Hark! A Vagrant

Kate Beaton’s webcomic turned literary and historical figures loose to behave badly: Napoleon, the Brontë sisters, Nancy Drew, an assortment of ill-advised Canadians. The jokes reward knowing the source material but land even if you don’t, because Beaton’s real subject is how ridiculous reverence makes people. Guillermo del Toro praised it as erudite, hilarious and irreverent, crediting her total cultural grasp of her targets.