I generally don't follow webcomics. It's not like I haven't tried a few in the past and even now I still have the links for 3-4 saved in bookmarks. The problem is that I hate waiting for new comics. This is a reoccurring theme for me. I hate waiting day to day or week to week for anything be it tv shows or movies or books. I want a complete and whole chunk that I can digest in large clumps from beginning to end. Occasionally through random chance or because the hype was large enough, I'll dig in anyway but once I catch up, it's almost inevitable that I'll stop checking back. Take Order of the Stick as an example. I followed that for ages and even bought the first 4 books but still eventually stopped following it somewhere around when they got to that whacky kingdom with the dragon running things. I tell myself I'll get back to it one day, but I figure that's a 50-50 chance at best.

Anyway, I was wikiwalking my way through TV Tropes (always a dangerous endeavor) when I stumbled across the entry for a webcomic that caught my eye. It sounded spiffy and on the plus side, it had been running since 2004! That makes it practically neolithic by web standards and also meant that there was a huge archive of comics for me to go through. So that's what I've been doing off and on for close to a week now. I've enjoyed it enough that I figured I'd share.

I present to you Vexxarr! (That was the tv tropes entry. The actual comics are here)



The basic story is that there are a race of murderous, evil aliens in our galaxy who have managed to subdue most of it through big spaceships with even bigger guns and the will to use them for fun. Earth has been left unmolested so far because it's a tiny, blue smudge with no strategic value whatsoever. Vexxarr (the one on the right in the green with tentacles) is a minor flunky who has caught the emperor's displeasure and is sent on a one-man mission to conquer the planet. The idea is either way he's out of the way either stuck on Earth or dead due to failure. As you might imagine, the invasion doesn't go well. The end result is that Vexxarr is a group of incompetent misfits become the universe's chewtoy as they try to survive knowing for sure that fate, destiny, and the known galaxy (just about) is out to get them.

Vexxarr: Cynical captain of a small ship kicked like a empty can from one quadrant of the galaxy to the next.

Minionbot: The dog-looking (temporary) robot second from the left. A possibly murderous and certainly unhelpful AI who was supposed to aid Vexxarr on his mission.

Carl: The AI of the ship (not pictured) who is absolutely murderous and would like nothing better than to smear all the meat sacks inside the ship into a viscous goo.

Spoorflix: The tentacly thingie with eyeballs on the left. Quite possibly a weapon of mass destruction. Wishes only for peace and harmony and yet manages to cause any being reading his livejournal (yes, livejournal) to immediately attempt to commit suicide.

Sid: The silicon crustacion second from the right. A being that is immortal and quite possibly nigh-indestructible, yet evolved as the prey species for some rock crunchers. Sid may be the most cowardly thing in the galaxy as his only goal is to avoid being eaten. Has been known to commiserate and try to rescue anything he finds in the fridge/pantry. It's said that he's so optimistic that he approaches cynicism from the other side. I <3 Sid.

You can find more info on the various races in the webcomic here. All in all, it's very well done and quite hilarious. If you have a love for epic levels of cynicism, this might be your cup of tea. Vexxarr doesn't think the universe is out to get him. He knows it, and every attempt to avoid fate only drops him deeper in the crapper. As you can imagine, he's also become amazingly genre savy though it's still not enough to help him in many cases.

Carl: What's life without a little danger?
* beat *
Vexxarr: How the hell would I know!?

So I thought I would pop up one of the comics that I really enjoyed as an example. If you like it, I suggest you give the whole thing a look. I have no clue what I'll do when I finally hit the end of the archive (which should happen in another day or so) but it will have been worth the time so far.