CynderCoyote @pawb.social 30+ greymuzzle yote new to and lost in the fediverse somewhere in the western US. - Social media dumbass. - Literally has no idea what they're doing. - :asexual_flag: :agender_flag: - Mostly silent spectator/lurker. - Occasional and novice suiter. - Suit by Aeluromancy.
I can't believe I missed this thread! YES! I actually saved a bunch of the strips from my local paper when I heard that Watterson was going to stop making comics! I bought most of the collections when they came out, including the 10 year anniversary book. I think I'm only missing two.
Ooh! That's a neat approach to it! I honestly don't think there's any wrong way to go about it. Pixeas and Henry kinda shares a similar architecture, with the anthro characters having evolved from their feral forms into their anthro forms. I totally agree with you on the handwaving. I feel like it's far too easy to get too far out in the weeds trying to settle minutiae, which can often distract from the story. I'm going to blaspheme and say that this was one of my difficulties when reading The Hobbit back in High School. I just got so damn bored with how richly described every little thing was. It's the difference between drinking an entire jar of Alfredo sauce, versus drizzling it over your pasta.
It's an interesting concept to explore. Certainly, it would probably be macabre for an anthro deer to see a deer mount on the wall, akin to visiting Buffalo Bill's house in Silence of the Lambs and seeing his sewing room. Real life analogues do exist though. David Sedaris, the famed humorist, once wrote about trying to acquire a real human anatomy skeleton he found at a shop in France for his husband. That guy who died at Mammoth Cave in Kentucky was kept in a glass coffin for viewing (for a fee), as was Lenin's body. I once personally encountered a shop in Hampden which centered itself upon the sale of the macabre, and while I don't believe they were for sale (I honestly didn't think to ask), did have several (allegedly) real human skulls on display in amongst the antique surgical tools and vintage taxidermy.
At its core, its the "Goofy/Pluto" dichotomy. It's Mae in Night in the Woods seeing a fat raccoon in the center of town, when she herself is a bipedal talking cat and bipedal talking raccoon characters exist in universe. I think it's hard (if not impossible) to really fully imagine the mechanics of how an anthro world would be constructed from our vantage point as humans. Despite the fact that, at our core, we're just smarter apes, we've so removed ourselves from the natural world that there's us ("people," who are intelligent, reasoning, and thinking...allegedly), and then there's "animals," which is every other living creature on the planet over which we hold dominion. Trying to create similar structures and analogues is hard because of how/where to draw the line. To us as "people" it seems rather clear. To us as imagined "animal-people," it's much more difficult.
In my opinion, it's also difficult to create settings that feel "alive" (for lack of a better term) without wildlife of some sort. I went the same direction you did with a story I wrote once where birds, fish, amphibians, ect. were a natural part of the environment as "animals," and then most mammals (like canids, felidae, cervidae, mustelids, whatever possums are, ect.) were "animal-people." In my head, those rules made sense based upon the relationship between those two "classes" (for lack of a better term) of animals, so that fish and birds could be guilt-free food and I could populate creeks and streams with crayfish, salamanders, ect to give some texture to my rural setting. I also felt like it was easier to write about critters with paws which could be used in an analogous manner to hands and with biologies similar to ours.
An example that went the complete opposite direction would be Bojack Horseman, with critters of every kind being anthropomorphized in that show. It played with that concept to great comedic effect and handwaved the rest, which worked perfectly for the setting the show had created (at least in my opinion).
I think either way works as long as there is some sort of framework or rules that doesn't trip the "Goofy/Pluto" dichotomy. That's my $0.02 worth.
You already mentioned TwoKinds, so I'll skip that one and get to some deeper cuts:
Night Physics: This is one of my all time favorites. Simply described by the author as: "a comic about a bear and his friends." A slice-of-life that contemplates the intricacies of navigating life in your 20's. (CW for: mature themes, drug use).
Pixeas and Henry: A story about two unlikely friends struggling for acceptance and coming to terms with themselves and their lives. (CW for: mature themes, implied SA, drug use, one of the characters struggles against homophobia, both internalized and external.)
Synthetic Instinct: From the author: "A Cyberpunk-Dystopia. Isa's mundane life is completely changed when the government finds out that she is a chimera- a hybrid of two unrelated genus. Navigating an unforgiving society Isa befriends a demobilized war machine named Rex, whose past is much darker and violent than she may realize. A story about who you are versus what the world wants you to be. Updates once a month."
Derideal: A series of sci-fi comics (there are several side stories set in the same universe available to read through) featuring anthro animals created as test projects for a shadowy corporate-state.
Project Roar: Not sure how to describe this one...A speculative historical fiction/sci-fi about a group of soldiers in WWII, biological experimentation, and their lives and experiences after the war. The story is still unfolding, but this is the general theme of the comic so far...
The Slow Decline: From the author: "When the world ended, they happened to be out of town. Now two co-workers, Rudy and Tom, are alone in a city that is making less sense by the day. The Slow Decline follows the two as they make their way through the mundane life of surviving the apocalypse. From anomalies at the breakfast table, smoke falling from the sky in the afternoon, or disembodied screaming through the night, it's all just another day at the end of it all. Updated EVERY THURSDAY!"
Psychopomp: From the author: "Something spooky’s happening in the eerie Southern town of Bonaventura, and Ray’s the only mutt who can communicate with the restless spirits plaguing the town. This ability might help him save the town from a supernatural threat, but it can’t help him navigate his own mundane life. Psychopomp is a queer comic which blends the campy mystery fun of Gravity Falls with the atmospheric horror of Silent Hill."
Lackadaisy: I'm sure you're already familiar with the animation, but before the animation, there was this comic. Beautifully illustrated and painstakingly historically researched, the comic follows a down-on-its-luck crew of rum-runners and the speakeasy they supply in prohibition-era St. Louis.
And for dessert, the saccharine sweet Duncan and Eddie: From the author: "Two boyfriends stumbling their through life together. They may not be the most competent couple, but that won't stop them from loving each other to bits! Updates every SUNDAY"
I want chicken,
I want liver,
meow mix, meow mix,
please deliver.
The whole series is over on webtoon. It's delightfully wholesome and ironic, with a dash of mid-2000's nostalgia.