By Adam Cadwell
Okay, I know that Adam Cadwell’s autobiographical webcomic finished a while ago. And I know this collection of episodes 151-200 came out a while back. But it doesn’t matter – it’s still worth mentioning and pointing out to you.
When I looked at The Everyday Collections 1-3 back in early 2009 I had this to say:
“As for the future of The Everyday – I don’t know. Will Cadwell grow tired of the single strip, disconnected approach and tackle more continuous and maybe more serious pieces? The two pages above prove to me that he can. Personally I hope he just carries on growing and developing. Mix it up, try the new, keep with the old, do them both. I’ll be reading along whatever.”
“…. there’s a simple joy in well crafted, well observed autobiographical comics – a simple joy that’s found throughout The Everyday.”
Well, since this is the end of The Everyday I guess Cadwell did get tired of his single strips. But he took it as far as he wanted to, delivering tales of simple events and snatched, isolated moments of everyday truths and along the way developing into an eminently confident and capable artist.
It was the moments of simple truth that I so enjoyed in collections 1-3 and it’s really no surprise that Cadwell just gets better and better as the series moves along, so that these final 50 strips approach something sublime.
The joy of The Everyday is found in the simple things, whether it’s the trials and tribulations of flat sharing, adventures at the Glastonbury festival, travelling to comic shows with his comic buddies or just observing those little moments of day to day (or even everyday) life.
And because Cadwell’s strips chose to focus on single solitary moments there is a disconnectedness in the observations of the little moments of Cadwell’s life – snapshots documenting one specific event, mood or reaction. But these snapshots build up to a very satisfying whole.
One sure sign of a great piece of autobiography is that the reader comes to share in the emotional highs and lows of the subject. And so it is with Cadwell’s The Everyday. Over the course of 200 strips we’ve been granted access to his life – he’s shared and we’ve enjoyed sharing.
And in this final collection we get the most personal moments yet, as Cadwell shares the moment he falls in love. It’s never said out loud perhaps, but it’s not needed to be spelled out for us, not when the artist can show us in strips like this one below – that’s very special stuff.
Cadwell’s next project is something as far away from the autobiog of The Everyday as it’s possible to get: Blood Blokes; a slacker vampire series. And he’s been talking recently of putting together a collection of all 200 The Everyday strips – something I’d heartily encourage him to follow through with. But whilst you’re waiting for that collection – you may as well remind yourself how good The Everyday was with this final collection from Cadwell’s online store.
And that was it – the 200th strip. As good a way for Adam to say goodbye as any, perfectly in keeping with the nature of the strip, just another moment in a life, effortlessly told.
January 10th, 2011 at 10:08 am
Thank you very much for the kind words Richard. I am happy you enjoyed the final 50 strips and the collection as a whole.
When I have news of the book version of The Everyday, you’ll be the first to know.
Also, Blood Blokes shouldn’t be the furthest it could be from my work here, it’s a very down to earth vampire story, if you can believe that. It’s more about arguing over who buys the blood than lusting after schoolgirls. There’ll be touches of autobio-style observation throughout it.
And thank you for your continued support of The Everyday and all my work, I am very appreciative of the coverage and encouragement everyone at FPI has given me.