Reddit was (still is?) considered as the "front page of the Internet" for over a decade. It's likely we all need time to unlearn the habits we picked up from Reddit. I know I still have that habit of refraining from commenting in certain threads because I don't want to potentially get bitched at.
I do wonder if a forum-based UI would help promote the kind of community you're looking for. Some people have suggested that text-only posts might help encourage more discussions and that is essentially what the forums are like. If you want to link to something for context, that just goes into the body text, rather than have the content show up first and foremost. That said, I don't think Beehaw is interested in switching to a forum-based UI. I could be wrong though.
There's a rather old project that may do what you want: https://github.com/zoran123456/Comic-Smart-Panels
I also use AlternativeTo to look for ...alternatives! Unfortunately, the other alternatives (besides Comic Smart Panels) are all proprietary, varying degree of "free": https://alternativeto.net/software/comic-life/