/ic/ - Artwork/Critique

Hi guys,
it's been forever since I've been on /ic/, but recently something in my art started to bug me and I thought asking here could maybe help me.

Does anyone have any tips or tutorials about how to tell a story in a single illustration? Any books or videos you can recommend?
I posted a good drawing I found recently as an example.

I'm usually able to draw colorful and "nice" looking illustrations but I think all of them are pretty bland, meaning they don't tell a story or are fun to look at for more than three seconds.
This makes me dislike my own art and blocks me from drawing as much as I used to.