What the hell happened to Sluggy Freelance? It seems way too complex to read now.
I need to catch up on the last year (so 7 strips) so I don't have the latest but:
*deep breath*
The comic's metaplot turned into stopping a demon KZK from ending the world. This was revealed to be some batshit complex comsic plot involving the the goddess of fate, her sister the goddess of the moon, and a pre-history king who was the King of Humanity, basically a moral god and the pincale of humanity.
This related to the other big bad org Hereticorp.
anywya, Abrams brought the comic to an "official end" by wrapping up that story addressing most of the unanswered question, including some big long set-up-and-slowly-delivered-over-20-fucking-years reveals. this was after his update schedule cratered (previously 7 days, then 7 days with guest sundays, then 5 days with guest sundays, then 5 days, then 3 and then "Whenever he has time & spoons to churn out comics")
Pete declared when that event/story/arc ended the comic was "over".
There was still a bunch of side characters never addressed adn bunch of shit left unanswered (like the fact all the lesser demons were runnign around, most of the side cast, etc) and he said he was going to continue to make comics with the main cast as an extended epilogue, but if you were looking for a time to stop reading that was your time, it would new adventures.
So what the comic became was the Scooby Gang with Turbo-powered Gwen (witch girl) going around and hunting various dangerous supernatural entities. And the first story post-"end" was actually pretty kino. But now they did some thing where... shit I don't even remeber why or how, but Riff got blasted into some random magic dimension and they were trying to find him and get him back. It was getting really maldy and angsty and unfun so I got busy and havne't had time to go back and catch up, but the last I saw they found Riff's mind, put it into a small harmless demon, and I think are now trying to find his body?
Basially he forgot all about the previous plotlines being done and isnow addressing them, much like any other comic that tries to do a "partial reboot".
Its a huge mess from the mind of an elderly boomer weeb, which honestly isn't the problem because when Pete has a kino idea is pretty fucking kino and makes dealing with the rest of the shit tolerable. The problem is that he isn't just using anime to come up with his plots, he's using fan-translated manga for his update schedue so he'll put out 12 strips in a week, then put out one strip the next, and then one strip in the next three months so when you come back to real you don't remember a single fucking thng that was going on.
And the comic is too text-and-lore heavy for a binge.
or tl;dr:
Pete is trying to tell a very involved story.
Neo-sluggy freelance works great when experiences as it was before: A daily comic strip where the action is moved along in drips and drabs and the action and plot continue at a steady pace, just enough to keep important parts fresh in your mind.
Pete is instead doing one strip every waxing gibbous, ensuring you have completely forgotten what is going, let alone all his clever set-ups, callbacks, and allusions.