The Ebola Files

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Rating Summary

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Background
I am reviewing this comic because one of our readers emailed us and suggested it.

If you are reading this review just after I had published it you probably remember the Ebola scare that was going on couple of months ago. If you are reading it months later then you might vaguely remember it happening, just like SARS, the swine flu, mad cow disease, the Chinese rice shortage and whichever other flavor of the months, mass panic we were meant to be terrified by in recent years. If you are reading this years later and didn't watch the news too intently during the week and a half this was treated like it would be the next Armageddon then let me fill you in: In late 2014 a few people got Ebola, nothing ever came of it and some guy made this really crazy webcomic about it.

Downfall
This was shit from the start. On the third page of the comic the main hero announced that he created Ebola and that it had already killed millions and on page 5 he does this:



Story and Plot
The plots is as follows:

We start with a man in a white suit informing the world that he is the man who created the Ebola virus, this is who would become our story's hero. We then go back in time where we are informed that he and his friend are expert chemical engineers (wouldn't you need to be a bio-engineer to create a virus?) and are being hunted by the US military in Australia. When the army catches up to the them (in this case "army" meaning a couple of guys in olive green T-shirts holding muskets) they inform them that they........ actually, this will be better with pictures.



So they are then taken to a "secret military base" (it's actually a school) and introduced to Dr. Sakura who tells them they must create the Ebola virus (doesn't that already exist?) and infect the world's population for no apparent reason. Some months pass and the project is complete. To prove this, Vincent (that's his name) dumps the virus into the water supply and thereby puts into action the plan to "kill japan" by poisoning people in Australia.

But Vince has a devious plan in mind and he had enhanced the virus's power to...



After he finishes his explanation he chats a bit with Dr. Sakura who informs him that she created the bird flu and is doing this all for fun. Disgusted by her lack of morals, Vince kicks her into the Ebola river and escapes with his friend.



On their way out of the building they are stopped by a menacing agent and a fight ensues. Here we are made aware that being a chemist gives people Goku-like powers that manifest themselves in the ability to pull a baseball bat out of thin air and "super human speed" that is represented by Vince creating two pale, limp clones of himself to fight alongside him.

With their escape successful, Vince and his friend go into hiding in a small log cabin that he had somehow built himself. Here Vince explains that his plan is to end all wars by infecting everyone with Ebola. But their attempts to go unnoticed prove unfruitful when they are found out almost immediately by another agent, leading to another DBZ fight.



This fight soon escalated (much like the stupidity of this comic) from shooting and throwing baseballs at each other to Vince using "the power of Ebola" to fly and create his own version of Goku's spirit ball that has a rather questionable power source.



Here I would like to pause this plot synopsis to point out a few questions that bother me about this, namely-
 * 1) Why does creating Ebola give you super powers?
 * 2) Why would the people you infected with Ebola "lend" you their power to fight the guy who is trying to kill you?
 * 3) How would an Ebola based energy weapon help him win the fight? Will it infect his enemy with "Super Ebola"?
 * 4) How much power do Ebola sufferers really have to lend, considering they are pretty weak from slowly dying of Ebola?

So it doesn't really seem like he's "lending" their power are much as taking it whether they like it or not.

Anyway, the fight is over and Vince, still laying wounded on the ground, pulls out his cellphone and announces his displeasure with the rate at which the virus is spreading. His solution? An Ebola grenade. One seems to materialize in his hand as if he had willed it into existence and they head out to the nearest train station where they meet...



Yep, it's Ebola-chan. She immediately becomes his girlfriend and they throw the grenade which explodes just like a regular grenade and kills a bunch of people. Next, Ebola-chan takes Vince diving to seek answers for an undersea dragon that advises him to go hide for a few years. Unfazed by the fact he just met a talking dragon, Vincent takes his advice and we fast-forward to the beginning of the comic where he is about to make his worldwide broadcast. After bringing president Obama to tears by offering to cure Ebola in exchange for a presidential blowjob, he goes outside and gets into another fight with someone that was sent after him by the Illuminati who appears to be Edward Cullen from the Twilight series (or perhaps it's the author's surrogate since this character is named "Jacob").

And then this happens...



Besides confirming my suspicion that Vince isn't "lending" people's energy as much as his is taking it by force (I doubt Obama would be in a giving mood in this situation), it also explains that his power bomb takes the lives of millions each time he uses it. The then proceeds to throw about a dozen of them, killing more people than war ever did (not even including all the people he killed by giving them Ebola).



With the fight over, Vince plummets to the ground and hallucinates himself as a girl in a bikini, dancing to the sound of "I'm Sexy and I Know it", with crudely drawn MS Paint poop stains added by Jacob Herrick to her backside. When he awakes he is picked up by someone in a van and they go on the run from the CIA while reenacting the samurai sword scene from the second Matrix movie. After Vince slices a helicopter in half the comic abruptly ends.

Art review
The art of "The Ebola Files" compliments the story like a mangled corps compliments a train-wreck.

Since Jacob Herrick can't draw, he decided to use "ComiPo!" instead that let's him pose ugly-looking 3D models and add copious amounts of unnecessary action lines. While some people working within limitations have created pop culture classics (the Hulk being green because grey ink wasn't good, the Simpsons being yellow because skin color made their hair look strange and so on), T.E.F's severely crippling art tool turns the comic from slightly sad to hilariously pathetic.

Thanks to the use of whatever this is, we get secret bases that look like Japanese classrooms, grenades that look like comically large crayons and people having a range of emotions that includes about four and a half facial expressions. When there is a need to show that someone is shocked, lines are added to his face that look like giant hairs, and when someone is supposed to look old, age lines are added to their anime baby-face.

Still, the best part that is the way that the art hinders the action scenes. Jacob desperately tries to create the illusion of movement, but no amount of aggressively adding action lines will ever make these static dolls appear to be in motion.

Writing review
Take the broken art and the deranged plot, then top it off with the preposterous script and you will find yourself looking at a poorly rendered, scientist/teenager shooting down CIA SUVs and delivering lines like "Don't worry, I've played GTA" with a straight face (or at least with the same angry face that he responds with to everything). Other gems include Dr. Sakura saying the government did 9/11, Vince telling his friend that his face looks like a toilet and throwing an Ebola spreading hand grenade a few feet despite earlier saying it has an infection range of 5 miles.

The humor is pathetic, the dialog is laughable and Jacob peppers the comic with a selection of dated memes from 2005. I could go on giving examples of stupid things said in this comic, but instead of making this part of the review needlessly longer, I'll just show you the best example.

Vincent ascends into the sky, collects the energy from people he has infected with Ebola to fight the guy trying to get him to cure them, explains that by throwing this energy ball he will kill millions of them, and then yells out:

I seriously doubt that

Author biography
I don't know or want to know much about Jacob Herrick. All that has been discovered about him is that he's in his 20s, owns Naruto paraphernalia and has two more webcomics, one called "Game of Ninja" which seems to be a cross between Naruto and GoT, and a new comic he just started called "The Player Killer: Warriors of The Wilderness". He also seems to be pretty delusional, judging by him uploading his comics to "MangaFox" as if it was a professional comic. He's aware to a degree about what a joke his comic had become and would regularly engage in argument with the readers that came to look at his comic only to laugh at it. This includes posting pictures of the insults he'd been sent on one of the comic's pages to snidely thank those who sent them, as well as (allegedly) using the "Tsukkomu" function on one of the sites he uploads the comic to, that allows people to add sarcastic comments like YouTube annotations, to respond to the posts people left there.

In fact, leaving MST3K style quips on this site became one of Ebola File's biggest draws. They're pretty funny so I might as well show you a few before we continue.

In any case, at some point the guys over at the CWCki forum found out about this guy and made a thread. Jacob found the thread while googling himself and joined the forum to talk to them. He made just six posts, only one of which is worth quoting here.

"I don't really know what to say, But feel free to ask me anything and I'll try answer. :)

I read the majority of the posts here but not all of them, So lemme know if I've missed something!

I found this thread after googling "The Ebola Files" and "Autist Artist: Jacob Herrick", really caught my eye! Lmfao..

I can't believe how many people are saying that I'm Autistic! I would really love to hear why you'd think that..

I'm guessing it has to do with the randomness of "The Ebola Files", how it makes little sense and how I haven't given up on it? Haha.

I do have a bad case of Insomnia, I sleep between 3-4 days a week, sometimes less.

Realistically though that only helps me spend more time on making my Webtoons.

(Could explain why the story sometimes doesn't add-up though..) Lol.

Is it a troll Manga?

I don't even know how to answer this question.

Originally I planned to make "The Ebola Files" half funny but also half serious. (If that makes sense?)

So that readers wouldn't think that I was trying to compete with professional manga authors/artists,

But could still have a laugh and follow some minor storyline.

However I had no idea about how much attention it would receive and how offended people would claim to be.

Too many people were taking it too seriously and because of that,

I decided to make my comic seem serious, but instead flood it with offensive, immature material.. Kinda just for a laugh. Teehee ^.~

But then I noticed most of my "fans" (I sound like a dick lol), thought it was funny and I found my actual audience.

So as of now - "The Ebola Files" is my own little project. I will not be persuaded by haters that can't accept it for what it is.

I will always try to make the people that do enjoy it, feel satisfied with every new Chapter.

I will try to maintain the story but will always be more inclined to focus on the fact that thousands are reading,

And that gives me the chance to piss off thousands. Who could refuse?

One thing is for certain - When I decide to finish "The Ebola Files",

The last Chapters will be very unexpectedly offensive, crude and derogatory.

I will definitely be going out with a bang! Lol.

I hope this cleared some stuff up for you guys,

I'm sorry if you don't like me but if we met in person I bet it'd be different!

I was bored one day and made a comic series that for some reason got more attention than it deserved.

To give you some idea of my stupidity irl here's my youtube lol: http://www.YouTube.com/ParkourFlips

Should explain my sense of humour to some degree. ^_^

If you have any other questions please do ask.

I have two questions of my own.

1. Who is "Dobby" or "Spook"? I read that apparently someone "licensed" my comic or something?

I don't know and don't really care unless it prevents the comics publicity or something like that.

"The Ebola Files" is copyrighted also, and in every single picture my name is hidden among graphics from Chapter #1.

Copyright number: ZMOG-X25Q-HL2G-L7FS

2. Salto are you single, Wanna date bro?"

So he seems like a generally nice guy, however his claims of making this weccomic intentionally bad once he realized people hate it don't really hold up since it was crazy and stupid from page one.

Conclusion
I don't really want to write a drawn-out conclusion for this thing so I'll get right to the point:

The Ebola Files falls under the category of things that are so bad that they're good. I highly recommend reading it if you need a laugh and I hope Jacob either continues it or follows it up with something like "The AIDS Records" or "The Leukemia Documents".

Links

 * The webcomic
 * Its Facebook page
 * Jacob's CWCki thread
 * Jacob's CWCki account
 * Jacob's YouTube
 * Video review/dramatic reading of the comic