R. K. Milholland | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | Randal Keith Milholland November 25, 1975 [1] |
| Occupation(s) | Author and Artist |
| Years active | 1999 - today |
| Notable work | Something Positive |
Randal Keith Milholland (born November 25, 1975 [1] ), better known as R. K. Milholland, is an American webcomic author. His works include Something Positive , New Gold Dreams , Midnight Macabre, Classically Positive and Super Stupor. In 2022, he took over as author of the Sunday edition of the Popeye syndicated comic strip. [2]
Raised in Bedford, Texas, Milholland attended Harwood Junior High and Trinity High School in neighboring Euless, Texas. [3] During high school he won several awards for his editorial cartoons. [4] [5] He went on to enroll in the art department at the University of North Texas where he spent four years.
Milholland moved to Boston in the spring of 1999. He worked odd jobs, including stints at a dot com startup, scientific non-profit, medical billing and medical research companies. During this time he started the Something Positive webcomic, in response to a criticism from his friend, voice actress Clarine Harp, that he should "do something positive" with his life. The protagonist in this comic, Davan, is loosely based on Milholland and the stories are often inspired by real life experiences. Davan's best friend Aubrey Chorde is based on Harp.
In June 2004, faced with increasing complaints about his lateness in updating the comic, Milholland challenged his readership to donate enough money to pay for a year of his salary so that he could quit his job and become a full-time cartoonist. [3] [6] [7] To his surprise, this amount was reached and surpassed in less than a month, making Milholland one of the successful pioneers of micropatronage. Since then, his webcomic has expanded into many realms of merchandising. [8] [9]
Milholland has relocated to Texas and travels the con circuit frequently. He also sometimes performs in community theater, especially children's theater. In 2017, he moved to Georgia. [10] In 2019, he moved back to Texas following the signing of Georgia House Bill 481, a so-called "fetal heartbeat bill", into law. [11] [12]
Something Positive started its run on December 19, 2001. As of December 21,2023 [update] , it is still being actively updated.
Starting on September 7, 2007, Milholland launched a third spin-off from Something Positive, this one also taking place in the same continuity as the original but taking place many years earlier. Something Positive 1937 follows the relationship of Fred's father Vester Macintire and his cousin Davan (Davan of S*P's namesake, first mentioned in the comic's May 8, 2007 strip. [13] ) The comic is in black and white and for a time featured in a sidebar next to the original, with archives available on the same page as the original strip. Milholland said in news posts he expected the story to last for a few years, and provided it with its own website [14] on September 24, 2007. The strip stopped updating in 2008.
Midnight Macabre is another spin-off from Something Positive. It features Gaspar Baugh, the father of Something Positive secondary character Lisa Baugh, as he attempts to resurrect a horror TV show presenting Midnight movies.
New Gold Dreams is a strip that spoofs the conventions of the heroic fantasy genre. It also ties in with Milholland's interest in role-playing games, as the comic is portrayed as a game run by Pee-Jee, one of the main strip's cast members; some of the characters in New Gold Dreams have the same appearance and personality as regular S*P characters. The comic started on April 2, 2004 but has been entirely on hiatus since the 20th issue in August 2005.
Super Stupor is a superhero comic, which mocks the conventions of the genre. Four self-published volumes of the strip are currently available from the Rhymes With Witch store.
Popeye is a newspaper comic strip from King Features Syndicate, starring an ornery sailor and a large cast of quirky characters. In 2022, Popeye's 93rd year, Milholland took over the Sunday edition from Hy Eisman as the latter retired. [2]
In January 2024, with Mickey Mouse's original version of Steamboat Willie becoming public domain, Milholland released the webcomic Mousetrapped. [15]
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Clarine Harp is the Director of Blu-ray, DVD, and video production and a voice actress.
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The New England Webcomics Weekend was a webcomics convention first held March 20–22, 2009 in Easthampton, Massachusetts, United States. It was organized by webcomic artists, including Octopus Pie artist Meredith Gran. A second convention occurred November 6–7, 2010. It did not repeat in 2011.
Popeye the Sailor is a fictional cartoon character created by Elzie Crisler Segar. The character first appeared on January 17, 1929, in the daily King Features comic strip Thimble Theatre. The strip was in its tenth year when Popeye made his debut, but the one-eyed sailor quickly became the lead character, and Thimble Theatre became one of King Features' most popular properties during the 1930s. Following Segar's death in 1938, Thimble Theatre was continued by several writers and artists, most notably Segar's assistant Bud Sagendorf. It was formally renamed Popeye. The strip continues to appear in first-run installments on Sundays, written and drawn by R.K. Milholland. The daily strips are reprints of old Sagendorf stories.
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Girls With Slingshots is a completed webcomic series by Danielle Corsetto that premiered on September 29, 2004. The series follows several friends as they deal with life events like unemployment, marriage, and their sexuality. Corsetto self-publishes Girls With Slingshots on her website and has released ten volumes of the collected strips through Lulu.com and TopatoCo. Corsetto has received praise for her depiction of LGBTQ characters and characters with disabilities.
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The history of webcomics follows the advances of technology, art, and business of comics on the Internet. The first comics were shared through the Internet in the mid-1980s. Some early webcomics were derivatives from print comics, but when the World Wide Web became widely popular in the mid-1990s, more people started creating comics exclusively for this medium. By the year 2000, various webcomic creators were financially successful and webcomics became more artistically recognized.
Notable events of 2001 in webcomics.
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