Webcomic Pick: Something Positive

Whenever you become hooked on some sort of entertainment, you always remember the first time you discovered it. Maybe it's the first comic book that hooked you on comics (for me it was Batman: Arkham Asylum), the first appointment television show (Moonlighting), the first card game that hooked you (poker), or the first novelist that kept you enthralled through an entire series or two (Piers Anthony).

I didn't become obsessed with webcomics overnight. At some point a few years back, an old college friend introduced me to webcomics by sending me a link to the site SomethingPositive.net and the webcomic "Something Positive" by RK Milholland. This is not just another 4 panel comic strip, and it's certainly not for kids.

Something Positive is edgy, funny, and because it isn't available in print, solely on the web, it could deal with adult topics with frankness, humor and sarcasm I had never seen in comic form. Something Positive opened my eyes to what comics could be - sharp, always funny, sometimes mean, but with a weight that comes with terrible decisions that aren't quickly forgotten. SP spins stories that are meant to offend, uses coarse language to hilarious effect, and could never, ever be printed alongside Garfield or Family Circus. But then, neither Garfield nor Family Circus could make a person laugh as hard as one strip of Something Positive. And neither are as good at making you care about the characters as SP is.

As you go through 6 years of archives, you'll discover quickly that Something Positive is a comic about Davan, his gelatinous cat Choo Choo Bear, and his two best friends, PeeJee and Aubrey. They live in Boston and deal with daily difficulties of the world around them, sometimes better than others. Davan's perpetually gloomy, PeeJee is hopelessly romantic and Aubrey is practical to the point of making money off of other people's problems. They torture each other a little out of love, participate in some of the strangest plays (their latest theatrical effort: "Re-Animator: The Musical") and help each other deal with some difficult situations.

The first SP comic sets the tone for the whole series: Davan talks with PeeJee about a baby shower gift he's gotten for an ex-girlfriend who cheated on him. The gift will shock you and, if you're the sort of person who might have had a similar experience, will make you wish you thought of it yourself.

At the same time as Milholland writes these shocking gags, you come to discover that Aubrey and Davan are still haunted by the memory of a childhood friend whose suicide still lingers in their thoughts. You learn about PeeJee's obsessive crush on her gay friend Jhim. You begin to care about the relationship between Aubrey and her boyfriend Jason, and you get to see dozens of other peripheral characters emerge in their own sometimes silly story lines. There's a lot to like about this comic strip, and a huge archive to bring you up to speed. Something Positive is updated frequently throughout the week on an irregular schedule, so make a point to bookmark it and check it out each day.

Some have argued that the golden age of comics ended long ago. With the advent of webcomics and the innovation of comic artists like Milholland, we are seeing a new revival of smart, mature independant comics through the power of the web. Don't be that person who is missing out.