Author Archive: Adam J. Smithee

#6 – The Grizzled Webcomic Vet

Like his counterparts The Female and L’artiste, The Grizzled Webcomic Vet is a new creative aspect fighting for control of the webcomic The Apple of Discord in the power vacuum left by the abdication of the original Artist character.   Unlike the others, there’s a chance he may actually know what he’s doing.  This is not his first dance with webcomics, nor is it likely this will be his last.

See… he was there.  A different handle on a different network, but he was there when webcomics started.  He’s seen the birth of diary comics, and sprite comics, and fan comics, and gamer comics.  He’s witnessed the rise of greatness, the creation of horrible darkness, the ascension of the talentless and the descent of the gifted.

And sure, it’s left him more than a little… scarred, both physically and mentally.  He has trouble trusting people, automatically assumes everyone around him is a teenage boy, and holds himself (and others) to a standard of conduct that is probably impossible to live up to.  He likes doing things the hard way, because he believes that anything worth doing is worth doing right, and is not above silently (ok, not so silently) judging others who take shortcuts and cheat.  That doesn’t mean he isn’t an incredible ally to have with you, though – if anybody knows what’s going on, what to expect, and what needs to be done next, it’s ol’ Griz.  Motivating him to care may be hard, but once he’s committed to do something, he’ll see it through.

Don’t ask about how he lost his eye.  Here’s a hint – it was shortly after he lost his hand and had the hook installed.  Mistakes were made, lessons were learned, and one day he’s sure they’ll let him back into that McDonalds.

#5 – The Crazy-Ass Webcomic L’Artiste

Just like Entry 4, the Female Webcomic Artist, this is another new “creative power” vying over the right to be The Apple of Discord’s creative control.

L’artiste draws his… her… its strength from pure artistic intent, irregardless of whether it actually makes sense, adds to the body of work, or even looks “good” when finished.  Since art is the goal as opposed to… amongst other things, quality… this creator may abandon traditional formats and delve into the highly experimental and nonsensical.  The pure unfiltered artistic contents of their mind pour out onto each page, appearing as a cavalcade of creatures and chaos instead of any sort of sensical classic comic.

Because of the unique nature of L’artiste’s source of power – raw artistic inspiration, unfiltered by any inconveniences like sense and reason – expect random update days and even more random update styles.  Some days, you may get a detailed sketch of something intricate and complex, others you might get a 3-dimensional reconstruction of the house that L’artiste grew up in made entirely of Eggos, others still might simply contain a napkin left over from Chipolte with the word “ART”, along with some vaguely Mythos-esque symbols,  written in what appears to be the blood of a virgin.  And that’s on a good day.

#4 – The Female Webcomic Artist Lady

The Apple of Discord originally featured a single crazy, incompetent, bombastic webcomic author/artist who served not only as the “Voice” of AoD, but also as a cautionary tale to anybody else who might follow in his footsteps.  Since he eventually came to realize his own inadequacies and confronted his own inner demons, and has now fled the webcomic scape to try and make a dent elsewhere.

In his wake, The Apple of Discord has been taken over by his Apprentice, aided by an Artist that our lone creator hired some time back to ‘class the place up’.  But in the subsequent power vacuum, more and more creative types have begun emerging, each trying to take the helm – and the power – behind the mythical Apple of Discord.

The “The Female Webcomic Artist Lady” is… first and foremost… female, an attribute that sets her apart from all the other contenders so far.  As one of the few openly female denizens of the web that aren’t secretly 40-year-old plumbers posing as teenage girls, she has had to harden herself against the arrows (and other phallic objects) thrust at her kind by an uncaring, unlearning, and unevolving gestalt entity of teenage boys.

The long-term effects of this constant exposure to the internet has left her more than a little jaded, but has honed her senses to a point that you could fit through the eye of a needle.  When backed into a corner, she’s not above cheating, nor is she better than base manipulation and “female voodoo mind control”.  Inside she secretly wishes to be more girly, to romp in fields with flowers and unicorns, however is afraid that feeling these feelings will cause her to appear to be weak, and therefore easy prey, so she locks them away in a small cage and hides their existence from all but the closest and most trusted of prying eyes.

Can draw yaoi upon request.  Will draw blood upon stupid request.