Friday, July 3, 2015

The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob

An important contrast for the first act of the hero's journey archetype is the difference from the real world to the fantastic world. The normal world is set up only for the hero to get a taste of a more adventurous life followed by the full on embracing the new life. The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob is one of those stories. It is also the comic's main joke.
 Bob is an incredibly normal person who likes his life and doesn't really care if he gets more out of it. But one day an alien landed on his roof and his life spiraled from their. Bob has ended up on many supernatural adventure. While most of the adventures involve aliens, other forces like unicorns and genetic experiments have been the center of some stories. And once the problem has been revolved with Bob's help, Bob goes back home to open up his newsstand the next day. That's basically it.

This is a humor based comic with a narrative broken up into multiple story arcs. The humor of the comic mostly stems from Bob being incredibly normal and staying very normal throughout all of the wacky adventures he goes through. I personally find the idea of this very ordinary guy going through all of this crazy incredibly funny. What doesn't work as well are some of the running jokes. Not all of them are bad. I find the fact that Bob's roof always gets destroyed to be hilarious, but some of the fourth wall jokes just hurt. Also the early comic pages were made for Pennsylvania State University so some early pages are just in-jokes.
The stories are not complex, but they don't have to be. These are just random adventures Bob and his friends happen to go on. It is a lot like a classic Greek story in that way. Bob is just going through his own adventure(his normal life) when weird stuff happens during it, but he overcomes it and continues on his way. One thing that differs from Greek tales is that his misadventures effect his normal life. For example that genetic experiment I mentioned earlier becomes his adopted daughter. The cartoonist Jim Cleveland also loves reusing characters whether they were important or minor. 

I feel I should quickly bring up Dr. Jean Poule. She is Bob's boyfriend and is such a great character. The comic doesn't do a lot of drama, but when it does the stuff focused around Jean is when its at its best. Also the back-and-fourth she has with Bob is very cute. She's my favorite character and I just wanted to talk about her a little.

The art is black and white throughout. It can be difficult to get use to, but it is possible. Backgrounds and character models are overall simple, but the image is always clear and you can always figure out what the image is. With that being said the art can shift to a much grander and complex image. 
If I had to describe The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob I would call it simple. The characters are simple. The stories are simple. The art is simple. But at times the character, story, and art can become much grander. This comic is a fun science fiction run for anyone wanting something simple out of it. If you want to read the comic I would recommend starting at beginning by clicking here

That's it for today. See you tomorrow.

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