rich's personal attention to his defied expectations. He's not calling Rich names or harassing people who still like OOTS.

I think a short note followed by an exit is probably the best way for those who don't like the strip anymore to get their point across. In the event that Rich cares, there is a record of one lost reader. In the much more likely event that he does not care, there's no disruption of the boards. For those of us who tell complainers, "If you don't like it, stop reading," IronBear is following our advice. It's understandable that he would want to express his feelings on the way out the door, and has chosen to do so in a commendable way--briefly and without drama.

So I'd like to thank IronBear for departing the community in a polite and courteous manner. If only more of those who no longer enjoyed the comic followed your lead.

EDIT: I just reread your post, Eric, and wanted to add that there is no threat to stop reading at all. There is simply a statement of fact, for the record, that he is stopping. A threat would be if he said, "I will stop reading if X, Y, or Z doesn't happen soon." He's not asking for anything here.

[Taekwondodo]

On an unrelated note I also have to say: Taekwondodo - your nick and your avatar are terrific. I want to award you something... how about enough melons to see you through the next ice age?

hope you dont mind but i'm putting that in my sig. it's nice to have your work praised once in a while...

[fangthane]

So anyhow, here's what disappointed me about this comic...
The adaptation of the old song wasn't as adept as what I'd have come up with myself if I were working on such an adaptation. What the old song should have said was "It don't mean a thing if you ain't bought that swing." As is, the meter is hosed by the extra syllables.

Still, an enjoyable comic, all things considered. I especially liked the implication that Xykon is a dummy, however unrealistic that may be :)