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@Blunttime
Wow. I must say, your last post has left me with a whirlwind of emotions at revelation of so much information. Now I too have some information to share with you as well. Now while I still have some counter-arguments, refutations, and the like. Undoubtedly, you have shaken my view of this infamous webcomic where now I contest whether or not it should go in the Horrible section of this site. Regardless, the entry needs some heavy revising if it still qualifies. I\\\'m going to be elaborating so I need to go step by step. Here goes... TL;DR mode.
First, some minor embarassment. I\\\'m sorry I got the names wrong in my previous post. It was Chris Hall, avatar Brew, who was the writer and coder of the site, and perceived beer addled fratboy who did not know what he was doing. And it was Brian Krumm, avatar trip, who was the artist and perceived woobie who mindlessly followed Brew despite his own immense potential. Again sorry for the mix up.
Second, some feelings of laughter, and minor anger. That Blended Goose stuff and those Penny Arcade Forum shenanigans sure had me fooled. I mean look at this comic here:
imgur.com/u2kEr1t.jpg
It looks just like the artstyle of the actual comic, right down to the linework and graphical edges, and the writing is a little similar too, if you were to tell me that this was done by the Shredded Moose duo, I would believe you. And I did believe, hook line and sinker. I\\\'ve been trolled, and I must say it was a very good and elaborate prank and was actually pretty funny. Interestingly enough, now that I know it\\\'s a troll comic, I found this comic with Anita Sarkeesian, Tatsuya Ishida, and David Cheung actually pretty funny but in so-bad-it\\\'s-good in-joke sense, because it features all these horrible internet personalities who are each detestable in their unique way. Brew, for being the infamous misogynistic fratboy we love to hate, Tatsuya Ishida, for ruining his decent webcomic with extreme militant and unreasonable feminism, Anita Sarkeesian, for being a clueless gaming journalist, and David Cheung, for being a creepy motherfucker with his \\\"ero-guro\\\" art. It\\\'s like a bad webcomic gettogether extravaganza!
The Coach_Brew antics have left me in stitches as well. I mean the troll got Brew\\\'s condescending mannerisms and \\\"swiggity-swag\\\" bro speak down to a science. Again if you were to tell me he was Chris Hall, I\\\'d totally believe you. This was all a really convincing act!
http://www.patreon.com/creation?hid=363860
Though these Blended Goose antics are funny they also frustrate me a bit because of some dishonesty on behalf of those in on the trolling. People like me actually did think it was Chris Hall being stupid online, again, when in actuality, he is still in hiding and MIA. Thus in a way, they\\\'re, especially after what you told me about Chris Hall and thus giving me a different picture about the man, tarnishing a guy\\\'s name when not called for, and beating a dead(and drunk) horse that\\\'s really really dead(and drunk) and yet despite all that, this horse was trying hard to redeem itself before it got beaten to death.
Speaking of people pretending to be Brew, I stumbled upon this amateur video on youtube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsrKhK8kA0A
Now, while the production values and performance of that video is a little iffy at times, I do give kudos to this guy(Homor) for at least being a little honest because you can see from the get go that it\\\'s a parody act. I also felt the line from 1:04 to 1:14 had me in stitches.
\\\"Um yeah, my old artist... Brian Krumm... He wouldn\\\'t come back because apparently he\\\'s got a lucrative career in children\\\'s books and he doesn\\\'t want to be associated with a guy who does a webcomic where the protagonist rapes a women and laughs at them... BUT THAT\\\'S OKAAAYAY!\\\"
Which now brings us to Trip, his master Brew, their character evolution, the evolution of the webcomic, other characters, the public\\\'s reaction to the webcomic, and Brain\\\'s dreams.
And those feelings are of bemused surprise and sadness.
About the bemused surprise.
The whole idea of Trip being a misguided woobie, was a narrative collected by the various critics of the webcomic.
I think it first began when Lilith Ester of John Solomon\\\'s posse tackled the comic stating
\\\"On a slightly happier note, there was one strip that did not crush all my hope in humanity. That one was amusing, but nowhere near so much as to actually redeem the rest of it.\\\"
The word strip linked to the Going Postal comic that everyone liked.
She then added...
\\\"You will notice that until now, I\\\'ve only been talking about the writing and not the art. I am going to remedy that by saying that the art is actually fairly all right. Sure, it\\\'s not strikingly original and derivative of Penny Arcade, but there is no evidence of copy+pasting, the shading and highlights are consistent with the light source and despite the SUPER SHINY OH MY GOD surfaces, it\\\'d be pleasant to look at if not for the subject matter. If you clicked on the links, you\\\'d know how badly the dude draws boobs. They\\\'re almost always oversized, vaguely banana-shaped or have nipples like hubcaps. Yeesh. Even the Orc Feminist has erect nipples and her ample cleavage on show.\\\"
One single criticism of the comic in regards to the art was that despite being good, the nudity was generally horribly drawn and fetish retardant. The consensus was \\\"Trip is good when he\\\'s not drawing porn, and unfortunately, Brew forces him to draw more porn!\\\"
Lilith Ester also stated.
\\\"Trip also likes to draw cameltoes, lending weight to the idea that he\\\'s no older than 14.\\\"
Anyway, also in that link to the Badwebcomics review, you should scourge around the comments section because Chris Hall actually tried defending his comic in the comments in the kind of mannerism that I described( in a condescending, cover your ass excuses kind of way), and ends up being pwnd by John and the gang. I will fish out the comment and repost them here to document the conversation, but I wanted to get to right now is this guy\\\'s response to Chris Hall\\\'s defense:
Aldatze said...
\\\"The only character I find remotely likable and worth developing in this train wreck is the blond haired kid, I say \\\"blond haired kid\\\" because he\\\'s so underdeveloped that I can\\\'t remember his name. He\\\'s naive and plays well against Brews douche-baggery. He should be the one pointing out how much of a stupid asshole Brew is, if not with words, with his actions. Sure, this isn\\\'t the most original solution, but ANYTHING would make this comic suck less. Right now, you\\\'re trying to have your cake and eat it too with a character who is an asshole to everyone and the world adores him. You think he\\\'s hip, and cool, and a badass, because you and Brew are one and the same. Learn some humility man.\\\"
After John Solomon\\\'s blog disappeared, the inferior Badwebcomics wiki surfaced, run by some John Solomon fans. They themselves did their own take on Shredded Moose, and continued this \\\"Trip as the woobie\\\" narrative on their author biography section of their review:
http://webcomicauthority.wikidot.com/shredded-moose
\\\"\\\"Brew\\\" is as disgusting as it is possible for a person to be. It isn\\\'t even that he\\\'s a misogynist, it\\\'s that he doesn\\\'t really get why his misogyny makes women want to murder him in his sleep and why it makes men view him a threat to real men everywhere.
\\\"Trip\\\" is another story. Rarely speaking out and by all appearances younger and more inexperienced than Brew, you just kind of feel sorry that Brew dragged him into this horrific debacle. I personally hope that Trip can recover, although I feel like he might have to go gay to find a girlfriend, considering that he\\\'s already alienated perhaps half of all women who will ever see his art on SM. At least if he\\\'s honest with them about it. My advice: Take the cock. I\\\'m sure it can\\\'t be all bad, dude. As Brew might say, hey, it\\\'s probably like taking a big crap.\\\"
\\\"Poor Trip can draw everything but women very well, which is depressing considering that Brew is forcing his storyline into lesbian intercourse and naked Orc feminists every other strip. The strip\\\'s art is pretty much Penny Arcade with sex references instead of video game references. In case you\\\'ve never seen either, that means blocky detailing, a hard push towards stylishness over realism, and more copy-pasting than, say, Lackadaisy Cats but less than the likes of Ctrl-Alt-Del. \\\"
\\\"Writing kills Shredded Moose. It utterly fails at being entertaining in any way and succeeds primarily at making the reader feel like a chauvinistic douchebag just for having opened the comic on his or her browser. The fact of the matter is that having a comic wherein the PS3, portrayed as a girl, is violently slaughtered by Mario for no apparent reason is not funny. Brew, the reason it\\\'s gross isn\\\'t Trip; he\\\'s drawing the scene just as he should. It\\\'s you. This arbitrary violence bullshit is not funny, it\\\'s disgusting.
For some reason, Brew decided that having a feminist hippie go after his Mary-Sue would make for good comicry. Apparently, when people accuse you of being a chauvinist you simply attach yourself to a feminist and it balances out. Except that it doesn\\\'t. It\\\'s weird to see the same exact feminist who once railed against you now having sex with you. Incidentally, I don\\\'t understand why your character had the need to wash off after making love to Monique, the purple-clad redhead; she\\\'s easily the most attractive woman in your entire comic. At least she isn\\\'t cartoonishly proportioned and looks vaguely normal.
In the end, Brew, after reading through your comic and looking at your various attitudes towards women, I get the feeling that you are a closeted, overcompensating homosexual. You have an obsession with forcing Trip to draw naked women that is almost unhealthy, if such a thing is possible. Look, all I\\\'m saying is that I\\\'ve never seen a man that was so sexually insecure that he felt a need to constantly show how much he thought that naked women were attractive.\\\"
So I find it a little funny that I\\\'m not the only that came away with this narrative but many other did too. It was believed to come totally from us, like sort of wild mass guessing theory because it came out of mere internet cold reading.
It\\\'s also a little weird because Trip was not the voice of reason in the earlier strips, he was just Brew\\\'s lackey. His role, was just following Brew around going all bug eyed saying \\\"Man Brew! You\\\'re so cool! I wish I was as cool as you\\\" as if he was an easily impressionable naive youth. It\\\'s like with flying monkeys from the Wizard of Oz. It\\\'s the witch that\\\'s the problem. Remove the witch, and the flying monkeys stop being terrifying, and start being adorable.
http://webcomicauthority.wdfiles.com/local--files/shredded-moose/SM1.jpg
https://31.media.tumblr.com/86ec8faa9995d330234b32a1a377be19/tumblr_inline_n1qgxuQlXO1rrro1a.jpg
I remember there was also a comic where Brew told Trip that if he wanted to get laid, if should act, appear, or be smart.
So. with all that in mind, I find it hilarious awesome and cool when I found out that this happened in the actual comic when everyone else and myself were not looking; Trip does actually breaks out of fratboy matrix, becomes his own person, and turns the tables on his fratboy master Brew by disregarding his crappy dating advice and views on women.
http://i.imgur.com/sbx7M8K.jpg
In fact some of the other comics on the page you showed me were, refreshing to say the least. It\\\'s like Chris Hall took Aldatze\\\'s advice and made an effort to deconstruct the douchey Brew and build upon the character who had potential, Trip. Thus turning the comic into a much needed deconstruction of fratboys who take in Tucker Max and Maddox the wrong way.
But it also weird because it seems to betray what the first half built up, although I don\\\'t mind much the first half being thrown out the window because I found the first half was excrement most foul. Most especially the date rape comic.
It\\\'s like the comic was at first making constant dude not funny! jokes through a completely Jerkass character, and having the nerve to say \\\"LAUGH WITH THIS GUY! THIS GUY IS ALWAYS RIGHT! HE IS SO COOL!\\\" and then mid way, when most have left the charade in disgust, the comic pulls a 180 and says \\\"Okay okay, remember this guy? Don\\\'t do what this guy says, HE SUCKS! He\\\'s a terrible human being and he needs to be taught a lesson, but stick around he might change with the help of all those around him, including this blond kid that used to think he was cool, and this feminist woman who we mocked in the past. She\\\'s cool now\\\"
Let me explain.
The first half of the comic seemed to be a Penny Arcade clone, except one with more sex.
In Penny Arcade, Gabe and Tycho tell videogame jokes, do character based humor, and show off their wit by making fun of industry giants, media, and John Romero for the umpteenth time. Basically the gist of Penny Arcade was that Gabe and Tycho super smart, super savvy, radical gaming dudes on a couch here to play video games, review video games, all the bitch slapping stupid people with a vengeance and rocking your face with edgy zanyness. And that\\\'s the \\\"Two Gamers on a Couch Genre\\\"
There have been many \\\"Gamers-on-a-couch\\\" comics in the past few years, \\\"Ctrl-Alt-Delete\\\", \\\"Power-Up Comics\\\", and of course this comic. Now if you heard all the shenanigans that Tim Buckley has done, you know people were tiring of this genre, especially when it was seen as gateway for ego driven authors to self insert themselves and go on mary sue wish fulfillment fanboy rampages complete with uncalled for political pushing and the usual not as educated opinions. The mission statement of this comic, as advertised on forums was \\\"Brew and Trip are radical gamers out to cure the world of stupid!\\\" With that mission statement, it generally believed that this comic was taken to be a more sexier Penny Arcade, and we are supposed to take Brew and Trip as super savvy protagonist and agree with their positions on everything and laugh at everything they do. Which is why I have hard time believing that the drama elements were planned from the get do. That and also the writer and the artist would personify themselves as Brew and Trip respectively leading us to believe that when Brew was going \\\"Ahahahaha look at that feminist Orc!\\\" we took it to believe that the author thought so about feminists as well.
And again, I might be cold reading here, but take a look at this strip here:
https://31.media.tumblr.com/86ec8faa9995d330234b32a1a377be19/tumblr_inline_n1qgxuQlXO1rrro1a.jpg
Note that it is Brew who is wearing the sweater of Tycho, and Trip who is wearing the shirt of Gabe.
Now if you\\\'re unfamiliar with the Penny Arcade duo, I\\\'ll just say that their characters are basically mature rated versions of The Angry Beavers. Gabe is like the violent impulsive imature Daggot to Tycho\\\'s suave sophisticated and pompous Norbert.
Likewise I get the feeling that Brew was originally supposed taken to be as sauve uber cool as shit bro who gets all the ladies.
On the Penny Arcade website, Gabe and Tycho also do written game reviews. I remember when the Shredded Moose site was still up, they too had written game reviews, just like on Penny Arcade, and Brew would do the reviewing. The reviews I remember he did were for the then new Tomb Raider game, simply titled Lara Croft Tomb Raider. He gave it a positive score, but also of course commented on Lara\\\'s Breasts saying they were jigglier.
The Shredded Moose site also had a forum, and according to Lilith Ester, had an \\\"educational\\\" thread that was there just for posting porn. I remember Brew also posting a joke link that said \\\"Gateway to hell\\\" and the link linked to the Special Olympics site which if I remembered earned him some scorn for being a mean spirited. At one point during the site\\\'s lifetime the forum was raided by \\\"Anonymous\\\" but specifically the /v/ and /co/ userbase of 4chan. When this happened the forums were filled with mocking spam posts shouting \\\"HEY BRO WASSUP DAAAAYUM IMMA BREW I\\\'M SO COOL I FUCK VAGINAS AND PUNCH THEM!!!\\\" Suffice to say, I think it was this incident that drove Chris Hall off the internet, and also drove Shredded Moose into further infamy since the date rape comic. I think Encyclopedia Dramatica documented a little about raid on their John Solomon page. I think they said something along the lines of \\\"Anonymous brought forth swift justice on the Shredded Moose forums, exposing Brew for the beer addled fratboy that he is\\\".
Suffice to say ED and 4chan, were, and still are the people who popularize the phrases \\\"Bitches & Whores\\\" \\\"Tits or GTFO\\\" and \\\"Ronery Gamers generals\\\", as well as guro fics like Cupcakes and that one Rocket Power copypasta where Tito says \\\"It\\\'s time for a dicking!\\\" so if these people are calling out a webcomic for being too misogynistic for their own tastes, then that is one hell of a message being sent to the public.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/EvenEvilHasStandards
However, like you said, this comic is not Satan incarnate(well, not the latter strips at least), and neither is it\\\'s author Chris Hall. Chris Hall just seems to be a flawed human being who had legitimately relocatable dreams and ideals of success and stardom, yet ended up making too many mistakes, and when he realized what he\\\'d done, and tried to fix it all.
I used to think of Chris Hall as just some random assclown on the internet who got his shit served in internet arguments. I merely laughed at him, much in the same way I would view Fred Durst. He was certainly a loser to me, but not as a horrendous internet loser as Chris Chan or ADF or Nick Bates. He was to me, just a clown, someone who prances until the forums promoting his webcomic with shin diggity brospeak, and then covering his ass and looking embarassed when people told him how much his jokes were non existent and how much of a jerkass his self insert protagonist was. In sense, I actually appreciated his presence on the web, not his Mary Brue, but him, Chris Hall, when he posted on forums just to advertise his webcomic. I probably didn\\\'t appreciated his presence on forums in a way he intended, because it was all from incitement of laughter on behalf of him making a fool out of himself.
However, now that I understand what his intent was, and how hard he tried to get there, I now actually feel really bad and sorry for the guy. He made quite some mistakes, but his ultimate crimes, I think, were just not understanding certain tropes when it came to writing, specifically comedy.
Plus learning code is quite an accomplishment. I personally know how math can hard some times. Sometimes you end up in a course in college that is way too advanced and sometimes you end up in a course that\\\'s way too easy. You have to learn all the prerequisites when it comes to mathematics especially when it comes down to computer programing. So now when I think back to that strip where Brew mocked both the PC and the Mac, I realize maybe he wasn\\\'t just catering to both parties for more hits, he might really been a Linux user! But in seriousness, the dream to have a gaming webcomic which would be more adult, and be devoted to reviews and minor political commentary, is actually a pretty cool idea, I\\\'m just sad that idea never reached it\\\'s potential. I also get the feeling the Chris Hall is like some sort of reverse Dave Willis, in that guy can actually do some decent drama, but fails miserably at comedy. Gosh I bet the guy might be crying himself to sleep at night because John Solomon, Anonymous, Yaoi Huntress Earth, and the rest of us were so mean to him...
Now for a little bit of minor refutations.
On the Date Rape comic, I recently downloaded mediafire collection of Shredded Moose strips, and I must say, the Date rape comic, along with quite a lot of entries are missing. Conspicuously absent. It would seem to that number 36 is understandably an Old Shame as it does taint the whole comic to an irredeemable level.
On subject of Rape. Rape is serious business and is not just some trope to be thrown around with little care.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DudeNotFunny
First some little side stories to further my point. The Nostalgia Chick over at That Guy With The Glasses, is a pretty decently respected web personality. Now she once did a little segment in a review called \\\"Rap about Rape\\\". She did the segment in a totally satirical manner, and keep in mind that she is a woman, and she is also a little bit of a feminist. She infuriated her fans and everyone who saw the segment because rape is a trigger subject that really is not to be taken likely. The same goes for Mookie of Dominic Deegan and Spooney and his little jest towards JesuOtaku that cost him his gig at TGWTG(actually his bipolar meltdown, if he just fessed up and apologized, sincerely, he\\\'d had been working again with TGWTG no sweat). Shredded Moose tackled rape in the worst way possible by making the rape of an unconscious blitzed woman the subject of joke, and even if it was actually Brew\\\'s creepy douchebaggery that was the subject of the joke, then it would still fail because again rape is like the complete monster of crimes in our society. The utterance of it inspires dread in all but the depraved.
This is why I find the date rape comic horrible. The comic would be forgivable without it.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CerebusSyndrome
I think the term \\\"cerebus syndrome\\\" still counts on this because \\\"cereberus syndrome\\\" I think is simply a switch from comedy to drama. It may have been always dark, but it was still a shift from straight up comedy to drama. Though I would now say that maybe it wasn\\\'t as \\\"Poorly executed\\\" as the entry said it was, seeing that the more redeemable strips are in the latter half of the comic. The latter comics work differently too, which again I think is what prevented this comic from getting an audience. If you were ask me, I would say the latter half of the comic, including the Deconstruction of Brew, the character development of Trip and Monique, and tragedy of Mutt would count as an attempted Author\\\'s Saving Throw.
Also on the issue of women in the comics, just keep this trope in mind.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madonna_whore_complex
While it\\\'s true that comic does not call out women as manipulative bitches(although it does consider some of the feminists to be orcs, keep that in mind), the comic does paint a lot of the women as \\\"Madonnas\\\" and by \\\"Madonnas\\\" I mean \\\"ripe for the picking\\\". For you see, in the misogynist\\\'s mind, women are either whores, or pure innocent childlike nubiles just waiting to be deflowered, and if you\\\'re a misogynist like Brew was in the earlier strips, you deflower as many Madonnas and toss them aside like used Kleenex.
Most of the women I have seen in the Shredded Moose comic fall under the nubile nympho Madonna category, which makes kind of surprising when Monique ends up get fleshed out as character although there\\\'s still the case with the sleeping in bed somewhere along the more serious latter half. Of course I take that her relationship with Brew ends being the serious relationship to which Brew commits. However I could imagine readers who abandoned reading the webcomic during the earlier phase taking glace at the particular strip, rolling their eyes, and saying \\\"typical Shredded Moose\\\" without understanding the context of the scene.
Again, I would argue for So-Bad-It\\\'s-Horrible for the earlier comics, but not the latter comics. Just the earlier comics. The latter comics from what I\\\'ve seen so far are mix between So Bad It\\\'s good, So Cool it\\\'s awesome, and so Okay it\\\'s average. But because the mere existence of the earlier comics brings down the quality of the latter comics, and the latter comics are relatively decent on their own. If one could somehow retcon the gag-a-day mary sue to the extreme earlier comics, ax the Penny Arcade esque interface, ax the gamer on a couch format, and started and just stick with dramedy storyline the latter comics would have been truly decent, if not average.
Wow. I must say, your last post has left me with a whirlwind of emotions at revelation of so much information. Now I too have some information to share with you as well. Now while I still have some counter-arguments, refutations, and the like. Undoubtedly, you have shaken my view of this infamous webcomic where now I contest whether or not it should go in the Horrible section of this site. Regardless, the entry needs some heavy revising if it still qualifies. I\\\'m going to be elaborating so I need to go step by step. Here goes... TL;DR mode.
First, some minor embarassment. I\\\'m sorry I got the names wrong in my previous post. It was Chris Hall, avatar Brew, who was the writer and coder of the site, and perceived beer addled fratboy who did not know what he was doing. And it was Brian Krumm, avatar trip, who was the artist and perceived woobie who mindlessly followed Brew despite his own immense potential. Again sorry for the mix up.
Second, some feelings of laughter, and minor anger. That Blended Goose stuff and those Penny Arcade Forum shenanigans sure had me fooled. I mean look at this comic here:
imgur.com/u2kEr1t.jpg
It looks just like the artstyle of the actual comic, right down to the linework and graphical edges, and the writing is a little similar too, if you were to tell me that this was done by the Shredded Moose duo, I would believe you. And I did believe, hook line and sinker. I\\\'ve been trolled, and I must say it was a very good and elaborate prank and was actually pretty funny. Interestingly enough, now that I know it\\\'s a troll comic, I found this comic with Anita Sarkeesian, Tatsuya Ishida, and David Cheung actually pretty funny but in so-bad-it\\\'s-good in-joke sense, because it features all these horrible internet personalities who are each detestable in their unique way. Brew, for being the infamous misogynistic fratboy we love to hate, Tatsuya Ishida, for ruining his decent webcomic with extreme militant and unreasonable feminism, Anita Sarkeesian, for being a clueless gaming journalist, and David Cheung, for being a creepy motherfucker with his \\\"ero-guro\\\" art. It\\\'s like a bad webcomic gettogether extravaganza!
The Coach_Brew antics have left me in stitches as well. I mean the troll got Brew\\\'s condescending mannerisms and \\\"swiggity-swag\\\" bro speak down to a science. Again if you were to tell me he was Chris Hall, I\\\'d totally believe you. This was all a really convincing act!
http://www.patreon.com/creation?hid=363860
Though these Blended Goose antics are funny they also frustrate me a bit because of some dishonesty on behalf of those in on the trolling. People like me actually did think it was Chris Hall being stupid online, again, when in actuality, he is still in hiding and MIA. Thus in a way, they\\\'re, especially after what you told me about Chris Hall and thus giving me a different picture about the man, tarnishing a guy\\\'s name when not called for, and beating a dead(and drunk) horse that\\\'s really really dead(and drunk) and yet despite all that, this horse was trying hard to redeem itself before it got beaten to death.
Speaking of people pretending to be Brew, I stumbled upon this amateur video on youtube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsrKhK8kA0A
Now, while the production values and performance of that video is a little iffy at times, I do give kudos to this guy(Homor) for at least being a little honest because you can see from the get go that it\\\'s a parody act. I also felt the line from 1:04 to 1:14 had me in stitches.
\\\"Um yeah, my old artist... Brian Krumm... He wouldn\\\'t come back because apparently he\\\'s got a lucrative career in children\\\'s books and he doesn\\\'t want to be associated with a guy who does a webcomic where the protagonist rapes a women and laughs at them... BUT THAT\\\'S OKAAAYAY!\\\"
Which now brings us to Trip, his master Brew, their character evolution, the evolution of the webcomic, other characters, the public\\\'s reaction to the webcomic, and Brain\\\'s dreams.
And those feelings are of bemused surprise and sadness.
About the bemused surprise.
The whole idea of Trip being a misguided woobie, was a narrative collected by the various critics of the webcomic.
I think it first began when Lilith Ester of John Solomon\\\'s posse tackled the comic stating
\\\"On a slightly happier note, there was one strip that did not crush all my hope in humanity. That one was amusing, but nowhere near so much as to actually redeem the rest of it.\\\"
The word strip linked to the Going Postal comic that everyone liked.
She then added...
\\\"You will notice that until now, I\\\'ve only been talking about the writing and not the art. I am going to remedy that by saying that the art is actually fairly all right. Sure, it\\\'s not strikingly original and derivative of Penny Arcade, but there is no evidence of copy+pasting, the shading and highlights are consistent with the light source and despite the SUPER SHINY OH MY GOD surfaces, it\\\'d be pleasant to look at if not for the subject matter. If you clicked on the links, you\\\'d know how badly the dude draws boobs. They\\\'re almost always oversized, vaguely banana-shaped or have nipples like hubcaps. Yeesh. Even the Orc Feminist has erect nipples and her ample cleavage on show.\\\"
One single criticism of the comic in regards to the art was that despite being good, the nudity was generally horribly drawn and fetish retardant. The consensus was \\\"Trip is good when he\\\'s not drawing porn, and unfortunately, Brew forces him to draw more porn!\\\"
Lilith Ester also stated.
\\\"Trip also likes to draw cameltoes, lending weight to the idea that he\\\'s no older than 14.\\\"
Anyway, also in that link to the Badwebcomics review, you should scourge around the comments section because Chris Hall actually tried defending his comic in the comments in the kind of mannerism that I described( in a condescending, cover your ass excuses kind of way), and ends up being pwnd by John and the gang. I will fish out the comment and repost them here to document the conversation, but I wanted to get to right now is this guy\\\'s response to Chris Hall\\\'s defense:
Aldatze said...
\\\"The only character I find remotely likable and worth developing in this train wreck is the blond haired kid, I say \\\"blond haired kid\\\" because he\\\'s so underdeveloped that I can\\\'t remember his name. He\\\'s naive and plays well against Brews douche-baggery. He should be the one pointing out how much of a stupid asshole Brew is, if not with words, with his actions. Sure, this isn\\\'t the most original solution, but ANYTHING would make this comic suck less. Right now, you\\\'re trying to have your cake and eat it too with a character who is an asshole to everyone and the world adores him. You think he\\\'s hip, and cool, and a badass, because you and Brew are one and the same. Learn some humility man.\\\"
After John Solomon\\\'s blog disappeared, the inferior Badwebcomics wiki surfaced, run by some John Solomon fans. They themselves did their own take on Shredded Moose, and continued this \\\"Trip as the woobie\\\" narrative on their author biography section of their review:
http://webcomicauthority.wikidot.com/shredded-moose
\\\"\\\"Brew\\\" is as disgusting as it is possible for a person to be. It isn\\\'t even that he\\\'s a misogynist, it\\\'s that he doesn\\\'t really get why his misogyny makes women want to murder him in his sleep and why it makes men view him a threat to real men everywhere.
\\\"Trip\\\" is another story. Rarely speaking out and by all appearances younger and more inexperienced than Brew, you just kind of feel sorry that Brew dragged him into this horrific debacle. I personally hope that Trip can recover, although I feel like he might have to go gay to find a girlfriend, considering that he\\\'s already alienated perhaps half of all women who will ever see his art on SM. At least if he\\\'s honest with them about it. My advice: Take the cock. I\\\'m sure it can\\\'t be all bad, dude. As Brew might say, hey, it\\\'s probably like taking a big crap.\\\"
\\\"Poor Trip can draw everything but women very well, which is depressing considering that Brew is forcing his storyline into lesbian intercourse and naked Orc feminists every other strip. The strip\\\'s art is pretty much Penny Arcade with sex references instead of video game references. In case you\\\'ve never seen either, that means blocky detailing, a hard push towards stylishness over realism, and more copy-pasting than, say, Lackadaisy Cats but less than the likes of Ctrl-Alt-Del. \\\"
\\\"Writing kills Shredded Moose. It utterly fails at being entertaining in any way and succeeds primarily at making the reader feel like a chauvinistic douchebag just for having opened the comic on his or her browser. The fact of the matter is that having a comic wherein the PS3, portrayed as a girl, is violently slaughtered by Mario for no apparent reason is not funny. Brew, the reason it\\\'s gross isn\\\'t Trip; he\\\'s drawing the scene just as he should. It\\\'s you. This arbitrary violence bullshit is not funny, it\\\'s disgusting.
For some reason, Brew decided that having a feminist hippie go after his Mary-Sue would make for good comicry. Apparently, when people accuse you of being a chauvinist you simply attach yourself to a feminist and it balances out. Except that it doesn\\\'t. It\\\'s weird to see the same exact feminist who once railed against you now having sex with you. Incidentally, I don\\\'t understand why your character had the need to wash off after making love to Monique, the purple-clad redhead; she\\\'s easily the most attractive woman in your entire comic. At least she isn\\\'t cartoonishly proportioned and looks vaguely normal.
In the end, Brew, after reading through your comic and looking at your various attitudes towards women, I get the feeling that you are a closeted, overcompensating homosexual. You have an obsession with forcing Trip to draw naked women that is almost unhealthy, if such a thing is possible. Look, all I\\\'m saying is that I\\\'ve never seen a man that was so sexually insecure that he felt a need to constantly show how much he thought that naked women were attractive.\\\"
So I find it a little funny that I\\\'m not the only that came away with this narrative but many other did too. It was believed to come totally from us, like sort of wild mass guessing theory because it came out of mere internet cold reading.
It\\\'s also a little weird because Trip was not the voice of reason in the earlier strips, he was just Brew\\\'s lackey. His role, was just following Brew around going all bug eyed saying \\\"Man Brew! You\\\'re so cool! I wish I was as cool as you\\\" as if he was an easily impressionable naive youth. It\\\'s like with flying monkeys from the Wizard of Oz. It\\\'s the witch that\\\'s the problem. Remove the witch, and the flying monkeys stop being terrifying, and start being adorable.
http://webcomicauthority.wdfiles.com/local--files/shredded-moose/SM1.jpg
https://31.media.tumblr.com/86ec8faa9995d330234b32a1a377be19/tumblr_inline_n1qgxuQlXO1rrro1a.jpg
I remember there was also a comic where Brew told Trip that if he wanted to get laid, if should act, appear, or be smart.
So. with all that in mind, I find it hilarious awesome and cool when I found out that this happened in the actual comic when everyone else and myself were not looking; Trip does actually breaks out of fratboy matrix, becomes his own person, and turns the tables on his fratboy master Brew by disregarding his crappy dating advice and views on women.
http://i.imgur.com/sbx7M8K.jpg
In fact some of the other comics on the page you showed me were, refreshing to say the least. It\\\'s like Chris Hall took Aldatze\\\'s advice and made an effort to deconstruct the douchey Brew and build upon the character who had potential, Trip. Thus turning the comic into a much needed deconstruction of fratboys who take in Tucker Max and Maddox the wrong way.
But it also weird because it seems to betray what the first half built up, although I don\\\'t mind much the first half being thrown out the window because I found the first half was excrement most foul. Most especially the date rape comic.
It\\\'s like the comic was at first making constant dude not funny! jokes through a completely Jerkass character, and having the nerve to say \\\"LAUGH WITH THIS GUY! THIS GUY IS ALWAYS RIGHT! HE IS SO COOL!\\\" and then mid way, when most have left the charade in disgust, the comic pulls a 180 and says \\\"Okay okay, remember this guy? Don\\\'t do what this guy says, HE SUCKS! He\\\'s a terrible human being and he needs to be taught a lesson, but stick around he might change with the help of all those around him, including this blond kid that used to think he was cool, and this feminist woman who we mocked in the past. She\\\'s cool now\\\"
Let me explain.
The first half of the comic seemed to be a Penny Arcade clone, except one with more sex.
In Penny Arcade, Gabe and Tycho tell videogame jokes, do character based humor, and show off their wit by making fun of industry giants, media, and John Romero for the umpteenth time. Basically the gist of Penny Arcade was that Gabe and Tycho super smart, super savvy, radical gaming dudes on a couch here to play video games, review video games, all the bitch slapping stupid people with a vengeance and rocking your face with edgy zanyness. And that\\\'s the \\\"Two Gamers on a Couch Genre\\\"
There have been many \\\"Gamers-on-a-couch\\\" comics in the past few years, \\\"Ctrl-Alt-Delete\\\", \\\"Power-Up Comics\\\", and of course this comic. Now if you heard all the shenanigans that Tim Buckley has done, you know people were tiring of this genre, especially when it was seen as gateway for ego driven authors to self insert themselves and go on mary sue wish fulfillment fanboy rampages complete with uncalled for political pushing and the usual not as educated opinions. The mission statement of this comic, as advertised on forums was \\\"Brew and Trip are radical gamers out to cure the world of stupid!\\\" With that mission statement, it generally believed that this comic was taken to be a more sexier Penny Arcade, and we are supposed to take Brew and Trip as super savvy protagonist and agree with their positions on everything and laugh at everything they do. Which is why I have hard time believing that the drama elements were planned from the get do. That and also the writer and the artist would personify themselves as Brew and Trip respectively leading us to believe that when Brew was going \\\"Ahahahaha look at that feminist Orc!\\\" we took it to believe that the author thought so about feminists as well.
And again, I might be cold reading here, but take a look at this strip here:
https://31.media.tumblr.com/86ec8faa9995d330234b32a1a377be19/tumblr_inline_n1qgxuQlXO1rrro1a.jpg
Note that it is Brew who is wearing the sweater of Tycho, and Trip who is wearing the shirt of Gabe.
Now if you\\\'re unfamiliar with the Penny Arcade duo, I\\\'ll just say that their characters are basically mature rated versions of The Angry Beavers. Gabe is like the violent impulsive imature Daggot to Tycho\\\'s suave sophisticated and pompous Norbert.
Likewise I get the feeling that Brew was originally supposed taken to be as sauve uber cool as shit bro who gets all the ladies.
On the Penny Arcade website, Gabe and Tycho also do written game reviews. I remember when the Shredded Moose site was still up, they too had written game reviews, just like on Penny Arcade, and Brew would do the reviewing. The reviews I remember he did were for the then new Tomb Raider game, simply titled Lara Croft Tomb Raider. He gave it a positive score, but also of course commented on Lara\\\'s Breasts saying they were jigglier.
The Shredded Moose site also had a forum, and according to Lilith Ester, had an \\\"educational\\\" thread that was there just for posting porn. I remember Brew also posting a joke link that said \\\"Gateway to hell\\\" and the link linked to the Special Olympics site which if I remembered earned him some scorn for being a mean spirited. At one point during the site\\\'s lifetime the forum was raided by \\\"Anonymous\\\" but specifically the /v/ and /co/ userbase of 4chan. When this happened the forums were filled with mocking spam posts shouting \\\"HEY BRO WASSUP DAAAAYUM IMMA BREW I\\\'M SO COOL I FUCK VAGINAS AND PUNCH THEM!!!\\\" Suffice to say, I think it was this incident that drove Chris Hall off the internet, and also drove Shredded Moose into further infamy since the date rape comic. I think Encyclopedia Dramatica documented a little about raid on their John Solomon page. I think they said something along the lines of \\\"Anonymous brought forth swift justice on the Shredded Moose forums, exposing Brew for the beer addled fratboy that he is\\\".
Suffice to say ED and 4chan, were, and still are the people who popularize the phrases \\\"Bitches & Whores\\\" \\\"Tits or GTFO\\\" and \\\"Ronery Gamers generals\\\", as well as guro fics like Cupcakes and that one Rocket Power copypasta where Tito says \\\"It\\\'s time for a dicking!\\\" so if these people are calling out a webcomic for being too misogynistic for their own tastes, then that is one hell of a message being sent to the public.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/EvenEvilHasStandards
However, like you said, this comic is not Satan incarnate(well, not the latter strips at least), and neither is it\\\'s author Chris Hall. Chris Hall just seems to be a flawed human being who had legitimately relocatable dreams and ideals of success and stardom, yet ended up making too many mistakes, and when he realized what he\\\'d done, and tried to fix it all.
I used to think of Chris Hall as just some random assclown on the internet who got his shit served in internet arguments. I merely laughed at him, much in the same way I would view Fred Durst. He was certainly a loser to me, but not as a horrendous internet loser as Chris Chan or ADF or Nick Bates. He was to me, just a clown, someone who prances until the forums promoting his webcomic with shin diggity brospeak, and then covering his ass and looking embarassed when people told him how much his jokes were non existent and how much of a jerkass his self insert protagonist was. In sense, I actually appreciated his presence on the web, not his Mary Brue, but him, Chris Hall, when he posted on forums just to advertise his webcomic. I probably didn\\\'t appreciated his presence on forums in a way he intended, because it was all from incitement of laughter on behalf of him making a fool out of himself.
However, now that I understand what his intent was, and how hard he tried to get there, I now actually feel really bad and sorry for the guy. He made quite some mistakes, but his ultimate crimes, I think, were just not understanding certain tropes when it came to writing, specifically comedy.
Plus learning code is quite an accomplishment. I personally know how math can hard some times. Sometimes you end up in a course in college that is way too advanced and sometimes you end up in a course that\\\'s way too easy. You have to learn all the prerequisites when it comes to mathematics especially when it comes down to computer programing. So now when I think back to that strip where Brew mocked both the PC and the Mac, I realize maybe he wasn\\\'t just catering to both parties for more hits, he might really been a Linux user! But in seriousness, the dream to have a gaming webcomic which would be more adult, and be devoted to reviews and minor political commentary, is actually a pretty cool idea, I\\\'m just sad that idea never reached it\\\'s potential. I also get the feeling the Chris Hall is like some sort of reverse Dave Willis, in that guy can actually do some decent drama, but fails miserably at comedy. Gosh I bet the guy might be crying himself to sleep at night because John Solomon, Anonymous, Yaoi Huntress Earth, and the rest of us were so mean to him...
Now for a little bit of minor refutations.
On the Date Rape comic, I recently downloaded mediafire collection of Shredded Moose strips, and I must say, the Date rape comic, along with quite a lot of entries are missing. Conspicuously absent. It would seem to that number 36 is understandably an Old Shame as it does taint the whole comic to an irredeemable level.
On subject of Rape. Rape is serious business and is not just some trope to be thrown around with little care.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/DudeNotFunny
First some little side stories to further my point. The Nostalgia Chick over at That Guy With The Glasses, is a pretty decently respected web personality. Now she once did a little segment in a review called \\\"Rap about Rape\\\". She did the segment in a totally satirical manner, and keep in mind that she is a woman, and she is also a little bit of a feminist. She infuriated her fans and everyone who saw the segment because rape is a trigger subject that really is not to be taken likely. The same goes for Mookie of Dominic Deegan and Spooney and his little jest towards JesuOtaku that cost him his gig at TGWTG(actually his bipolar meltdown, if he just fessed up and apologized, sincerely, he\\\'d had been working again with TGWTG no sweat). Shredded Moose tackled rape in the worst way possible by making the rape of an unconscious blitzed woman the subject of joke, and even if it was actually Brew\\\'s creepy douchebaggery that was the subject of the joke, then it would still fail because again rape is like the complete monster of crimes in our society. The utterance of it inspires dread in all but the depraved.
This is why I find the date rape comic horrible. The comic would be forgivable without it.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/CerebusSyndrome
I think the term \\\"cerebus syndrome\\\" still counts on this because \\\"cereberus syndrome\\\" I think is simply a switch from comedy to drama. It may have been always dark, but it was still a shift from straight up comedy to drama. Though I would now say that maybe it wasn\\\'t as \\\"Poorly executed\\\" as the entry said it was, seeing that the more redeemable strips are in the latter half of the comic. The latter comics work differently too, which again I think is what prevented this comic from getting an audience. If you were ask me, I would say the latter half of the comic, including the Deconstruction of Brew, the character development of Trip and Monique, and tragedy of Mutt would count as an attempted Author\\\'s Saving Throw.
Also on the issue of women in the comics, just keep this trope in mind.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madonna_whore_complex
While it\\\'s true that comic does not call out women as manipulative bitches(although it does consider some of the feminists to be orcs, keep that in mind), the comic does paint a lot of the women as \\\"Madonnas\\\" and by \\\"Madonnas\\\" I mean \\\"ripe for the picking\\\". For you see, in the misogynist\\\'s mind, women are either whores, or pure innocent childlike nubiles just waiting to be deflowered, and if you\\\'re a misogynist like Brew was in the earlier strips, you deflower as many Madonnas and toss them aside like used Kleenex.
Most of the women I have seen in the Shredded Moose comic fall under the nubile nympho Madonna category, which makes kind of surprising when Monique ends up get fleshed out as character although there\\\'s still the case with the sleeping in bed somewhere along the more serious latter half. Of course I take that her relationship with Brew ends being the serious relationship to which Brew commits. However I could imagine readers who abandoned reading the webcomic during the earlier phase taking glace at the particular strip, rolling their eyes, and saying \\\"typical Shredded Moose\\\" without understanding the context of the scene.
Again, I would argue for So-Bad-It\\\'s-Horrible for the earlier comics, but not the latter comics. Just the earlier comics. The latter comics from what I\\\'ve seen so far are mix between So Bad It\\\'s good, So Cool it\\\'s awesome, and so Okay it\\\'s average. But because the mere existence of the earlier comics brings down the quality of the latter comics, and the latter comics are relatively decent on their own. If one could somehow retcon the gag-a-day mary sue to the extreme earlier comics, ax the Penny Arcade esque interface, ax the gamer on a couch format, and started and just stick with dramedy storyline the latter comics would have been truly decent, if not average.
