Gee, when Sean Penn punched out the Paparazzi he got arrested...

(From TV Circuit. Click on image to see full-sized image.)

If I were going to sum up TV Circuit in two words, it would be "soap opera." Heh. Well, that is probably to be expected in a shoujo-style (female-oriented) comic, but still, I found the comic to be an interesting glimpse into the world of tabloid television, however fictionalized.

TV Circuit is the second online comic put out by Strawberry Comics (the other being Red String which I reviewed on Friday). Strawberry Comics also puts out two print comics, Fractured Kisses (which is an anthology of a variety of romance stories) and Prophesy of Destiny (a conspiracy/science fiction comic with undertones of mysticism). And while the artwork is not as delicate as that found in Red String, I found it suited the darker grittier undertones of TV Circuit.

The comic follows Kyoko Mishima, a TV anchorwoman for a Japanese Tabloid show, TV-Circuit. We start out with her reporting on an escaped stunt pig for a children's TV show. Once the cameras switch off her, her expression switches from chipper to dour; she's not Les Nessman with the Hog Reports, after all.

Ratings on the show aren't doing well, and Kyoko's boyfriend/manager, Tatsuki, comes up with a plan to help boost ratings. He contacts a "friend" in the paparazzi, who gives him the scoop on a celebrity having an affair, in exchange for permission to take pictures of Kyoko for his own tabloids.

Kyoko isn't in on the plan. Indeed, she's played off as being a fairly sympathetic person who feels horrible when she ends up revealing the affair when she thought she was going to the movie set for an interview, and ends up breaking up with Tatsuki (and quitting her job) when he admits it was his plot. Meanwhile, in the background the paparazzo who orchestrated the entire thing gets photos of Kyoko and Tatsuki's fight.

It doesn't end there, as Kyoko struggles to find a job under the taint of being a tabloid reporter and with the papers reporting on her leaving her job and her breakup with her manager/boyfriend. She eventually is encouraged to start another job as a co-host of a radio show, but the tabloid reporter continues to stalk her, culminating in the face-off in the latest update.

One of the few problems I did have with the series was how it abruptly shifted into flashbacks in Episode 4 and 8. The flashbacks just didn't seem to work very well and didn't seem to flow with the ongoing story (especially the flashback in Episode 8 which seemed contrived and sophomoric, though that could be because it was Tatsuki's remembrance of what happened, and he seems to be a rather self-centered bastard). However, the flashbacks don't take long and don't detract from the story itself.

The series is set to run for two more episodes (each averaging 10 to 12 pages) before the series ends. Writer/artist Robin Sobolewski has plans for a new webcomic to start up in the fall. Considering the current story and her work in the Fractured Kisses line of comics, it should be a fairly interesting and well-written story.

Robert A. Howard
-------------------------