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Stinz is probably the right place to start, and possibly the right place to stop depending on your sensibilities. Hader and the Colonel is adorable if you can get over the harpy inexplicably being dressed as a Nazi. I mean, "inexplicable" beyond that it's Barr and she loves to draw Nazis.
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Mar 5, 2014 02:39
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Oh, it's not mentioned in the OP, but the core Stinz and Desert Peach (and Hader) are from the late 80s, they just happen to be available online now as well. They were originally published through Fantagraphics.
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Mar 5, 2014 02:51
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corn in the bible posted:This is a hell of a thing to have a thread about. You are the one who brought it to everyone's attention. You should be grateful! This is your legacy.
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Mar 5, 2014 03:46
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In case this thread needs talking points: - Why are hats animate post time-travel? - Rosen is worse than Kjars - Where the hell does the mute dude's dinosaur come from? - I don't understand the deer skull hallucination chapter or why there is a vampire - Why is Afterdead so god damned weird
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Mar 5, 2014 05:03
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Captain Candyblood posted:Is there a timeline her comics should be read in (besides Stinz being first)? I want to read this stuff--everything that's been posted is so fascinatingly bizarre--but I want to make sure I do it in the right order, it seems confusing enough as it is. Yes, sort of. My recommended order would be: Hader & the Colonel Stinz (switch with Hader if you have a zero tolerance policy for Nazi uniforms) The Desert Peach Then potentially, Bosom Enemies Wow, you're still here? Afterdead Afterdead absolutely requires Desert Peach and Stinz, and draws from the others to a lesser extent--mostly aspects of the setting. "Barr Girls" is in there with Bosom Enemies apparently but my copy hasn't come so I can't speak for its contents. (I personally might recommend skipping Bosom Enemies though, since it's sort of a transitional state of strangeness that doesn't quite gel.) Pick fucked around with this message at 06:00 on Mar 5, 2014 |
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Mar 5, 2014 05:48
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I'm not sure, but I've wondered if Barr doesn't like the idea of him and Pfirsch together better than Pfirsch and Rosen. The horse chapter is literally analogues for all of them and it's all about Udo trying to pair up the "right" horses (the small gray one instead of the big black one).
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Mar 5, 2014 08:35
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corn in the bible posted:Also, Pfirsch and Rosen are no longer together for no apparent reason other than the author changed her mind At first it was because of that rule where you least remember the people you were closest to, and Rosen genuinely didn't seem to remember, but then later he does somehow, as indicated by his black fingernails. Pfirsch also has black fingernails, but it had been implied he was able to remember because he was a cyborg. The reason they're not together is that Rosen doesn't care any more because Rosen just can't stop being terrible. Or stop being Hell Pope.
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Mar 5, 2014 08:40
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It literally only makes sense if the intervening chapter didn't happen (the one where he remembers who Pfirsch is). Then again, Barr has mentioned she has memory trouble so she might actually have forgotten she did that. But he still has black fingernails, so he must remember, and she must remember he remembers? Also, they still hang out at roller derby, and Rosen is drooling over the girls (and mentions he's had relationships in the afterlife previously) so the excuse he gives Pfirsch--that he doesn't have any such drive any more--clearly isn't true?
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Mar 5, 2014 08:53
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CROWS EVERYWHERE posted:Another Afterdead thing that is bothering me: was that facehorse with the girl Rommel and Kjars met meant to be Hitler? Yeah, the horse was definitely Hitler.
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Mar 5, 2014 09:01
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These are the Barr horse levels: 1. Horse: normal horse, we see them in Desert Peach and Stinz, and maybe Afterdead, I forget if we've seen regular horses there. There's one at the very, very end of Bosom Enemies too. 2: Face horse: It's a horse with a person's face. Seen in Afterdead (people who protested without a license, and Hitler) 3: Turb: A person who was made into a horse where the front half is a person (still four-limbed) and the back half is a horse, though some are born that way and simply referred to as "horses". From Bosom Enemies and show up in Afterdead. 4. Horse-headed guys: I forget what they're called exactly, but they're from Bosom Enemies and show up in Afterdead. 5: Centaur: like Stinz, pretty self-explanatory. From Stinz and show up in Afterdead. 6: Not a horse: There are some of these.
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Mar 5, 2014 09:27
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Heresiarch posted:Also, a warning for Pick: "Barr Girls" is pretty much straight-up porn. Very, very weird porn which I don't think anybody but Barr could possibly find exciting. I'm not going to explain the book's gimmick because it will be much more amusing to watch your reaction if you don't know ahead of time, but I suspect that it was spoiled for you by whatever site you ordered it from.
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Mar 5, 2014 09:38
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CROWS EVERYWHERE posted:Thank you, I probably should read some actual good webcomics. I am warning you, if it is horse cock, I may actually laugh myself to death. This is not the death I intended for myself but we do not always control such things. e: But if I do, Heresiarch, please amend my Barr horse scale post-mortem.
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Mar 5, 2014 09:49
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Haha that farmer's tan makes Rosen look like a douche.
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Mar 5, 2014 09:59
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I... I have no idea. There's nothing in that picture that is one-tenth as skeevy as Bosom Enemies and there is content in it that is almost identical. "A human riding a centaur with light bondage? Why I never!" I mean, the main thrust of Bosom Enemies is the turbs are humans that are converted into slave mounts, is this really worse? e: Oh yeah, the horsehead guys are "Tudan". Pick fucked around with this message at 10:10 on Mar 5, 2014 |
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Mar 5, 2014 10:07
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Not just some sense, that's like the most Donna Barr thing imaginable. The very essence of horse-Nazi amalgamation.
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Mar 5, 2014 16:25
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chthonic bell posted:I'm currently reading the chapter where the Peach and Udo are in England, disguised as women. Is Udo Jewish? Because he's pretty adamant he's not. Oh, he definitely is, but he has a strange relationship with it that's expanded on as you go.
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Mar 5, 2014 16:31
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CROWS EVERYWHERE posted:She really likes writing scathing rebuttals to MRAs and internet libertarians and is deeply feminist and overall seems like someone you could almost talk to. I seem to recall she's going to be at Emerald City Comic-Con, and if I end up going I most definitely am going to stop by.
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Mar 5, 2014 18:31
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I am confident that, if nothing else, she is absolutely fascinating.
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Mar 5, 2014 20:03
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If nothing else, she is an incredible (and prolific!) artist, and I can't help but respect her helping to pave the way for future women in indie comics. I was actually quite disappointed that the folk making a documentary about women in comics didn't seem to consider her. Yeah, she's an oddball, but isn't that part of what makes her story interesting? This is someone who knew the status quo and fiercely threw it to the wind. It takes some serious stones to have created this stuff, considering the way that women are pressured to keep their output within heavily restricted parameters, especially if it has sexual overtones. Even if you go "What the hell?" (which is a totally fair reaction to some of it) it's still a heck of a story and must have been one heck of a fight. Shame about all the Nazis though. Pick fucked around with this message at 20:35 on Mar 5, 2014 |
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Mar 5, 2014 20:29
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corn in the bible posted:As far as I know, Stinz is the only comic she's managed to do without being dropped by publishers for being unmarketably insane. That's rather unfair because 1) it isn't true, since Desert Peach and Hader and the Colonel were published in full by Fantagraphics and 2) we don't know the circumstances of her starting to self-publish. chthonic bell posted:I'm just kinda sick of people trying to convince me how perverted and awful Barr is, both in the GBS thread and here. I know, okay. I know. Meanwhile, nerds love all sorts of men way more questionable than Barr is and they never even begin to admit those people have flaws, and that is starting to grate on me. If I recall, the pinup is even from the 2010s when the comic itself is from the 80s/early 90s. One can imagine why they could be viewed separately.
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Mar 6, 2014 01:31
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corn in the bible posted:I don't know about Hader, but The Desert Peach was absolutely moved around from publisher to publisher. Oh, son of a gun, you're right, it moved from Fantagraphics to MU Press. I didn't notice since the issues look basically the same.
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Mar 6, 2014 01:36
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Yeah, let me make it perfectly clear, I just don't have a thing for Nazis. I just don't. I think some people end up in this position where for whatever reason they're really in sync with Hugo Boss fashion or whatever, maybe it's beyond their control and maybe it's not, but either way it's not my bag of beans. That said, it's possible for me to read something and be interested in it without it appealing to me sexually. I love comics and in a genre that is over-stuffed with generic drivel I can't imagine how anyone could not at least see why her work gets attention.
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Mar 6, 2014 01:47
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I actually think there's a really good discussion to be had about what constitutes "over the line" or bad taste in regards to sensitive topics. I will admit, Barr's beyond my comfort zone when it comes to defending her work in full. However, I disagree with any position that has as its logical endpoint essentially broad artistic censorship. Additionally, I think you enter a weird space when you're criticizing someone who does, in an absolute sense, know more about a topic than you do. I'm not saying such critique is off the table, that's pretty much the opposite of my point. What makes this particularly interesting is I don't feel like I'm 100% behind any particular position and that's part of the fascination. There are a lot of fundamental questions about art that are really well-represented by this specific situation.
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Mar 6, 2014 02:02
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corn in the bible posted:I just thought her comics were funny and weird and that other people should therefore see them. I did not intend for anyone to become enamored of it or for any of these other things to happen. Stinz is fun, but most of her other stuff skeeves me the gently caress off, to be honest. I do not want people to find Bosom Enemies among my belongings when I die. That is not a joke. But again that's part of what makes it interesting. She went from someone doing strange but totally defensible work--there is nothing wrong with Stinz in the slightest--to... Nazi rear end tats and Hitler face horses. Somewhere on that spectrum we kicked over to something you're not going to publicly admit you liked. But where and why?
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Mar 6, 2014 02:11
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chthonic bell posted:But also, I can't really be skeeved out by something like Bosom Enemies or Afterdead. Horses with human faces? Half-horse, half-men beasts of burden? I just find that poo poo hilarious, even if it is at least partially sexual to the creator or some of the audience. Bosom Enemies goes even further off the rails than you'd think. Also, there's an absolute massive proportion of it dedicated to condemning the treatment of the Native Americans by, uh, white horses kind of? This seems to have become one of her pet issues and it shows up in her other work on occasion. She lives on the Olympic peninsula, where there is still a conspicuous presence of Native Americans so that might have contributed.
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Mar 6, 2014 02:21
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chthonic bell posted:But you're right. I'm not comfortable saying Barr has no right to write the poo poo she does, especially since she has put way more research into the topic than most people would put into anything they write. But I'm also not going to not have reservations about something like The Desert Peach. Yeah, I guess that's part of it--does being hugely more knowledgeable and aware about a topic make you more entitled to be somewhat fatuous about it? I especially thought about this in terms of her chapter of Desert Peach about the introduction of a woman to their battalion, where she was a woman in the military. Some parts of it felt a little off-color (Rosen, jesus loving christ) but I have a hard time thinking I'm in literally any position whatsoever to say so compared to her. I don't even know how much I don't know about WWII (though I am pretty interested in the Eastern front), but it's clear her awareness of the facts is leagues ahead even if she doesn't adhere to those facts strictly.
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Mar 6, 2014 02:33
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chthonic bell posted:I mean, I can't really imagine how much further off the rails it could've gone, but I can't lie and say I'm not curious. At some point time-travel is introduced and they go to America. They're then human again sometimes but then not other times. However, they can't take their clothes off or look different or their clothes will hunt them down (the hats can jump). One guy's wife recognizes him and doesn't even think the situation is weird as far as I can tell. Then they flash back to being forced to cross-dress as circus horses and then some things are maybe hallucinations and others aren't. Another guy is abducted from Vietnam and charged to carry the sun, but he panics and kicks a Tehran and runs into the sea.
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Mar 6, 2014 02:53
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That's after the Native American sequences though. It's strange but completely comprehensible up to the introduction of the time-travel.
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Mar 6, 2014 02:57
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Once you click on an image, it takes you to a more traditional nagivation scheme. Try this. 
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Mar 6, 2014 05:05
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Afterdead has some depressing flashbacks too. In case you dared think that Udo got to die happily, after Pfirsch dies he dehydrates to death under an overpass.  What shocks me is the things we've never seen that I assumed (wrongly) would be in the first chapters of Desert Peach. (Due to how the site is set up, I'd read the later ones before the earliest ones.) For example, we have no idea why or how Rosen proposed, which I always thought was one of the most bizarre things to never mention.
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Mar 6, 2014 05:23
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CROWS EVERYWHERE posted:Pfirsich did not get the good end of the stick in the descendants department It did seem like self-image was the defining aspect there. This does not answer your question, unless the skinhead grandson was otherkin or something, which is like disappointment squared.
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Mar 6, 2014 06:23
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And seriously though why was the skinhead grandson a centaur 
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chthonic bell posted:Okay, wait, is Pfirsch rooming with Udo (who doesn't remember him) in Nazi Hell? And whatever happens to the gunbird that bonds to him? He's just trailing Udo, he still lives with Ham. CROWS EVERYWHERE posted:If only Pfirsich self-identified for longer as a zombie, I am of the opinion that there need to be more fantastically flaming zombie characters in popular fiction. Afterdead is completely worth it for a gay Nazi zombie in hiphop gear.
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Mar 6, 2014 07:15
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chthonic bell posted:Right, right. But for some reason, Udo (who died relatively soon after Pfirsch) somehow did a 180 on his beloved old boss and now thinks he's an annoying tagalong?? Well, it's a pretty major plot point that Pfirsch took an exceedingly long time to get out of Hell, so Udo/Isador has potentially centuries of new experiences that might have changed his perception of things.
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Mar 6, 2014 07:19
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CROWS EVERYWHERE posted:Also Pfirsich is hanging out with Udo (who now doesn't go by that name and is trying to ignore Pfirsich because ?????) in order to, uhh... Something to do with toaster ghosts. Toaster ghosts have something to do with guns. Toaster ghosts are also a metaphor for ?????? Udo needs the gun to protect the roller derby girls from the earlier chapter, since he is their manager. Everyone thinks this is silly since they can take care of themselves. He's using the name Isador because that's his real name (his Jewish name, mentioned in DP). The way you get a gun is that you fish one, and the person who rescues it from you bonds with it (so actually someone else should catch it for you ostensibly). Meanwhile, his toaster stopped working (I'm less clear on this) so he got a new one. Appliances are powered by ghosts of people who were originally living in that word--not Afterdead. They consider this an extension of the duty they practice in life to the Reich, so it's Pfirsch's good nature being misguided again and he is hit with a bagel.
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Mar 6, 2014 07:25
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CROWS EVERYWHERE posted:Ah yes, I remember most of that now. I knew Udo was going by his birth name but I wasn't sure why he was ignoring Pfirsich other than "because the plot says so". Also, note that Udo doesn't have black fingernails, so he doesn't remember the good things about his relationship with Pfirsch, ostensibly, but he can remember the bad ones. However, in the chapter where Pfirsch tracks down Kjars' sister, it's implied a good memory sufficiently strong can sometimes be recalled with prompting. e: Oh yeah, the toaster was stolen by the Barr Girl who is causing the roller derby team issues.
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Mar 6, 2014 07:29
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Yeah, so when they're fighting over the porno reel in the first roller derby chapter, Udo remembers some things about their relationship because he and Pfirsch had interacted over that tape in the past. Prior to that, he doesn't remember Pfirsch or the war so it starts to come back. Rosen says something to that effect too. When Pfirsch first showed up in the field and meets Ham, Ham explains that it "fades", people don't lose their good memories immediately.
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Mar 6, 2014 07:43
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chthonic bell posted:I only read the latest chapter, got incredibly confused and totally gave up. Maybe I'll tackle it later. Afterdead really needs to be read in chronological order, certainly more than the others. It makes more sense than you'd think at first glance; the worldbuilding seems to be consistent, it's just very very odd. The details are completely bananas though.
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Mar 6, 2014 07:53
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CROWS EVERYWHERE posted:If only you had started in one of the two arcs where everyone is naked. Only, surprise! She's just a publisher. I guess I'll say this: If you're going into Afterdead, here's my understanding: The setting of Afterdead (at least after Pfirsch escapes purgatory where he grows geraniums on a tank, walks through caves of chicken bones, and is pestered by mammoth-riders and his skinhead centaur grandson) is some sort of Nazi analogue. There it's not the Third Reich, it's just the Reich, since they're so efficient they created fascism correctly the first time. Most of the people in the Reich are living. It's one of a range of afterlives, though, for people who are dead from other worlds, or possibly only our world. As far as we've seen, only people from our Earth have shown up as Afterdead there (and not all people who died on Earth and escaped purgatory go there; there is a filtering system). Afterdead are vastly outnumbered by living people. Everyone goes about their Reich duty like usual. It's vaguely absurd because she's highlighting the absurdity of that kind of government. There are centaur, half-horses, harpies, multi-armed persons, horned persons, face horses, and other bizarre creatures, as well as cyborgs, vampires, failed resurrections, and etc. Most folk seem comfortable with the system. They prefer their lives to what they know of Earth, which they can witness and have heard of from the afterdead. They have their own Catholic church but we don't know too much about it, other than its Pope. Afterdead persons are seen as an annoyance more than anything, and no one is really sure why they are there. They often come across as quaint, anachronistic, and weird. Also, they have memory problems. Their awareness of the good things about their lives fades over time, unless they have black fingernails. It's not clear if the black fingernails are a signifier of having achieved self-awareness after arriving or whether they're just a symbol that is associated with people destined not to lose their memories. Either way, the average Afterdead person can only remember the things they hated about Earth or which caused them distress. The downside is that since Pfirsch has black fingernails, he remembers people who don't remember him back. As far as we know, the people with black fingernails are only Pfirsch and Rosen, and earlier Kjars. That said, it seems that people who have forgotten good things can be prompted to remember them if the emotional connection is sufficiently strong. Anyway, this has resulted in a bit of a post-mortem reshuffling of some folk because they're more likely to be friends with acquaintances than with people who were particularly important to them in life. Hence Kjars and Erwin hang out now. People who are Afterdead are often given assignments like normal people, but they're not actually required to do them. They can't die again or be harmed in any physical way. Afterdead do not look exactly like they did in life, but it's not clear why they will sometimes show up differently. For example, Erwin has long hair and Kjars has portions of African-looking skin. Is that what everyone figures so far? Pick fucked around with this message at 09:50 on Mar 6, 2014 |
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Mar 6, 2014 07:55
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CROWS EVERYWHERE posted:That seems more or less accurate! I was wondering whether the black fingernails thing was something that you got saddled with and so you remembered things, or was something that you gained after being prompted to remember enough of your living memories. I suppose it may be expanded on later, either way, it seems deliberately ambiguous at this point. quote:The inverse correlation of memory to affection thing works with hate, too: if you hate or otherwise dislike someone, you are able to remember them very clearly. This makes sense in a ghostly kind of way and is the plot of Kjar's and Rommel's epic adventure, featuring the Hitler-horse. (Facehorses are humans (and possibly horses/centaurs?) who did Bad Things and now have no memory and are all like "Yeah, I'm a facehorse, it's cool I guess. What's odd is in a way this makes sense: you don't pine after what you've lost, but you can still make amends. Cool, no? Except other people remember the relationship you had if they knew you both, e.g. Kjars. Kjars didn't like Pfirsch and wasn't close to Erwin, so even if Pfirsch didn't have black nails, Kjars could remind him that they were brothers with a largely positive relationship that they have now forgotten--that they've lost. We've already been shown that this causes people considerable grief. Add in the black-nailers and it ends up being pretty emotionally devastating. quote:And cyborgs get special rights and clearances in exchange for being literally owned by other members of the Reich. And Pfirsch is a "cyborg" because of his replacement heart valves, knees, and bladder!
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Mar 6, 2014 08:36
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Oh man, I didn't even see that in the gradients. Good catch! Other world notes: Though Pfirsch enters the afterlife-world in a field outside the Reich city proper, most of the comic takes place in the Reich. However, the Reich does not encompass the entire world. There are tribal bands in the outlying areas, some developed cities, and some of the valleys--like Stinz's--are essentially independent in their day-to-day operations. The Raider also operates from outside Reich lands. It's not really clear how far the Reich extends or if they are other Western-style "nations", though we should probably assume there are because tourism is a known phenomenon. Additionally, race and species don't seem to matter in the Reich, although Catholics are not considered a subset of Christians, where Christians suffer a weird sort of persecution which is more like annoyance. Being Jewish or LGBT is irrelevant. However, being a one of the "creature" species can be relevant because the Reich (with the exception of outlying areas) controls breeding. Being from an established bloodline is apparently still important, and centaurs at least suffer for their lack of representation in the Reich's studbooks.
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Mar 6, 2014 08:51
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