Do you read Queen of Wands? Have you ever? Why not?

[kitanzi]

Queen of Wands is a wonderful comic strip which ended today. The archives cover some of my favorite moments of any online comic, all the way back to July of 2002. I know a lot of people hate reading through archives, and don't like coming in on the middle of a story, so they don't tend to pick up ongoing comics. If that's the case, this is a golden opportunity for you.

Starting tomorrow, Aeire will be rerunning the entire archive. She'll rerun ALL the strips, one at a time, Monday through Friday. Even better, she'll include commentary this time around so even if you HAVE been reading them, there will be something new and interesting to go along. Aeire will eventually do other projects, but Queen of Wands was one of a kind. If you like smart, funny, well written comics with engaging characters who you will really start to care about then I can't recommend this strongly enough to you.

Queen of Wands
http://www.queenofwands.net

edit: Sorry, starting Monday. My mistake.

Comments

[redaxe.livejournal.com]

I came in late, mostly liked the strip (I'm not a fan of gratuitous snark, and when it was in there it turned me off.)

I don't like that ending, though. As true to the character as it is, it just leaves me blah. Lady and the Tiger endings, with no real resolution, have to be handled REALLY well to work, and I think this one, though it went in the right direction, fell short.

Looking forward to the reruns, and the commentary, though.

[kitanzi.livejournal.com]

I didn't see it as Lady and the Tiger - more just recognizing that endings are beginnings, too, and there really is no "the end". I quite liked it, but obviously it's a personal preference. I'm really looking forward to the commentary, too.

[redaxe.livejournal.com]

L&T in the sense that we don't know if the journey gets successfully completed or derailed (or diverted) along the way by the end problem or any others. But yes, endings are (almost) always beginnings, and this is clearly not The End, Hollywood-style.

Ending long-running strips is hard. Calvin & Hobbes, and Bloom County, for example. And I hate to think of the impending (one year or so?) end of For Better or For Worse; no matter how she handles it, it's going to leave a huge gap.

[braider.livejournal.com]

FBoFW is ending???

[kitanzi.livejournal.com]

Oh yes. You didn't know? I'm sorry. It's been planned for quite a while now - possibly from the beginning, I don't remember.

[redaxe.livejournal.com]

*nod* Lynn said that she's definitely ending the strip. She is set to end sometime around 2007 (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A14846-2004Oct7.html) (scroll down or search for "How far will you take the family into the future?") -- but, in the next question, she also says she's planning an animated something, when she's no longer on deadline.

So, good news/bad news. And something to look forward to. (Sorta)

[kitanzi.livejournal.com]

Absolutely. I don't remember when I started reading that, but it's been years and years, and it's one of my favorites.

[msminlr.livejournal.com]

I followed the link, read the final panel, then browsed around the site. I've got it bookmarked now and looking forward to the commentary.

[kitanzi.livejournal.com]

I hope you like it as much as I do!

[niquildrvr.livejournal.com]

Sounds good--thanks for the tip!

[kitanzi.livejournal.com]

Hope you enjoy it!

[poltr1]

I'd catch it occasionally. I liked it, but no so much to go to the site every day.

I hope Aeire has plans to have the strips republished in a book. I'd buy a copy!

[kitanzi.livejournal.com]

I think she does. Certainly, that's the one thing people have been saying most once she announced the end was near.

[filkerdave.livejournal.com]

QoW never did much for me, on the whole. But FBoFW...THAT I adore!

[surrdave.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I got hooked into it maybe a year ago and pretty much went straight to the archives. It was the artwork that got me initially, I think. One of the dozen that I read daily (well, as often as it posted).

[rdmaughan.livejournal.com]

Thank you, I have now read the entire archive and am catching the annotated ones as they come out.

Never heard of this strip until you mentioned it. Thanks.