The Annotated Wondermark

by David Malki

I don't read many web comics, but one of the ones that I can't go more than a few days without checking is David Malki's brilliant Wondermark.

Malki crafts his strips out of cut-up images from Victorian books and catalogues, relying on the standard dimensions of a newspaper comic strip to make his observations about modern life, or to tell stories that are given birth in his whimsical and mercurial mind.

A standard Wondermark strip goes something like this:  A man approaches another man dressed as an 'Indian chief', and asks for peyote.  The Native man, seeing a police officer nearby, berates the man for falling back on negative racial stereotypes.  The man then cites the billboards and TV ads wherein the Native pushes his peyote.  This continues, and a humorous alt-text is posted beside it.  Pretty standard stuff in Malki's work, and always funny.

This book, The Annotated Wondermark, was the first publication of Malki's work, before Dark Horse published three hardcovers of his cartoons.  I got this self-published book at TCAF, and it now completes my collection of Wondermarks available in print.  There are still new strips twice a week at the website though, so I'll just be looking there for new fixes.