A preliminary lexicon (because not everybody needs to rip off Eric Burns)

Ok, I've finally managed to get myself to the point where I enjoy webcomic criticism. People have interesting things to say, they highlight portions of a strip which I personally would never have noticed, they show me the good points in strips which I generally consider to be universally bad. Reading criticism gives me a better understanding of the medium as a whole and enables me to make more informed decisions when choosing what to read (although ultimately in the end it comes down to: Do I enjoy reading it?), and can really create some great discussion when people build on each other's posts.

That being said, if I see one more webcomic critic use the word "snark" on his site, I'm gonna puke. I'm literally going to disembibe stomach acid on my keyboard. The same goes for "Cerebus Syndrome" and "First and Ten". I'm ok with it when Burns uses them, because they're his terms. But seriously? Show a little creativity. I know most of us were inspired by Burns. Heck even I openly admit that the sole reason I started The Webcomicker was because he demonstrated to me that the concept of webcomic criticism was cool. But I've never once stolen any of his terms. Outside of this post, I've used the word "snark" once, and that was when I was specifically referencing Burns in my very first post. And I've never used "First and Ten" or "Cerebus Syndrome".

That being said, it is useful to have some shorthand terms for referring to common events or circumstances in your field of criticism. Where would art criticism be if they had to explain the concept of "avante garde" every time they wanted to reference it? And as I've made posts on this blog, I've come up with some useful lexical terms that would be helpful to make known to the readers, so I don't have to explain them again in the future.

So this is the kind of post that will probably get a permanent link (although perhaps a version of it without all the ranting at the beginning, to save face), and get periodically updated as I think of spiffy new terms. Feel free to use these terms if you like (I think they're pretty good), but keep in mind that overuse of the terms will make them cliched, much like Burn's stuff has become.

(Note: as of this writing only one of the terms defined here has actually been used in a post: sidequesting. The other ones are terms I've had kicking around in my head and look forward to using sometime in the future.)

Sidequesting: In the world of RPGs, a sidequest is an adventure that is completely tangential to the main storyline, and is typically used as an element to length the playtime as a game. Sidequests are usually performed to make one's characters stronger or purely for the enjoyment value. In webcomics, sidequesting refers to the situation when a webcomic that is primarily storyline driven has the characters engage in some kind of side adventure or mini-storyline which is tangential to the plot as a whole. This occurs to some degree in almost every storyline driven webcomic, and sidequests vary wildly in frequency, length, and quality.

Techno-Bill: Techno-Bill is a minor character from the Dilbert comic. He only appeared in two strips, but was hugely popular with the Dilbert fanbase, and his moniker is still widely used on the internet today. So the lexical term refers to exactly what Techno-Bill is: a hugely popular bit player in a webcomic. Techno-Bills are pretty rare in webcomics because when readers latch on to a character, they tend to bug the creators to reuse them so much that the creators cave and make the character more regular (because fanservice is much more necessary in webcomics than other mediums). Some examples of characters which began their careers as Techno-Bills but ultimately joined the rotation are Chef Brian from Ctrl+Alt+Del, and the infamous Homsar. A good example of a real Techno-Bill is Pizza Girl from Questionable Content, who to date has appeared in two strips.

Respawning: Ok, this one's got a history to it. Obviously the term respawning originally came from the world of first person shooter games, where after you die your character magically comes back to life back at your base (or some other location). Beyond that I have nothing concrete to say about the etymology of the word. In the world of webcomics, respawning refers to when a strip fundamentally changes its premise. Note that this is not the same thing as retconning. In a retcon much of the history of a strip may change, but the premise is typically the same. The need for this term arose from a recent post of mine where I wanted to describe how the premise of Ctrl+Alt+Del had changed. I used the term "jump the shark", but later was made to understand that jumping the shark contains the implicit implication that things have turned for the worse. And while jumping the shark typically includes a shift in the premise, this shift does not necessarily indicate a downturn in the strip. Note also the difference between respawning and the ever popular "Cerebus Syndrome". Cerebus Syndrome specifically entails that a gag-a-day strip has become more serious, has taken on some dramatic elements or at least a running storyline with consequences. None of this is required for a respawn, just a change in the premise. Examples of strips that have respawned are Ctrl+Alt+Del (as mentioned in the post linked above) and Real Life.

Now, for those of you curious types, here's how I ultimately chose the term respawning. I was looking for a good term after the aforementioned Ctrl+Alt+Del post, and lacking inspiration, I tried to think of strips that had undergone similar changes and hoped I could find some good term from their discussion of it. So I went searching. And what I ultimately found was this strip at Megatokyo. If you scroll down the page a bit, you'll see that this was when Fred Gallagher (Piro) first announced that Rodney Caston (Largo) had left the project. This signalled a fundamental shift in the premise of the strip, from random adventures with zombies and robots to more serious relationship drama. And what was the title of the strip when this announcement was made? "Respawning tactics." I knew I had my term the moment I read it.