Week 3 of Interest Piquers finds a few more strips jumping on my already-overflowing pull list, all, as usual, courtesy of Digital Strips (have you heard of the site? I hear it’s pretty good). The first and most exciting is the subject of the most recent podcast: The Dreamland Chronicles. Not far behind that is Sequential Art, a strip reviewed back in Podcast #74, which I’ve fallen behind on keeping up with due to lack of RSS feed or compatability with my bookmarking service. And finally, a quick thought or two on webcomic merchandise. Ready? Here we go!

- If you’ve listened to this week’s podcast, you already know of Daku and Phil’s love for Scott Christian Sava’s “The Dreamland Chronicles”, a strip mixing fantasy elements with the most endearing characters this side of a Pixar film. Before hearing what they had to say, I ran through the entirety of the archives to formulate my own opinions. By the time I finished, I really, REALLY wanted to see the next page. Every character in the fantasy world is engaging and contains some personality trait that makes it that much easier to truly care about each of them.

Why do I single out Dreamland as my favorite? Well, like Daku and Phil, the real world is much less interesting than the one we enter when Alexander slumbers, but that’s really the way it should be, isn’t it? The catch that he appears to lose all brain activity when traipsing about Dreamland is enough to give Sava the benefit of the doubt; I bet things are about to get much more interesting for Alexander and his real world friends. Check it out and be part of the ride!

- If you love anime/manga-inspired art that is highly emotive and perfectly detailed, matched only with characters who are equally emotional and funny as hell, then Sequential Art is the strip for you. Much like Dreamland Chronicles, I ran through the archives when I heard the DS crew was reviewing the strip and instantly fell in love with the world creator Phillip M. Jackson has built. As a general rule of thumb (and good taste), I HATE manga strips and this art style is definitely reminiscent of that realm, if not directly spun off from it. Somehow though, the characters overcome that stereotype of overblown dialogue and predictable storylines to simply exist in the quirky and sometimes homicidal gray area between over-the-top and just right. Stop by the site to check out the strip and hang aroudn for a bit; Jackson’s got more than enough projects and sketches ongoing to please your eyes as well as your minds.

- This week I was lucky enough to receive not only the shirt I’d ordered from Press Start to Play but from Beaver and Steve as well. Both are of excellent quality and contain images that kick at least five different kinds of ass, but that’s not the point. My question to you is, how do you choose to contribute to the success of your favorite webcomic creator(s)? Do you purchase their printed endeavors, like the recently announced Please Rewind book? Do you get as many shirts as you can and proudly emblazon your chest with their wonderful characters? Or do you go the quieter, more modest route and just drop them some bucks via Paypal? And yes, you could be the unconscionable b****** who refuses to be supportive and just reads the stupid s*** for the sake of your own f****** s***, flying from one c****** b***** to the next, sucking the joy out of everything you touch… but that’s not you, is it?

So how do you show your appreciation? Next week: Support without aid of ego inflation. I could teach a course on that subject.