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Distilled Cringe
i was on the internet, as i am want to do, and i saw the video where marty zuckerblaag announced that the popular website and social media platform ‘Facebook’ (i’ve never heard of it either) was changing it’s name to ‘meta’. then he proceeded to show off what his vision for virtual reality was going to look like, where he envisioned himself as a giant dork, wearing the clothes he was already wearing. it was the worse thing i’ve ever seen on the internet, and made that 2 girls 1 cup video looks like kittens playing with yarn. i cringed SO hard, i threw my back out, my head spun around like the exorcist, and pea soup went everywhere. which is quite a thing, cause i haven’t eaten pea soup in years. soup makes me angry. fun fact. unrelated.
so, i’ve decided the future is cancelled. it used to fill me full of hope and wonder, or at least if it was dystopian, it would have had super cool hover bikes or whatever, but now it just looks lame. I’ve already deleted the rest of the script and pages for Black and Blue, and from now on, the comic will be a complete rip off of ‘a bee story’. my dream now is to get sued by seinfeld, and i have a feeling, even if you admitted that was your intention, he seems like the kind of guy who’d do it. i digress….
anyways, i’ll keep making the comic. i guess. but i used to think if i worked my whole like, got to 90, by that time, VR would be super cool, and i could while away my remaining years hooked up to a vodka IV drip playing simulations of whatever. and no one would care, cause i earned it. ‘hey, isn’t that that guy would made an average amount of money, and then finished a massively unpopular web comic, only to drop off to enjoy his last few years fused by filth to a recliner hooked up to a VR machine?’ is what they would say to no one. but not now. now that the tech weasel who ruined catching up with old friends decided to wade into my sci fi dream. guess i’ll just have to live in the real world now, with all you jackasses….
Speaking of all you wonderful people, super shoutout to my new patreons! you know who you is. and all the people who are just quietly reading, not bugging no one, howdy to you to. no one has to pay me nuffin. it’s nice if you can and want to, but no one has to, obviously. share it with friends if you’ve got any of those things, or just enjoy.
anyone check out the new Dune yet? super good. i grew up with the lynch version, and that was just fine, but when something else comes along, and shows you what you were missing, you look at it in a totally different way. then again, i think we got a taste of that from jodorowsky’s dune. if you haven’t watched that, check it out. it’ll blow your mind. south american director almost got a shot to make dune before lynch. it was the movie we never got, but desperately needed. ah well. reminds me of that concept of neail gaiman’s, where in the after life, there is a library of all the books that were never written. i hope that concept works for tv and movies. i’d really like to see my comic adapted to different formats. black and blue, the kabuki theater experience!
ok, that’s it. that’s all i’ve got to say for now. it took me like 30 seconds to dictate this nonsense to my secretary, and i’m not reading it back to review it. ok mirna, read that back to me…..
and if you’ve gotten to the end of this screed, scroll back up, and enjoy the gore and viscera.
Well, that was shocking, Angel who had not much of a head now has only a bloody stump.
Here I sit, shocked! yes I do, indeedy do dah.
I love this comic, it continually amuses, delights and absolutely surprises me.
thanks! keeping it fresh, and keeping you guys on your toes is reward enough if it works!
Well damn, if you’re going nihilistic in tone, I’m going poetic.
Why do you weep? Is this the only future for VR? Surely you knew there would be growing pains. Did you not gaze upon Lawnmower Man? Did you truly believe we would get to VR in the real world without some ugliness along the way? Best we get it out of the way now.
Your future isn’t lost! No, I say, you shall one day feel the very bark scraping your knuckles as you punch trees for wood in glorious, GLORIOUS 4800p! You shall perceive the absolute waste of your remaining years in higher definition than your bullshit eyes could have ever produced, with impossibly crisp lines on every Creeper you hear at the last second as you turn just in time to die once more.
Lo, cast out your doubts. Zuck’s mouth is a city of lies and filth. Do not believe his meta, or in his Meta. Your crusty, horrible, vodka-fueled future is not the impossibility you have foolishly allowed yourself to believe it is.
i WANT to believe! haha. who knows. maybe. the lawnmower man comparison makes it seem even lamer now.
BTW, and only 8 days shy of a year later, I’m re-reading the whole comic and I just noticed you referencing Neil Gaiman’s Sandman in your blg post. I was randomly thinking about that exact part of the story earlier today. I want to say it was in book 3.
Anyhow, Morpheus’ librarian mentions his library has all the stories that were thought of but never written, “… including that one you thought of with the really cool car chase scene.” This was linked to the idea that Destiny was in charge of what was while Dream (Morpheus) was in charge of what wasn’t.
holy crap on a cracker….. my site just disappeared. for like an hour, no black and blue. i had myself a little panicky moment, and the whole story went from destiny’s hands, to dreams hands. then snatched back luckily. phew. ok, this is me venting, your comment was the one i chose to hyperventilate towards. yay! you won! haha
Dead! Live! Really, really dead! Yee haw! Angel is now with the … uh … gutter rats.
Reach out, reach out and touch someone! Reach out, reach out and .. just say … die!
Ma Bell ain’t reading this, so I feel safe. So very safe. Also, I know that I won’t spend my twilight years in a recliner hooked up to VR. Not me, I’m going to be living in a wet cardboard box, dying of exposure. Why wait for a future dystopia when you can have it right now? Rome wasn’t built in a day, but it sure burned overnight! Light a match for the future!
you can still die in a cardboard box, hooked up to VR. multi task!
I want to comment and play, but I got the Covid and it is eating my brain. Still loving the comic though.
what? no way… omg, are you ok?
Interpretation algorithm (not to be confused with the Al Gore Rythm, a terrible Macarene technique, see viscera reference at the end of the commentary):”it was the worse thing …” Umm, capitalization skipped, indicating an informal, cyber-punk tone. Check. “Worse” rather than “worst” used, indicating you’ve seen two things on the Internet, meaning rejected in favour of the proposition that you meant to convey that it’s really bad, but could still be worse … somehow. Check.
Pea soup … quintuple cultural reference (Exorcist, Warhol, English fog, early Impressionism, lots of Burberry enhanced low budget horror films) and one dirty pun. Check.
More power to thee. It’ll be so meta when TikTok supersedes Facebook/Meta and the nice people in Beijing get access to our data in place of all the woke capitalists and their occasional Muscovite and Iranian Revolutionary clients on a case by case basis. Meta, I tell you.
Don’t take my future of lying in my filth cranked up on drugs and hooked up to VR away from me please.
I’ve worked and saved for years for this dream.
Also – the comic absolutely rocks. I sent a link to my wife and she’s been blasting through the archives. No idea why this hasn’t blown up.
Why do I get the feeling you’re gonna end up in a George RR Martin situation: working for 40 years on your art, and then wildly successful right about the time you’re ready to be strapped into your VR recliner / nursing home.
thanks for sharing it! hope she’s enjoying it too. i dunno, i kinda hoped for more of a reception, and i tried ads, but i only ever got a dedicated core group of readers. so, i can’t complain. but i wouldn’t even mind going the george rr martin route. it’s a daydream that keeps me going. ahh, to be appreciated in one’s own lifetime. maybe if it gets popular while i’m strapped in at the VR farm, someone will nudge me, and let me know.
Quite frankly, I thought the same thing about the cigarette. Lol
Seems a bit unsafe to keep it stuck to the gun. But, then again, this world has a very different definition of safe
Wait, when I zoomed in and looked really closely, I saw that the cigarette was notched into the sniper rifle. My bad.
nope. he planned ahead. figured he’d need a smoke in a sec, and his hands would be busy. i thought it was a really creepy thing to do, so, that’s that.
I like how the cigarette is out of his mouth and goes back in.