Comments on: A worm in the head

A worm in the head

picea — Mon, 03 Jan 2005 10:16:52 -0800

Ballad is the story of a nervous and confused little homunculus. It's an unsettling webcomic with moody artwork and fantastic pacing that creeps along slowly, like a severed hand across the floor.

By: car_bomb

car_bomb — Mon, 03 Jan 2005 10:32:51 -0800

it's so goth, i hurt. :P

By: headspace

headspace — Mon, 03 Jan 2005 10:34:58 -0800

The backgrounding and inking are gorgeous, but there are whole pages where nothing makes sense, and as soon as the people show up... eh. I thought the Ballad character was more compelling before he got skin. I think the concept suffers from overshow and undertell- the art needs to serve the story.

By: euphorb

euphorb — Mon, 03 Jan 2005 11:39:18 -0800

Cute and well drawn. I liked the moon dream sequence.

By: crunchywelch

crunchywelch — Mon, 03 Jan 2005 11:44:01 -0800

quite nice, a good break from the one-off comics that are so pervasive nowadays. It forces you to slow down and examine and enjoy the artwork. I like that some panels don't make total sense, exploration and contemplation make up much of the difference between art and advertisment imo....

By: shmegegge

shmegegge — Mon, 03 Jan 2005 12:05:41 -0800

the artist needs to have a writer. Seriously. He or she has the excellent pacing and layout aesthetic of Dave Sim, but in Cerebus stuff actually happened during those long silent bits. ditto car_bomb. Beautifully illustrated, though.

By: nearo

nearo — Mon, 03 Jan 2005 12:11:15 -0800

Beautiful.

By: The Thnikkaman

The Thnikkaman — Mon, 03 Jan 2005 14:39:11 -0800

"presents of mind"? Yes... definitely in need of a writer.

By: taz

taz — Mon, 03 Jan 2005 15:00:01 -0800

Wow. Fantastic work. (And nice presentation, picea!)

By: dabitch

dabitch — Mon, 03 Jan 2005 15:14:00 -0800

Not 'our' little confused homunculus I hope, poor thing... ;)

By: Scoo

Scoo — Mon, 03 Jan 2005 15:37:52 -0800

A good pastiche of Sim, Gorey, Brown, McKay and Escher. I can see this person developing a more personal style moving forward. One quibble I have on the technical side, if you're going to crib your puddle illustration from Escher, you have to be consistent with reflections in the water. The artist seems to be pretty arbitrary in deciding when water is reflective and when it isn't. To be fair working out the perspective for reflections can be a total bitch. I love the architectural and mechanical drawing, and the half glimpsed face of the father reflected on Ballad's pupil was genuinely chilling.

By: Doohickie

Doohickie — Mon, 03 Jan 2005 21:12:40 -0800

I don't get it. I went all the way up to 81, and finally decided it was pointless.

By: taz

taz — Tue, 04 Jan 2005 01:58:25 -0800

It's an ongoing cartoon, so it doesn't quite have a traditional plot structure. This is why it seems so loose and rambling, which can be irritating if you try to take it in with one big gulp (there are 119 pages in the main section right now!), but I think it's a lovely project to check up on once a week. The artist updates on Tuesdays, and it looks like the current Ballad episode is "Cakes for Tea" (see the comics page); I'll be checking in later today to see what's new, and will probably keep tracking it. At any rate, I just loved seeing all that fantastic illustration.

By: Doohickie

Doohickie — Tue, 04 Jan 2005 09:48:46 -0800

"Fantastic illustration"? I guess aesthetics are lost on me.

By: crunchland

crunchland — Tue, 04 Jan 2005 10:06:50 -0800

I think I'll wait for the movie.