A Young Man Stands in His Bedroom

[Spectre]

Have you guys ever heard of a story called Homestuck?

--------------------

I completely understand if you hate this idea, purely because there are a TON of people online who will not shut up about it. Clearly, I'm about to fulfill that self-fulfilling prophecy.

--------------------

Homestuck is a webcomic. As in, each page is a picture (with a goofy art style) and a bunch of text underneath explaining what's going on. And... there's about 6000 pages.

Now, the story! It starts as a tale about some kids who want to play a computer game. I'll be honest, the first "Act" (it's split into giant chapters called Acts) is pretty slow, and there's a lot of text to read through. For some reason, the dialogue- ALL dialogue- is put in chatroom form, with every character getting a username and poor grammar.

From the beginning, it's very confusing; even outside of the game, they collect items as if they were in it. Nicholas Cage and Betty Crocker play important roles. It's just goofy.

Then, after a while, you start getting the sense that things aren't quite as they seem. Little things start reappearing- random animals, symbols, even specific phrases. A few characters start acting like they know more than they should. After that,

Everything.

Fracking.

EXPLODES.

Nothing- and I mean nothing- is off limits plotwise. You wanna throw in some time travel? No problem. Alternate universes? Cloning? Alien children using video games to travel to other planets? Why not! Hilarious combinations of science and magic? Absolutely.

It's awesome. Honestly, it is the most complicated, frustrating, maddening story I've ever experienced- but it is absolutely worth it. Parts of it are hilarious, and parts are actually terrifying.

I think that, since it's a webcomic, the author didn't have to worry about story-length the way you would with novels. And since it's so ridiculously confusing, he's completely free to have the characters make fun of everything that's happening.

If you don't mind a fair bit of swearing, and a weird art style, it's definitely a story that will stick with you.

-------------------

Whew, okay! Good to get that off my chest! Alright, so that was my fanboy rant of the month or whatever.

I apologize if you guys give it a try and totally hate it.

[Spectre]

Ugh. Reading this again, it really feels like an infomercial. Bleh.

Also, this may or may not be the reason I haven't been on the site in a while. ;D

[sapphire]

So you got my interest, and I Googled it...
This is strange. I just... I don't know how to react. What?

[Spectre]

Haha, yeah. That pretty much sums it up.

You know what? I think I overreacted. See, I've been reading (watching?) this story for a while, and I really like it. So I have a ton of inside jokes and goofy references and stuff.

But I don't know anyone else who's read Homestuck. Ergo, I have no people to share these jokes with.

This has never happened to me before.

Really, every other time, if there was something I REALLY thought was awesome, I could at least share it with my brother. But being at college now, that's not really an option.

It's sort of a weird feeling.

[sapphire]

Haha... This is what I do with Brandon Sanderson. In high school, I had a group of friends also reading his books. I got to college, and... no one. So I talk about him here.
Except I've finally converted one of my friends, so now I can fangirl over Elantris and Warbreaker with her, at least.

[Raphael]

I really have to try this sometime....... I have had some really bad writers block and so this would be a blast.

[Spectre]

It's almost weird how close of a bond you can have with someone, based on nothing but the stories you've read. But I like it.

Raphael, I really think you'll like it. I thought it was just comedy at first; later, I found myself surprised by how much I cared about what would happen next.

[Zoom]

I read Homestuck up to the point where the universe or whatever explodes and the girl uses the game to accidentally push the car into the abyss. Then I was like, What, my brain, what

I read part of Problem Sleuths too, same thing.

I love the idea of how the comic works, though, where it's mostly the readership that drives the story with suggestions. COMPLETELY CRAZY suggestions.

I know what you mean about shared interests. I read Infinite Jest a while ago and I freaked over it for literally a month, but nobody I knew had read it, and I could hardly push this 1000+ page book on somebody just so I could rant about the ending.
This shared interests thing is part of the reason I'm so excited to go to college. (PS I WAS ACCEPTED BA HA HA) Although it looks like in your case, anyway, Sapphire, this worked somewhat in reverse. Hopefully the rest of it worked in your favor?
Also: the first conversation my best friend and I had was about our shared love of Pendulum

Hey they should have a place where you can list all the random things you know and like and then talk with people about them.

[Spectre]

I sense that there's something like that, Zoom, somewhere on the Internet. I wouldn't know where to find it, though.

Sapphire- I'm only on chapter 6 of Mistborn, and I'm pretty sure there's already a higher body count than there was in all of Elantris. Wow. I wasn't sure how well the metal-magic system would translate into fighting, but... WOW. It's awesome.