Johnny Wander is a webcomic

Webcomic

Webcomics, online comics, or Internet comics are comics published on a website. While many are published exclusively on the web, others are also published in magazines, newspapers or often in self-published books....

 written by Ananth Panagariya and illustrated by Yuko Ota. It is published bi-weekly. The comic generally focuses on slice of life stories involving Ananth, Yuko, and their friends and family following graduation from college. However, the comic occasionally encompasses unrelated fantasy storylines. The name is meant to evoke the creator's desire to use the comic to "wander" through whatever topics interest them at the moment.

The webcomic has been generally well-received, with reviewers calling it as a humorous and sweet comic that invites new readers to continue reading. The artwork has also been praised for its depth and quality. The first physical book collection "Johnny Wander Vol. 1: Don't Burn the House Down" was published in 2010.

History

Panagariya and Ota first published Johnny Wander in 2008. Originally intended to encompass more subjects than autobiography, Ota picked the name "Johnny Wander" because it sounded both catchy and broad in scope. The name implied that the two could "wander" to whatever subject they were interested in. The first few test strips were done sporadically, as Ota was attending school and Panagariya was working full-time as a graphic designer

Graphic designer

A graphic designer is a professional within the graphic design and graphic arts industry who assembles together images, typography or motion graphics to create a piece of design. A graphic designer creates the graphics primarily for published, printed or electronic media, such as brochures and...

. They eventually decided on autobiographical work because it seemed quicker to do, though the webcomic quickly became focused and polished. A collection of the comics, entitled Johnny Wander Vol. 1: Don’t Burn the House Down, was published in 2010. The book was released under a Creative Commons

Creative Commons

Creative Commons is a non-profit organization headquartered in Mountain View, California, United States devoted to expanding the range of creative works available for others to build upon legally and to share. The organization has released several copyright-licenses known as Creative Commons...

 license.

Style and format

The webcomic generally focuses on slice of life storylines involving the lives of the creators and their friends. Occasionally, it ventures into surrealist

Surrealism

Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early 1920s, and is best known for the visual artworks and writings of the group members....

 short fantasy stories. Each comic consists of a stand-alone, single page comic. Often, the inspiration for a comic comes from a simple conversation or occurrence in the characters' everyday lives. However, an ongoing storyline, The Girl with the Skeleton Hand, involves a woman's romance with a personified death

Death (personification)

The concept of death as a sentient entity has existed in many societies since the beginning of history. In English, Death is often given the name Grim Reaper and, from the 15th century onwards, came to be shown as a skeletal figure carrying a large scythe and clothed in a black cloak with a hood...

. The artwork is inked by hand and done in grayscale

Grayscale

In photography and computing, a grayscale or greyscale digital image is an image in which the value of each pixel is a single sample, that is, it carries only intensity information...

. First, a strip is penciled, then inked with a brush

Ink brush

Ink brushes are used in Chinese calligraphy. They are also used in Chinese painting and descendant brush painting styles. The ink brush was invented in China, believed to be around 300BCE...

, and finally shaded and toned in Adobe Photoshop

Adobe Photoshop

Adobe Photoshop is a graphics editing program developed and published by Adobe Systems Incorporated.Adobe's 2003 "Creative Suite" rebranding led to Adobe Photoshop 8's renaming to Adobe Photoshop CS. Thus, Adobe Photoshop CS5 is the 12th major release of Adobe Photoshop...

.

Characters

• Ananth Panagariya - The comic writer, he describes himself as a comic book nerd. His hat constantly obscures his eyes, which are never seen.
• Yuko Ota - The comic illustrator and inker, draws herself much more tomboyish than she really looks. Attended college with Conrad and John.
• Conrad - Originally a roommate of the two main characters, Conrad likes to eat breakfast constantly.
• John - Another former roommate of the group; John often spouts seemingly random and surreal statements unrelated to the situation.

Reception

Greg McElhatton of Read About Comics called Johnny Wander one of his favorite webcomics. He went on to describe it as "consistently funny and sweet", and praised it for its comedic timing and sharp character art. Arun Kale of Helter Skelter magazine called the webcomic "a light-hearted, honest look at life".

Gary Tyrrell of Fleen compared Johnny Wander to Archie Comics

Archie Comics

Archie Comics is an American comic book publisher headquartered in the Village of Mamaroneck, Town of Mamaroneck, New York, known for its many series featuring the fictional teenagers Archie Andrews, Betty Cooper, Veronica Lodge, Reggie Mantle and Jughead Jones. The characters were created by...

in its accessibility and ability to make new readers feel welcome. Mike Braff of Suvudu

Suvudu

Suvudu is a genre site created by Random House, Inc., to provide additional content, such as author interviews, chats, chapter previews, reviews, previews, and news around science fiction, fantasy, comics, graphic novels, and video game guides and books published by Random House, Inc., across all...

praised the webcomic, calling its writing good and its art "breathtaking".