Is It Possible to Separate the Webcomic Artist From the Art? Kique Nordin

Update: December 17, 2023 Removed some references to Kique’s ex-girlfriend’s former name. There will be some references to her name that remain when she was with Kique, but at this point going forward, it’s pretty much a dead name to her. I’ve also removed her from headline, as she has apologized for her past actions when she was with Kique and understandably wants to move on. I’ve added a section for what she’s publicly shared.

On a minor note, links to Tumblr accounts and Google Docs that have been erased have been removed.

Update: As of August 2022 Serena is no longer a co-author of Home and she’s no longer Kique’s girlfriend. As far as I know all references to their relationship have been removed. That’s all I know and all I’m willing to talk about. This blog was written in November 2021 and is a reflection of Serena‘s actions when she was with Kique and actively working on the comic with him. The drama resulting from her involvement in Home has largely been quelled and in some cases resolved. As for Kique, he hasn’t changed much as Serena‘s contributions to the comic have largely been removed from the credits list.

I felt it was fair to update anyone who comes across this article on what happened in the past regarding Serena. Fortunately, she is moving on from her time with a toxic artist and person.

In my writing I don’t always touch upon how an artist treats their fans and their own body of work. Sometimes it’s not possible to separate a toxic artist from said work. Occasionally, the two are so intertwined that bad behavior has to be called out. Today, I’m mostly focusing on Kique Nordin and to a lesser degree his co-author and ex-girlfriend, Serena when she was dating him.

I’m going to note that this is not an invitation to bother or harass these two. I simply want to make note of their past and present bad behavior as a reader beware piece. Again, Serena has apologized for her past actions and wishes to better herself. As for Kique, it is best to ignore him and certainly don’t engage his diehard fans.

I’ve written a lot about Home since this blog’s inception. In the webcomic world feral canine comics occupy a small niche. A few artists are influential and Kique is among this group. His body of work isn’t as well-known as Off-White, No North, or The BlackBlood Alliance, but he does command a respectable-sized following at 4,400+ followers spread between various social media and art sites. He used to have a larger audience before he deactivated his DeviantArt account in 2017. Kique eventually did come back under different names in 2018, but his following never quite recovered. On the surface, the reason for his deactivation was because of harassment from users on DeviantArt, but the real reason was because he couldn’t get the parody, Emoh removed from DA. The parody was created by the Salt Tribe (who would later become the Comic Critique Squad or CCS) and is protected free speech.

Before Kique’s deactivation on DeviantArt and while SmackJeeves was active, he already had a fair bit of controversy surrounding him and his comics. I was a supporter of him from 2015 to 2018. Although I saw a fair amount of controversy for myself or I was privately warned by others, I simply wrote it off as him having a short-temper and being too sensitive to critique. I saw the poor handling of subjects like rape and sexism in his comics, and his attitude toward vocal fans. However, I tried to ignore the controversy and enjoy the story. A Patreon comment of mine even got singled out once by CCS in 2018. As a fan I did some white knighting for him when I felt critics weren’t being fair. I believed that DeviantArt was just too toxic of a place because Smackjeeves and Patreon didn’t seem to have the same issues. In reality, it was always easier for him to delete comments on other platforms versus hiding them on DA. At some point I realized most of Kique’s issues with fans were of his own making, as problems regarding criticism continued even after he left DeviantArt.

Still, I quietly tipped on eggshells when engaging him and laid low especially in his Discord. It wasn’t until his dispute with TheSodaSmuggler in April/May 2018 that I truly saw him for the person he was—a narcissistic user with a victim complex. Soda had been a good friend of his and they often collaborated on art. One day, she became frustrated with Roamer and vented about it on Patreon. I thought to myself, “Kique’s not going to like this comment.” Indeed he didn’t and a friend privately informed me that she had been banned. Shocked, that someone could ban a friend over a fictional character, I became furious and then disillusioned. That would be like me ditching one of my friends because they disliked a fictional character I adored. I’ve had these types of disagreements with various friends online and local. Guess what? We’ve remained friends for years and even decades. I even have disagreements about fictional characters with my husband, but we’re still partners and friends.

As for Kique, I sought out the criticism of him I had previously ignored and found the CCS Tumblr. Friends told me about his entry on Encyclopedia Dramatica. Through ED and CCS, I found Nabisco Parodies.  I realized all of Kique’s claims of harassment and bullying from jealous haters were lies. Kique’s “haters” didn’t hate him because they were jealous of his success, were homophobic, or were transphobic. The “haters” were fans or friends at one point who had been grown tired of Kique’s narcissistic personality, were shunned when they tried to help him improve Home, or were harassed by him or fans for daring to speak their minds.

In Kique’s case it is not possible to separate the art from the artist. He’s put way too much of himself into his work and it has negatively impacted the comic. Kique takes criticism of Home, especially of his favorite characters (Roamer, Rogio, and Ranach) personally because they are self-inserts. If you dislike his favorite characters he interprets that as insulting him as a person.

His problems with misogyny in real-life extend into the comic via the depiction and treatment of female characters. For example, every single female character that has been raped or is the victim of incest gets over their trauma without a second thought. Characters who do speak out about their treatment are made to look villainous, are sidelined, or killed. Nearly every female character eventually has their agency stripped from them when they deal with male characters.

Controversial topics such as rape and mental health aren’t given the research or care they deserve and are haphazardly written about at best. When Kique received negative feedback from people, especially rape survivors, he let his fans do the fighting for him and slowly began to retcon Home to make the issue less visible. Mental health is often used to excuse poor behavior with his favorite characters. Not only are these portrayals offensive, but they also reinforce negative stereotypes among his most impressionable fans. One of the worst examples is that you’re free to treat your family and friends like trash without remorse or self-improvement because you have a mental illness like depression.

https://nabiscoparodies.tumblr.com/post/185708805506/in-response-to-an-author-trying-to-make-excuses

Have you ever wondered why Rogio gets a pass for all of his toxic behavior in Home? Why Roamer and everyone else coddles him despite him being selfish and manipulative? It’s because in Kique’s eyes Rogio and Roamer are the ideal relationship, i.e. a good partner should never call out bad behavior and shield their mate from all criticism. A partner should also NEVER complain when they are being treated badly and just beg to be loved more. Rogio never has to face any negative consequences for his behavior besides Kargo calling him out. If he is told, nearly everyone in the cast is there to tell him that he did nothing wrong nor should he learn from his mistakes. After all, every bad decision can be blamed on depression and being held in “mental chains.” This is why he does not have to worry about bothering to help anyone in the Meteor Tribe especially when it comes to Ranach, leave his chores for Roamer to do, betray Kargo multiple times, and then ignore Roamer for months with barely an explanation.

Never mind that Rogio was never once shown to be abused in his relationship with Ranach and was always the physically dominant one.  Never mind Rogio trying to actually BE a better person and trying to DO better. His actions and how others react aren’t too different from how the author views himself, encouraged by fans that reinforce his worst behaviors instead of pushing him to be and do better.

Kique believes he is the victim or is unfairly being targeted by harassment. He has surrounded himself by sycophants on Patreon and Discord. His girlfriend took on a similar attitude regarding issues of narcissism, taking criticism of a story or characters personally, and having a victim complex while sending fans to attack others when they were a couple. He blocks out any critique of his comic –no matter how helpful. I doubt the negative messages in Home will change any time soon. This is in addition to the overall plot and pacing problems that have plagued this comic since day one.

Kique won’t change, but at the very least a myriad of other voices refuse to let him control the narrative about his comics or his very public behavior. Here are numerous blogs and documents recording his and his former girlfriend’s (when she with Kique) bad behavior throughout the years:

Bad Webcomics Wiki Forum discussion going back to 2016:

A discussion of Asmundr and early Home’s traced art completely separate from fans, ex-fans, DeviantArt, and the numerous Tumblr blogs. Travel outside of the niche canine comicsphere and people are much harsher. They saw Asmundr and Kique’s flaws more than a year sooner than the rest of us. (Unfortunately, they do misgender Kique here.)

Leyendo Entre Lineas page by page critique going back to 2017:

An analytical page-by-page breakdown of all of Home’s Flaws and Kique’s shortcomings as a writer. The blog was last updated in February 2021. As far as I know the writer (Signatus) has burned out on this project. She made it to page 577 which is extremely impressive.

Document Drops from CCS going back as early as 2017:

An extensive 60+ page document outlining Home and MUCH of Kique’s bad behavior—this includes comments on DA and SJ. White knighting fans, dropped plotlines and so much more. This was only a year and a half into Home! Things are so much worse now.

Kique’s theft of dialogue from Spartacus and his excuses/gas lighting. (Note: the stolen dialogue was eventually changed and the Spartacus plot dropped.)

A 39-page document detailing how Kique reuses art and traces, despite his frequent denials.

Documents on how Kique dropped the ball and ruined his main female characters—namely Ronja and Aira.

Nabisco Parodies going back as early as 2018:

All of the posts tagged “Home” for your reading pleasure.

Nabisco’s breakdown of why Kique’s beloved Rogio is a toxic character.

Proof that Kique has gone back and retconned past pages even though he insisted Home’s script was completed before he started writing.

A callout of Kique’s use of mental illness to excuse bad behavior.

KiqueNordin-DiscordReceipts going back to 2019:

An ex-fan fed up with Kique and his Discord server leaked a variety of screenshots of discussions from the Patreon Discord and the server dating from its creation to June 2019. They also shared files on how to view the server’s content. Since then the server has been wiped and restarted. Some of the stuff leaked from the users is borderline or outright zoophile material among his fans.

Vallany from DeviantArt going back as early as 2019:

Comic Review: Home: part 1 on YouTube

Kique reusing poses and tracing, different from the CCS document

 

KyttyCat’s going back to September 2021 and October 2021:

Her experiences with Kique and his girlfriend Staz over tracing and reference allegations. Note the hypocrisy as Kique and Staz have no problem tracing or heavily referencing poses, but they call out other artists for similar behavior. And they are relentless if someone dares use a similar or exact pose, even if that pose was pulled from a reference photo.

Staz encouraged her and Kique’s followers to harass this artist with a much smaller following.

Just read the entire blog, it is eye opening in regards to the lack of self-awareness, projection, and hypocrisy.

A callout post in the form of an artist beware chronicling Staz and her fans’ harassment of KyttyCat/Shade.

Yas Queen Ranach going back to September 2021:

A document showing how Kique and Staz steal poses from other artists or outright trace photographs. Some of these pictures are the same found in the CCS document, but it goes a step further in showing who the rightful copyright holders are.

How Kique and Staz cherrypick who is allowed to reuse their poses. Mind you, they attack other artists for doing the same, but give their friends a pass. Even as the pair stole the original poses from other artists.

Salty Malty going back to October 2021:

A callout document covering the behavior of Kique (recently on DA), Staz, and some of their followers, including feral porn. This includes screenshots from Discord and the type of fetish material that violates Patreon’s terms of service.

An update on one of Staz’s followers still harassing Shade after Staz told them to stop.

Lapis Lupis Gaming going back to October 2021:

A callout video for Kique, Staz, and their fans regarding copyright, referencing, tracing, and tons of hypocrisy. This includes their bullying of Shade.

Serena Tells Her Side of the Story 2022:

A breakdown of her their relationship as it broke down, and all the work Serena did while she was a co-author and co-artist for Home.

In 2023 Kique again paints himself as the victim with a post out of the blue. If he had evidence of her wrong doing, he’d share evidence, but he hasn’t. Contrast this to the mountain of evidence provided by everyone else.

Kique will continue to be problematic. I’m just content that I managed to get my thoughts out and shared much of the deeper controversy surrounding this artist. I don’t really have a call-to-action except for spending your time reading better webcomics with an author who don’t mistreat his fans. My goal is to make people aware of what type of artist they’re dealing with. If people continue to read Home and the author continue to create, that’s their business. He has a right to create and I have a right to critique his creations and the ways he’s unfair to their audience and even his co-authors.