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Some banners to link to The Pantheon:
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The webcomic exchange banner.
A seriously chunky animated gif just for fun.
Other webcomics I like:
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Other webcomics I like:
The Sinner Dragon by Gilda.
Also a candidate for best webcomic in the known universe. The adventures of Kaim, a dragelf, Alexander, a purebred elf and nymphomaniac (not even Satan is safe from his wiles: see my fanart page) and Tristan, a werewolf.
There's a djinni in the "Kitsch Mage" storyline - does he remind you of anyone? There's convergent evolution going on out there in the world of webcomics!
Battle On! by Jeanette Atwood.
How could I forget Battle On? The very first webcomic I ever read. It has Ares in it. I like Ares. Not updated any more, since Xena finished, but don't hold that against it.. :)
Spellshocked by Benjamin Yackley, Mark Freid and Charles Caffrey.
Set in a wizards' university, this comic reminds me a lot of Diana Wynne Jones' book Year of the Griffin. The main character is a "quarter-dragon" named Fendrian. I'm dying to find out what the other three quarters of him are. His roommate is a grey fox who is very good at blowing things up and hopeless at spells. There's also a cockatrice named Thula who works in the necromancy lab. I've never seen a cockatrice character before. Check her out.
Kevin and Kell by Bill Holbrook
Daily and unfailingly entertaining, this is the tale of Kevin, a rabbit, and Kell, a wolf, who happen to be married. That's a socially frowned-upon state of affairs in a world where, despite the veneer of civilisation, predator-prey relationships are retained.
The Suburban Jungle by John "The Gneech" Robey.
Set in a world similar to Kevin and Kell's and starring aspiring supermodel Tiffany Tiger. The natural instincts theme is not so strong, though the difference between lions and tigers in the mating game is investigated. I have yet to fathom why some of the characters wear pants and others do not, though I'm not complaining about Drezzer Wolf's habit of wearing naught but a leather jacket.
Sabrina Online by Eric W. Schwartz.
Still on the subject of pants, we come to Sabrina, a skunk woman, who also appears to wear none. Or does she..? Read the archives.
Ozy and Millie by D.C. Simpson.
I'm a recent convert to this one. Haven't even read the full archives yet. It's cute and smart. The storyline about educational testing is a corker.
All me mates - (useful sites and friends of The Pantheon):
Psychic Dyslexia Institute. Scott and Tony were my first Keenspace friends back when I started The Pantheon. Onya, guys! :)
Furfire
It's an epic, so you have to read the entire archive.
Zeera, by NoemZ
by Reinder Dijkhuis.
Also an ongoing storyline.
The Forest of Eshva. Slash by a friend of mine. Pretty site!
The GaySpace calendar page. If you want a calendar image for January 2002, there's a nice one of Metrobius and Satan there.
Minotaur's Slash Database. Oh yeah! Great site, this 'un. My slash is in the search engine there.
The HOMni directory. One very extensive site for gay-themed webcomics. Keep up the good work, Tony! :)
Phred's pages. A friend who lives in Melbourne, who I talk to a lot on ICQ.
Hottest Comic Strip Boy Babes. I'd never noticed before now that Aladdin has no nipples..
Boxers or Briefs: Investigating a comic strip conspiracy. Straight cartoon characters wear boxers, as a rule. What's going on?
Freedom of Speech Balloon. Phred's comic links.
Shonen Chikara by the Animequeens. Boy Power!
Paladin's Haven by Alex Herakai.
Ezailia by Lauran Parise.
Books which thou shouldst read because they have Influenced Me:
Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman. I'm sure the whole world must know by now that I consider this to be the greatest book ever written. There's a bit of a cop-out at the end regarding the nature and motives of good old Jehovah, but apart from that, Whoo-ee, as Crowley would say.
Anything else written by Pratchett or Gaiman. Though I must admit I haven't managed to read The Sandman yet because they insist on having it illustrated in that godawful realistic graphic-novel style that I hate almost as much as anime. But Neverwhere is intriguing. As far as Pratchett goes: Small Gods is up there, Lords and Ladies has the great line: "I've got a great big tonker" and The Science of Discworld is one mightily intriguing history of the earth. Oh, and get Nanny Ogg's Cookbook too, because it's got a Strawberry Wobbler recipe in it.
Okay, enough Pratchett. If you're holding out against reading the Harry Potters, reconsider, because they're seriously good. I was drawing a picture of a wolf on a whiteboard at uni recently and a woman asked me who he was. I said that he was just a wolf, but he could be Sirius Black from Harry Potter. She declared in a grandmotherly tone that she was too old for Harry Potter. I told her no-one's to old for Harry Potter. And it's true. There's a whole lot of dark, seriously grown-up stuff going on there. Read.
The Talking Parcel by Gerald Durrell. This was the first of that great naturalist's books that I read, and the one I received my childhood knowledge of mythical beasts from. My niece and her contemporaries have gleaned theirs from Harry Potter, of course. But this is a truly great little adventure story, full of cockatrices and unicorns and gryphons and a sea serpent named Oswald. You can see its influence in Princess and Gryphon.
Hunter's Moon by Garry Kilworth. In fact, quite a few books by Garry Kilworth. (His Navigator Kings series is intriguing). But Hunter's Moon, about a British fox named O-ha, is one of the best. In the same genre, Ratha's Creature by Clare Bell, about a prehistoric cat. There's no obvious influence of these two on The Pantheon, but I've read them both several times so something must've stuck with me from them.
The Quintaglio Ascension series by Robert J. Sawyer. Very very good. The individual books are called "Farseer", "Fossil Hunter" and "Foreigner." About a race of dinosaur-descended people called the Quintaglios, who learn that their world is actually a moon in danger of breaking up. Sawyer's creation of their culture is perfection. It had such a profound influence on me that I spent weeks after reading the books clicking my teeth together when something amused me, in the manner of a Quintaglio. It hasn't had any effect on The Pantheon, but Quintaglio Ascension has strongly influenced the novel I'm writing. You'll see, if it ever gets published. The other strong influence on it is Robin Hobb's Liveship Traders
Just recently I read a book called Laptop of the Gods by Peter Chippindale. It doesn't fit with my idea of what the gods are like, but it's worth a look. As is Ye Gods! by Tom Holt, which a fair bit closer, but still not *quite* the same as mine.
Because I'm on a roll: Interesting movies and tv shows and plays.
Stuff by Baz Luhrmann, namely Romeo + Juliet and Moulin Rouge. Haven't seen Strictly Ballroom yet. I am proud to be of the same nationality as one of this day and age's greatest creative artists.
Other great movies: the Disney ones, but especially The Lion King (Scar is so gloriously evil), Hercules - Mmm! Greek mythology! (and Scar's hide - spot the cameo!) and Tarzan. You could say the same about these animated films as you could about Harry Potter. But they're worth the watch.
The world's greatest play: Arcadia, by Tom Stoppard. Smart, multilayered, full of beautiful, understated sexual innuendo. The opening line is "Septimus, what is carnal embrace?"
The greatest version of a play that I've ever seen: Othello at the theatre near Sydney Uni that I've forgotten the name of. Not the Footbridge, the other one. But anyway, it was good because Iago won! They didn't catch him - he just froze the action postmodern-style and strolled out. Yarrr! :)
On the subject of people who can grab a situation that's slipping from their control and turn it 100% to their advantage, I would just like to mention DS Don Beech from The Bill. I *love* characters like that! He is a legend. Watch The Bill. It's good.
You'll see Beech, Scar and several of my other favourite baddies in the "Tribute to Villains" storyline.
The Lynx believes he has now exhausted the possibilities as far as recommending things goes.
Good travelling, cousins.