The OFFICIAL Unofficial Achewood Message Board
Achewood => Achewood => Topic started by: coldfrog on February 28, 2007, 03:08:58 am
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http://achewood.com/index.php?date=02282007 (http://achewood.com/index.php?date=02282007)
I understand Roast Beef actually wrote this out himself in Visio and submitted it to Onstad for posting. Phillipe's was drawn on a 3X5 card in crayon.
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Very very nice.
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This is the 2nd online comic that I've read in the past 3 minutes to mention Judge Judy. Coincidence? I certainly hope so.
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Do you think he'll really offer us one of those with our names in it? I'd actually consider getting one of those, it looks as if it would make a good wall-hang. Then again, do I really need to be reminded about that damn gross oil in the peanut butter every day I'm depressed?
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Can I can this strip?
The wiring in my apartment is rude and my lightbulbs have a lifetime of maybe a week. Eventually we end up carrying lightbulbs to different rooms while we wait for building maintenance.
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I have a theory on the proliferation of Judge Judy lately, actually, because now that you've mentioned it, she HAS been kinda heavy in the zeitgeist lately...
I think that when it hit the news that the judge in the Anna Nicole case was bein' all nutty because he's been gunning for a teevee judge show for years, everyone's point of comparison to his potential show was Judge Judy.
And so she's floatin' around in the collective subconscious in relation to Crazy Accent Judge.
That's my theory, anyway.
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The idea that you can order this with your own or someone else's name in Beef's place is vastly depressing. Like, more depressing than the strip itself, which is an achievement.
Can I get Philippe's instead?
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I made icons.
(http://img340.imageshack.us/img340/1038/depressedvc7.gif) (http://img340.imageshack.us/img340/9704/yeshivc0.gif)
If I had that font it would probably be quicker to make them from scratch. But I don't.
I'd better go eat some peanut butter.
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Why is reading the internet easier than reading books for depressed people? It's clearly true, but why?
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Oh god the non-linear storytelling Scott McCloud orgasms.
This is splendid good. Somehow he's placed everything just right so the eye stops, or trails off, at the perfect spots for maximum frustration and despair.
Sometimes Onstad's work reminds me of Chris Ware, but a Chris Ware I prefer to the real Chris Ware. Insular, claustrophobic and given to nonlinear panels and old-school fontage (the Onstadian black-box "Soon." or "Later." is a straight Ware rip, I think), yet with a somewhat less rawly documentary focus on dysfunction. I think my issue with Ware is that he seems to actively avoid engaging with, or giving a damn about his own characters (though this is based solely on Jimmy Corrigan, so maybe I can be corrected). To me, making that artistic choice is like choosing to write a novel without dialogue. It's legitimate, but why?
Anyway, today's comic is like Ware, but with a sense of recognition and a Judge Judy joke.
Now, somebody else drop the name of a well-known comics creator with a degree of crossover success. Do it for no reason.
Art Spiegelman! No, you, I said you.
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See, I was gonna say that it was reminiscent of some of Groening's early "Life is Hell" work but... I didn't have any concrete examples to refer to and, hence, I was gonna lay quiet on the subject.
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I'll back you up on that. In fact, I think the working title for "Life in Hell" was "A Series of Depressing Yet Humorous Flowcharts."
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That was my first thought upon reading the strip. As far as examples go, the two specific ones that come to mind at present are the one in Love is Hell following the different paths a relationship can take and the one plotting the evolution of music from primordial lava noises to vulgar sea shanties to hip-hop and so forth. If I had any of the books with me I would go look these up, but sadly they are all 2,000 miles away at my parents' house.
Does Philippe's flowchart actually lighten the mood of the strip, or is it really just there to make Beef's chart more depressing by comparison? I'm tempted to order one of the personalized charts for myself, but I really just don't feel like it right now.
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Why is reading the internet easier than reading books for depressed people? It's clearly true, but why?
Maybe the light from the screen acts like an anti-depression lamp (http://achewood.com/index.php?date=11202006).
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This comic was rather manic-depressive.
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This is me. This is me to a terrifyingly accurate degree. Down to the fuck*ng peanut butter and coding.
Are you depressed? Yes / yes.
Onstad definitely knows someone who is a depressed computer programmer. It might have been him before he got into doing online comics. This is so frighteningly accurate.
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If I had that font it would probably be quicker to make them from scratch. But I don't.
I don't recall anyone ever trying to suss out the font that Onstad uses. Doesn't seem like it would be that hard.
It's not perfect, but I think bolded Arabic Transparent is a good substitute for the titles (like the ROAST BEEF DECISION MAKING FLOWCHART header).
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Are the questions Beef talking to himself or are they Molly gently prodding him toward non-total-dysfunction, or has their relationship gotten to the point where that isn't really a meaningful distinction?
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*standing ovation*
I'm so ordering one of these. Philippe's flowchart could make it more depressing or make it happier, depending on one's prevailing mood at the time, and/or depending on if you're a glass-half-full or glass-half-empty person. I've read thist strip several times and had a different reaction to Philippe's flowchart every time. I think it's a good reminder that sometimes you have to step back and just look at things simply, not get bogged down in the details, and say "Yes!" to life. There is something very Zen about Philippe's approach sometimes, which is a great contrast to Beef's issues. Sometimes I want to say, "Look, Beef! There is your salvation, right there, that little retarded otter!" But then I think that would just make Beef want to kill himself.
Yeah... this is going up on my desk at work.
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So. I do a thing in real life where sometimes I am jokingly mean to people?
Last night my friend Jessica dreamt that I was the TA in her Spanish class, and that at the end of her big mid-term presentation I asked "Are you Retarded? Seriously?"
And then she started crying and ran out of the room, etc. I think her chart is a little beyond "hi! yes!" though.
Also: I love this strip a lot.
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Are the questions Beef talking to himself or are they Molly gently prodding him toward non-total-dysfunction, or has their relationship gotten to the point where that isn't really a meaningful distinction?
It's a representation of Beef's internal thought processes.
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Are the questions Beef talking to himself or are they Molly gently prodding him toward non-total-dysfunction, or has their relationship gotten to the point where that isn't really a meaningful distinction?
I need a Molly. :-/
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There are times when my girlfriend is pretty much exactly my Molly, all calmly guiding me through my madness to points where I am not-completely-despairing and I can at least try and open the blinds.
But unlike Molly and Beef, it cuts both ways.
For all the ways she helps me through my crippling anxiousness, I'm able to temper her... manic-depressive tendency to wanna quit jobs when one thing goes wrong, explain to her that her mother's bourgeious Long Island values aren't what she should be judged by, hold her back from beating the shit out of ladies who are mean to their kids in stores, that sort of thing.
Combine that with my younger brother's Sherlock Holmesian obsessive-compulsive hermitude and you've got one hell of an interesting apartment.
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One of my friends worries that her relationship is like that... she thinks that her boyfriend is like Molly, constantly being tasked to calm her down. I told her I didn't really see them that way, but insecurities are a hard thing to shake.