Chris Onstad’s Achewood reminds me of an adult oriented version of Adventure Time. It’s not just the fact I can’t help but read Ray’s lines as John DiMaggio (the voice of Jake the Dog, and they do have similar designs), but both properties are versatile with their subject matter, wickedly funny, and more cerebral than they initially appear. (For what it’s worth, Beef sounds like Clarence in my head.)
While some of Achewood’s humor can get pretty crass- there’s some full frontal cartoon nudity now and then, so let the buyer beware- Onstad’s dialogue is heady and doesn’t bother to dumb itself down.
This leads to a weird effect where one strip could casually reference the writing of Michel Foucault, and the next one could revolve around Ray planning a dumb scheme or trying to score with chicks. But despite that, it didn’t take long for me to get to know the cast, and they’re not hard to root for despite how dysfunctional they are.
The world of Achewood revolves around a gang of stuffed animals and other assorted critters living with a dimwitted and overzealous rich cat named Ray Smuckles. His BFFs are Roast Beef, whose cynicism and low key attitude serve as a counter to Ray’s zaniness, a slacker toy bear named Tedor who usually plays the everyman, and a youthfully naive otter doll named Philippe. Less frequent cast members include resident jerks Lyle and Pat, an Eastern European talking robot and a teddy bear named Cornelius who writes terrible fiction.
Both the comedy and major storylines in Achewood lean toward the surreal, but without sacrificing any wit or strength of narrative. One arc has Ray and Beef taking a joyride in NIN frontman Trent Reznor’s car, which needless to say becomes an emotional experience for the duo.
Each of our feline leads have had disturbing encounters with the unsettling Cartilage Head, who is simultaneously an antagonist and arguably a figure to be pitied. And the Great Outdoor Fight is hilarious, poignant, and epic enough to reverberate through the rest of the comic’s run.
Visually Achewood is very understated, but it’s a design choice that suits it well as it’s driven by its script. It’s still pretty easy to tell how Ray, Beef and the rest feel most of the time, and while the art does evolve and improve over time, it pretty much maintains a consistent aesthetic.
On top of having a nack for delivering sharp and layered jokes on a daily basis, Onstad knows not to let his characters or humor go too far into unpleasant territory. There’s a sense of camaraderie among the cast underneath their stupidity, and the atmosphere is playful and cheeky in spite of its vulgarity. Occasionally there’ll be a couple of strips too avant garde for their own good, but the strength of the characters and the depth in their writing easily make up for it. The author even goes as far to give each cast member their own blog, and some of them even rival their plotlines in the main strips.
I clearly slept on Achewood way too long, as it’s one of the funniest web comics I’ve come across in some time. As of now it’s currently in hiatus, but the archive is massive so most new readers will have plenty to swim through. Easily recommended, so click here to join the house party.