The Stick Awards II: Second Edition (#0271 - #0280)

[Porthos]

Welcome to The Stick Awards II: Second Edition!

The Stick Awards are handed out to the best strips of all time as chosen by our fellow Playgrounders.

This week we are covering the comic strips 271 through 280.

For full details about the Stick Awards, please check out the main thread here.

To read more about the original Stick Awards, created by Nazzo, the 102nd, please read his thread here.

To vote in this thread, simply state which comic of the ten listed is your favorite. Bolding the number of the comic (Like this) helps it stand out.

Voting for this week will close on January 2nd, 4pm EST. Any votes made after that will NOT count toward the totals.

Last week, 270 Dueling Egos decided that the best way to bring the holiday spirit to its nearest rivals was to share in the warmth of a roasting fire. Literally. Afterwards, no one else really felt like challenging it for the award.

Who will win the award week? We only get to find out once you tell us.

Once again, it is time to turn the calendar page, look back on the previous year, and look forward to the future. And whilst we are in this reflective mood, what better time than now to figure out which strip deserves to win.....

.THE STICK AWARDS II: 0271 - 0280

271 The Prosecution's Case
272 The Big Secret
273 The Crayons of Time: Doodles on the Sketch Pad of Eternity
274 The Crayons of Time: The Snarl
275 The Crayons of Time: World 2.0
276 The Crayons of Time: The Order of the Scribble
277 The Crayons of Time: Breaking Up is Hard to Do
278 A New Strategy
279 No Soup for You
280 The Boot

====

For ease of reading, What Haley Said, courtesy of the thread of the same name.

Spoiler

Show

#275
Vxv?
Huh?

#277
Zfq bq nzml?
Are we back?

[ChristianSt]

Some nice strips there. Any strip featuring Belkar has a plus, and "Halfling Drop Soup" is an awesome name for a dish. The giant boot is also really great! (And I would say the lawyers are my favorite smaller characters, especially Mr. Phil Rodriguez)

Saying all that the Crayon strips are just awesome. So I'm going with 277 - The Crayons of Time: Breaking Up is Hard to Do, since it features a really nice punch-line in the transition back to the normal comic.

[Muenster Man]

I've grown really fond of Blackwing in the more recent strips so that little gem in panel 5 of #271 was really great. It's probably not the best of the bunch, but it made me laugh a lot and none of the back story exposition comics really stand well on their own so that leaves little competition besides #278.

[Gift Jeraff]

#275. Poor Mijung, but a classic line from Loki.

[Sir_Leorik]

271

"Curse you, treacherous avian!"

And the Flumph breaking down on the witness stand, recalling the traumatic experience. Comedy gold!

[martianmister]

273..............................

[mythmonster2]

Lots of good exposition here, but I think the best of it is 277.

[thatSeniorGuy]

Definitely 277, I love the ending!

[Emanick]

280: The Boot. So ridiculous it's golden.

[Plerumque]

#275. Some nice exposition and Loki's great line.

[sam79]

Not my favourite section of the comic; despite the interesting art and some good lines, an exposition-heavy trial scene is still an exposition-heavy trial scene. The Snarl and the Order of the Scribble stuff is good, but it never sat right with me that after hearing Shojo deliver this complex and detailed narrative we're still supposed to buy that the Order accept his tale as true while still thinking he is a nutcase who thinks through his cat.

Vote for 277, for its punchine, and for the strife in the Order of the Scribble.

[LadyEowyn]

Voting for 277. Crucial and very interesting backstory on the Order of the Scribble, and sets up everything we know about the Gates and their defences.

[Killer Angel]

277

...because the Order's, is the typical reaction of the standard group of adventurers, facing a flashback.

[littlebum2002]

This is like, in politics, when you have one candidate of one political ideology running against 3 other candidates who are all of the opposite ideology. The candidates all split the "other" vote., thus giving the lone opponent the plurality of the vote.

Anyway, all the crayon comics are good, but how could I possibly choose which one is the best? So I had to eliminate them all from contention, sadly. Having said all that (which will of course be ignored, because who reads this stuff anyway?) I'm going with 272

[Bird]

274. That drawing of the fate of the eastern gods is one of my favorites.

[Meph]

271, whole bunch of important and funny strips still.

[DolGrenn]

I'm going with 276 for the callback all the way to 47.
Good thing they didn't have to go through the water dungeon, or else they'd still be stuck there...

[Auburn Bright]

276 for me. The Order of the Scribble is fleshed out pretty well in a single comic, especially the reactions to Kraagor's death.

[Torrasque]

271 The treacherous avian takes it for me.

[FLHerne]

275. The entire Snarl sequence is rather plot-important, but 275 sets out the basic nature of the world, rifts and implied purpose of the Gates which has been the main motivation for the OOTS's actions since then.
I don't think judging a plot-central group of strips by 'best gag/callback' is really the way to go here.

[Porthos]

People are still trickling in after being away for the holidays, and the vote total is a little low for my tastes. So for those reasons (and also to get back to the regularly scheduled start day of the week) I am going to extend the voting period for this block until January 6th 4pm EST.

[David Argall]

Which gives me a chance to vote for 280, for no good reason.

[NobodyWasTaken]

I almost voted 275, but then 276 was better.

[GuySmiley1970]

Tough choice between 276 and 277 but I will go with 277. Intriguing backstory about the Order of the Scribble as well as tantalizing hints about each of the gates.

[Jaxzan Proditor]

I'm gonna vote 273.

[Mike Havran]

I'm not a big fan of crayons, so it's a toss up between 271 and 280.

#280

[Haar]

#278 needs more love.

[Porthos]

Tough choice this time around, as a lof of the comics flow into the next. But I have long thought that the line "Dude, don't taunt the god-killing abomination" was one of the best lines of the comic ever. For that reason alone, I vote for 275.

And with that.....

VOTING IS NOW CLOSED!

(finally )

: 277 The Crayons of Time: Breaking Up is Hard to Do is the winner this time. It now moves on to the Best of the Hundred tournament.

Full Results are as follows

...THE STICK AWARDS II: 0271 - 0280
{table]|Comic Number | Votes Received | Vote Percentage |
|

271

|

4

|

15.38

|
|

272

|

1

|

3.85

|
|

273

|

2

|

7.69

|
|

274

|

1

|

3.85

|
|

275

|

4

|

15.38

|
|

276

|

3

|

11.54

|
|

277

|

7

|

26.92

|
|

278

|

1

|

3.85

|
|

279

|

0

|

0.00

|
|

280

|

3

|

11.548

|[/table]

Please join us for the next round of voting for Strips #281-290 here.

[rs2excelsior]

Oops, didn't realize voting was over. Nothing to see here, folks!