Storytime of Navel Gazing 1: Change

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>>94015704

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I wouldn't say I "hate-read" Kot's comics, but I definitely roll my eyes more often than I would during a comic I "enjoy."

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>>94016112
I was starting to feel lonely. Thank you.

>>94015704
>Kot
Anon, please. Some things are just too cruel, even for this weekend.

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>>94016179
this city deserves a better class of criminal

>>94015704
There are a lot of bad comic writers and there's certainly worse comic writers but there's no writer I hate more than Kot. He writes mediocre drivel and acts like that makes him the new Grant Morrison or Alan Moore. Like misquoting your professor from a Philosophy 101 class at your community college is some profound revelation that elevates shitty cape comics to high art. He thinks naming a planet after an avant-garde musician makes a comic avant-garde.

There are worse writers than Ales Kot, but I don't think there's any writer as pretentious or narcissistic as Ales Kot.

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>>94016549
His "I'm done with comics, you people didn't appreciate me" essay he wrote last year kind of sealed the deal for me.

>>94015704
Are you going to storytime some Gillen too?

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>>94016723
Independently of this, I have considered a Wic+Div storytime. I've never read any of his other comics.

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I've also considered going "full-Kot" this weekend.

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>>94016801
Zero tomorrow and Material/Wolf on Saturday? I'm open to suggestions though.

>>94016549
So he's one of those "here's a literary and modernist pop culture reference, now the book is deep" kind of writer? I can stomach those kind of writers honestly if they have self awareness about them.
>>94016619
>His "I'm done with comics, you people didn't appreciate me" essay he wrote last year kind of sealed the deal for me.
Link?

>>94016772
>Wic+Div
That's the one that I think is annoyingly hipsterish. I don't know why Gillen thinks of himself as the next Gaiman. Not that Gaiman is great, most of his stuff his YA tier, especially his prose.

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>>94016838
The Surface is a "sequel" to this book and he definitely shows some self-awareness for how up-his-own-ass Change is. Material and Zero are really pretentious though. Zero starts off as a spy mystery and ends as mushroom trip with Allen Ginsberg and Material is just notes from his college philosophy classes.

as for that link, I'm looking.

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>>94016891
Wic+Div is very well executed and "well mannered" in so far as how it's constructed. Very deliberate paneling and pacing, etc.

BUT, the dialogue is steeped in "tumblr speak."

>>94016906
>Zero starts off as a spy mystery and ends as mushroom trip with Allen Ginsberg
Sounds kind of intriguing desu.

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>>94016963
It's ~18 issues and there's a strong possibility I'll run it tomorrow.

>>94016906
>Zero starts off as a spy mystery and ends as mushroom trip with Allen Ginsberg

Isn't there a whole issue or arc that's just Kot going on about William Burroughs?

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>>94017129
I haven't re-read it, but yes. That's either Zero or Material. I believe it's Zero.

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>>94017250
(why not start music-cues three issues and nine pages too late)
https://youtu.be/o9gK2fOq4MY

An advice OP, next time start the thread with your mobile or another IP to get self bump.

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>>94017432
I do it the other way around and only bump from my phone once if I need to. It seems more democratic that way. If no one is bumping then there's no reason to storytime.

>>94017491
>If no one is bumping then there's no reason to storytime.
If it's on page 1/2 for a longer period, more people will jump in the thread but fair enough.

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say what you want, but when the climax of your story involves

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>>94017592
>involves....
Cthulhu farting out the author self-insert....it can't be all bad

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this page will show up in part 2 of the storytime

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Storytime of Navel Gazing will return with "The Surface" later tonight. In the meantime, here's a God Hates Astronauts pinup

>>94017743
Bump

>>94015704
That is a very bad cover a maker would want to start with.

>>94015904
What is up with the polygons on the face?
Her mental image of herself being a hologram cover like some.kinda Scanner Darkley knockoff?

>>94015754
I gotta admire how the VERY FIRST text box sets you up so you instantly know what you're in for.

It really feels like Kot wants to write novels.

>>94019544
It's optic camouflage meant to hide her from surveillance cameras/the NSA. She references it when it breaks later on.

>>94016027
>>94016011
How did she win that? That was super unclear.

I'm not sure what the fuck the creators were going for, but I can't say I enjoyed this as all, or even found it though provoking.

This is the same guy who went after the punisher guy for letting his art be used for veterans charities, if I recall. Weird thing to lose your shit over.

>>94019681
Kot is one of those crusaders that can't seem to reconcile the fact that they "CARE SO MUCH" with the fact that they're working in a self-indulgent entertainment industry. They try to silence the cognitive dissonance by "fighting the power" with their work but it ends up just alienating the intended audience, which the author then interprets as people being "bigots."

>>94019681
>I'm not sure what the fuck the creators were going for, but I can't say I enjoyed this as all, or even found it though provoking.
You'll have the same reaction with all of Kot's comics. He reads thought provoking comics, but is too stupid to understand them. As a result, he's under the mistaken impression that something being non-sensical is the same as being deep/thought-provoking.

>>94016365
>$2million enough for 10k people's healthcare
>2mil/10k= $200 per person for a year

Someone didn't do the math when writing this.

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>>94019943
BOOT LICKER! FIGHT THE POWER!

>>94016549
My first introduction to him was Wild Children and I wasn't too impressed. I feel like the art carried it more than the story itself.

Wasn't the worst story ever but it seems like its stuck up its own ass for most of it..

>>94019867
Much of his shit is refferincing lovecraft, burrows, pynchon. But he's not going anywhere with it. So, you've got a flowers for algernon reference. It's not thematically relavent, doesn't tell us anything about the charactes, is completely unrelated to the plot. Why bother with it in the first place?

>>94017129
As someone that has "read" Burroughs, I'm not a fan. I focused on teh NOVA trilogy and it isn't incomprehensible but, I had to take multiple attempts just to get through The Nova Express.

>>94020106
>Why bother with it in the first place?
To tell you how much of an art connoisseur he is.

>>94015704
This looks interesting and I have zero idea what I'm getting myself into.

>>94017529
Pffffff

>>94017658
Well that sucked.

I'm all for a comic that doesn't explain itself but at least make SOME sense.
Like, what was the point of the blonde woman at all? Why did they have a funeral for a dog? Were the cultist who woshipped the old one supposed to be real people, or made up illusions as well. Why did the astronaut look nothing like the guy he was supposed to be a future version of. Why did W-2 and writer girl get swept up in beard guy's issues anyway; like just make it an anthology comic don't feel the need to connect this all into one giant mess.

>>94020914
>what was it about
Doublehead is a fiction suit that Kot is using to interact with his narrative. Everyone is an illusion, but Doublehead is less fake than everyone else. His issues with relationships (being attracted to disasters) stem from observing his parent's volatile relationship as a child. W-2 is sort of a shadow/mirror character that Doublehead/Kot uses to externalize his own dreams/fears of love and celebrity. The blonde is some kind of anima construct that represents Kot's feminine side, the women in his life, and his own creative process (anima as muse). I could go one, but it all boils down to therapy masquerading as a comicbook.

>>94015781
I had no problem with the style of the first page, or the faces in this page, those things in her face are kind of weird but whatever. But what the fuck is up with those saturated eyes and mouth in the third panel?

I liked Surface a lot desu

>>94022247
It sure is purdy.
>>94022166
I think they're intended to be reactions that aren't communicated in the host-panel. Or something.

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>>94015754
>Her face was beautiful like drone video footage from Afganistan

Good lord, that may just be the worst comparison I've ever heard. I am just baffled here, and it's the first thing from the book.

>>94023574
Is the prose there supposed to be metaphoric or ironic? What is the author trying to accomplish?

>>94016284
This is as far as I could get, and dammit I was trying. He's just not even attempting to make this cohesive or enjoyable to read, it's just making my eyes tired.

>>94024151
yes. he's attracted to women he thinks he can save. you can take it from there.

The stealth sequel - The Surface!
>>94024786
>>94024786
>>94024786

Dunno what's with the kot hate. Wild children and wolf were enjoyable as was zero but that's because I love Burroughs and did my dissertation on his work. Not everything artsy and political is pretentious. I did not like his bucky run though with the try hard merzbow reference

>>94024881
honestly, I enjoyed Change a lot more this time through. But the things that irritate me still irritate me. He's by far the best out of the current crop of millennial lefties, but he's still a millennial lefty.

>>94025048
So it Has more to do with ideology?
I can see it, I get that way about comics sometimes too. The most recent superman comic was super on the nose and the point about graffiti made me Do an eye roll

>>94025109
>ideology
As an example, look at the discussion about healthcare costs earlier in the thread. To Kot, these problems have "simple solutions." Just take the money from people who have it, and throw that money at the problem. "It should be enough right?"

He thinks it should be enough because capitalism "robbed" the earth of its natural, peaceful state. All of the pieces of utopia where JUST RIGHT THERE, but the capitalists fucked it up. So if only we can take all of those pieces back from the capitalists, then we'd have utopia "again." It's that fundamental misunderstanding of what is "natural" and what comes from institutions that I think is the hallmark of the vocal left. They're so steeped in the safety and accommodation of modern life that they don't even realize it. Their only problems come from the relatively small imperfections in the existing system, but they realize it. It's like a teenager screaming at her parents for "ruining her life" because they won't allow her to go out that night. "I wish you were dead!" Yes, then you could go out whenever you wanted. In fact, you'd always be out, because you wouldn't have a home.

that was not well constructed at all, but I think there's a point in there.

>>94024881
I originally thought Kot's work had a layer of self-aware irony to it. Upon reading some of the stuff he wrote outside of comics and learning more about him, I realised that no, he's just a genuinely narcissistic, pretentious, self-aggrandizing asshole. Once you know that, his works start to go from "he's trying to make a point but is flubbing the execution" to "he's failing to make a point but believes that everyone should treat him like a fucking messiah for it."

>>94015754
First fucking textbox and it's already painful.

My body is ready.