4,1 stars

This comic holds a lot of nostalgia for me, because I used to love the webcomic when I was a teenager. Mostly, I still enjoy this a lot. However, this was written in the early 2000's and some things haven't aged well, at least to my eyes. For example, using the word "retarded" as a derogative. Or the whole friend zone trope. Or how it's okay for Faye to be so violent toward Marten and how it's cute because she's a girl. And so on. Having said that, I still really liked this, especially considering this is just the beginning of the story and I'm sure the writing grows and develops as time goes by. I can't really say I remember very well, considering how long it's been since I last read these. I'll definitely be moving on to volume two, and hopefully eventually catching up to present day. ( )

I wanted to see how the emo thing actually played out. It actually works to be this laid back? Nice. ( )

Jeph Jacques is one of my favorite comic artists, I even have three prints that I had commissioned at the Edmonton and Calgary comic expos. I really want the rest of this series. ( )

This series is great. ( )

OK, so it's a little nutsy to buy a print version of a web comic. However, it is often easier to get people to look at a book than a computer screen, and this is the first step in my plan to convert all the intelligent people I know to Questionable Content fans (the dumb folk I know can continue with newspaper comics). The short comments on the strips are a nice addition, as are the "remix" comics -- the strips where he lost the original hi-res art and so had to redraw them. His art style has changed considerably over the years and this is a nice way to track that.

Ok, now for the comic. Full of indie rock references, anthropomorphic computers, sass, and denied sex, QC is, hands down, my favorite webcomic. I've gone through several over the years, and eventually either the artist pisses me off, I lose connection with the jokes and story lines, I get bored, or I can tell the artist is getting bored. But I've followed QC with great interest for about 5 years now. I discuss it in depth with friends like I would a great TV show or book series -- speculating, explaining, generally spending a lot of time thinking about the characters and situations. That speaks strongly to the quality of Jacques' story telling ability. That I can (and have) spent hours thinking about a webcomic may point a sad finger at my life, but I think it's just that the comic is fun and interesting. ( )