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I grew up during what’s said to be a “golden age” of comics; I do not know what a golden age consists of, but there were at least a few of the greatest comics ever created running in most newspapers when I was a kid: Calvin & Hobbes, The Far Side, Doonsbury, and my favorite, Bloom County. That golden age died fast and hard, but there is now Achewood. It is online, but such distinctions don’t matter.
That’s an awfully abstract way of selling it to you, so better yet: imagine art-house Bloom County as drawn (daily) by Chris Ware channeling Winsor McCay and written by the best student of David Mamet and David Milch. Onstad has a great eye and works wonders in a grayscale format, but his real gift is dialogue and utterly sui generis phrasing:
The worst possible things you could ever say: I’m not typing it.
