Darren And Jason

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Rating Summary

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Background
A male homosexual joined our forum to ask us to review this webcomic, finding its depiction of homosexuals offensive. And what better webcomic to review than one that actually insults its intended audience?

Downfall
The webcomic began innocuously enough as a mild comedy involving two anthropomorphic foxes, but jumped the shark when it became about a triangle relationship between three gay males. But the webcomic really went down the toilet when it became all about the leads having sex with anyone and anything they could get their hands on-and that was all they ever did. Easy to see why the one gay man took offense to the whole thing.

Story and Plot
Darren and Jason (who address each other as Ren and Jay, respectively) are two anthropomorphic red foxes who are friends, and Jay owns up to homosexual feelings for Ren. But might Ren reciprocate such feelings toward Jay? Just maybe? But what sort of relationship does Jay have in mind? Well, Jay gets this far with Ren. And shortly afterward...

(Like you expected differently? If there ever is a gay-themed webcomic where a male hits upon another male and the feeling is not eventually reciprocated, let me know and I will put on a pink tutu and dance "Swan Lake"!)

The beginning of a romance between the two? Not so fast. Jay may have Ren, but he already has his eyes on another guy named Simon. And Simon accepts his affections. So now what does Jay want? Yes, a triangle relationship of himself, Ren, and Simon. And would you believe that the other two readily agree to this arrangement? Only in webcomics.

Soon after, the author announces the webcomic will no longer have an overall plot but consist of random jokes.

Well, not quite. It seems that Ren, Jay, and Simon aren't sufficient for each other; they must have more partners. In fact, new partners include a raccoon policeman, and an unknown dog (anthropomorphic, we assume).

Then there is a story arc where our heroes are visited by...a ghost. Not just any old ghost, but that of Dan, a deceased friend of Ren's. Years ago, Dan had been mortally wounded by burglars while visiting Ren, and as it turned out, Dan asked Ren to suck his cock before he died, and Ren obliged. Ren and Dan do still love each other, and Ren allows Dan to continue haunting the house. Sadly, it turns out that Dan is a kangaroo and the author completely fails to make him look like one.

Next, our heroes go to a fair. But despite the other attractions, they are still clearly obsessed with sex. And on top of that, they end up making a park security guard and then his boss discover their own homosexual proclivities.

Before I go further, I should point out that this is a British comic. This is obvious from the spelling and the slang in the characters' dialogue. What does that have to do with anything? Because the webcomic has what is clearly British humor, meaning sillier and weirder than the American type.

But this just-described story arc could not help but make me think of the colonel played by Graham Chapman in Monty Python's Flying Circus who appears at the end of certain sketches and announces that the sketch had to stop because it was getting too silly. In this case, this webcomic was threatening to become a homosexual version of Kit n' Kay Boodle where all the characters spend most of their time doing something sexual. And as for how the scenario is building up...

One more thing I should mention: one significant new character added to the story is none other than Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer. I am not making this up. Another sex partner for our heroes? Well, maybe... But Rudolph is brought into the story for more than just sexual reasons.

Despite these rare attempts at story and character development, most of the webcomic consists of our heroes performing one sort of homosexual activity or another, picking up as many new partners as they can (not always willing ones), and even incorporating homosexuality into everyday activities.

UPDATE: There have been no new strips in months, and even beforehand the output of strips had been slackening. It is reasonably safe to assume that the author has abandoned this webcomic and will not continue it any further.

SECOND UPDATE: This webcomic has disappeared from the internet.

Art review
The earlier strips look literally like they were drawn in pencil on lined notebook paper (and probably were):



In strip #116, color is added, but the notebook paper lines are still present. In fact, it is not until strip #179 when there are even color backgrounds. And even then, there are no background illustrations or even foreground furniture except as absolutely necessary. Also of note is that most of the pictures are side views of the characters, and except for the sex scenes, the viewer rarely sees anything below the belt. Frontal or even three-quarter views of any of the characters are rare treats indeed. Dialogue lettering is rather sloppy but legible, and though there are no word balloons, at least the dialogue text is placed so there is no confusion over who said what.



As for the figures themselves, they are stiff at first and slightly less so as the webcomic continues, and consistency and proportions are none too good. Worse yet, characters of the same species (including Ren and Jay themselves) look identical, so that it is not always easy to determine who is who in a picture. Even worse than that, Ren's late friend Dan was supposed to be a kangaroo, and if the webcomic didn't say so, I would have assumed he was another fox. Holy Immelmann!



The characters have animal-like genitalia, and sex scenes are graphic and messy. Holy Collar 6, even bondage is incorporated into the sex scenes! This webcomic will provide no enjoyment to people who are not into this sort of thing.

Writing review
Looking at the earliest strips, I get the impression that the author decided on a lark to draw a couple of anthro foxes and make a series of random jokes, with even the homosexual kissing as just another gag, as indicated by this strip. Perhaps even at this stage, the author was still uncertain as to where he was going to go with this idea.

Okay, by now the author decided to make this webcomic gay-themed, complete with graphic sex. Maybe the author wasn't really serious about a triangle relationship between the three characters to begin with, but then he decided to go ahead with the gimmick. Trouble is, once this situation is set up, there never seems to be any romantic feelings between the three; in fact Simon takes a back seat from then on while the other two go out and find as many new sex partners as they possibly can.

Besides the sexual jokes, there are those about breaking the fourth wall as well as jokes dealing with various holidays.

Author biography
I found nothing besides the links already provided.

Conclusion
I am not a gay furry, but I know some people (over the internet) who are. Only one I've met has mentioned having two different gay partners, and they have different homes and he visits each one. Others even have open relationships. But I suspect that very few if any have sex lives as depicted in this webcomic.

Perhaps the author originally intended this to be a genuine romantic story, but if so, he soon abandoned that idea. Only Ren has any sort of backstory; Jay and Simon are nothing more than gay stereotypes. The ghostly Dan was brought in, perhaps as a second attempt to put character development into this story, but that faded out too. Indeed, though the three leads are supposed to be members of a triangle relationship, there hardly seems to be any love or affection between them; they are like roommates with a convenient sex life. The only real romance in this story seems to be that between Daxter (the security guard) and his boss, and even then their relationship is hardly covered once it is established.

Okay, Darren And Jason may not be like Kit n' Kay Boodle after all; the characters do wear clothes some of the time and there are no "gods of yiff" in this story. Nevertheless, the three protagonists are rarely shown doing anything that doesn't involve having gay sex. Don't these people have any other interests at all? Don't they do anything else for fun? Look at boyfriends Campy and Connor in Furthia High, and even ClosetCoon, for all its male nudity and genital shots, did not have its characters constantly humping one another.

If you're looking for (highly stereotypical) gay furry porn including bondage, this webcomic is the place to go. But that's all this webcomic is. You'll be greatly disappointed if you're expecting a story about relationships or romance.

UPDATE: The webcomic's hosting service Smackjeeves has been shut down, and I doubt the author intends to resurrect this webcomic anywhere else.

Links

 * Wolfoxx's FurAffinity page
 * And his Weasyl page
 * An equally negative review by The Webcomic Police Domain expired. but the review pretty much said what this review has said, in more detail.