Off Duty, Technology - Air Force Times

New military-themed comics finding homes on the Internet

Beetle Bailey may be well-loved, but he’s what the Pentagon calls “legacy technology” — a laugh-delivery system left over from an era before today’s joint, net-centric military and its wired, Web-savvy service members. Ink-on-paper cartoons, like many legacy systems, still are useful, but you’ll find few new-generation military gagsmiths in your newspaper. Now, of course, they’re online.

For the cost of a domain name and some computer gear, military cartoonists can deliver jokes and characters tailored to an audience of fellow service members who’ll laugh at things that might produce blank stares from civilians.

Take 1st Lt. Ken Dahl, star of “Air Force Blues,” available online at http://www.afblues.com. The fictional F-15 aviator wears an “I’m a fighter pilot” T-shirt for days when his flight suit is in the wash. His most hated enemy: The MQ-1 Predator, which deigns to do an Eagle’s work.

Dahl and “Blues” are the work of Staff Sgt. Austin May, a public affairs specialist at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas.

“What I like best about it is, it’s not being done right now,” May said of drawing an Air Force Web comic. “A lot of people have done them in the past, and they’ve had great success with them, but this niche wasn’t being filled.”

May first forayed into the Web comic world with “AWACker,” based on his experience as an E-3 aircrew member at Elmendorf Air Force Base, Alaska; the comic still can be seen at http://www.chairforce.com. His new comic is more inclusive of the whole Air Force and is similar in its Web presence to the popular gamer comic “Penny Arcade,” complete with loyal forum-goers.

“Air Force Blues” and “Penny Arcade” inspired another military Web comic, “Anchors Away,” drawn by a Navy F/A-18 Hornet pilot, Lt. Cmdr. Tim Lockhart — in fact, Lockhart credits May for coming up with the “Anchors” name. Online at http://www.navycomic.com, “Anchors Away” takes its inspiration from Lockhart’s daily life in the Navy and from readers’ e-mailed suggestions.

May said his readers provide a lot of his comic strip’s material, though story arcs also deal with real-world events.

In March, May had just started a series featuring his friend Staff Sgt. Christopher Frost when Frost was killed in a helicopter crash in Iraq. After discussing with his readers whether publishing the rest of the series would honor Frost, or simply be too painful, May delayed the story line. He has since started raising money for Frost’s children.

One longtime Web comic fan is Master Sgt. Peter Vierps, a production supervisor with the 962nd Aircraft Maintenance Unit at Elmendorf. Vierps followed “AWACker” “because it hit home, because it was our comic,” he said. “It was something that dealt directly with what we did on a day-to-day basis. Ever since he expanded it to ‘Air Force Blues,’ I think I like it more.”

BRANCHING OUT

May just published his first “Air Force Blues” book and plans to release another with every 100 new comics, he said. A new comic comes out about every other day. He also recently helped launch http://armedforcescomics.com, an index of military Web comics. Lockhart sells bumper stickers and signed comics through his site.

The ability of freelance cartoonists, military or civilian, to franchise their own products — for which creators such as Jim Davis (“Garfield”) and Charles Schulz (“Peanuts”) relied on national press syndicates — is another new phenomenon in the funny-pictures game.

And it’s not just books: May sells coins and clothes for his strip’s fictional 809th Fighter Squadron. Navy Electronics Technician 1st Class Pat Hrabe, a submariner who makes the cult-hit Web cartoon “Hey, Shipwreck,” sells a DVD with his first year’s worth of animated “Hey, Shipwreck” shorts at his Web site, http://www.tubedaze.com.

“Hey, Shipwreck” was renowned in the squid world for jokes that land only with sailors, and sometimes only with submariners, enabling Hrabe to carve out a Navy niche for himself on the Web. But for 2008, he plans to branch out with a new Web series about his tour as a military recruiter near his home in eastern Washington.

“I am definitely opening up a whole new can of worms with that,” said Hrabe, whose new series is called “Join the Navy.”

The series’ main character will be a Navy recruiter, but it will feature Army, Marine Corps and Air Force recruiters, as well as civilian characters, which Hrabe hopes will broaden its audience.

Unlike “Hey, Shipwreck,” which is animated with a computer-graphics engine that gives it a rich 3-D look, “Join the Navy” will have a flatter, hand-drawn, 2-D look, similar to some of Cartoon Network’s deliberately unpolished “Adult Swim” cartoons. There’s a trailer for the new series on Hrabe’s Web site and on the “Hey, Shipwreck” DVD.

In addition to containing all 15 episodes, viewable back-to-back or by chapter, the “Hey, Shipwreck” disc includes a true DVD-style behind-the-scenes feature about how Hrabe and collaborator John Seguin — who have never met in person — make the show. Hrabe, in his basement, writes the dialogue, records himself doing all the voices and creates the animation. Then he sends it all to Seguin, in Missouri, who composes the original music for the series.

A VOICE FOR SPOUSES

For Julie Negron, putting her military comic on the Web was intended as a first step toward establishing a print presence. Now, even with her weekly comic “Jenny” appearing in more than 20 base newspapers and the military newspaper Stars & Stripes, Negron says most of her feedback comes from her online readership. Her site, http://www.jennyspouse.com, also houses a full archive of her work.

“Jenny” is unique, even among military strips, for presenting military life from the spouse’s point of view. Negron, an airman’s wife and longtime cartoonist, started the comic after a particularly difficult permanent change of station to Kadena Air Base, Japan.

At a squadron wives’ function at her new base, “The spouses let loose with story after story,” Negron said via e-mail. “Everyone had a tale of terror involving PCSing or dealing with official records or living in base housing.”

“Jenny’s” eponymous star jumps through hoops based on the real-life experiences of Negron, her friends and their families. Single-handedly managing a PCS and feeling like a second-class citizen on base are the strip’s touchstones, but the humor is always light and often describes the benefit of spousal networks.

Negron thought the civilians-in-the-military theme would be accessible to the broader public, but mainstream papers weren’t interested.

“The response was always the same: ‘Our target readership isn’t military, and they won’t understand the references in the strip. You should market to the base paper,’” Negron said.

Both online and in print, though, “Jenny” receives warm responses for describing the difficulties that spouses often feel they can’t voice.

“They like having a comic strip of their own,” Negron said. “Many, many readers write and say, ‘Thank you for making me laugh.’ I feel extremely honored by that.”