The Ongoing Adventures of Rocket Llama
| The Ongoing Adventures of Rocket Llama | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Author(s) | Alex Langley, Nick Langley |
| Website | http://www.rocketllama.com |
| Current status/schedule | Updates 4 times per week. |
| Launch date | April 2007 (comic) July 2008 (webcomic) |
| Publisher(s) | Rocket Llama World Headquarters, LLC |
| Genre(s) | Furry/Comedy/Adventure |
The Ongoing Adventures of Rocket Llama[1] is a webcomic starring "a high-flying llama, a sword-swinging cat, and a rocket as loyal as a cowboy hero's horse."[2] Created by Alex Langley while he was a student at Henderson State University, the comic first appeared in a comic book titled The Workday Comic.
The Workday Comic
For The Workday Comic comics anthology, a spin-off of Scott McCloud's 24-Hour Comics, comics creators each wrote and drew their own eight-page stories in eight hours in April, 2007, on Friday the 13th[3], which turned into an ongoing publication.[4] Rocket Llama debuted in one of the first issue's six completed stories.
On a panel with comic book artists Phil Hester and Jacen Burrows and writer Jason Henderson at Wizard World in Arlington, Texas,[5][6], contributors described the creation of The Workday Comic and Rocket Llama. Co-presenting with comics author and scholar Danny Fingeroth (Dazzler, Spider-Man, Superman on the Couch), the creators described the webcomic's evolution as a spin-off of The Workday Comic during a Comics Arts Conference panel at 2008's Comic-Con International in San Diego, California.[7][8][9]
Whether despite the original story's childlike art or because of it, the Rocket Llama story proved to be the most popular in the 2007 anthology collection of the eight-hour comics.[10] After comic artist Stephen R. Bissette, an instructor at the Center for Cartoon Studies and comic book artist best known for his work on Swamp Thing with Alan Moore, read all of the stories in the first volume of The Workday Comic, he remarked, "That llama's gonna stick with me."[11]
Debut story
The full title of Rocket Llama's debut story in The Workday Comic #1 (spring, 2007) was "The Ongoing Adventures of Rocket Llama #112: 'Trouble in Paradise'".[12] The story introduced the taciturn hero Rocket Llama and his talkative sidekick, an anthropomorphic cat named Bartholemew 'Bart' Meowsenhausen, who find themselves stranded on an island after a battle with an enemy called Jetpack Dog. Spherical islanders capture them and then challenge them to combat. A villain named Böwser vön Überdog arrives with Jetpack Dog and, in a sudden Star Wars parody, summons a giant robot known as the Super Robot Dog Walker which blasts a volcano to bits. Before it can fire a second blast, Rocket Llama destroys it by getting it to swallow a pot of water and backfire. The story ends with Böwser tied up and the heroes using the giant robot dog head as a boat to get themselves home, with the promise of the next story to be titled, "Yuck! Yukon!"[13][14]
E-zine
.
Nick Langley redrew the story with a less childlike drawing style in webcomic form for online publication[15] as the flagship title for the website rocketllama.com. The Rocket Llama World Headquarters e-zine has an affiliation of websites featuring webcomics, art, entertainment reviews, and scholarly studies of comics.[16]
In addition to "The Ongoing Adventures of Rocket Llama", e-zine features from the Rocket Llama Ground Crew include Action Flick Chick movie reviews[17]; Marko's Corner comics, cartoon arts, and podcasts by Marko Head; Reddie Steady comics for college newspapers; The Workday Comic, the 8-hour comics which spawned Rocket Llama; You Can't Do That on the Internet film crossover comics; interviews (e.g., Blair Butler[18], Chris Watters[19], Lou Ferrigno[20]); convention reports[21]; gaming news[22]; blogs[23]; and other articles.
Online comic
The online story featured a new cover[24] and omitted a one-page gag, a preview for an unrelated Stealth Potato comic, which had appeared as an intermission in the middle of the original story.[25] The original story also appeared online as the comic's "ashcan copy."[26]
The authors present the Rocket Llama stories metafictionally as the world's oldest comic book, established in 1916, which they allegedly rediscovered and are adapting into webcomics. "Deep underground, in an archaic vault we searched until we found the fabled tales. As both the current production team behind The Ongoing Adventures of Rocket Llama and appreciators of such groundbreaking literature, we have taken it upon ourselves to restore these classic issues to a glory more befitting a modern, digital age."[27]
Although every "issue" is presented with panels and screens in the correct order for each story, the issues are presented out of order as if readers were discovering old issues of a classic comic book in a seemingly haphazard order, however they come to find them. After the redrawn number 112's online publication came the serialized time travel story #136-137, "Time Flies When You're on the Run," appearing one page at a time throughout each week[28][29] and expanding the cast with characters like the scientist Professor Percival Penguin and cavedogs who joined them by stowing away in the heroes' time rocket after the supposed previous issue.
Special Rocket Llama Says bonus features appear only in "ashcan" form drawn by the original creator.[30] The only "modern" comic and the only one published during the same month (October, 2008) as its metafictional comic book form has been a one-page Halloween cartoon, supposedly an excerpt from issue #1110.[31]
References
- ^ Rocket Llama World Headquarters
- ^ The Web Comic List: The Ongoing Adventures of Rocket Llama.
- ^ Waddles, Joshua. (2007, April 2). Comic book club puts in a full day's work. The Oracle vol. 99 (25), p. 3.
- ^ Beard, Sarah. (2008, August 25). Comic Arts Club offers excitment. The Oracle, vol. 101 (1), p. 5.
- ^ Head, Aron. (2008, November 10). Wizard World Texas - Sunday at the Con. Retrieved November 15, 2008.
- ^ Phil Hester, Jason Henderson, Jacen Burrows, Nick Langley, & Marko Head. (November 10, 2008). Can College Prepare Creators for Comics Careers? Panel presented at Wizard World Texas. Arlington, Texas.
- ^ T. Langley & R. Duncan, panel moderators, with respondent Danny Fingeroth. (2008, July). "Capes and Tights, Caps and Gowns." Panel presented at the Comics Arts Conference, Comic-Con International. San Diego, California.
- ^ Recent and Upcoming Research Presentations
- ^ Pannell, E. (2008, July 27). Comic communication part of professors' classes. The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, T-1, T-4.
- ^ Hardiman, Morris. (2008, April 14).Club produces second annual workday comic. The Oracle, vol. 100.
- ^ Quoted in "The Workday Comic: Not Just One Third of a 24-Hour Comic." Comics Arts Conference, Comic-Con International. San Diego, California. July 27, 2008.
- ^ Page 1.
- ^ The Workday Comic #1. Spring, 2007.[1]
- ^ The Workday Comic - online edition.
- ^ The Ongoing Adventures of Rocket Llama #112: "Trouble in Paradise." Script: Alex Langley. Art: Nick Langley.
- ^ You are here.
- ^ Action Flick Chick's Super Action Page
- ^ Interview: Blair Butler from Attack of the Show!
- ^ Who Wants to Interview a Superhero #1: Major Victory
- ^ Wizard World Convention Report: The Incredible Lou
- ^ Closing Thoughts on Comic-Con
- ^ Wrath of the Lich King - Our Beta Testploration
- ^ Blog-It Llama! The Rocket Llama Ground Crew Has Plenty to Say
- ^ #137-Cover.
- ^ Sneak Peak at Stealth Potato #75.
- ^ Rocket Llama Ashcan Copy.
- ^ Who Is Rocket Llama?
- ^ "Time Flies When You're on the Run, Part 1." Script: Alex Langley. Art: Nick Langley.
- ^ "Time Flies When You're on the Run, Part 2." Script: Alex Langley. Art: Nick Langley.
- ^ e.g., "Tanks a Lot." Rocket Llama Says #8. Script and art: Alex Langley.
- ^ Happy Halloween from Rocket Llama World Headquarters!