PvPonline
Sometimes, I really like PvP - it’s a popular comic, one that a lot of comic authors look up to for its financial success, and I find many of the storylines really amusing.
I have to say that I’m disappointed with the current storyline, about a baby troll dropped on PvP’s doorstep, though.
First, I’m disappointed because it’s already been done. By Bugs Bunny. In 1954. Baby Finster (pictured twice here) is a nasty little ganster who robs a bank, accidentally loses the money down Bug’s rabbit hole, and disguises himself as a baby to get it back. It’s a classic that doesn’t get shown on TV very often anymore, probably since Bugs gives Finster a good spanking for playing with knives and using dirty language.
If that wasn’t enough, it’s also about to be done again by a Wayans movie. The movie doesn’t launch until July 5th, but the ads are already playing — and if Scott Kurtz had gotten his Chuck Jones ripoff well-established before this Chuck Jones ripoff had started advertising, maybe I’d just see it as a rehashing of an old favorite, done by a different cast.
But that’s not the part that put me off of it. What put me off of it was that Kurtz had implied so much promise to it in the news blip on his homepage. He wrote:
I’ve been wanting to start this storyline for a long time, but I wanted to work it out in my head and make sure that it was done right. I’ve been concerned that introducing another troll character in the strip might make Skull less special
And I thought, wow, a new character, and a baby, and hey, it has nothing to do with games, but PvP hasn’t had anything to do with games in a long time, maybe this is a branch off of the Jade/Brent thread with the little girl or something equally funny and heartwarming.
Then the little bugger lifted Brent’s wallet. Then he turned out to be an adult troll (if there is such a thing) in disguise.
And all I could think was, you know, it’s not that introducing another troll would make Skull less special you need to worry about, it’s making the plot unique that’s important.
Which isn’t to say that I might not be selling Kurtz short. I might be. After all, he does say “I don’t think that anyone will be able to figure out where this is going.” I just hope he means he’s got some great twist coming, and not that he hopes none of us remember “Baby Buggy Bunny”.
