Schtickshift

I get to talk about the Walkyverse! Hooray!

In 1997, college freshman David Willis published his unbelievably crummy comic Roomies! in a campus newspaper. Roomies! was an unfunny gag a day strip about the shenanigans of two college roommates.

David Willis then had a complete nervous breakdown and dropped out, yet continued publishing his comic online. Around this time, Roomies! slowly transformed into a weird melodrama about the dangers of sex and alcohol. Then Willis developed self awareness and recognized the general unlikeability of the characters he created. In its final stage, Roomies! became a bitter, cynical deconstruction of itself and abruptly collapsed under the weight of its own failure.

Willis then created a spinoff in which one of the Roomies! cast members joins an alien fighting task force. It's kinda like a poor man's Dragonball Z.  This comic, It's Walky! started out as a sci-fi comedy, but became increasingly grim and apocalyptic during it's five-year run.

Once that comic was finished, Willis began his SECOND spinoff, Shortpacked!, in which one of the supporting cast members of his previous comic starts working at a toy store. It's much better than it sounds, and it ended its whopping ten-year run earlier this month. 

Willis, who has grown over the years into one of the greatest webcomic creators ever, is now working on his magnum opus, Dumbing of Age. It's a reboot of the Walkyverse minus all of the bad art, bad writing, retcons, and science fiction elements. And it's totally amazing.

Anyway, this is a drawing of Shtickshift, who I won't go into much detail about, since it's knee deep in Shortpacked! spoiler territory. I normally prefer to avoid middle fingers, since most usage of it feels less like an epic rage against the heavens so powerful that it cannot be expressed with words, and more like a twelve year old trying to convince everyone that he's a total badass. I'm making an exception for Shtickshift, since it's kind of integral to her personality.

I tried to do something a bit more in Sir-Heartsalot's style, since I'm far too reliant on opacity and blur. And it seems to fit Willis's style better than an ultra-realistic attempt would.