What Did I Learn?

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BreakPoint City by Brian Emling

The description reads like this:
Welcome to Breakpoint City! Located in Summit County, Ohio, Breakpoint City was built from the ground up as the nationÕs first hovering city after a generous donation by the Sploz Corporation. Though only a few decades old, our city has already been praised as being the global capital of cutting edge technology.
Supported by five anti-gravity generators located near Alberton, Ohio, the city hovers approx. 0.76 miles above the Earth. Our many spaceports make the city an inviting spot for travelers from every corner of the galaxy. Breakpoint also is the current home of Sploz Co, makers of everything from advanced holography operating systems to fat-free yogurt.
Protecting our city are two bright young heroesÉ and one talking dog:
-Ben F. Megawattis an inventor from the past with the power of electricity.
-Sofia Jaypeg hails from the future and uses that extra 1% of her mind to thwart crime.
-Dan, BenÕs pet dog, is powerless, but dreams of one day overcoming his "second banana" status.

Can an inventor, a superhero, and a talking dog survive life in a fast-paced future?"

This sets up the comic nicely, but what the comic is all about is a mixture of science fiction tropes and all these wonderful little pop/geek culture references like 'reticulating splines,' Mythbusters and Let's Make A Deal. Every comic has pop culture bits but how they are handled can make all the difference. Here we see that characters using the various references while they are furthering the action instead of relying on the refs to carry the strip. They're like side comments that enhance the enjoyment of the comic.

I love the names of the characters. It's also great for the comic to be based in Ohio, a much overlooked source of adventure. It has great colors and special effects artwork, snappy dialogue and is full of geeky fun. Another thing that is handled very well is the upbeat action. It's not easy to move the action forward and be entertaining at the same time. Many times, an artist has to choose one or the other and one of those dark sides may lure you more often than not. It's easy to get in a rut.

What did I learn?
I'm sometimes too heavy handed when it comes to pop culture bits and I really ought to scale them back to side notes (most of the time.) Am I in a rut? Have I lately avoided story and portrayed action OR have I shown action but not really advanced story and theme? Or do I have a good mix? BreakPoint City has a good mix of pop culture references, good artwork and entertaining characters and storylines. See for yourself.

Next week's review: Count Your Sheep.

Previous Reviews

Battlegate| Butterfly| Good Ship Chronicles| Evil, Inc.| Madscott| Jefbot| Chronicle| Sheldon| Stardrop| Theater Hopper| Knave| Lullaby| High Moon| Metadawn| Dead Days| PC Weenies| Ask Maridee | Tiny Folk | Gordian Algebra | Starslip Crisis | The Front | Coffee Time Comics | Patches | Little Creature | The Horrible Pirates | Serenity Tales | Crashlander | Girl Genius | This Is Me | Handle With Care | SuperFogeys | Copper | Eskimo Dave | Real Life | Chateau Wonderful | Count Your Sheep | Breakpoint City | Eeekeemo | Boxcar Astronaut | Zip and Li'l Bit | Wally & Osborne | Jump Leads | Dr. Sheep and the Aardvark | Station V3 | Dresden Codak | Lab Ratz | Toyzville | The Boids | Cow and Buffalo | Casey and Scotty | Just Outside | The Pretentious History of Everything | Tia's World | Quirks | Patrick Grey | For What It's Worth | The Sixth Dimension | Max and the Gorilla Goon Squad | Rainbow Orchid | Neko and Neko | Lions, Tigers and Bears | Spacequint | Lessons In Fire Safety | Corrupt Hardware | Enker's Tale | The Surreal Adventures of Edgar Allan Poo | A Rusty Life | You'll Have That | From the Margin | Jitterati

About These Reviews

I love comics and I'm always looking at how I can improve my own work by examining other creators' works. It's such a wildly diverse field that it's not advisable to make sweeping generalizations and ignore special circumstances and subjects.

There's a lot we can learn from one another. And while there are many forums where you might discuss this, I haven't found any lengthy discussion on what we can do to make our comics more successful. There are a few good books on the subject but the aspiring webcomic creator is forced to learn by sheer brute force practice how to adapt his/her personal style to the medium. This is not as efficient as it could be.

Also, there are literally thousands of webcomics but only a handful of places where you can find decent, regular reviews. The focus of my reviews will be on trying to determine what is positive, successful and worth emulating about each comic. You might even get hooked on a given comic you read about here.

You may also wonder where the 'criticism' is and where the negative things about the comics are pointed out. As a matter of fact, I did mention some dissappointing issues with layout and such in my initial reviews. I quickly came to the realization that it's easy for any viewer to know what they like and what they don't. I don't need to call extra attention to the negative. I have, on a few occasions, emailed a webcomic author with a few ideas for improvements but there's no need to make that information public.

I'm not trying to sugarcoat anything, mind you. I just wish to have an open discussion about what good comics do. Hopefully, more voices will join in.