I want to tell all of you about the webcomic that I love more than any other strip.  I hope you will love it as much, if not more, than me and my family.  Its a little piece of awesome called Misery Loves Sherman.

Misery Loves Sherman has appeared in this blog once before, and I’m sure it will do so again.  MLS is another wonderful example of Watersonist art and writing.  MLS is written and drawn by the extremely  talented Chris Eliopoulos.  Chris also did a comic strip called Desperate Times, a comic book called Franklin Richards: Son of a Genius, currently writes Pet Avengers, and runs a business lettering comic books.

Misery Loves Sherman is about a boy with a mean spirited sister, two extraterrestrials and the living embodiment of Death as friends.  Oh, and an action figure who has been brought to life.  Well if that is not a little imaginative and bizarre, I don’t know what is.  The strip is family friendly just like Waterson with Calvin and Hobbes.

But Misery Loves Sherman is not a copy of Calvin and Hobbes.  It is most definitely its own entity.  The art has the fun and expressive quality of a cartoonist who has been drawing this comic all their life.  Sherman’s hair even has this little flip at the end.  The art is fantastic!  The characters bounce when they walk, a spring in their step; but after misery strikes, the characters feel weighty and down trodden.  Chris has just enough background in MLS to tell you where you are, but leaves enough empty that your mind fills in the rest.  He has, with or without his knowledge, recreated Shakespeare.

Speaking of Shakespeare, the writing of MLS is consistently funny.  He is able to still make you laugh at the tragedy of another and you don’t feel bad about it.  My two year old laughs at the jokes and so does my wife.  There is a story that arches over the comic but you can pick it up ant any given point and be just fine.  I wish I could say the same about my own comic.  I also wish I could say my comic was funny, but its not always meant to be.

Misery Loves Sherman is taking a temporary hiatus.  Chris is currently focusing on his business and working on a children’s book.  But MLS will be back.  Until then you will need to read the archive on the website or even better yet would be to buy the book.  When my wife was recovering from surgery, she would read the book and laugh her way to a very quick recovery.  The doctor was even very impressed with how quickly she recovered.

Chris, in case you are reading this, thank you.  Thank you for a wonderful read, for helping my wife recover, and thank you for being letting me use Sherman in The Manor that one time.

I’ll see everyone back here Wednesday.

-A-