Ugly Hill

Ugly Hill
Author(s)	Paul Southworth
Website	http://web.archive.org/web/20051019001840/http://www.uglyhill.com:80/
Current status / schedule	Completed[1]
Launch date	2005-05-23
End date	2009-03-29
Genre(s)	Absurdist humor

Ugly Hill is a webcomic written and drawn by Paul Southworth. The titular Ugly Hill is the home town of the main characters.

Ugly Hill is currently a part of Blank Label Comics.^[2] On 2006-11-07 it was announced that Ugly Hill would be published on Viper Comics' website.^[3] Ugly Hill has also been published in newspapers, notably The Turlock Journal^[4] (Turlock, CA), due to Ugly Hill's association with Keenspot.^[5]

Ugly Hill was recognized with the Web Cartoonist's Choice Award 2006 for Outstanding Character Art^[6] and a nomination in 2007 for Outstanding Character Rendering.^[7]

The Web comic has had several guest authors/artists, such as Howard Tayler of Schlock Mercenary and Kristofer Straub of Starslip Crisis.

Paul Southworth has been a guest speaker at two major conventions in recent years, the New York Comic Con in 2006 and Vericon in 2007.^[8]

On March 29, 2009, Paul Southworth concluded adding new content to Ugly Hill.^[1][9] Paul's newest active project is "Not Invented Here".^[10]

Primary Characters

• Eli Kilgore is a slothful, consistently unemployed blue dinosaur-like creature with a seemingly permanent five o'clock shadow (that is, except when he allows it to sprout into a full-on beard). He is kind, likable and intelligent, but is lazy, has nothing resembling a work ethic, and is prone to making bad decisions that result in unpleasant consequences. He is a fan of the heavy metal band Skulldrift, and via an unlikely series of events, currently fronts another popular band, Blöodsignal.
• Snug is Eli's pinkish-colored best friend who still lives in his mother's basement. His mother is never seen, but is portrayed as a domineering, controlling woman. Despite her overbearing nature, Snug depends on her totally even if he is terrified of her. He can claim a certain amount of legal notoriety since, by his own account, a landmark court decision has resulted in his being considered legally retarded when awake before noon. Snug has been shown to be slug-like in his sensitivity to salt.
• Hastings Kilgore is Eli's workaholic brother. He is 33,^[11] tan-skinned, wears glasses and an ever-present necktie (despite not actually having a shirt), has horns, and stumpy arms which Eli teases him about. He is work-obsessed, which leads to a very high-stress life. These factors have led to problems with his blood pressure, necessitating a strict diet, which he ignores due to his love of good food (salt in particular). He is a noted racist (against the minority of one-eyed people in the Ugly Hill world, once he is called a Two-Eyes Supremacist). Hastings has been married many, many times, but even he is often confused as to the exact number due to a variety of strange circumstances. He is constantly frustrated by Eli's inability to find and hold a job, but nonetheless supports him due to a feeling of family obligation, mixed with messages/threats from their mother. His middle name is "Aloisius", although he somehow managed to conceal this from Eli until recently.
• Peter Wipp is an intern at Hastings' office and a high school student. He has the appearance of an octopus wearing a hooded sweatshirt and a bowl haircut. He is a bright boy, often acts as the voice of reason, and is usually the most level-headed character in the strip. He often suffers from the pressure put on him by Hastings' workaholism. He also makes good pancakes, but not great ones. He recently had a minor flirtation with Goth/Emo subculture, but abandoned this pursuit when he discovered that he had the potential to become a successful syndicated comic strip artist.
• Elliott Krauthammer is a co-worker of Hastings' who is at best an irritation to him, often leading Hastings to act more extremely than normal. To wit: Hastings has attempted to eat Elliot on more than one occasion, as well as attempt to both get him fired for perceived workplace infractions, and to blow up his septic tank. For his part, Elliot is constantly attempting to dig up professional "dirt" on Hastings, saving up what he finds in order to employ it at the time when it will have the direst effect.
• Karl Kilgore is the father of Eli and Hastings. While Karl looks like a taller, thinner, mustachioed version of Hastings, his personality is similar to that of Eli: a slacker and mooch. He finds work to be "for losers" and has built up considerable debt via various means. Not long ago, he was carted off to jail after hiding in a cave in an attempt to elude bill collectors, but while there, he still managed to hire a professional killer to try to murder his ex-wife. He once escaped from prison when he heard of Mrs. Kilgore's attempts to get Eli to shave his beard. His absurd passion for stopping her endeavors to make Eli shave off his beard comes from a delusional conviction that his life was sent downhill when Mrs. Kilgore forced him to shave off his own mustache when they were together. Recently Karl was released from prison.
• Grant Sherman is Peter's history-buff friend. He is active in Ugly Hill's civil war re-enactment community. He is green-skinned, with orange hair, thick glasses, and a bulbous nose. Usually seen wearing his uniform. In addition to historical re-creation, Grant is a fan of pastries, and violent video games.

Other characters

• Fausto Ivanov was the Russian owner of a local convenience store in Ugly Hill. Looking like a small green slug with a black beard, Fausto is owner and seemingly the only employee at his store, Fausto's. In an April 2006 storyline, however, it was revealed that Fausto was actually a cyclops terrorist (wearing a prosthetic eye to avoid suspicion) with plans to assassinate President Herbert Tripp. His plot was ultimately foiled by the efforts of Peter (who tackled Fausto) and Hastings (who took the bullet). The storyline ended with Fausto in US custody and awaiting trial. His fate is currently unknown.
• Dr. Hope Kilgore is one of Hastings' ex-wives. She resembles a pink dinosaur with orange hair, back spines, and glasses. She was married to Hastings for two years, but they divorced when Hastings learned that one of her parents was a cyclops (whether it was her mother or father is not mentioned, although the day Hastings and Hope remarried, there was a solitary one-eyed man on Hope's side of the church, and who is probably Hope's father). Despite this, Hope comes off as polite and cheerful, helping Hastings even after their divorce. Regardless, Hastings still treats her coldly, feeling betrayed that she kept her mixed parentage a secret from him.
• Daisy Ellington is another of Hastings' ex-wives, and the next-to-most recent. According to Daisy, she and Hastings were only together for "a few months" before separating. However, they remained legally married for some time, as she evidently never signed the divorce papers out of bitterness over Hastings' apparent desertion of her children, who were fond of him. Hastings was unaware of this clerical error until attempting to remarry. Daisy is a green lizard-like creature with light scales, and blond hair. She has arms, but a tail in place of legs. She lives at the "Purdy Mouth" Trailer Park with her children Mudpie and Daisy Jr., and her brother Butch...With whom she may or may not be romantically involved.
• Vivian Kilgore (deceased) was the mother of Eli and Hastings and Karl Kilgore's ex-wife. For the first few arcs of the strip, she had only been referenced by other characters and not seen, but was introduced during the Thanksgiving '06 story arc. Whereas Hastings more closely resembles Mr. Kilgore physically, Eli takes after his mother, sharing her blue skin and bulbous nose. Even so, based on prior character references, Hastings more closely mirrors some of Mrs. Kilgore's attitudes, though not all. Vivian was, overall, an extremely unpleasant woman, having exhibited characteristics of manipulation, greed, bigotry, laziness, and emotional instability. She also condoned bad habits in others. To wit: she didn't seem to object to Eli or Karl's sedentary lifestyles, going as far as to threaten to stop needle-pointing "inspirational landscapes" for Hastings should Hastings ever kick Eli out of his apartment (a prospect that frightens Hastings enough to allow Eli to stay). She also maintained an extremely low tolerance for facial hair of any kind. Vivian Kilgore died in her sleep during events depicted in a strip that ran 02/06/09. In a subsequent forum post on the "Ugly Hill" section of the shared Blank Label Comics message board, Creator Paul Southworth indicated that he had "...been waiting to kill that bitch for years."
• Nora Callahan is Hastings' most recent ex-wife. There was some difficulty with the initial legality of their marriage, as it was not considered official by the municipality of Ugly Hill until Hastings officially divorced from Daisy. She is a blond, blue-skinned creature with tiny black bat-like wings on her back. Nora is also a committed workaholic, which is what attracted Hastings to her to begin with. Hastings divorced Nora after Nora hit Mrs. Kilgore in the face with a snow shovel (during a dispute over the gross misuse of a substantial amount of money Mrs. Kilgore was lent by Nora and Hastings to supposedly save the family home, which was up for sale due to Mrs. Kilgore being cut out of her father's will. Specifically, the dispute was in reference to Mrs. Kilgore's having spent the money on luxury items in an apparent attempt to prevent Nora and Hastings from using the money to adopt a child).
• Mr. Ladwig is the immediate supervisor of Hastings and Elliott. He is lavender, with black wings, a small tusk/trunk for a nose and blond hair (which might be a wig). A non-confrontational person, he is constantly in the middle of disputes between Hastings and Elliot. There does not seem to be any bias in these fights, as Ladwig is willing to demote Hastings and foil Elliot's attempts to get Hastings fired or punished. While seemingly possessing a large amount of patience, he has been known to lose his temper when the fighting between the two employees disrupts his personal life (such as when Elliot badgered Ladwig while Ladwig was talking to his dying father).
• Miss Mudrick is Hastings and Elliot's boss. She is one of the minority single-eyed creatures of Ugly Hill, and thus, Hastings must continually try to keep his racism in check around her, but usually fails. Miss Mudrick is quite religious, and tolerant of others' idiosyncrasies to the point of heavy self-sacrifice. She has been known to rage in private, though, usually off-screen.
• Tom Wipp is Peter's father. Under the pen name of "Prod Roberts", Mr. Wipp wrote a number of instructional books on the subject of workplace efficiency, which Hastings greatly admires. Hastings becomes disillusioned when he discovers that after writing the books, Mr. Wipp had a startling realization that he had wasted his life, and turned to spending all of his time with his son instead of at the office.
• Ned Gooseberry (deceased) was the CEO of Poisonwood Brands, the company Hastings works for. He was described by his creator Paul Southworth as "a very bad man." This was reflected in his appearance - That of a red-skinned demon with leathery wings, and a pointy tail. Mr. Gooseberry prized Hastings' occupational drive, to the point of blacklisting Hastings from taking any office position anywhere in the professional world after Hastings displeased him. He later ran for President against one-eyed candidate Baker Osgood (an obvious parody of Barack Obama), and around the same time was revealed to have inherited the leadership of B.I.C.L.O.P.S., a secret two-eyed supremacist cult, after the last leader, Hastings and Eli's maternal grandfather, died. This leadership is briefly usurped by Hastings (along with Ned's Presidential candidacy) when it's made known that Hastings reconciled with his grandfather shortly before the latter died; however, both returned to Gooseberry after Hastings was admitted to a mental hospital on the grounds of having paranoid delusions of Osgood being part of an underground One-Eyed Supremacist organization. Gooseberry, in a supreme display of irony, was then assassinated by said organization, thus vindicating all of Hastings' supposed delusions.
• Patricia "Pestilence" Moresorrow is a student at Peter's school, and also the object of his affections. Pestilence is a white-skinned creature with dark hair, and favors a "goth" style of dress and attitude.

References

1. "Ugly Hill will return on Jan 5th". UglyHill.com. 2008-12-30. Archived from the original on February 3, 2009. Retrieved 2009-02-03.
2. Blank Label Comics is Formed
3. "Viper Sinks Fangs into Five Webcomics". IGN Comics. IGN. 2006-11-07. Retrieved 2006-11-08.
4. Denied:1up! Software
5. Keenspot.com: Keenspot Comics Page
6. "The 2006 Cartoonists' Choice Awards". Retrieved 2007-02-09.
7. "The 2007 Cartoonists' Choice Awards". Retrieved 2007-02-08.
8. Vericon
9. http://web.archive.org/web/20090209120310/http://uglyhill.com:80/2009/02/only-constant-in-universe-is-change-of.html. Archived from the original on February 9, 2009. Retrieved February 9, 2009. Missing or empty |title= (help)
10. Bill Barnes (2006-11-07). "Not Invented Here". Retrieved 2009-11-16.
11. Do not hire this man Retrieved on 2008-09-11. Archived May 24, 2008, at the Wayback Machine.

External links

• Ugly Hill web site
• Blank Label Comics
• Paul Southworth interviewed on Fleen