A Guide to the Life Cycle of the Average Webcomic.

Most people have at least one webcomic that they enjoy. Whether it's a quick glance at the week's Penny Arcade strips or a dedicated following of the intricate plot of Girl Genius, there's a webcomic out there for everyone. What most people don't realize is that almost every webcomic moves in the same, predictable pattern throughout its career.

INTRODUCTIONS

Ah, a webcomic's first strip. Someone out in the reaches of cyberspace has perfected their artistic talent, come up with a profound story, and dreamt up characters that seem to truly live and breathe -

All right, I'm joking. The vast majority of strips are started by amateurs, with little or no artistic or writing talent. The initial characters are often identical to the cast majority of others - two guys playing videogames on a couch. These two have a hilarious contrast - one might be crazy and one is normal, or one is smart and the other dumb, or one might be lazy and the other a workaholic. Most strips start out in this format - it's simple and makes it easier to copy Penny Arcade.

Story strips, or strips founded with an overarching story already in place, traditionally open with a prologue. The means of introduction for the characters of a standard strip is primarily an out of character sequence in which the two characters give a welcome speech to all new readers. Other methods include simply starting the strip and letting readers figure out the names and character traits, and starting with biographical entries.

FORMATION

The early stages of a webcomic are its formative times. While the strip is new, and has not yet attracted a readership, the artist is free to do as he or she likes with he strip. Wildly fantastic plot elements are often introduced here that would not be accepted later on - if Garfield, for example, had run for several months before having Garfield start to talk, the audience would have been understandably confused. Yet because it was established in the formative phase, before the boundaries of expectation set in, Garfield's sentience is accepted. Running gags, such as PvP's panda joke or EE's Eddie's hammer, are also often started here.

Also, for a non-story strip, this time is often referred to as "gag-a-day", as there is seldom any overall plot this early in the series. Strips simply run a self-encapsulated joke each day.

In this phase or the next, there is also often the introduction of the first female character, in order to attract a female readership. This first female character will almost always have some quality designed to show how fair-minded and unsexist the author is - generally she is an outspoken feminist, and reacts violently to comments from one of the founding male characters.

THE SAGA BEGINS

A webcomic reaches maturity, some would say, with the introduction of its first storyline. Moving on from simple, repetitive daily jokes, the webcomic here begins its new life. The strip's villains are here introduced, should the first story be an action adventure, or the first love interest, should the story be a romance. Often, gags from the strip's formation phase are pressed into new roles here - for instance, Eddie from Emergency Exit has the comedic ability to pull a hammer out of thin air, for comedic effect. In an early storyline, Eddie uses this previously funny ability to fight the madman Visage.

Story strips here have the action begin - the orphan boy leaves his sheep, finds a sword, and sets forth to slay the dragon.

Often, this phase can be painful to read if it has happened too late. Villains must be shoehorned in to a world that has no place nor reason for them, and funny characters are frantically revamped into attractive or dangerous heroes.

TURNING POINT

This is where the fate of the comic will be forever decided - a story strip, or a classic comic? Story strips have already made their choice, of course. Megatokyo, for instance, turned from a stereotypical gaming strip into an ongoing soap opera, as did PvP and Ctrl-Alt-Del, though to a lesser degree. Emergency Exit changed from the crazy antics of a pair of roommates to a dimension-spanning action quest, and The Order of The Stick turned from simple DnD jokes to an epic fantasy. Some strips, however, stay true to their roots - Penny Arcade still does a daily gaming joke with no storyline whatsoever. Regardless, this is where the strip chooses to become what it will be forevermore - only Checkerboard Nightmare ever escaped this decision, once made.

FINALE

There are many ways that this can come, but they all begin alike. One day, an update is missed, and the author never apologizes or does any filler. The author begins to shift the deadlines back more and more, updating less and less, and finally bows out due to problems. Often, the author will post a redrawing of his first strip, showing how much his art has improved, or a shot of all the characters waving goodbye.Then the strip is abandoned, forever waiting for the next joke or the next piece of the plot, until the website is no longer paid up, and the webcomic is gone forever.