Real Life (Greg Dean)

(Starline, 2004)
™ and © Starline

By high–tech standards, Greg Dean’s online daily comic strip is a relic, having been introduced in the pre–Y2K days of 1999. As one of the Internet’s Golden Age comics, Real Life has amassed a pretty massive collection of strips over the past six years, the first of which are collected in this similarly massive trade.

Dean’s strip is a humble and likeable autobiographical feature based on some of the everyday elements of his life—and the life of many other Gen-Y’ers: Internet surfing, gaming, junky first cars, etc. His illustration skills are limited, and there’s lots of sitting around and talking, but Dean changes topics and excuses his characters from the kitchen table just often enough to avoid the kind of stagnation seen in such similar one–note titles as Knights of the Dinner Table.

These snippets of Dean’s life are fun, but, like a bowl full of M&Ms, fans might get their fill of this kind of thing before they’re finished. Fortunately, Dean hops from subject to subject and provides insightful commentary for each strip, ensuring readers will resume the book after a break.

— Jim Johnson

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#1

July, 2004
Cover Price: $24.95
3 copies available from $6.73

Greg Dean