With the recent announcement of the demise of Modern Tales' AdventureStrips line, Interviews Editor Leah Fitzgerald tracked down Christopher Mills -- the driving force behind the shortlived subsidiary. In the interview that ensued, Mills offers his thoughts on what happened, on the fate of comics that were hosted on AS, and what is slated in his own future.

Sluggy Freelance. SLUGGY FREAKIN' FREELANCE! Over a thousand comic strips! THIRTY-FOUR CHAPTERS! SEVEN books! Almost SIX YEARS! The paraphernalia for sale! The support sites! The tribute sites! The Pete Abrams worship - it's everywhere. Plug "Sluggy Freelance" into Google and you get 25,600 hits.

Where does one even plan to begin to start to talk about this comic?

Underground. Edgy. Raw. Inventive. Independent. Webcomics have all of that and more. That said, the following may seem like an absurd question, but it needs to be asked: are webcomics having an impact on mainstream popular culture? When do we get to pay 8 dollars to watch Sluggy Freelance II: The Search for Oasis or an animated Fanciest Froglin on the big screen, or flip the channel to Mad Science with Doctor Helen Narbon on the television?

Phil Cho's Skinny Panda is often quoted as a favorite by other webcomic creators, and it's easy to see why. The strip is not only beautifully drawn, but boasts some of the most endearing characters on the web. From the lovesick Robokitty to the know-it-all Penelope, to the Skinny Panda himself, Cho has an uncanny ability to skewer pop culture, exploit human foibles, and make you feel for his characters in a way that the greats such as Breathed, Watterson, and Schulz did so well.

Physical Connections In The Electronic World

Summer is here and the convention season is upon us. It’s time to strain and pull ourselves away from our computers and hopefully make some sort of real human contact with the people that we’ve learned about through e-mails, forum posts and web pages. These are webcomics and comic communities bringing people with similar interests together, and showing quite clearly that most costumes look ridiculous on the average human being.

A Regular Eisenstein, Or Something…

That comics and film have much in common is pretty much a given. The bond they share as mediums of visual communication is strong, and over the years there has been a great deal of cross-pollination between the two artforms. I’m not talking about comic adaptations of films or films based on comic books – although there certainly are a lot of those these days – but rather the nuts and bolts that hold the two mediums together.