BARELY FUNCTIONAL ADULT (2020)
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Distastefully insipid on two levels: the art is some half baked GIMP crap that betrays any notion of MEICHI NG putting in effort, and the writing might register as worse than children's lit in regards to prose. The art is seriously terrible and not for any reason of aesthetic, but rather the startling lack of care on NG's part. It seems much of the characters are built off factory lines, CTRL-C and -V having hadn't been pounded this hard since BUCKLEY'S CTRL-ALT-DEL, or perhaps FAMILY GUY. Like FAMILY GUY but somehow unlike BUCKLEY, NG doesn't bother to shade or render out anything: flats are fine, next comic please. And unlike either examples but quite like GARFIELD, NG doesn't really care to back her blobs with a background. At the most, she draws new props. I can't imagine the beads of sweat that perspired in having to draw her pet frogs in multiple, non-blob like positions. My favorite aspect of the author and artists' self insert's fucked up head is that such fuckedness doesn't even translate properly to the marketable plush featured on the back of the book. You don't give a shit at all do you MEI? Just as long as you hear the cha-CHI NG, lol.
The writing is steeped in a disgusting amount of navel gazing that makes HYPERBOLE AND A HALF blush. And on that note, wow this shit is similar except the focus is on a very bland, aggressively unfunny modern day blob who has really nothing to ask and nothing to say, a rather different contrast to the poignancy that could be achieved in aforementioned HYPERBOLE. It's just cruel having to read that the author read HARRY POTTER to her pet fish, no wonder the thing died its soul probably slammed against its skull as means of escape. I don't know why she doesn't go harder on her "character", why she doesn't play up how much of a boring dumbass the character comes across as. Waait yes I do the character's as sanded down as can be so that you, the reader, can self insert to the relatable content that unfolds over a grueling 393 pages (and printed with images way smaller than need be for my old grandpa eyes).
