It's funny what can spark a new interest. I was thinking about the various webcomics I read and how I got into them, mostly it's regular word-of-mouth and recommendations, but one stands out as a funny introduction.
When I was in highschool I mostly hung out with the geeky/weeby/goth/emo set. One of the guys would regularly use "a demonic duck of some sort!" as a distraction or way to change the subject. I figured that it was probably a reference to something and looked up the phrase. El Goonish Shive came up and I started reading it, mostly because I wanted to talk about stuff with that friend, and ended up really liking it! The handling of the anime gender-swap trope was fun and I latched onto Tedd pretty fast. Love scrawny geeks with glasses, and a cute squirrel girlfriend? Peak.
But when I brought up the comic to that friend later, some other reference to what was happening in the comic at the time, he was absolutely baffled. Turns out he'd never even heard of the comic, but had heard the duck thing from someone else?
So I kept reading anyway and now it's like 15ish years later and I haven't seen the guy since graduation but the comic is still here and still getting better all the time.
