OK Rav, let me express me more correctly. I have no problem with highly "simplified" drawing styles such as those of Bunny, Fat Cat or for that matter the one you just posted. Garfield is in the same category. Simple but very expressive.
Inverloch is totally different, as is for that matter Applegeeks, but they share with the others the following characteristics
- a definite and personal style
- care in drawing & consistency
- style follows function (dreamy epic goes well with style in inverloch as does the style of Bunny and Fat Cat of their dead pan delivery of slighty absurd humour).
- expressive (however simple it still conveys what's needed to convey)
One should not confuse
simple drawing with
sloppy drawing.
What annoys me with some of the fantasy spoof comics is that I have the idea that sometimes getting accross some insider joke is judged more important than putting up a good quality drawing. The drawing is just a way of showing of how witty they are, and looks sometimes terribly amateuristic if not childish.
And what's worse, that cramming as many jokes as one can in a page is more important than developing a story line. In my opinion you better go for a running gag type of thing (Garfield or Hagar like) and make the gags and joke central, but then they'd better don't pretend there is a story line.
The word I'm looking to translate correctly in English to express what I mean is "verzorgd". My limited dictionary here gives "well-groomed" or "polished" or "taken care off" and that describes what I find in the comics I like (whether it dead pan absurd humour as bunny or dreamy (semi)serious epic as Inverloch).
This doesn't mean I don't like chaotic, or weird or surrealist styling. For instance one of my favourite graphic novel serieses is "
The Black Moon Chronicles" which has a very chaotic, overloaded style that assaults the eye, but still very "verzorgd".
Wordt vervolgd - A suivre - To be continued