Bad Guy High - Online Comic Review
posted November 27, 2008 - 11:04pmBad Guy High is an online comic hosted by Drunk Duck and written by an author under the alias "The Red Death". The comic starts out about a highschool for super villains but steadily evolves into a parody/pastiche of Marvel and DC superheros with a semi-original plotline. The best part about this comic is probably the writing due to its cleverness but the artwork is not too shabby either.
The writing is clever. Common superhero tropes often get played with, famous comic book storylines are often incorporated into the plot, and scenes are sometimes dramatic and comedic at the same time. The banter has a lot of humor in it without taking over the comic. At times it tries to make itself ridiculous but does not bother to justify any of it when more serious story arcs appear.
The characters of Bad Guy High are creative and worth caring about. Some are blatant parodies while others are more subtle, but in either case you can see they are more multidimensional than simple mockeries by having their own personalities and struggles. When character origins come up, they are usually played for laughs by being absurd, and characters' superpowers are often humorous takes of characters within superhero comic books. Not only does this add more comedy to the strip but skips the details focusing on more important traits of the characters.
Bad Guy High is a drawn comic; the quality of which varies from time to time getting slightly better as the series progresses. Cut-and-paste photo backgrounds are used sparingly, but when they do appear the artwork fits well enough that it becomes a good stylistic choice. Occasionally characters look slightly off or the artwork does appear slightly jostled but nothing too jarring after the earliest arcs.
Some jokes make obscure references only regular comic book readers would get - however, these are far and in between. Usually when a joke is based on a comic book reference readers who are not familiar with it can laugh at it on the surface and others in the know will get it fully. Only a few require annotations or guessing.
Non-comic artwork pages can be found dotted throughout the archive. These arguably have the best artwork, and are usually accompanied by a joke or are cool to look at. Similarly, filler comics also crop up but they are funny and worth reading even if they break from the storyline that day.
Overall, Bad Guy High does have a few flaws, but they are overshadowed by its greatness. The comic does not laugh at superhero comics, but laughs with them. If you are into superhero comics or not, Bad Guy High is definitely worth reading. It really does stand out as one of the better online comics out there.

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