What? You don’t keep a sex ledger?

Welp, that’s the last one of those I’ll be doing for some time. Sketched Comedy will have one more new strip on the 27th before it goes on indefinite hiatus. On that same day, I’ll also be putting up the first few strips for my new webcomic, Vagabond Starlight, over on the new site. It’s tempting to post something both informative and reflective here, but that would leave me with precious little to post on Monday. So for now, I’ll just keep it short.

See you Monday! And then see you Monday with something totally new!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Apologies for any errors or implied team loyalties on Football Man there. Everything I know about football I’ve learned largely via half-glanced Madden box art. I think there are shoulder pads? And it somehow involves a ball. Regardless, one thing I do know is that there aren’t nearly enough puppies in it.

But then, what does have enough puppies, truth be told?

So the New Thing I’ve been blabbing about? Well, provided I can put the last pieces in place, I think it’s going live this month. My new webcomic is called Vagabond Starlight. It’s a thrilling sci-fi epic about normal people in space! And by thrilling, I mean “hopefully rather funny.” And by epic, I mean “it’ll have a coherent storyline, rather than random jokes.” And by space, I mean “space.” The story follows the crew of The Fool’s Errand as they do odd jobs in and around an asteroid belt. Stuff like Cowboy Bebop, Firefly, Red Dwarf, and Farscape serve as primary inspiration fodder. (With a little Babylon 5 on the side, if I dare to dream.)

It’s gonna be a lot different than Sketched Comedy. I still plan on telling jokes with it, of course, but they’ll be more character and plot driven. I’m also sharing writing duties with Shadlyn Wolfe, so (thankfully) I won’t be flying solo anymore. The layout and art are also a little bit different, too. But that’s a good thing. Because, woof, I am so ready to start leveling up my art again.

Right now I’m putting the finishing touches on the new website. (Well. Not right now, right now. Right now I’m writing this post. But I guess that was implicit… Anyway.) After that, it’s just a matter of building a comfortable buffer and going live. Scary. Exciting! Hope to have something soon. Until then!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I stand defiant in the face of the doctrine that states “there is no such thing as a stupid question.”

Or… perhaps this is a celebration of it.

It would appear I have lost all perspective. Apologies. Flee this place while you can, lest the madness draw you all into ruin.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I can’t possibly be the first person on the scene with this one. This movie must already exist, right? And if it doesn’t, I’d like to think my work here poses one simple question: why not?

I’d like to think I have more jokes to tell with a pair of undercover cops disguised as nuns that speak only in Bible verse, because that’s just the sort of premise I was born for, but I fear my wings are clipped by my, shall we say, rather rampant atheism. As much as I enjoy digging through online versions of the Bible to half-assedly wedge scripture into an admittedly paper-thin premise, my general unfamiliarity with the Word o’ God makes such a task tedious. Also? I might screw up and find something I like in there, which would mean I’d have to turn in my Atheist Self-Righteous Hate Card. And then where would I be?

Besides, what does God need with a comic strip?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Now I know what you’re thinking. “Aren’t there supposed to be jokes on this website? It does have the word ‘comedy’ right there in the URL.” That’s a fair criticism. I have prepared a statement. Ahem.

Hey, look over there at that other thing!

Sorry about kinda phoning it in today. I don’t know if you noticed but last week was a little nuts. The craziness in Boston was So Crazy that when a town in Texas exploded, it barely registered as news. So y’know, I’ve been a little distracted. When I wasn’t distracted by news, I was making all sorts of great progress on Mystery Project X. And then, on top of all that, I briefly got sick. Awesome. Thus, you good folks get a small-y this week. Apologies.

And if it looks like I’m just making excuses for a poor performance up there, let me reassure you that I totally am. Oops. For what it’s worth, I posted some stuff on my Twitter feed about Dat New Thing I’m Working On. Maybe you’ll like?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Sometimes, you just wanna feel useful.

You’d think if I had all week to come up with this thing that I wouldn’t have so much trouble pulling a few words out of my head. You would be mistaken! I am finding myself strangely bereft of verbiage. But, more pressingly, I’ve also been focusing on That New Thing I’m Writing. It’s coming along okay, I think. My parter is helping keep me on track. I’ve got a schedule and everything, no foolin’! Sketched Comedy was (and, truthfully, remains) a rather slapdash sort of production. I wanna get this New Thing right. Unfortunately, that means I don’t have anything to show off.

Well, I do, but you can’t look. ‘Cause it’s not done yet. ‘Cause this is hard. And hard stuff is difficult.

…Okay, I suppose it’d be shitty to just leave it at that. And, much as I enjoy being shitty, I’d rather share. The way we’ve got the schedule broken out now, I think I can start running the new strip next month. I’ve got a cast I like, a handful of storylines that are slowly congealing, and some first stabs at art. But there’s still a shitload more art to do. The scripts need a second draft in some cases and a first draft in others. So. Y’know. Stuff is happenin’, I swear.

Oh, and I hope you folks enjoy people being silly on spaceships, because that’s where this shitshow is headed. I mean, it had to be that, really. As I have demonstrated here today, I clearly can’t be trusted with superheroes.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Don’t mind me, just breaking down my breakdowns.

Cars and I don’t entirely get along. I respect cars. I admire them from a distance. I’ve spent a considerable amount of time utilizing their services as Point-A-to-B People Conveyors.  But I don’t… get cars. I can start one, fill it with gas, and (usually) keep it between the lines someone so generously painted upon yonder blacktop, but there ends my expertise. Look, I had to call a tow truck the first time I needed a tire changed, alright?

As such, I’ve always hated that feeling of handing my won’t-goable automobile over to a self-purported expert in the field of automotive make-it-go-ness. I feel like a kid who put something into the microwave, and now there’s all this smoke and fluids and oh god I need a grown up, like, right now. All my helpless ass can do is point and cry. So my car goes in, they’ll break down what’s wrong, I’ll nod my head like I have any idea what they’re talking about, and at some point I get to take my car home with a wallet that’s 700 dollars lighter than it was this morning. If he told me that the polarity needs reversing on the neutron flow, I would believe him. I have to. And man, that sucks.

Some have told me that educating myself could alleviate some of this stress. Such a course of action sounds foolish. (Or, at the very least, would require, y’know, work and stuff.) I much prefer the idea that I simply need to find some old people who are supremely unfamiliar with their computers. For if mechanics can exploit me, then I merely exploit someone else. It’s the Circle of Life, really.

That, or I’m shortsightedly lashing out again. Hmmmm…

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Thought I’d write something cheery and lighthearted, today being a holiday and all.

I will have to keep this brief, as I’m afraid I’ve injured my arm somehow. Possibly the new exercise regimen? Maybe all the pre-production art I did this week for Mystery Project X? Perhaps all that time with Bioshock Infinite? Or maybe it’s just that robot bear I got into a fist fight with over which Golden Girl was the most goldenly girlish. (Betty White, of course.)

Whatever the case: ow, my arm hurts, so I’mma stop typin’ now, a’right?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I love robots. But sometimes I get the distinct impression that robots don’t love us.

As you can see, I’m still (more or less) working on the Old Thing while the New Thing continues to take shape. Uh, I’d like to say that I’ll have the New Thing started in April, since having it for March clearly ain’t happening. Saying that, however, would constitute a commitment. And we can’t have that. So instead, I’ll just say the following.

Work is happening on the new comic. Work has… hit some road blocks that I’m trying to drill though. I know what I wanna do, but I’m still trying to figure out how to get there. Two years of Sketched Comedy has taught me a hell of a lot, but holy shit is there still more to learn. I’m really eager to put this story in front of people, though. Gotta push though, make this thing happen.

So. More when I have more, I guess?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

For my money, David is Michelangelo’s most impressive and most enduring work. It cannot be denied that he is one of — if not the — the greatest artist of all time, for one very simple reason: he got the entire world to marvel at a gigantic stone dong for over five centuries. Bravissmo, sir.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Will Wright’s enduring classic gave me an appreciation for the joy of creation that no game about shooting aliens ever came close to achieving. But that didn’t stop me from burning all those motherfucker’s houses to ground with the giant monster disaster. Let’s not get crazy, here.

I played a lot of the SNES version of SimCity. A looooooot. At the time, I hadn’t really stopped to question why the good people of 1970′s Detroid thought an 8-year-old could fix their crime problem. But, there I was, in charge of a major metropolitan nightmare, the yoke of greatness thrust upon me when I could still barely handle fractions. They had hoped I might deliver them from the gangs, riots, and rampant littering that plagued them. As my name was not Paul Atreides,  the best result I was able to muster wasn’t so much “utopian paradise” as it was “smoldering ruin.”

Ah, good times. Well. Not so much for them, I suppose.

I can’t speak with any true authority to the state of the latest SimCity offering. As of this writing, I haven’t had my hands on it. Impressions from Internet Land have certainly seemed, shall we say, dour. The “You Must Be Online At All Times” DRM is biting customers in the ass, as I feared and expected. Best of luck to any of you poor fuckers that bought the thing. Should you ever get into a game, I hear tell that there’s a fantastically mediocre experience awaiting you! And if you’re really lucky, it won’t screw up and lose your city when you stop for the night.

Now that I’m done shitting all over a game I haven’t played, we can move on to new business. There is no new business. Because I’m here, stalling, instead of working on Mystery Project X. Um. Shit. Uh, see you next Monday!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Put down the pencil. Please. I can’t have the police thinking I’m mopping up blood with these things.

Hoh-kay, so I kinda phoned it in on this one. And I’m afraid the news only gets worse. Going forward, I will only be updating Sketched Comedy on Mondays. Last week was sort of an experiment. I used the time normally devoted to the Thursday strip to instead work on Mystery Project X. Here’s the good news. That actually worked out really well for me. By redirecting that creative energy I normally channel into Sketched Comedy, I was able to get a shitload of work done on Mystery Project X. Work that just wasn’t getting done otherwise.

Alas, this means you won’t be seeing as much stuff out of me in the coming days, as Mystery Project X doesn’t have anything for me to post. But it does mean that — with any luck — I’ll have something even better for you down the road a bit.  Or, if not strictly better, something different. I’ll have something, in any event. Can’t wait to show it to you folks.

Just as soon as I’ve, uh… Made it.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

S’weird. I woke up yesterday morning and suddenly had the urge to stop spending money, complain about today’s media, and point out to people exactly how doomed the world is. I was also super regretful of everything I’ve ever done in my life, but that part has happened every morning since junior high.

So, yeah. I’m thirty, which also happens to mean that the strip is two. That’s kinda neat. I’ve been staring at this blank prompt for entirely too long now, trying to think of something profound to write. I’ve since abandoned that and tried, instead, to deliver something funny. Sadly, it looks like that line is going nowhere as well. Check back with me at the end of this post, maybe I’ll have something then. In the meantime, I guess I’ll use this space for announcements or whatever.

As I mentioned a couple strips back, I kinda wanna work on something else. Something Else hasn’t been developing as much as I’d like. Which is to say, at all. Thus, I’m going to take some time away from Sketched Comedy to try and focus my creative energies towards this Mystery Project X. I won’t be posting a comic this Thursday. Service will resume on Monday.It feels weird to skip a day after two years of steady, unbroken strips, but… Clearly I can’t focus on two things at once. And if there’s one thing I’ve learned about life, it’s that you will never find time. You have to make it.

Anywho, since this is a comedy website (no really, I swear it is, the name even says so), I won’t overshare a bunch of personal crap on why my dumb webcomic won’t show up again until Monday. Instead, I simply offer an apology and the hopeful promise that Mystery Project X will bear fruit.

Mmmmm… Bear fruit. I’mma go make dinner. ‘Till next week, folks!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Sometimes, you’ve just got to nuke the site from orbit. Only way to be sure.

While I’m not the sort of person to use one of those little paper sheets you find in restrooms, I can appreciate someone not wanting to rub their ass cheeks all over public porcelain. At the same time, those partaking in paper protection need to Do the Right Thing and clean up after their nasty asses. I don’t care how proud you are of your pungent underwarmth, nobody wants you to share.

Sharing a toilet is already traumatic enough. Allow me at least the illusion that someone didn’t just make intimate contact with the thing using the most horrible part of their body, right before I put my own precious organs into close proximity with it. Please, allow me this beautiful dream, that I might shit in peace and trouble you no more. You gross, gross, gross motherfucker.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

First he came for Star Trek, and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a Trekkie. Then he came for Star Wars, and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a fanboy. Then he came for Half-Life, and there was no one left to speak for me. But that’s probably just because Gordon Freeman is a silent protagonist.

Okay, okay, so Famous Television Guy J. J. Abrams getting his grubby mitts on, basically, everything isn’t exactly on the same scale as the Nazi party’s rise to power. And, quite honestly, I don’t seriously think much will come of him and Valve’s Gabe Newell saying “we wanna do stuff together.” Hell, I’ll be a bit surprised if he really does end up at the helm of Star Wars. Still. Doesn’t mean I hafta like that we’re talking about it.

Not that I have anything against the man personally. I mean, I don’t like Lost, and the new ’09 Trek film was entertaining enough, but nothing for the history books. My real beef? Well, think about it. The idea of a single dude being behind two of the biggest works of popular science fiction the world has known? And that he might further get his mitts on the works of Valve, one of gaming’s most influential development houses? That the dude behind fucking Lost could position himself as some sort of nerd Omnissiah, holding the reigns of popular culture, uncontested and uninspired, guiding what nerds are and shall be?

I think Kanye said it best: no one man should have all that powah.

…And anyway, what the hell does “J. J.” stand for? Huh? What’s he hiding?!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

What kinda right-minded woman wouldn’t appreciate a hearty meal?

I fear I don’t particularly have anything of grand insight to say when it comes to Valentine’s Day. I think it’s stupid, of course. If you have someone in your life, you really should be just doing nice things for them as part of your regular relationship. You don’t need a special day to say “I love you” in whatever material manner you see fit.  Just fuckin’… do it. And, conversely, if you don’t have someone in your life, the prospect of having a day of the year solely devoted to grinding home the loneliness and despair of your empty, meaningless existence is, to put it mildly, completely fucking shitty.

I do, however, have some insight into my writing. As I finished drawing this strip, I realized that I seem to have a pattern for telling jokes that simultaneously fail the Bechdel Test and involve cannibalism. That’s… That’s weird, right? I mean, I feel like that’s the sort of thing that oughta be, y’know, a warning sign or something. Like when you’re sitting alone in front of a darkened TV with the lights off, and you suddenly notice that the previously full whisky bottle you’d been sipping has mysteriously emptied and your legs now only respond to commands from the brain with a firm “oi, get fucked.” Y’know, one of those sorts of inflection points in Life where you just go “awwwww man, I’m completely screwed up, aren’t I?”

Although… I’m not sure if that pattern is more or less concerning than the Love Boat, Pat Benatar, and Bonnie Tyler references I seem to have surrounded this comic with.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

And thus concludes our guest strip interlude. I hope you enjoyed them. I know I did. Because I used the opportunity to screw around for a few days.

While I’m certainly not at the end of any my many ropes just yet, there is a grain of truth here. I’m finding myself less and less happy with the work I’ve accomplished with Sketched Comedy, and have been contemplating another project. Don’t get me wrong, the site isn’t going away any time soon. Indeed, Thursday’s strip sits partially finished in another window as I write this. But I feel I owe it to you, my small but ardent readership, to mention that I’m contemplating shelving Sketched Comedy to some degree. More on this story as it develops.

Sorry to get all Real Talk on ya. Had to talk about it somewhere, somethime, though. And anyway, it was either this, or four paragraphs of me railing about how voluminous my hair is in reality. Dude. Seriously. My hair doesn’t stop at my chin. I’m like the unholy fusion of Alan Moore and a troll doll.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

For the 200th strip, I thought I’d do something special: nothing at all!

Today’s guest comic comes courtesy of my good pal Dan Stefanidis, who is largely responsible for that webcomic known as Manifest Destiny. He was kind enough to offer up a pair of guest strips for my birthday, that I might have a week off from Sketched Comedy. Apparently he fears my impending burnout. It’s like he had some reason to worry that I might be losing my mind or something.

Jokes on him. Can’t lose something you never had to begin with! Hah!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

If there’s only one thing I’ve learned from Hollywood, it’s that you should never leave alone what can be overhauled and convoluted.

I suppose this strip comes from the same place this one comes from. I’m not sure where or what exactly that place is, mind you. Somewhere dark and terrible and really hard to describe, I suspect. Wherever it is, there are jokes there, and someone keeps letting them out. They should really stop doing that.

Someone’s going to lose an eye at some point if this keeps happening, I swear.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

We all have to start somewhere. Some of us at far more humble a place than others.

It’s weird to think that the brains rattling around in our skulls today are essentially unchanged from the dollops of grey matter bequeathed by Fate to our smelly, unshaven ancestors all those thousands and thousands of years ago. The person what thunked up “rock + other rock = fire” is basically the same as the person who figured out that Twitter would be a swell idea. That’s crazy, and amazing, and just seems totally fantastically unbelievable.

Right up until you see what people tend to write on Twitter, at which point it becomes all too frighteningly easy to comprehend.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Yup, that’s me, puttin’ dat “slash” in “hack and slash.”

So I recently completed a run through the awfully named DmC Devil May Cry, and really enjoyed my time with it. Indeed, I almost immediately dove into the first unlockable difficulty level. I’d be playing it right now if this lousy webcomic didn’t draw itself. ‘Tis a fine addition to a fine legacy.

Mind you, it’s not without issues. There are some story bits I don’t care for, and some character stuff that made me really uncomfortable, but the gameplay is rock fucking solid. On a scale of 1 to 7 frogs, I’d give it a solid fuchsia.  Good work, Ninja Theory! I take back (most of) what I said when you unveiled this potential train wreck.

Man, 2013 is only one month in and already shaping up to be weird. I came into this year hating the DMC reboot and chomping at the bit for the SimCity reboot. Turns out DMC is a blast, while EA is doing everything in its power to ruin SimCity. Anytime you wanna start making sense, Life, you just let me know, ‘kay? I really wouldn’t mind.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I often wonder if people with hydrophobia get stressed out knowing that their bodies are something like 70% water. I know I’d lose my shit if my body was 70% spiders.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Dark Souls is pretty cool, you guys. But I can understand if you don’t have the cash, time, or patience to play it. Good news is you can get a pretty similar experience by just stabbing your hand with a fork. Pretty similar. You’ll swear less, of course.

In all fairness, the game really isn’t that hard. Sure, you have to approach it on its own terms. Dark Souls has no interest in playing fairly, and is (unfortunately) kinda shitty at explaining itself. But with that knowledge in one hand, and a decent guide in the other, it can be bested. Don’t get me wrong, I still wanted a fucking T-shirt when I managed it. And it’s not the sort of game I would recommend for everyone. But it’s really not as scary as the reputation.

Seriously. Put down the fork.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Living in Texas, I don’t get much snow. I certainly don’t get any Real Snow, as seen in other parts of the country. It’s this thin, icy, imitation of the genuine article. So I may have lost touch a bit with what snow looks or behaves like. Or smells like.

Still, imminent demise at the hands of a dinner-seeking ogre notwithstanding, I suppose having a gentle blanket of cheese all around the house could be fun. Cheese balls. Cheesemen. Cheese angels.

Think about it.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Just… just let me merge. Just, please, let me merge. I don’t… No, guy, come on. Come on. This isn’t some personal affront to you and everything you stand for. I don’t have an agenda that I’m looking to advance by slightly inconveniencing you in traffic. I just… I just want to merge.

Please? Please just let me merge into traffic all I want to do is go home oh my god I don’t even care if I’m in front of you just speed up or slow down or get out of the lane I don’t care which just please please let me merge so I don’t have to exit here please let me merrrrrrrge.

…God damn it, I hate you all.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Sure, it took them eight weeks to get the big guy to say “hooah,” but it was totally worth it.

While they certainly make for good movies and the odd video game, the idea of a living biological weapon is not without its flaws. Sure, it’d be cool to have the fully-autonomous, nigh-invulnerable, super-strong, terror-inducing killing machine, but what are you going to feed it? Where do you keep it? Who has to clean up after its (quite possibly acidic) poo? Every global megacorporation always sees the end results of the biological super-weapon and says “yup, sign me up!” They never look past the dead bodies and gibbering survivors to see the very real logistical nightmare that keeping Frankenstein around presents.

Look, be megalomanical all you want. Just, y’know, be reasonable about it. You could have bought a bomb with that money. Probably a lot of bombs. Bombs that don’t poop.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I kinda watched a lot of Star Trek as a kid. I hope you did, too, or this joke is fuuuuuuuucked.

I admit, I haven’t seen much of Gene’s original opus, Star Trek. I have the requisite number of films under my belt, to be sure, but the show itself has never held much appeal. It was just a little too 60′s for my tastes. I can appreciate what it was trying to do, and I understand why some will hold that it’s the best (or even the only good) Trek to be had, but I fear it is largely lost on my puny, video-game-addled brain.

The Next Generation, on the other hand, was a completely different story. The continuing adventures of Captain Jean-Luc Picard and his disgustingly wholesome crew cemented early what would become a life-long love affair with science fiction. Star Wars taught me that spaceships were cool, but it was Next Gen that explained why they were important. Sure, the show is so cheesy you could spread it on a Ritz, and looking at it in the rearview I can honestly say the bulk of it is obnoxiously hard to take seriously. It will forever occupy a place of honor in my heart, though.

Try as it might, however, it will never touch Deep Space Nine. I admit, as a kid that show really put me off at first. What do you mean we’re not on a ship? Who are all these non-Federation characters? And what the hell happened to the tone?! I was a really stupid kid. For my money, DS9 was where Trek finally got it right. Or as right as Trek is allowed to get, anyway. By letting us see the universe from a perspective outside Starfleet, it painted a much more interesting picture. Let’s face it, there’s only so much sanctimonious preaching one can take from the inhabitants of Paradise before you just wanna stand up, scream, and shank a fucker.

I love the Randian nightmare that is Ferengi society. I love watching a former terrorist try to lead her people out of the rubble of genocide. I love seeing Starfleet willing to do some serious dirt to uphold its ideals in spite of its ideals. I love characters that hate each other, unhappy situations with unhappy endings, and the tangible character growth that you get from a story with an arc. (A very loose arc, but it was there often enough.) It still falls short in some areas, sure. It’s still Trek. But Deep Space Nine is the best that franchise has to offer.

And then there’s Voyager. I tried. Dammit, I really did. And I suppose it’s a neat premise, but it was largely squandered on exploring the Borg. Apparently, the less we know about them, the more interesting they are as a villain. The characters are far and away the weakest, which is a crying fucking shame given they did stuff like putting a woman in command and casting the first officer as a Native American. There’s kernels of greatness in there. The Doctor is one of my all-time faves. But it also has friggin’ Seven of Nine. And Neelix. Fucking Neelix. Oh well. At least the theme song was really good.

Enterprise I skipped. Between Voyager and the largely god-awful Next Gen films, it was clear that Star Trek wasn’t for me.

Besides, I’d seen Babylon 5 by then. And lets be perfectly honest here. Once you’ve had real orange juice, you just can’t go back to Tang.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Fun trivia. Romantic Comedy was, at one time, a possible title for Sketched Comedy.

No, it wasn’t.

I… I don’t know why I tell these lies!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Happy New Year, all! Well, unless you’re Hebrew. Or Chinese. Look, just, have happiness regardless of the manner in which you track days, alright? I don’t care how you get there, just get there!

Part of me wants to think that this strip is 2012′s send off to any and all long-time readers of the site. The other part of me recognizes, however, that it’s kinda self-indulgent. I just really wanted to put a bunch of characters who never normally interact into a room together. There are, I suppose, some unfortunate omissions from this strip. And there are characters I love, but haven’t figured out what to write for ‘em. Still, this represents a reasonable cross section of favorite characters.

Matt notwithstanding. Sorry, Matt. Maybe next year, buddy.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Oh, god. Oh, god, you guys. You guuuuuuys. Being a cartoonist is so hard. You have to think up all these jokes… and then you have to draw them. Oh my god, guys, you don’t even know, you guys, you guuuuuuuuys.

Christmas kinda snuck up on me (which should give you a crystal-fucking-clear vision of how firm my grip is on the world around me), so I’m afraid all I have to offer today is this joke that hinges on you being familiar with the world’s oldest form of dummy text. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a fan of ol’ Lorem ipsum. Many a time have I visited the extremely useful lipsum.com. But I recognize that this isn’t exactly 24k comedy gold, here.

Or, hell, maybe it is. This is the Internet we’re talking about. The rules for what gets to be funny are different here.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Sometimes you sit down with grand designs, hopeful plans, and idealistic dreams to deliver your particular brand of comedy in its sharpest form. You’ve got this idea. It’s a cool idea, a fun idea, one that would reward long-time followers. You have your art in hand, and you’re ready to do something special with it.

And then a really, really stupid joke that’s just too perfect comes to you instead, and — fuck it — that’s the joke you go with.

Happy holidays, all!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I love cats.

They’re soft and warm, and they make this really pleasing noise when they’re happy. They certainly aren’t awful and pushy and bratty. They always reciprocate any love you show them, and are never moody or psychotic. They never break your shit, or tear up your furniture. They don’t bite or scratch or try to kill you by darting between your legs as you’re walking. They never excrete horrifying substances out both ends of their bodies whenever and wherever the mood strikes them.

I love cats.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Now I will be the first to admit that my composition isn’t the greatest. At times, it’s barely even passable. And as such, I will often construct a sort of comic strip puppet show, wherein the characters seemingly drift around in some sort of legless void. But have you ever stopped to really ask why comic strip characters are so often only seen from the waist up?

This is why.

Stop asking why.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Well, most women don’t, at any rate. A true gentlemen never presumes such.

I’ve seen a number of books and guides claiming to hold an array of proven techniques, guaranteed to teach you how to pick up women without fault or failure. I was shocked at how many of them wanted money in exchange for this information. It’s really quite a simple process, one I feel ought to be shared freely. You don’t need an elaborate training course for this. At most, you need a back brace.

Incidentally, much of this also applies to how you pick up men. The primary difference being that men typically do have at least one natural handle.

They’re not too keen on being lifted by it, however.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I have been sitting on this joke for longer than I care to admit. But some jokes can only be told in a certain place at a  certain time by a certain asshole with a certain disregard for good taste. I am certain of this.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I can see his logic. They do make a lovely couple. A couple of what, exactly, I am unsure. But a lovely one, nonetheless.

I can’t help but feel that, perhaps, the dragon has not thought this through. It seems rather a convoluted scheme to enact — albeit half-assedly — just to convince one little girl to go wander out into the woods. But hey, who am I to judge? I’m sure it makes perfectly good lizard sense, and I would hate for dragons to think that I’m some sort of racist.

In any event, it is here that we say goodbye to this particular dragon and that particular princess. For the time being, anyway. I’ve got some other jokes to tell, and as fun as it is to explore these two, it’s time to start telling those jokes.

At least, I’m pretty sure I have some other jokes to tell. Oh, shit. Do I? No, I do. I must! Right? Shit.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I’m with you, sister. Ick.

This big green guy was always intended to run for more than one strip, but I didn’t expect to kinda fall in love with the character. I find myself strangely fascinated with his “plight,” curious to see if he’ll catch a break. I suppose, as his creator, I do have some agency in that. But alas, I am naught but a conduit through which Humor must flow, and its whims shan’t be challenged. I fear his suffering shall only continue.

The princess, on the other hand, seems to be doing just fine, irrespective of her plight. Perhaps it is her age that grants her such an unflappable nature. Or perhaps it’s the lack of a central nervous system. One never knows with kids.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Generic rage: cheaper than regular rage!

People wiser and more practiced at this than I have said it is unwise to let one’s politics slip into your comic. To such people I offer a hearty “fuck you,” because if I can’t push my man-hating liberal agenda here, then what’s the point of having a website? I managed to keep my mouth shut when the whole “fake geek girl” thing blew up earlier this month (mostly because I didn’t think to move on it until it had mostly petered out). But last weekend there was the #1reasonwhy thing on Twitter, and watching the reaction to that just pushed me over an edge.

Nerds are shitty to all sorts of people, but for brevity’s sake, let’s just take the most recent and recurring group. Guys, at the end of the day, how you should stand on how women are treated by the geek community comes down to two very simple paths. Just ask yourself the following. Do you regularly treat women like shit?

If “yes,” then maybe you should stop acting like a subhuman and learn to treat other people like a fucking person. If “no,” then what the hell are you worried about? You’re not the problem; fucking chill out. Accept that women are allowed to point out how hostile the community can be to them, and drive on. I know, it seems unfair that They get to bitch and moan about stuff that We don’t. Yeah, you know what’s also unfair? The disproportionate amount of bullshit They deal with that We don’t.

I’m sorry that this post is such a bummer, it’s just… God dammit, Internet, I can’t believe “hey, maybe not be shitty” is a discussion we really have to have.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

It’s a cautionary tale, really.

This strip is kinda special, really. It’s the world premiere of Sketched Comedy (dot com)’s newest feature: fingers! Look! There, in panel three. Little stubby digits. Don’t get too used to them, however. I’m pretty sure I can only cast that spell once per year.

Now, a keen observer might be heard to ask “so where, exactly, did this little kid come from, anyway?” I would be remiss in my duties as a storyteller to not have an answer for such a question, even if it wasn’t made immediately clear in the material. The answer, friends, is thus.

Shaddap and don’t worry about it.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Hah hah, jokes on her. I just outed her as a practitioner of witchcraft on the Internet! Something she… is proud of. And talks about extensively. Sometimes even on her blog. That’ll… show her…

Well, shit. Knew I shoulda stuck to jokes about dry humping.

As I was finishing up this strip, I stopped for a moment to consider the potential implications (and repercussions) of basically saying that the love of my life is a mercurial bitch whose whims torment me with grand regularity and ferocity. But only for a moment. Because, dude, she’s mean. I don’t know where she developed this overly cruel sense of humor these past years. It certainly wasn’t from me. I’ve been teaching her to make fun of other people, so that just doesn’t hold water.

Must be all that awful TV I hear so much about.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

“Hitman,” it seems to me, would be a very lonely career.

I’m being a touch indulgent with today’s update, for which I almost feel I should apologize. Without pulling back the curtain too far, suffice it to say that this is a character I’ve had in my head for a bit. Maybe something will come of this? Maybe not. But hey, if I can’t explore things on my own website, where the hell can I?

Besides. Pink and white polka dot pajama top with tiger-stripe sweat pants. So, y’know. Comedy obligations fulfilled.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Look, I could try and explain this one. I could justify it and rationalize it and try and make some sort of sense out of it. But let’s be real. At the end of the day, you and I would be be much better off if I didn’t, right? This came from somewhere, deep and dark in those back corners of my brain. And me? I didn’t question it! I just let it flow through my hand and onto the screen.

See, my brain and I have an amicable arrangement. I don’t ask where it gets this stuff, and it keeps handing jokes through the little slot in the door. Nobody gets hurt, everyone gets what they want. Peaceful equilibrium is maintained.

Besides. Where else on the Internet are you gonna go to see a table in a bustier?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

What? They’re cavemen. They don’t so much have Maslow’s Pyramid of Needs as Maslow’s Flat Bit at the Bottom that Includes Food and Sex.

I’ve been playing Halo 4, and I suppose it’s somewhat to blame for this one. I got thinking about all those precursor species you see in sci-fi that have a bit of fun with humankind’s genetic makeup. Perhaps this is the cynicism of having just lived through another presidential election here in the United States, but when I look around this Great Land of Ours, I can’t help but think “if this is what some ancient race of all-powerful aliens was looking to create, then they’re either not nearly as smart as they think they are or they’re complete assholes.”

I mean, seriously. If I’m supposed to be imbued with the genetic legacy destined to unlock the universe’s secrets, why did I just write so awful a run-on sentence?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

You can’t prove it’s not art! You can’t!

Yeah, sorry, having kind of an off week. I haven’t been sleeping well, my mood’s been kinda in the pits, and I just haven’t liked any of the jokes I’ve been writing of late. Also, I’m pretty sure my humors are completely outta whack. Not enough sanguine, maybe…

Well, whatever it is, I’m sure it’s nothing that drinking the blood of freshly drained virgins won’t fix.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Hell hath no fury like a woman denied Internet access for a week or so.

While I’m reasonably sure the east coast hasn’t devolved into a dystopian wasteland where nice young couples are forced to club people to death for cans of vegetables, I’m given to understand that Hurricane Sandy did quite a number on New Jersey. Quite a number of numbers, even. Mother Nature got quadratic on that shit, yo. So to any and all of my readers out there, I hope you made it through okay. And to my friends on the shore, not a day goes by that I don’t miss seeing you on Steam or Twitter. Hope you folks get plugged back into The Grid soon so we can start swapping electrons like the good ol’ days.

So here’s to a speedy recovery! Because a world where I can’t make fun of New Jersey is a world I don’t want to be a part of.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

National Aeronautics and Space Administration? More like, National Assholes and… Something… Administration! Yeah! Burned you, baby, woo!

I’ve never held even the tiniest inkling of a speck of an iota of doubt that we made it to the moon in ’69. But if I were one of the Secret Masters, ruling the world from a shadow government, spreading disinformation in order to control the masses, you bet your ass I would fake a moon landing. And I would do it on the moon. Think about it. Anyone who ever discovered the truth would never be able to tell another living soul without sounding like a complete asshole.

Basically, what I’m saying is that if you’re gonna troll the world, troll hard.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Eh, whatever. They were probably just gonna spend all the cash on candy anyway.

Poor pirates. They really have no idea how any of this is supposed to work. Although, in their defense, trick or treating — even if it’s unwitting trick or treating — is still basically extortion. Oh well, I’m sure the captive lady will get them sorted eventually. Or go insane trying.

Whichever is funnier, really.

This is the last new strip I’ll be putting up before the month is out. Since Halloween decided, rather inconsiderately, to fall a full 24 hours before my next strip on Thursday, I’ll instead take this opportunity to say “Happy Halloween.” Happy Halloween! Or Samhain. Or All Saints. Or wut’eva’. Look, just go put a costume on an dance about like a crazy person, will ya? Wooo!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I’m pretty sure my cats are trying to kill me.

Not in any overt way, mind you. This is a “death by inches” thing. They know that if they just make small, sharp noises in the deepest, darkest hours of the night that they will slowly — almost imperceptibly — push my sanity to the breaking point. A crash here. A quiet scratching there. The stress will result in higher blood pressure, and with it an increased chance of heart failure. One day it’ll be one tipped over glass at 2:47 AM too many, and your’s truly will be victim of a meticulously crafted heart attack.

Now it’s true this will take considerable time. Years even. Some of them might not even survive to see the fruits of their diabolical labors. But these cruel beasts are playing the long game. They’re patient. Very, very patient…

…Oh who am I kidding. They’re cats. They get distracted by their own farts.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Mostly, he just wanted to see if she could do it. He was bi-curious.

Some comics just speak for themselves. This is not one of those comics, so I fear you’ll just have to fend for yourself.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I mean, really? You’re going to lose your shit and starting freaking out just because an 8-foot-tall, 4-foot-wide alien with a plasma rifle capable of annihilating a Buick in one shot shook off a rocket to the face and is now charging your position? That’s all it takes? You people sicken me.

So, XCOM: Enemy Unknown is pretty fucking great. I’ve played entirely too much of it since it dropped last week, which is why you’re getting one of the dreaded Video Game Comic Strips today. Then again, given the general brutality of X-Com, which the new XCOM fully (one might even say gleefully) embraces, I think this still counts for our vague horror theme of the month.

My short review? Undeniably true to the spirit of the original game. Extremely slick visual presentation. Mostly streamlined in good ways. Interface is superb, except when it’s dumb. Damn fine soundtrack. Some underwhelming story beats. Damn good strategy, as you’d expect from Firaxis. Buggy as hell, as you’d expect from Firaxis. Overall, just a hell of a game.

In fact, I’mma go play s’more right now. These poorly-funded, ill-trained, and staggeringly-outnumbered men and women aren’t going to put themselves into the ground. Indeed, I’m kinda hoping the bodies will stack up high enough that the smell will put the invaders off the whole invasion idea.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Aw, come on, she’s just pulling your leg.

So every year around this time I get seasonal allergies something fierce. Making me barely functional during my favorite holiday is probably the Universe’s way of punishing me for something. I dunno. I guess I did spit on all those nuns or whatever. Anyway, point is, in trying to write this one paragraph, I’ve gotten up three times to go blow my nose. I have nothing clever to write here because I have joined the living dead.

Turning into a zombie for the month of October may be appropriate, but it is a not insignificant barrier to getting any shit done. Consider. When was the last time you ever saw the shuffling, slavering hordes actually make anything? I mean, aside from an awful stink. Which I’m sure my unshaven, unkempt, undead ass is certainly producing. And so it is that this post becomes a mobius strip: coming from nowhere, going nowhere, and ending here only because I say it should.

Fuck. Plants.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

For me, the most terrifying part of this scene is that those two are wearing my high school colors. Chilling.

Normally, this would be the part where a funny rant (or “meandering diatribe,” if you want to get technical) goes. But, uh, so… XCOM: Enemy Unknown is out? Yeah. I’ll be honest. It’s a small miracle this comic even got produced. Um, but, well, hang, I’m sure something will come to me. There’s gotta be something punchy and clever that I can write about slasher films or teenagers screwing or machetes or something. Any minute now.

Boy, that… killer sure… didn’t see that one… “coming?” There. That’s innuendo. I’mma go play some more XCOM.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

It’s a gas.

I suspect the reason this happened is because my girlfriend has been watching a lot of Poirot. I have no particular affinity for Agatha Christie — indeed, I don’t really care for mysteries at all — but David Suchet’s take on the fussy little Belgian is an absolute delight. He rides the fine line between “eccentric” and “complete asshat” in way I haven’t seen since like the like of Jeremy Brett. Jeremy Brett, if you aren’t familiar, is Sherlock Holmes. This if fact. I will fight you over this. With, like, knives and shit.

Actually, come to think of it, I’d kinda like to see Poirot try and take Holmes. Oh sure, ol’ Sherlock has fencing, boxing, and heroin on his side, but don’t count our friend Hercule out. I’m pretty sure that mustache has killed before.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

The only thing I fear more than spiders, Martians, and half-spider Martians that ride atop full-spider giant spiders is the thought of missing a deadline.

Truthfully, I am grateful for this. If not for the ever-present dread that I will disappoint the four people who read this webcomic by failing to update on an Update Day, I sincerely doubt I’d get much of anything done. I mean, come on, there’s video games and TV shows out there, man. They need me to play and watch them. Need. And the only way to functionally counteract this lethargy is by living in a constant state of fear and self-loathing.

Ah, fear. The Great Motivator. Keep this artist honest, old friend!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

It’s October, fuckers, let’s draw some god damn monsters! Yeah!

That’s it. Nothing deep here. I just love Halloween. Oh sure, it doesn’t hurt that weird furry monsters are way, way easier to draw than hoo-mons. More fun, too. In fact, screw humans. This webcomic is about blobs, tentacles, and spongy-bouncy things now.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Is it October yet? No? Why not?

Now don’t get me wrong, at it’s core the whole Slenderman idea is pretty spooky.  I was right there with SomethingAwful. I dutifully watched Marble Hornets. Found it all quite creepy. Y’know, three years ago.

I’m trying, with no small amount of desperation, to not start hating just because this “Slender mythos” has gotten crazy popular. But, man, come on. This guy is in friggin’ Doctor Who now! The whole mess just reminds me what what went we through with Sadako. Yeah, remember when The Ring was still scary? Remember how it was followed by this period of “okay, all ghosts will look like this going forward?” Remember how crap that was? Can we please, please, please not do this again? Good horror is hard to find.

This is the part where I could get crazy cynical about how The Internet Ruins Everything, but I’d rather end this with an observation I observed while sketching this. Slenderman and Sadako are basically creeped out versions of Lurch and Cousin It. Which leads me to believe that I’ve stumbled upon some deeper Da Adams Code conspiracy, here.

I’ll have to look into this.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I’m old now, so I get to drop wisdom on the young. This is the form it will take.

God help them.

For what it’s worth, I offer prospective enjoyers of  sexual endeavors this much. After you get past the awkward, stumbling, was-that-a-happy-grunt-or-a-”Help-I-can’t-breathe”-grunt stage, sex more resembles a SWAT team. Everyone knows their positions, precision maneuvers are executed flawlessly, and all the latest tools are being used to devastating effect. Also, if you’re doing it correctly, the terrorists lose.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

In space, the monster that’s trying to eat you can hear you scream. And it finds it very off-putting. Please stop screaming so much.

As of this writing, I’m playing a looooot of FTL, so space is kinda on my mind. (As of this posting, I suspect that Borderlands 2 will have supplanted it, but hey, that’s the price we all pay for me having a buffer.) Were one to shell it like a nut, FTL could be called a “spaceship management roguelike.” Basically, you have this hapless little space ship that’s trying to not die. Everything else in existence is rather keen on making sure it does. Oh sure, you have guns and robots and stuff on your side. You get to shoot back at the universe, as it were.

You probably shouldn’t bother, though.

The game is devastatingly fun, if not exactly for everyone.  Part of the point is that you’re going to get killed a lot, and if that’s going to be off-putting, then chart a course for calmer skies. On the other hand, if the thought of locking a giant mantis in the gunnery room and remotely opening the airlock to vent all the O2 whilst simultaneously fixing your shield generator and desperately rerouting power to charge the lasers so that you can finally kill this alien cruiser and maybe, just maybe, make one more jump before the enemy fleet runs you down and reduces your desperate run-on sentences to a puffy little cloud of atoms… then FTL is probably a game you’ll dig.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

So why’d they even bother taking a captive? Look, all they know is that they’re supposed to have one. What they should do with one is something that hadn’t really come up before. Hell, they only lucked into this one because she was sitting in the other ship’s hold, pre-packaged and insisting.

Unfortunately for the romantically misaligned lass, all that awaited her on the terrible pirates’ ship was a fate worse than bawdy ravishment.

On the bright side, they can finally break out that sweet-ass mahjong set they looted.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

You win this day, water tower. This day…

Tryin’ some stuff with art in this one. Experimenting with hats. Testing the water with flannel.  Making an art teacher somewhere cry at what I’m passing off as forced perspective. Yeah, that’s right! I’m artin’! You can’t prove I ain’t!

…Mostly because you can’t really prove a negative, I admit, but whatever! Look, look! Silly pictures! Wooo-ooo!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Bound in human flesh and inked in human blood? I dunno, sure sounds like social media to me.

Twitter is about all the social media I have the stomach for. Short, simple, and easy to manage. Facebook, I am told, allows people to find you.  Alas, this is as at odds with the fact that I often do not wish to be found. Some relationships are not worth maintaining. Some people you stop talking to for a reason. Some people get way too clingy and try to feed your spirit to Thimxux, the Two-Mouthed Keeper of the Pain of the Innocents who lives at the edge of the Ever-Night.

That’s not the sort of thing you rekindle, ya feel me?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

And thus it goes when the creative process doesn’t.

You may occasionally find that the Thing in your head isn’t nearly so funny once you commit it to the physical realm. It’s tragic, really. The Thing is so perfect, so fully realized in a way that could never be sufficiently expressed out loud. Tragically, though, you wish to share it, and somewhere between the mind’s eye and the eye’s eye, the Thing withers and dies. So, in that sense, actually telling jokes kinda does us all a disservice.  If you really stop and think about it, you’ll realize that we should just walk around, not speak to one another, and randomly burst into uproarious fits of laughter.

Parties, I suppose, would be a lot more awkward.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

He has a point. Wouldn’t want to be exclusionary, after all.

I suppose this bit right here is where I defend my stance by explaining in better detail the thing I was so vehemently raging about in the comic above. The thrust works thus: women get to have their own spaces, and it’s not sexist because a number of other spaces are de facto men’s space. Simple, right? See, I knew we’d get along.

I’m glad we can all be friends on the Internet!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Let’s see you block this chop, y’old bastard.

I seem to be drawing a lot of old guys and martial artists and old guy martial artists lately. Weird. I’m sure it must mean something, but I daren’t fathom what. Partially because I fear the revelation would be so overpowering as to bring undue stress to already fragile ego, but mostly because it would be a lot of work. Screw that noise, I have video games to play and comic strip to avoid doing.

I don’t actually have much to say in this last paragraph. I just really enjoy the symmetry of these blog posts having three paragraphs in them. They look much nicer this way. Don’t you agree?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Poor Grandpa. He knows he’s supposed to be racist towards someone, he’s just not sure whom.

I suppose I should mention that the bulk of my grandpa information is second-hand, and is mostly comprised of what I’ve gleaned from the world’s most reliable source of information: television. See, I never really knew my grandpas. I am recently down my maternal one, and his paternal counterpart bounced from this mortal coil a number of years ago. So, full disclosure, I’m just sorta winging it when it comes to “this is how old guys roll.”

But then, really, as a socially-maladjusted misanthrope living in self-imposed hermitry, terrified of even the most basic interactions with others of my kind and generally having no sense of the goings-on of The World,  I guess that’s true of everything I write.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Some comics just speak for themselves. Kinda wish I’d done one of those kinds of comics, in retrospect.

Trying to poke at art stuff a little more, and refine my stuff a bit. I’d like to think I’ve managed to make a little progress in the last year and a half, but there’s still a ton left to learn.  So I experiment.

The lady in panel one, for example, finally has something approaching reasonable hair. Speaking of which, I’ve started adding little highlights to those. We’ll see if that works out. Also, I wanted to draw something non-human, so a lion found its way into two panels. And I’m still looking for that middle ground between “serviceable background” and “floating around in the Comic Void somewhere.” So, y’know. Art stuff is happen at place of here.

Hey, speaking of art stuff happening, my good friend Dan has started posting new strips over at Manifest Destiny again! Go read his stuff! Go, go, go! That dude has proper scribbles on his page, and he’s been known to make a joke or two. You’ll dig it, trust me.

Oh, one other thing. Lions float. Like, on air. So the perspective in panel three is totally not completely fucked. Check your science, man. Lions float.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Hey, man, vengeance is a luxury we just can’t afford in this economy.

Really, seeking revenge for a fallen trainer seems foolhardy regardless of your financial situation. Think about it. Some dude just rolled up and effortlessly wasted the guy that’s been explaining to you — at considerable length — how to not get killed by people. I’d say he’s rather spectacularly proven that his advice on the subject of combat is not to be considered.

Particularly when it comes to dealing with someone like Shun, the Demonic Man-Slayer With Very, Very Large Biceps.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Someone. Anyone. Please. Mess with Texas. The thermostat is way, way too high. Way too high.

Perhaps the most troubling thing about this farcical peek into my life is that I don’t actually own a shirt that particular shade of blue at the moment. The rest of it is basically true. My Dearest really doesn’t give a shit what excuses I’m making, I really should be working more, and it really is the sort of hot that makes you think “Earth is a habitable planet, my ass.” Still. Through suffering, art.

Or, at the very least, a reasonable facsimile there of.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Just give it a second. It’ll come to you. Or it won’t. Be you laughing uproariously or scratching your head in befuddlement, I’ve accomplished my job regardless.

I’ve seen Who fans occasionally use the phrase “my Doctor,” and if I were to make such a decision I suppose I would have to say that Tennant is definitely ”my” Doctor. But Tom Baker is the Doctor I wish was mine. His choice of headgear certainly doesn’t hurt, but I just love the insane energy he brings to the character. Hartnell was grumpy, Troughton a bit weasly, and Pertwee — while frighteningly charming — was hampered by being stuck on Earth most of the time. But Baker had that wonderful mad flare, that “let’s go out there and poke the universe with a stick” that I love about the Doctor.

It doesn’t hurt, either, that he ran with both Leela and K-9, easily the best companion-pairing the show has had. I shall not have this questioned.

Uh, and a brief side-note to stem the obvious outcry. I know the Doctor’s name isn’t “Doctor Who,” and thus, the joke is technically off a bit. My response is only that Doctor Who is, itself, a bit rubbish, and thus so should any jokes made at its expense.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

People can be so judgmental when you have chainsaws for arms.

It seems to me that it would be such a waste to destroy perfectly good robots just because they want to kill you. Admittedly, this sentiment may be born out of a misguided youth spent thinking Terminator 2 was the height of cinema. Still, what does it say about us as a species if we’re really willing to destroy some misguided automaton on the grounds that, if left unchecked, it will end all human life? Nothing good, I should think.

Apologies, by the way, to the fine folks over at Privateer Press for the title of today’s strip. Warmachine  – the spiffo keen table-top wargame — is actually quite a dandy little simulation of heavy metal mayhem, and I daren’t mean to imply that they should cease making it. Quite the opposite in fact, for their robots are fucking siiiiiick.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

When in doubt, tell a fart joke.

That’s my comedy advice for today, children. Let those seven words guide you though the path of Comedy. Let be your creed. Radiate the light of the fart joke outward from your heart, and let its blessings fill this dour world with joy and merriment. Do this, and always shall you have a joke to tell.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

See also “Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.” ‘Tis a fine sentence, that one. English gets kind of a bad wrap, what with it’s rather convoluted structure and bloated lexicon. And I suppose that’s not really an unfair, as the poor thing is a bit of a mess. Consider, though, that it lets one create beautiful absurdities like the above. How can you hate that?

It’s like that crazy guy out behind Wal-Mart. Sure, he throws rocks at passersby and holds council with his own feces, but when he starts to sing, angels weep.

Ultimately, though, this comic was just an excuse to finally combine my two favorite things: undercover house-cleaning services and crappy wood paneling.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Oh crap, I think they’re on to me.

Now what the hell am I supposed to do? Even my own characters aren’t willing to put up with my goofy bullshit. Don’t they know I don’t have any fresh material? I’m a hack, dammit, and I very clearly laid that out in their job descriptions before they signed on to this gig.

In fact, you know what? Any character not willing to work with the insufferably juvenile and stunningly lackluster sense of humor that forms the mainstay of Sketched Comedy’s content is no sort of character I want to associate with! You! Red-shirted guy with the weird hair point who I originally intended to be vaguely-Asian but totally went in some weird direction that I’ve never properly fleshed out! Play along or you’re fucking fired! 

…I gotta stop writing this crap at 2 in the morning.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I’m pretty sure that’s not how you’re supposed to peel a human.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

When someone asks you “when was the last time you ate,” and your only response is “um,” it’s time to reevaluate your situation. I like video games too, but you have to realize that most of them are trying to kill you. It’s in your best interest to get up from the couch every 12 hours or so and grab a bagel. Trust me.

Not that I’m one to talk, I suppose. I’m the person whose response to “huh, this chair is starting to hurt after sitting in it for 8 hours” is to go grab a pillow. Standing up? Doing something else? Crazy talk. Those are the words of an insane person, and I shan’t heed them.

I, however, have a web comic, and she does not. So she’s the one who gets made fun of. It’s a pretty sweet deal, really.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I don’t see what she’s so upset about. It seems nice enough. Like a tiny friend who floats over your wet, naked body and makes small talk. Who wouldn’t enjoy that?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Based on a true story.

So yeah, late the other night, I’m hammering away at some bullshit on my computer. Just as I get up to rest my weary bones, from my kitchen emanates an alarmingly sudden “droooooooid.” What the crap? Did my phone just update? So I go out there, take a look. Phone is restarting. Weird. So I let it do its thing.

“Drooooooid.”

The screen flickers a moment… and then returns to the start-up sequence again.

“Drooooooid.”

That happens another — if I’m remembering correctly — 4000 times as I fail to address the problem. Or diagnose the problem. Or even comprehend the problem on the most basic, chimp-like level. My phone was just locked in a cycle of stating it’s name, over and over, like foreign spies were trying to interrogate it. (In fairness, I was pretty desperate to get some personal information out of the thing, so perhaps this was not wholly unjustified.) After doing enough swearing to assure myself a place next to Judas in the 7th circle, I expunge the battery from its metal carapace with all the gentile nature of the Manson Family. Blissful silence. I go to bed.

In the morning, the battery is returned to its Place of Power, and I start up the device. Boots normally. Swell. But something is awry. None of my settings are in place. All my widgets are missing. Cold sweat sets in as I go to check my contact info for Everything and Everyone I Know in the World.

Apparently my phone stores all its contact data in something volatile. No power, no data.

Shit.

Lousy technology, don’t you know my brain is squishy and fallible? How am I supposed to remember a phone number? It’s, like, seven digits long! Seven!

The moral of the story, here, is not that one should backup one’s data. No. It’s that technology is a jerk, and the future can go fuck itself.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

If you can’t trust a smile like that, what can you trust?

Fairy tales are pretty cool, but I won’t even try to pretend like I’m one of those quirky creatives who’s waaaaay into those timeless tales of mutilation and fear. I mean, sure, I find stories about  people getting eaten alive, hacking off hunks their own feet, or dancing to death as funny as the next person, but they hold no particular reverence for me. Alas, those tales as I know them are all through the lens of Disney.

Which leaves me to pondering. I’m not which which is worse: regaling your child with Clive Barker-esque visions of torture and vengeance, or damning them to the inane, saccharine abyss of being a faithful cog in Disney’s child-moulding machine.

Sheesh. Good thing we have video games to side-step all that shit, huh?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

You know, I really think I’m starting to grow as an artist.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

If there’s one thing Discworld and Sandman have taught me, it’s that Death can be pretty damn jaunty from time to time.

Which reminds me. Hey. Brits. What’s the deal with you folks and death, anyway? Is there something you need to tell us?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Sheesh. Even as a reanimated corpse, that poor orc just can’t catch a break.

And so it is that my little sidetrip into the land of fantasy and whimsy draws to a close. Thanks for coming along with me on this insane ride. Perhaps you found a chuckle or two on our trip. Perhaps it drove you to put a gun barrel in your mouth in a desperate search for sweet oblivion.  As long as something irrevocable has happened to you, that’s all I’m looking for.

I’ll be getting back to the normal sort of crudely constructed humor next Thursday. After this series, I’m thinking I should do something suitably grandiose. Y’know, like a one-panel pun or something. Jesus Christ, what was I thinking when I embarked on this set? Five panels! Who does that!

…Although, I’ve already got an idea of a joke for ranger. And I wouldn’t need to make a new character design for a barbarian. Hrmm…

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Not so much a rogue as someone who’s “roguelike.”

Three down, one to go on my little hit list of PnP RPG PCs. This series will wrap up next Monday, after which I shall return you to your regularly scheduled poop jokes, violence, and lame wordplay.

The rogue class – or its equivalent – has always been the one I find myself most drawn to when indulging in any sort of RPG. I’m not sure why. Perhaps it’s because my first pen ‘n paper roleplaying game was Shadowrun, a cyberpunk/fantasy funhouse that features elves with assault rifles throwing fireballs at one another. Basically everyone is rogue in that game. Or perhaps is the sly cunning that is employed by the archtype. That idea of using one’s brainy bits to outfox traps, outmaneuver combatants, and outwit henchmen rather than going the typical fighter route of applying Heavy Thing A to Brain Pan B.

Or maybe I’m just a sociopath who enjoys sucker punching people with knives.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Remember, there’s no problem so big that it can’t be solved by 3d6+Int.

And so the roleplaying train keeps rolling. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never known any wizards that I could describe as “stable individuals.” Think about it. These fuckers parade around the killings fields of the lower hells in their bathrobes. Me? I wouldn’t mind a piece of metal or two between my fleshy visage and the freakish denizens of the hoary underworld that wish me harm. But them? They’re perfectly fine with the softer side of Sears being their first and only line of defense when the orcs come a’callin’.

Then again, I suppose being able to set things on fire with your smartness brings with it a degree of well-earned cockiness.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Ah, the lonely nights spent in the arms of an elven prostitute. Who hasn’t been there, really?

So hey, this is the first in a series o’ D n’ D themed strips. We’ll see where that takes us. I’ve actually been wanting to do this since ’round about the time Sketched Comedy was first coming together. I decided to sit on them, though, as I felt my capabilities as an artist were still germinating, and thus not up to the task of doing the jokes I had written justice. Now that the Photoshop stars have aligned themselves, I feel the Time is Right to spin my tales of depressing daring do in the dungeons what hold dragons. Enjoy!

…The Internet still thinks RPG jokes are, like, funny, right? Man, ’cause if not, this site is fuuuuuuucked.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Sometimes I tell jokes. Sometimes they make sense.

Try and stop me, fuckers.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

So a while back, Dante Shepherd over at Surviving the World had an open call for guest art. He was busy helping create a human being from scratch and needed a little breathing room. I think he’s a funny dude, and I wanted to help out, so I cobbled together what errant brain cells I could and slapped the above one-panneler out on my tablet. He said thanks, but he didn’t run it.

Which is fine, really, because now that means I can run it on my own site! Which means I could slack off a little bit and not have to sweat getting a strip done for today! Which is great, because holy hell did that Ogre thing sap away a bunch of time and energy, and leave my poor hands a cramped, repetitive-stress-disorder riddled mess. Pretty sure I lost a pinky back there somewhere… Eh, it’ll probably turn up.

This should be the last of me bitching about paying work for a bit, as that’s finally starting to draw to a close. I’ve got something special I wanna run, but just haven’t had the time to focus on. Here’s hoping I can get started on that soon. Until then, enjoy my goofy-ass unused fan art!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Her glasses disintegrated in the heat. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

All together too often I find myself sliding my scroll wheel down past the end of an article. “Maybe,” I think. “Maybe this time someone will have something insightful to say. Maybe they’ll have something interesting to add. Maybe they won’t devolve into puerile name calling and strained metaphors. Maybe.”

Be it optimism or insanity, we may never know. Thus, I present a nuclear option for keeping one from losing their mind on the Internet. Costly, perhaps, and more than a little dangerous, but consider the alternative. It’s either this or watching bieberfan97 call GreenMom a “jewnazi” on Reddit.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

They wouldn’t call it filler if it wasn’t at least somewhat filling, right?

Yeah, coasting a bit here, but in this case I figure that just means the joke works on multiple levels. It’s the lowest common demoninator, but with layers. That’s some zen shit, son. The reason for all this is that I’ve been really busy with work, helping Steve Jackson Games with their Kickstarter project for Ogre. It succeeded beyond anyone’s wildest expectations, which of course means the amount of work needed has exceeded all expectation. It’s been a bit draining. Ask me about Kickstarter some time after the smoke has settled a bit, and I’ll tell you all about the trails and tribulations.

Well. Actually, I’ll probably stab you in the eye. After that, though, I’ll be happy to tell you about Kickstarter.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I took the Woman of Willendorf in a direction other than pornography. I’m not sure if I’m proud or disappointed.

Work continues to be a thing, and it’s taking a hell of a lot longer than originally anticipated. Which is why you keep seeing blocks of text under my comics that read less like “ho, ho, clever jokes” and more like “durr hurr quaagg.” This one, I fear, is going to be no exception. So instead of trying to provide actual content here, like I usually prefer, I’ll use the opportunity to thank my readership.

I’ve seen some votes on Top Webcomics for Sketched Comedy that I know I am not responsible for. Which means they must all your fault. Thanks! Appreciate the support. I’m still seeing more traffic from StumbleUpon at the moment, but some people here and there seem to have found their way to the site via TWC. So thanks for that. In fact, thanks to any and all of you who have mentioned Sketched Comedy to your friends, loved ones, enemies, and animal spirit guides in whatever capacity. The traffic I see for this silly little website is pretty humble, but I really do appreciate the readership you’ve managed to help me build.

Of course, if any of my fans wanted to break onto the set of Good Morning America and hold the crew hostage in order to broadcast a message to the world about how much they enjoy the strip, I’d appreciate that even more. Just, y’know, a thought.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Trying something a little different this week.

Totally not stalling because I’ve been busy with real, money-generating, not-webcomic work.

Truly definitely not stalling because all the rest of my time is getting gobbled up by Diablo 3.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

A little trip down memory pain. Curiously, the hair that I gave the old woman vaguely reminds me of the Cigarette Smoking Man from X-Files. Scientists aren’t sure what this represents.

Oh hey, look who’s returned! Welcome back, ye bastard child of Claptrap and the Fruit Fucker. And it only took, uh… five months or so? Aren’t you supposed to be the strip’s mascot or something? Oh, whatever, I’m sure I’ll figure this out eventually. As long as calculated acts of sensible violence continue to be funny, I’m sure I’ll have material for the tiny grey avenger.

Not that I’m advocating you uppercut grannies on behalf of beprank’d orphans some 40 years removed from the event. At least, not out in the street like that. The cops might see you.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Dick move, Mario.

I normally try to leave Video Game Jokes to the big boys of the field, knowing full-well that webcomic-verse is good-and-proper saturated with that sort of thing. That said, I’m not sure a Mario joke really even counts as a Video Game joke at this point. Go ahead, Google “Mario.” See? Dude’s made a bit of an impact.

When the hell did video games get so normal?

As part of my growing effort to bend the universe to my will make people give a shit about my silly webcomic, I’ve created an entry for Sketched Comedy over at Top Webcomics. If you’re feeling particularly kindhearted, throw a vote my way. You needn’t sign up for anything, just click that little TWC icon under the comic. (I’ll see about making that look nicer in the near future, too.) Votes are tallied on a monthly basis, and you can vote once a day. You don’t have to, of course, and I won’t be offended if you don’t. But if you feel like doin’ me a solid, hey, the link is there, and I would really appreciate it.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Yup, that’s me. Always the bridesmaid, never the bride.

Last Saturday, my good friends Dan and Marisa got married. And this is how I decided to show my love and support. I am a terrible friend. It’s okay, though. They already knew that. Good luck, you two. And hey, when you get to the honeymoon, make sure to have a few orgasms for me!

My somewhat unique Life situation keeps marriage well out-of-reach, so I’ll never know the joys corralling a billion of my “closest” friends and relatives into an over-priced and under-prepared meeting hall to see how much debt we can wrack up before my beloved and I “start” our lives together. I suppose I’m grateful for that. Still, I have precious few excuses to engage in formal attire — and fewer still to justify shopping for a wedding dress — so I have been known to wist on occasion.

I mean, sure, I have my Great Expectations Reenactment Club, but one can only coast so far on irony.

In any event, I feel I should use my small corner of the Internet to say something nice to the newlyweds, so as to prove to myself and others that I’m not a complete asshat. So: Dan? Marsia? Love is pretty fucking boss. You already know this, of course. That’s why you went and made all those people buy you crap and come to your party. But now the whole world knows it, and that’s what’s important here. Because the world is awful. The world is dirty, and it’s shitty, and it’s painful, and it’s just a terrible place to spend your life. Except every so often, a few people come along, and they stare the world right in the eye and say “hey, fuck all that noise. Love is pretty fucking boss.” And those people make all the rest of that shit worthwhile for another day. And now, those people are you people. Thanks for makin’ the world just a little less crappy.

Unless, y’know, you get divorced. Heh, ’cause man, that would suuuuuuuuck.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I, of course, am putting my money on a “grey goo” scenario. If anything’s gonna kill me, it should at least have the decency to be fun to say.

Strangely,  I haven’t actually been thinking about the end of the world or anything. Hell, this came to me after watching The Avengers, and if there’s one surefire way I know of to just feel happy, it’s to watch The Avengers. Good movie. But, given the box office take, odds are you already know that.

Still, it’s fun to think about all the adventures one could have after the bombs drop, the asteroids hit, and the zombies take over. (You know, like “The Quest for More Toilet Paper.”) Got a favorite?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Damsel in distress, indeed.

I fear anything I write here would only detract from the quiet absurdity of the piece. I’d hate to do anything that might over-explain it, because I enjoy humor that leaves empty the spaces between things. It’s a dangerous line to tread, of course. You want to land the ball somewhere just outside the bounds of Good Sense but just inside the lines of Complete Fucking Anarchy. This is why some of the greats like the Pythons or the Kids in the Hall are so funny. There’s a bizarre consistency to their lunacy. It’s not that it doesn’t make sense, it makes it’s own sense.

Also, this joke involved a toilet, and toilets are always funny. Hee hee. Poo.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I sure drew a lot of feet this week. Will have to look into what’s causing that.

Long, interesting blog posts are for people who have energy. I am not one of those people. I am, instead, hip deep in the shit helping Steve Jackson Games deal with their Ogre Kickstarter project. As of this writing it’s up over $700,000 and has, like, 6.9 trillion backers or something? I dunno. It’s certainly what it feels like. They have so many questions. They are Legion.

But it still pays better than this gig, so I’ll take it. For now, at least. I’m sure I’ll crack under the pressure sooner or later. I’m pretty sure that’s one of our stretch goals for the project.

Anyway, if you’re wondering why you’re getting a short comic and a short blog post, that’s why. Go blame Steve Jackson and his amazing colossal Ogre game. That whole thing is grotesquely overblown in every conceivably way. Me? I’mma go take a nap, then maybe try and bash together a couple more comics for next week.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I am no expert on The Jesus, and so – as it is with all things that I am not well versed in – I retreat to my usual fallback position: extremely cringe-worthy wordplay. Also run-on sentences, apparently.

Speaking of gods, I was taking a moment to brush up on my Avengers movies in preparation of the then-upcoming Avengers Movie and, while sitting through the credits of Thor, a thought occurred to me regarding incest. (This happens to me more often than I care to think about.) When I think of the Greek pantheon of pagan deities, two things come to mind: animal fuckin’ and family fuckin’. The former is mostly Zeus’ fault, but the latter is kinda endemic. So I sat down and had a good think about all the other pantheons floating around out there.

And it occurred to me that this is pretty much just a problem the Greeks have.

Weirdness with Odin the Allfather aside, you don’t really hear about Asgardians fucking their siblings. Nor does this really come up (hee hee) with the Egyptian gods. I’m not as familiar with Hindu deities, so I can’t speak much there. I’m fairly certain the Shinto kami tended to keep things decidedly un-Alabamian. The tribal American spirits had the sense to not create a family stump. So what the crap is Greece’s deal?

I mean, thanks for the foundations of modern civilization and everything, Greece, but seriously, what the hell.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

The truth, of course, lies somewhere in between. It is not, however, nearly so funny.

Computers and I have gotten along reasonably amicably over the years. I ask it to entertain and inform me, it asks that I don’t ask it exactly how it goes about doing that. We have an understanding. I suppose I’ve transgressed this a little of late, what with trying to set up this website and all. It fumed and huffed and roared a bit, as I forced my way into WordPress and started making demands. In the end, however, I quickly subdued The Beast. See, all I had to do was I exert my dominance by simply pointing out that I’m the only one in this fight that constitutes a sentient being.

That’s when I realized I was yelling at an inanimate object, and went and had a nice little lie down.

Things just sorta fell into place after that.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

It suddenly occurs to me that I do, on occasion, tell some really dumb jokes. Feels good.

Speaking of feelings, I always feel weird utilizing this space as something that might be considered a more traditional blog. (A word I would abhor if it weren’t so much damn fun to say.) I don’t even really feel comfortable calling this section the “blog” section, as that implies that I should use this space to pontificate on the general goings-on of my life. I just can’t imagine anybody really gives a crap what I’m up to. After all, you’re just here for the jokes, and rightly so. Thus, I try to use this little block of text to slip in some more jokes in paragraph form.

Sadly, this does not always work, as you can see clearly demonstrated here.

And so it is, with no jokes popping into my diseased brain and no desire to bore you with the details of my daily routine, that we find ourselves at something of a content impasse. In times like these, I find the best course of action is to ramble on for a few short paragraphs in a sort of text shell game, hoping that nobody notices you’re not really saying anything of merit. With any luck, they’ll keep reading it to see if you’re going anywhere, and you get to sit back and say to yourself “ah, look at all those paragraphs I produced!” In other words, you stall in order to pad the website.

…There’s a chance, however slim, that I might not be very good at this. And yet despite this, here I am, contemplating more ways to bring The Funny. ‘Tis a damned ship we ride, my friends.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Just a little something a cribbed from the Perry Bible Fellowship playbook. And MST3k, now that  I think about it. Because, hey, if you’re gonna steal shit, go big or go home.

Been doin’ some more backend work on the site. Spent a couple hours figuring out how to set up a testbed , getting it installed, and getting all the settings in place. I then proceeded to research options for a new comment system, for though the one I have in place is functional, ’tis less than ideal. After another hour or so of research, I decided sticking with what I have is the best course of action for the time being. Which meant I didn’t actually have anything to do with my newly created testbed.

Order of operations, people. Turns out they’re important.

Still, I suppose it can’t hurt to have a place to screw around without risking the live site. Indeed, I used to opportunity to change things a little so that clicking the link to leave a comment doesn’t make the page layout lose its goddamn mind. So that’s nice.

Every time I start a  new paragraph, I feel so certain that it’ll be the one that I’ll think up a good joke for. And yet, with each carriage return, we find ourselves further and further from the glimmering shores of Comedy Land, and closer and closer to the rocky crags of Jesus Christ, Is He Still Rambling? And so it is with a heavy heart that I simply put a bullet in this blog post right here. Ta!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Or “gentlemen.” Whichever. He’s not picky, I suspect.

Really, this seems like the natural extension of any intelligent species that wears that much fishnet on a day-to-day basis. Oh sure, you’d like to chalk it up to them being alien, and therefore incomprehensible to our fleshy human minds. Not the case, I assure. These people are not making a simple fashion statement. They made a lifestyle choice.

That bottom skull I used in the background there looks vaguely familiar to me, but fucked if I could remember where I’ve seen it before. Perhaps I dreamed it up because the shape suited my needs, or perhaps I’ve replicated some be-horn’ed critter’s dome. It’s always nice when, upon doing something you feel weird about, you ask your brain a question and it simply replies with a half-hearted “i’unno.” Thanks, brain. Thanks loads. If you know what the hell that skull is, feel free to leave a comment in designed commenting area.

And now I shall go write and draw some more jokes, a process which looks exactly like this.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

What? They gotta practice somewhere, don’t they?

It’s good to revisit these characters and give their designs a much needed update. I originally wanted the big dude with the sick tats to have a knife in his teeth, but I found it difficult to convey that correctly. Which is to say, it looks like someone had just stabbed him in the mouth. And, while grotesque facial injuries are not outside the norm for pirates, it would be somewhat at odds here with the sheer glee on display. It’s hard to be happy when there’s a knife sticking out of your head.

Trust me on this one.

I do need to revisit how I draw kids, though. I fear she looks more at home in the Shire than on a playground. While this webcomic is quite silly, it’s not that silly. Or perhaps it is, but I’m just living in denial right now. We may never know.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

And the caveman TV saga continues. Not that I can really blame poor Zog for being angry. Man Stabbing Deer is an arc-heavy show, and missing even part of an episode can really put you in the dark.

When I first scripted this, his line originally read “who taped over.” Speaking of being ancient, sheesh.

Doing these caveman strips are, I do admit, a little bit like cheating. The art’s largely recycled and the joke is, more or less, the same. I’m not sure I care, though. It’s my website. Mine! And I’ll drive this god damn joke right off a cliff if I want to! You, as my readership, are merely the people in the backseat. Scream all you like, this car is going down in whatever blaze of glory I so desire. Oh, what, you think you can stop me? You think you can take me?! Well climb up here – if you’re man enough – and just try it, pal!

…Wait. I think I might have lost my analogy.

In any event, yay cavemen! I oughta get back to some of my other recurring characters, though. Haven’t seen the pirates in a while. And I wonder what those barbarians have been up to. Oh yeah, and didn’t this website used to have a robot for a mascot?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Words are dumb.

I’m sorry, I’m just lashing out.

I’ve decided that I am now nocturnal. Fuck you, daywalkers. I claim the night. If you’d like some context for that barely coherent outburst, it’s that I’ve been keeping odd hours of late. Which means I haven’t been sleeping well. Not that I’ve only been up during the numerically odd hours and asleep for the evens. That would actually be kinda cool. And this is decidedly uncool. And now I’ve gone completely pulled this paragraph off kilter. New paragraph.

I think what I’m basically trying to get at, kids, is that if you don’t sleep when it’s sleepy time and be wakeful when it’s wakey time, your brains will seep out your ears and form tiny puddles on the floor. You may think it’s fun to splash in those puddles, but in fact doing so will annihilate all cognitive function. And you need that. For .. brain… worky-ness.

I’m kinda tired, ya’ll, is what I’m saying here. Don’t stay up all night.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

It’s fun to draw a chicken.

Believe it or not, there was a rejected I’m not sure how I feel about the fact this is not my only chicken/egg joke. I mean, I have more than one of these things? Why? I’m not sure whether the appropriate course of action here is to weep at how desperate I am for gags, or to embrace it and schedule the rejected version for posting. Come to think of it, I suppose embracing the madness did work out pretty well for Batman, and this is basically the same thing. Hmm.

In other news, there is no other news.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Based on a true story. Now, to be fair, I’m pretty sure that spider was a black widow. At the very least, it was black and alone.

(Side note: Why do I suddenly feel like some kinda spider racist…)

As Sketched Comedy is my sole occupation at the moment, I don’t really leave the house much. While this has allowed me to maintain my beautiful fish-like pallor with greater ease, I’ve noticed one small side effect. Every so often I go a teeny, tiny bit stir crazy and start drawing on the walls in my own blood. Nothing major, but it does give me a gentle reminder that I should go outside from time to time and remind myself what the sky looks like.

Inevitably, though, this ends in tragedy. Immediately I am reminded of the fact that (a) I live in Texas, so it’s roughly 70,000 degress outside; (2) that we live in the middle of nowhere, and the bugs have decided our yard is a convention center; and (orange) that I’m too lazy/disinterested/afraid/busy playing video games to keep the lawn under any semblance of control, so there’s all this scary Green Stuff full of God Knows What out there. Plus, y’know. Spiders are a thing that exist.

Tell you what, though, Outside. If you can meet me half way, I’d be willing to give you another try. All you have to do is be climate controlled. And cleaner. And bug-free. These are not unreasonable requests, you know. You’re just not trying hard enough.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

The alternate title, of course, being April Fool’s 2: Fool Harder. I’m sure this guy will get his some day. But not today.

I hope you had a fruitful and prosperous April Fool’s Day yesterday. What’s that? This comic seems to be up a day late you say? Well, to that I respond only with this: April Fool’s!Hah hah, yeah! I got you, man! Woooo! Yeah, buddy, woooo!

That’s… how this works, right?

Joke next time. I promise. No foolin’.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

(A small note: I forgot to include a hover-over gag in Monday’s strip. Whoopsie! That’s fixed now, if reading small hidden sentence is the sort of thing you’re in to.)

I worry, sometimes, that things aren’t silly enough. Then, I correct this state of affairs.

While perhaps not my finest work – and certainly not my deepest – these last two strips have allowed me to finally start getting the wheels turning on getting ahead of my production line. This is in stark contrast to the desperate last-minute leaps out of the exploding buildings that I have been doing ever since I migrated the site from Comic Fury. Feels good.

Now that it’s been just over a year, I suppose I should start finding more ways to push this comedic abomination in front of more people. Alas, that’s the part of this I find the most tricky. ProjectWonderful is a nice starting point, but like all things in life, networking is key. But… all those people with all their thoughts and opinions. Why, I’d have to talk to them! What do I say? How should I act? What if they – *gasp* – don’t like me?!

Nope. Changed my mind. Gonna stay here. Where it’s safe.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Oh, you’re just mad you didn’t think of it first.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Why indeed, Jack.

So I, like much of the Greater Internet Area, have finished Mass Effect 3. I’ll keep away from spoiling overmuch, but suffice it to say that the ending isn’t everything it could or should be. BioWare is capable of much, much better than this, as evidenced by, well… the preceding 90% of Mass Effect. I was pretty disappointed, and the impression I’ve gotten is that so is most of the Internet. And by “disappointed,” I of course mean “people are losing their god damn minds over this.”

Now, I’ll be the first person to admit that when a piece of fiction I’ve invested five years in comes to a conclusion that has all the narrative satisfaction of a brick in the face, I get upset. What I’m not prone to doing, however, is starting petitions over a bad ending. Or protests over a bad ending. Or filing complaints with the Federal Trade Commission over a bad ending. Or donating tens of thousands of dollars to Child’s Play over a bad ending. (Although, kudos on that one, I guess. Child’s Play is a worthy cause.)

Truth be told, I’m split on this whole situation. On the one hand, I totally get it. I’m annoyed, too. As both a player and as someone who appreciates a good story, I want a more satisfying ending. I want closure. I want catharsis. I want shit to make sense. On the other hand, man, really? Sure, the ending is shit, but it’s their ending to tell. You don’t have to like it, but do you honestly think throwing an Internet tantrum is going to make it all better? All we’ve done is put BioWare into a “damned if you do, damned if you don’t situation.” Either they cave and risk further criticism depending on how they handle the DLC, or they don’t and risk coming off as Just Another Vile Megacorp.

Still, there is one good takeaway from this whole fucking debacle. Turns out people seriously give a shit about the narrative in their video games these days. If that’s not reason to smile, I don’t know what is.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

They’re all about small government. So small it’ll fit inside a woman’s uterus, in fact.

Okay, okay, I’m done. This is the end of my little patri-arc-y. I’ve gotten it out of my system. Besides, with these two comics, all systemic sexism against women everywhere is solved, right? That’s how that works?

The next comic will be about some more funnierish. Probably something about Mass Effect 3, as that’s my most recent gaming conquest. If I do, don’t worry. I’m sure it won’t be anything at all related to the controversy surrounding the game’s ending. Totally sure.

In other news, I’m working a little here and there to try and get the site some more exposure. To that end, I’ve recently gotten Sketched Comedy listed on a pair of webcomics aggregation sites. The first is Just the First Frame. It’s a website that collects the eponymous first frames of loads of different webcomics and presents them in sort of a collage form. It’s a pretty cool way to browse, as it gives you just a taste of the joke. (And, for me, it’s fascinating to see a page full of joke set-ups without their punchlines.) It’s easier to show than to explain, so go give ‘em a click.

The other site I signed on for is inkOUTBREAK. It’s kinda like StumbleUpon, but only for webcomics. It categorizes comics by tags, and as your browse comics you can thumb them up or down. It then uses the comics you’ve thumbed up to recommend other comics with similar tags. Its kinda new, and the interface could still use some work, but it’s a really neat idea.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Look at me covering recent events. Didn’t think I could be topical, did ya? Shit, son, I’m so topical you could find me in a jar at Bed Bath & Beyond!

So yeah, heh, this one came from a place of anger. Thankfully, both Shadlyn and Dan talked me down a bit. Now the strip is just a little bit of pointed commentary rather than the scream-it-from-the-mountain-tops ravings of a bloodthirsty lunatic. Seriously, though, what the hell is going on these last few weeks? Are you seriously going to tell me – with a straight face – that medical insurance should cover Viagra but it shouldn’t cover birth control? And then there’s the whole “you have to have a transvaginal ultrasound before getting an abortion” thing. And don’t even get me started on the ongoing Limbaugh shitstorm. I just. Grah. Argh. Ghghgaugghghaghh!

I like women. Big fan. Even applied for membership. (They tell me the paperwork is “still in processing,” but, pfft, you know how they can be.) So maybe I’m a little biased when I say this; maybe my perception is a bit skewed, but… Couldn’t we try being nice to them? Like a little? For, like, twenty seconds, people? It’s really not hard, I assure you. All you have to do is this: Don’t say and do really stupid shit. That’s it! Easy, right?

Come on, we figured out the wheel, god dammit, we can get this one right, too! Who’s with me?!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I warned back in February that more cavemen were coming. Actually, I think I threatened more cavemen, strictly speaking. Regardless, cavemen I desired and cavemen I delivered. And I have yet more of these. Stay tuned. God help ya, stay tuned.

Truth be told, this one was kiiiiinda rushed out the door with a kick in the butt and a shout of “good luck!” I still haven’t fully recovered, creatively, from getting the site migrated and looking nice. I think I accidentally burnt myself out a little. So this one got slapped together with all the love and affection one typically finds mere hours before a deadline. Y’know. None. Be thankful I even spellchecked the  damn thing.

Wait. Did I spellcheck this strip…?

Regardless, I made it. I had to reach back under the rapidly descending cave wall to snatch the hat I lost as I slid under, sure, but I made it. And at the end of the day, I’m sure that’s all the matters. And any errors that crept in or corner that had to be cut, well, they’re not that big a deal. The Internet is nothing if not a kind, understanding, and ultimately forgiving place of compassion and reason, right?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

It wasn’t until after I started drawing this one that I realized that it functions as something of a follow up to the last strip. Wholly unintentional, I assure you. Probably. I think. Man, I dunno, the subconscious is such a motherfucker, y’know?

If you’d like, feel free to take this as a biting critique of the unfortunate nomenclature of the “tea party,” a stinging indictment of abstinence-only “education,” or both. Or neither. I’ll gladly claim any misplaced depth of message as my own if it’ll endear you to my scribblings, but my primary intent was to make a silly joke. About sexual organs. And relations. You know, I’d like to think I could make a joke without going straight into someone’s pants, but sadly that does not seem to be the case.

Which… would certainly explain all those restraining orders, now that I think about it.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Get it?

It’s a dick joke. Well, a masturbation joke, technically. But, in this instance, that basically just means means it’s a dick joke.

Subtle, I know.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

In space, no one can hear you scream for ice cream. Well, at least, not if you’ve got your head stuck out in the vacuum. And frankly, if that’s the case, you’ve probably got much bigger problems to worry about. For another couple seconds, anyway.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Heh heh. Butt joke.

Still trying to get back into my production rhythm after migrating the site. It turns out that if you do something consistently for a couple weeks, and then take a week or so off to do this other thing, the first thing sorta up and dies. Stupid… things. Further compounding is the issue is that I’m down to working on the really tricky stuff on the site. And I don’t wanna work on the tricky stuff. So I don’t wanna draw and I don’t wanna work on the site. And I’ve (more or less) run through all of my buffer.

Basically, what I’m saying here is “waaaaaaaaaaaaah!” Self-indulgent? ‘Tis a bit, I’m afraid. So I invite you to come “waaaah” with me! That way you won’t be annoyed and I won’t feel bad wasting your time. Waaaaah!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

And there’s my first intentionally sappy comic strip. Couldn’t help myself. It’s both the 100th Strip and the strip marking the 1-year anniversary. (Well, technically that’s tomorrow, as technically I started this strip on the 24th. But that’s a Friday this year, so nuts to that.) Which reminds me, I need to make a little announcement.

I’m afraid to inform you that Sketched Comedy will be continuing for another year. I know, I know, that’s gonna disappoint a lot of people. Believe me, it’s not the ideal situation for me either. But, after looking all the data, weighing the pros and cons, and consulting the chicken entrails, I’ve decided that the best, most rational course of action is to continue scribbling down jokes and putting them on the Internet twice a week. No promises yet, but it’s looking like you’ll get some run-on sentences as well.

Season one is in the can. Season two awaits. So, again, my apologies.

(In all seriousness: Sketched Comedy would not have happened without the love, support, and patience of many of my friends and family. Thank you, everyone who pestered me 6 or 7 years ago to start writing a webcomic. Thank you, Shadlyn, for putting up with all my art questions. Thank you, Dan, for helping me to continually level up my game. And thank you, readers, for sticking with this silly website and feeding my ego.)

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

And with that, allow me to welcome you to Sketched Comedy’s new server. Woooooo! For your purposes, it looks a hell of a lot like the old place. For me, it means an entirely new WordPress-powered backend on a server that’s mine to play with (read: break) to my heart’s content. I’ve been spending the past few days getting everything working correctly, but I am far from the most masterful of webmasters. So if you see a bad link or screwed up formatting or the ghostly visage of friends long dead, just drop me a note and I’ll do what I can to straighten things out!

One thing to note for those of you using the RSS feed to imbibe my humorosity: the URL has changed slightly. It is no longer sketched-comedy.com/rss . It is now sketched-comedy.com/feed . I’ve set up a 301 redirect on /rss, so with any luck you shouldn’t even notice the change. It oughta just bump you over gently to the new URL, like a spurned lover might quietly nudge someone into traffic. If its not playing nicely, however, just let me know and I’ll look into it. (Of course, if you solely use the RSS feed and it broke somehow, you wouldn’t be able to read this. But… uh… Well, let’s just hope everything went to plan!)

And finally, you may notice the site is a little… uglier than usual in some spots. The archive page, for example, is a prime offender right now. Sadly, some stuff is still a work in progress. I’ll try to get things looking nicer in the coming days as I acclimatize to the new backend. All the important bits of functionality should be here, however. As always, you can leave a comment below, shoot me one of them electronic mails, or tweetle-de-deet me.

As for the comic I posted up there… uh… well, I’ll just leave this block of text here as a placeholder. With any luck, I’ll come back and type up something before this goes up at midnight! It’ll be like Russian Roulette, but with words. Exciting!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Sometimes you just find yourself staring at a computer screen, thinking up jokes, and the thought pops into your head that, gee, Paula Cole sure is relevant to day’s popular culture. So you write down a joke about a song that topped the charts in 1997.

And then you go outside and softly weep at how truly disconnected you’ve become from all things hip.

In unrelated news, this should be (with any luck) the last strip I do on ComicFury. I’m currently in the process of shuffling everything over to my own server where I am running WordPress. ComicFury has been good to me, but it’s time to spread them wings and fly, fly away!

…That is, provided I can figure out how the hell all this stuff works. I swear, you spend your whole life thinking you’re a proper nerd, and then some program comes along and helpfully points out that you’re just an awkward social failure with who’s way into Star Wars.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Just a friendly remind to all of you out there to practice safe, sane, and consensual sex. Otherwise, you might find yourself in way over your head. In a vat of pudding. Wearing Spider-Man pajamas and a blindfold. Out in the woods. Just sayin’.

A little good news as I slowly creep up on both the one year anniversary and 100th strip of Sketched Comedy (dot com). I’ve finally gotten a reasonable workflow going, so now I’m slowly building up one of those “comic buffers” I’ve heard so much about. And to think, it only took a year! Man, at this rate, I’m gonna own the Internet in another week, tops.

You hear me, Internet!? I’m coming for you! Eye of the tiger, baby, raauugh!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I’ve got loads of these. And, god help ya, I’m probably going to roll them out in the coming weeks. If you’re lucky, I’ll space them out at a reasonable rate. Do you feel lucky? Because I feel like drawing more cavemen.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Pfft, babies. Am I right, folks?

No, seriously, am I right? I’ve never raised a kid. I’m working from second-hand information here. Everything I know about babies I learned from a combination of Rugrats and the Look Who’s Talking trilogy. And while I feel that that qualifies me for parenthood, I fear my lack of actual hours logged in the field of child rearing may limit my comedic accuracy.

Side note. “Child rearing” sounds like one of those phrases that would get you put on an FBI watch list.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I may need to revisit my definition of “douchebag.” This character has ended up slightly more… murderous than his title would imply. Ah, well! Humor must be served, and if it demands a sacrifice, so be it!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

There’s always gotta be one at every table. Everyone’s moving along, having a good time, rolling some dice… then some clever asshole utters words like “grapple” or “decking” or “hang on guys, I want to try and seduce this monk,” and it all goes down the shitter as the game grinds to a screeching halt. Or, in this case, deciding that bacterial life would be a cool thing to put on a character sheet.

Stupid planet Earth, ruining the game for everyone else.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

So I got stuck while scripting. What the hell do you do when you’re stuck and you’re too stubborn to allow yourself to stay stuck? You write about being stuck, damn you! But how do you write a punchline to your joke if you’re blocked? No, you fool, don’t you see? That is your punchline.

Oh yeah. This strip is meta as shit.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Poor Bruce. And here I would have thought that getting a little pussy would finally be enough for him to crack a smile.

Batman, to me, will always be the exquisitely put-together Batman: The Animated Series. The Wikipedia helpfully informs me that I was nine-years-old when the cartoon originally ran on Fox Kids. I hadn’t really gotten into anime yet – which was more happenstance than intent – so this was the first time I’d seen a cartoon that really took itself seriously. Well, as seriously as TV-Y can get, anyway. But I mean, people died, the drama was tangible, and it looked gorgeous. Plus, y’know, Kevin Conroy puts to utter shame every other actor that’s played Batman.

But enough nostalgia. You’re here for jokes. So let’s end this on a funny note. The above comic? Somewhat inspired by this extremely inspired scene.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

In any activity involving my genitals, I’ll take a seasoned practitioner over a nervous rookie every time. If you’re a virgin, and we’re having sex, you damn well better have an instruction manual in the other hand. Or maybe some kinda sex coach in the room. Something, anything. I’m sorry, I just like my genitals too much to put them in the shaky, ill-prepared hands of an amateur.

What really pisses me off, though, is that way back in the 80s a one Mr. Al Yankovic wrote a song called “Like a Surgeon,” which means I cannot use the most perfect title for this strip. Damn. It.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

It’s funny ’cause it’s true.*

(*All claims of truth made by Sketched Comedy should not be taken as actual truth. No truths, real or factual, are implied. Readers are advised to actually look into things themselves and not believe everything they read in a comic strip on the Internet.)

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I hate it when that happens.

So lately I’ve been having trouble keeping myself motivated. See, cartooning doesn’t come naturally to me. I’m not one of those artists that’s all “this is the all-consuming drive in my life and I must be drawing cartoons at all times.” It’s, uh, work, actually. I tend to approach Photoshop with a bit of dread. And then there’s all the ancillary stuff to running a webcomic: making an attractive website, making a functional website, advertising, keeping up with social media, et cetera. Frankly, it’s a bit draining. I’d much rather just goof off and eat candy.

I mention this not to invoke pity, but rather because I have a question. I’m sure you’ve got something like that in your life. How do you stay motivated?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Sometimes I worry that I’m repeating some other joke. Sometimes, however, I’m not too worried about repeating myself.

Was hoping to get more drawing done, but I screwed up my shoulder earlier this week. How? Sleeping. Yeah, baby, I’m an extreme sleeper. You think your sleeping is hardcore? Your sleeping doesn’t have shit on my sleeping. When I sleep, it’s like, woo, man, yeah, hah hah! You don’t even know, dude.

And that’s totally not even a lie to cover my ass because I slept funny and couldn’t turn my head right for two days.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

It seems one of our poor piratical pals is having a bit of an existential dilemma. Understandable, though. Sometimes, you just have to ask yourself the Big Questions. You gotta look inside and ask “why?” Whyyy? Why?!

Why did I write a dumb joke about a pirate? Why construct such a flimsy premise around something I’m only passingly interested in? Why return to these characters when there are others I more readily wish to write for?

No, seriously. Why’d I do that? (And don’t say “aliens.” Everybody says “aliens.” So help me god, if you say “aliens,” I’ll… just don’t say “aliens,” okay?)

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I wish I had something clever to put down here. Oh well. Happy New Year, everyone! I hope you were suitably irresponsible during the holiday.

So yeah, I’ve seen an episode of The Twilight Zone or two and played a few games of D&D. I don’t personally subscribe to the idea that your heart’s desire is always your undoing, but that wouldn’t stop me from being overly paranoid if I found a monkey’s paw or magic ring. It’s just not worth risking crazy shit like having your genitals turned into a pumpkin because you constructed your sentence poorly.

I gotta imagine lawyers would find lucrative work in the magical land of fairy tales just drawing up proper wish wording. Sure, it would be tedious to have ‘em carefully construct your question, and it probably wouldn’t be cheap, but just remember the alternative. Pumpkin. Genitals.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Just getting my druthers back after the holiday kookiness. Not that I have any fucking idea what “druthers” are. Sounds like something you’d need an ointment to clear up.

“Dude, what happened to you; you look terrible!”

“Ugh. I got the druthers, had to go see the doctor. I couldn’t go to the bathroom comfortably for a week.”

On second thought… I don’t think I want my druthers. You can keep ‘em.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Happy Boxing Day, people. (Provided you’re reading this the day the comic went up.) I gotta figure the Jerk-Punching Robot is the most appropriate mascot for a day so dubbed. The Wikipedia, of course, will have you believe it’s some rubbish about gift giving or Europe or something. Lies! This is a day for punching!

So come on, everyone! Grab those comically over-sized Boxing Day boxing gloves and pound the ever-loving shit out of random people on the street! You’ll be glad you did!

And if you hear sirens, it just means you’re not boxing hard enough.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

And so it continues. To be concluded next Monday!

If I’ve done my job right, you should be hearing something like this when you hit panel three. If I haven’t done my job right, well, that would be par for the course. Either way, we all go home a winner.

Happy holimas, all!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

What’s this? Do thine eyes deceive? Or does that indeed say “part 1″ up there in the title?

It do. Stay tuned.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

And that’s what it looks like when you let me near feminism.

Art on this one kinda wiped me out, and brain is too fried to be clever, I’m afraid. Just do me a favor and assume I made a particularly poignant comment here about how women really are objectified and exploited in a lot of media. (Because, y’know, they are, and it’s stupid.) And then pretend I made a joke about that.

Then for this space down here, imagine a hastily written apology for being a complete bastard.

Ah, that was easy. Imagination is fun!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Gotta be the first time I’ve ever rendered myself with amble bosoms. I suspect it shan’t be the last.

Hm. Considering yesterdays strip, it would appear I’m on something of a bosom kick. Not really a conscious attempt to put bosoms at the forefront of my comic, the bosoms just kinda popped up. Um, not that there’s anything wrong with bosoms. I think bosoms are great. Grand, even. Ah, but not, like, in a pervy way. In a normal, healthy, bosom-enjoying way. Um… right, no bosoms next time, I think…

So yeah, acquiring a proper quantity sleep at the right hours is proving more difficult than it oughta. As a result, you get something more akin to a fever dream than a proper joke. The management apologizes for this state of affairs, and promises that it won’t happen again. At least, not until it happens again. Then all bets are off.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Been on a bit of a science kick lately, and I’m takin’ all you fuckers with me. Actually, this was just a weird timing thing. After I did the last strip, I watched this video on Extra Credits. (An activity I am often wont to do. If you have even a passing interest in gaming, go ye forth and do likewise.) It occurred to me that, while a learning machine would be super neato, we probably don’t want to expose it to too much too fast.

Or at all.

I mean, seriously, have you seen the Internet? They’ll let any asshole with a keyboard put whatever puerile crap they want on that thing. Any place that let’s someone like me run loose is no place to unleash upon an unsuspecting newborn robo hyper-intelligence. I mean, shit, and you thought your parents screwed you up…

Oh, and one other small note. This is the first strip I’ve done fully digitally. Yay, woo. It’s… a bit rough, but hopefully you’ve come to expect crappy art by now. Really happy with the process, though, which is getting faster all the time. Could that mean a more frequent schedule? Mmmmmmmmm… We’ll see.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Evidently, the only job that elder barbarian has is to pass out cutlery. Well, more or less. A basket isn’t an edged weapon in the strictest sense, but I don’t doubt she could still take someone’s head off with that thing.

While I was composing this, Shadlyn helpfully pointed out that, during winter, there’s precious little in bloom. Y’know, except stuff like holly. Which, y’know, is crazy poisonous.

Ah well. They’re barbarians. They already do everything else in a violent haze of rage, may as well add “going to the bathroom” to the list.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Words! Big steamin’, gleamin’, streamin’ piles of wordy words! I try not to inflict them on you — my gracious and wonderful readers — too terribly often, but I fear you shall have to indulge me every once in a great while.

Though not done entirely digitally, this is the first strip I’ve worked on with my shiny new Wacom Bamboo Connect. (I did the initial sketch in pencil and then inked/colored/etc. with the Bamboo.) I’ve used a tablet before, doing some light graphical work for SJ Games, but never for freehand foolery. Very weird, but kinda fun. With any luck, I should go fully digital soon.

And with the money I’ll save on ink and copy paper, I’ll make up the difference in… uh… some… quantity of strips. Oh, god dammit…

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Hope you had a good holiday. (Provided you were inside the United States, of course.) Please enjoy this phoned-in comic. (Which I feel performs irrespective of your location on the globe.)

I will freely admit that those are, technically, tires. Technically, tires go around a wheel. They are not wheels themselves, technically.

And that’s why I’m a cartoonist and not a technician.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Happy Turkey Day! I’m serving up a little bit of continuity from yesterday’s strip. I hope you like a little dark humor with your dark meat.

I noticed a bit of an increase in traffic lately (thanks StumbleUpon!), so I’d just like to say welcome to all the newcomers to the site. Welcome, newcomers to the site! I’ll be serving up fresh, piping hot comedy every Monday and Thursday.

Hope you like what you see! If you do, tell people you don’t hate about the site! If you don’t, tell people you do hate about the site. Navigation links are located fore and aft, refreshments are being served absolutely nowhere at all, and in the extremely unlikely event of a server crash, you can follow my Twitter account (@Fox_Barrett) for emergency jokes. Thanks for stoppin’ by!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Woooo, I’m such a satirist. So clever. So scathing. So full of word balloons.

This was kind of tricky. How do I convey Native American in my rather simplistic (read: shitty) art style without going from “identifiable” to “unbelievably racist.” Wouldn’t want to undermine the whole point of my joke, after all. Feels like I struck a nice middle ground, though.

I think. I hope. Maybe. Well, I’m sure I’ll get a nasty letter if I didn’t, at any rate!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

This one goes out to all my trans* brethren out there. And sistren. And… Fuck it, we’ll go with *ren. This one’s for you, person reading this comic, however and whatever your circumstance may be.

Unless you don’t want it. That’s cool to. We have options here to accommodate all shapes and sizes, is what I’m sayin’. I want you to feel welcome, because I believe we should cast aside our differences and join together. Be as one with each other. Even if that means hollowing out someone’s chest, installing a window, and living inside.

…Y’know, I swear that paragraph made sense in my head when I started writing it.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

The scientifically-minded among you will undoubtedly point out that the full name of the process is actually “radio carbon dating.” And you would be correct. I kneel humbly before your scientific prowess and offer in return the only thing I can. A silly picture of an atom in a tie. Please enjoy.

…Y’know, thinking on it, I’m not sure how I feel about gendering an atom. It almost makes me sad to think that even non-sentient particles of matter still feel the pressures of society to conform to expected gender roles.

That, or maybe it just keeps getting the damn things for Christmas and figures it might as well put them to good use.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Yeah, sorry if you check this at work. Or with loved ones in the room. Or at all, really. That was a bit of a reach just to get drop the phrase “S&Emmy.”

I’ve always thought there oughta be an award’s ceremony to celebrate excellence in pornography. Partially because the Internet has shown me that these people deserve a little recognition for the unbelievably crazy shit they’re willing to do. Partially because I have something of a sex-positive slant to my worldview, and feel that we could stand to be more open and reasonable about sex.

But mostly it’s because I just think the name “S&Emmys” is really funny.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Apparently my shorthand for “these people are at an office” is just to have everyone holding coffee mugs. It seems that, in my twisted worldview, an office is just a place where grown-ups stand around all day and discuss sex whilst imbibing nearly toxic levels of caffeine. A place where nothing gets done, everyone is tweaked out, and the conversations only get more depraved as the day drags on. Like a bar that doesn’t serve alcohol, leaving you to get drunk only on human misery.

Actually… Yeah, that sounds about right.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Panels! Panels panels panels panels panels. Holy crap, let’s not do that again any time soon. Shorter jokes… shorter jokes…

Astute readers will notice that I didn’t explicitly show just what it is that paper does to rock. That because “paper covers rock” is bullshit. Paper covers rock, sure, right up until rock gets fed up with paper’s bullshit and decides to burst out of paper chestburster-style. This is just another sad example of realism being cast to the wayside for the sake of game balance. Alright, fine, have it your way.

Just don’t come crying to me when you try to stop an avalanche with the Sunday Times and end up with your body being a whole lot of dead. Feh.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Take that, patriarchy! Well, now that I’ve solved all women’s issues forever, I think I’ll just kick back and enjoy the holiday.

So yeah, I’ve never been a fan of that weird disparity between men’s Halloween costumes and women’s Halloween costumes. This whole trend of taking any men’s costume, subtracting 70% of the fabric, and slapping the adjective “sexy” on the front is pretty deplorable. (What’s worse, they aren’t even sexy! They go no class.) Ah, well. We all know the best costumes don’t come off a shelf, anyway.

But I’m not about to let obnoxiously pervasive sexism get the in the way of the Best Holiday in The Universe, and I hope you won’t either. The hell with heteronormativity, says I! It’s Halloween, dammit!

So Happy Halloween, all! Or Happy Samhain, as the case may be!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

While doing the pencils for this, I noticed that the brain I drew looked not unlike a butt. So I pulled up some reference on Google Image Search and, sure enough, viewed from the right angle the human brain does kinda resemble a butt. A lumpy, wrinkly, very unappealing butt, but a butt none the less.

Atheist though I may be, the metaphysical implications of this is something I’d rather not ponder.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

You say “insecurities,” we say “muse.” To-may-to, to-mah-to.

In all honesty I do appreciate the merits of true creative endeavors intended to have meaning and symbolism and resonance and all that junk. Still, as a creator myself, I recognize that at the end of the day it’s still pretty much a ploy to get some attention. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Provided you’ve given me some modicum of entertainment in return. Which reminds me.

Thank you for providing me with validation! I hope the entertainment I offered in exchange was of acceptable value! Please continue to look at me and tell me I’m great, that I might continue to distract you from your existentially meaningless existence!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Don’t mind me, just trying to find some more depths to sink to. This hole can get deeper, dammit, I’m sure of it!

Not that I wish any particular harm against babies specifically, mind you. As long as the babies don’t break into my house and start stealing shit, I got no beef with the larger baby community. We just don’t tend to run in the same circles, is all. (Though I suppose we do share a few interests: eating, pooping, making inane noises for the amusement of others.)

I’m not really sure what Consolidated Incorporated does, exactly. Aside from hire creepy receptionists, I mean. Perhaps they manufacture extremely intimate receptionist counters and make their employees test out how awkward they are.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Such a blatant disregard for the fourth wall. So shameful. Still, at least here it kinda makes sense. ‘Cause lemme tell ya, when you do this shit in real life? Scares the hell out of people.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Well, at least she’s decisive.

I can safely make D&D jokes, here, right? I mean, they only let nerds on the Internet still, yeah? That’s how that works? No? I was told that’s how that works. Well, whatever. You know where to find the Wikipedia.

Doing a comic about drow presents an interesting challenge. They’re subterranean and obsidian-skinned. By rights, I could have just stuck three solid black boxes up there with some speech bubbles and called it a day. But then you wouldn’t have seen my crude scrawlings that approximate the voluptuous form of a typical female drow and her standard-issue male underling. Lucky you.

Man, I tell ya, between this and the naked bears, I should be pullin’ in mad hits from the basement-dwelling demo now. Sweet internet pervert fame, here I come!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Now to just sit back and wait to see how many furries this strip pulls in.

In the meantime, allow me to direction your attention to the right and the bottom of the site. I have ads now! Sorry about that. Sort of. I’ll try to keep them from being too obtrusive. Someday I’d like to offer up merch or “gifts” for donators or any of the myriad other ways to “monetize” my little endeavor. But that’s for someday, not today.

Now that I’ve made money doing this (fuck yeah, 3 cents!), I’m technically a professional cartoonist. Because I’m self-owned and financed, that therefore means I’m an indie comic creator. However, I’m also running advertisements, a long held sign of someone selling out to The Man.

…Does that mean that I’ve simultaneously achieved snooty artistic legitimacy and sold my soul to corporate overlords in one swift action?

My puzzler hurts.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Some jokes you just tell for yourself.

Perhaps it’s just the natural result of being a little kid right smack in the middle of Nintendo’s resurrection of the entire video game industry, but The Last Starfighter has had a lasting effect on my (admittedly diseased and fragile) psyche. I love that movie. And you should, too, even if just for the bitchin’ soundtrack.

As for our friend up there, I’m not sure what he’s so upset about. I thought dweeby, insular, dating-sim-loving otaku liked Cthuloid tentacle monsters. Sheesh. Just no pleasing some people.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Remember kids, if someone asks you to get in their car, do it. Because once that baby hits 88 miles per hour… you’re gonna see some serious shit.

That is a joke, of course. Kids, don’t get in strange people’s cars, even if they do claim to be time travelers.

Or do get in their cars. Or whatever. Do what you like. Don’t let me be the arbiter of your destiny. Live you own life! Forge your own path through the world! Be responsible for yourselves, for once, dammit!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Life would certainly be a lot less awkward if we could have officially appointed representatives handling all our uncomfortable social situations on our behalf. Mind you, I’ve never been in a situation where I’ve had to turn down someone’s advances at a nightclub. There’s a chance that this is because I do not frequent nightclubs – that I can, in fact, count the number of clubs I’ve been in on one stamp-free hand. But I’m not entirely willing to rule out the possibility that it simply hasn’t come up because there’s a government conspiracy actively working against me to make sure people don’t talk to me at clubs, bars, dance halls, VFWs, PTA meetings, and other places where adults awkwardly try to solicit one another for sexual favors while obnoxious music is playing.

Of course, given that I generally handle talking to complete strangers somewhat poorly, that would easily be the worst use of a cabal of clandestine conspirators’ time ever. But then, I suppose that’s bureaucracy for you. And I do have a wide array of enemies. Or, at least, natural predators, which I think basically counts at the same thing. I mean, let’s face it, I could honestly say “that lion over there is my mortal enemy.”

I seem to have lost my train of thought, and with it any semblance of a point. I suppose that’ll happen when you’re sitting at your desk an hour before a comic is supposed to go live, randomly bashing letters on a keyboard because you just remembered you never did get around to writing that author note you were supposed to write days ago. Looking back at the preceding paragraphs, however, it would appear that I have done that very thing – and rather admirably, at that. And thus do I depart, that I might sleep the sleep of the righteous. Or, at least, the sleep of someone who knows how to fill an awful lot of space with absolutely fuck all.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Just seemed like the sort of thing people needed help with. That’s what I’m here for, after all. To be helpful. I just make no guarantees on the quality of that help. Like a doctor’s office populated with monkeys.

Hey, would you look at that! The website is all diff’rent and stuff. Sure, the layout doesn’t display entirely correctly in Firefox, but it works okay in Chrome and (shudder) IE, so that’s close enough right? As the man told us, two out of three ain’t bad. And I don’t know about you, but I’m not about to question someone who’s been in and out of Hell that many times. Anyway, yeah, I’m happy enough with it. It will inevitably get tweaked at some point, but at least now it’s not in a state that fills me with shame and revulsion.

Speaking of shame and revulsion, drop me a line if you find anything broken on the site (or otherwise have difficulty navigating the thing). This whole adventure has been a bit of a learning experience for me with CSS, and as a result the code is a bit of a mess.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

The alternative, of course, being that women simply take longer to go to the bathroom because of a number of physiological and social factors that in no way involve roller coasters. This explanation, however, is terribly dull and makes for poor comedy. The hell with reason, I say. Bring on the fanciful misrepresentation of reality! Things are much more fun with you’re living in an amazing technicolor dreamworld of mobile toilets.

I suppose the case could be made that I’ve already told this joke before. Just wanted to let you all know that I’m plenty aware of that. See? I even included that same bald character. My ways are subtle, no? That said, I suppose this does mean it’s about time I found something exclusive to the other half of our species and used it as a comedy vehicle. Unfortunately, the only thing that springs immediately to mind also involves bathrooms.

Or should that be “fortunately?” The bathroom is always good for a cheap laugh, and if there’s one thing we’re all about here at Sketched Comedy (dot com), it’s a cheap laugh. Right then, I’ve rambled on enough. Back to your life with you!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I hate it when that happens. I suppose I have something of a unique view on spoiled food, however. As someone who’s anosmic, I lack the usual human means of determining the status of food. Without someone else to sniff the carton for me, having a drink of milk is much like playing Russian roulette. Unless the item in question has obviously transmogrified into another form of matter not typically associated with an edible state, leftovers are a bit of a crapshoot for me.

In my world, expiration dates are not a suggestion. They are a dire warning, a portent of foul tidings carved on the stone slab covering the ruins of an ancient and terrible cyclopean city where vile beings from an alien dimension wish us gory misfortune.

Bright side: I can’t smell farts. Which means they will remain hilarious to me forever.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Go big or go home, right? Why do something as uncouth as physically accosting the child when you can engage in the sort of mental attack that’ll keep food on some future therapist’s table for years to come? I like to think that the sign is just right outside the kid’s window, too. Glowing through the night. An ever-present illumination of precisely how his creators feel about him.

It’s probably best that I’m not put in charge of children.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Droppin’ some science on yo’ ass. More or less. And I do hope that Simon-looking thing hanging on the cave wall looks more or less like a chore wheel to you good folks, because I’ve never actually seen one in the flesh. Er, poster board. Whatever. Easily the weirdest thing I’ve had to look up a visual reference for, so far.

If the strip isn’t sciency enough for you, go watch (or even just listen to) this video right here. In fact, just go watch all the Symphony of Science videos. Every time I find myself feeling crappy about whatever fucking stupid direction it looks like we’re all moving in at any given moment… I just go listen to an auto-tuned Carl Sagan say something mind blowing about our species. And then it’s all happiness and rainbows again! For a few hours. Then the crushing weight of humanity’s ineptitude drags me back down into the soul-shredding abyss of pablum and mediocrity that is life.

It’s a vicious cycle. But it has good music!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Like so many things, Twilight Sparkle put it best.

Hey, what is this shit. When did I get so preachy? This is a webcomic, dammit! I demand more fart jokes! Yeah, dunno where this one came from. I haven’t been at the epicenter of any particularly volatile religion/science debates or anything of late. This is more of just a general philosophy of on life I try (with… some success) to live by. I could pontificate on its finer points in great detail here, but I already wasted enough of your time with the Star Wars joke on Monday. It boils down to thus:

Be excellent to one another or I will fucking punch you.

Speaking of which; hey, look! Robot! I need to get more robots into this strip.

Oh! Uh, side note! The website might look a little weird in the coming days. Or it might change radically. (In fact, I’m really hoping for that last one.) I’m in the process of stumbling around in the HTML and CSS Forest as I get this website into something resembling a presentable shape. I finally have an idea of what I want, just no idea how to get there. Yet. More on that story as it develops.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Hey, lookit ‘at. I can do satire! Cool, huh? And it’s even a commentary on recent events. Wow. It’s a whole new Sketched Comedy.

So yeah, as you’ve undoubtedly heard by now, Lucas is fucking with the trilogy again. More stupid bullshit is finding its way into the Blu-Ray release because, pfftt, why the hell not. To be perfectly honest, I don’t even know what he’s changing. I guess the infamous “Nooooo” from Revenge of the Sith is making a guest appearance or something? See, I haven’t looked into it. Haven’t clicked link one. Why? Because I’ve moved on.

And frankly, I think it’s time we all did.

Look, I love the original films just as much as the next person who has used the phrase “may the Force be with you” unironically in a conversation. But I’m done. I don’t care about Star Wars any more. Oh sure, there’s an X-Wing sitting on my desk as I type this, but I don’t care about Star Wars. I don’t care about Lucas, I don’t care what new crap is slouching out of Skywalker Ranch these days, and I couldn’t give less of a fuck about anything involving the word “Jedi.” Why? Because I’m drained. I’m tired of investing emotional, mental, and physical energy into the fever dreams of the idiot god-emperor of a galaxy far, far away.

Remember when this was fun? When being a fan meant dressing up as Han Solo for Halloween or joking about how much XP Luke got for every Stormtrooper that died on the Death Star? It’s not like that any more. We haven’t let it be for years now. Are we honestly shocked and upset that Lucas is doing something unbelievably boneheaded again? Weren’t we paying attention the first hundred times? Why are we still paying any of this the least bit of mind? You don’t have to! You really don’t! All you have to do is realign your perspective, and I guarantee you’ll be the happier for it.

There are these three films – these three incredible films – that shaped who I am in more ways than I really care to think about. They still exist. I have proof! There’s these three VHS cassettes sitting on the dresser next to my bed in this long, obnoxious slip case that has the words “Widescreen” and “THX Enhanced” written on it. Those tapes are the definitive versions of those films, and I will treasure them always. Nothing’ll ever change that.

The only difference is that now Star Wars is just some cool thing from my past rather than from my present. That’s not a bad thing. That’s the place where my Super NES lives. That’s where I find The Hitchhiker’s Guide. It’s where I keep every good orgasm I’ve ever had.

I can live with that.

…oh fuck me, I wrote a damn essay. I’m supposed to put an extra joke down here. Um. Uuuuh. “Boobie.” A’right, I’m out.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Wooooo, indeed. Feels odd to have fifty comic strips in such a short period of time. Fifty feels like a big number, but I’ve only been at this about six months. And six is a small number. Small number. Big number. Christ, this is confusing.

Admittedly, my brain may just be a little baked because we’ve consistently hit over 100 degrees every day for the past… forever. (That’s Fahrenheit, but I suppose it may as well be Celsius with the effect it’s having on organic matter.) I was told this is the “Lone Star” state. I was not informed that said star was, in fact, the Sun. Stop bogarting, Texas.

And seriously, Firefox? Your spellchecker doesn’t recognize “bogarting?” Where has this world gone so wrong…

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Five minutes ago she was a crazy cat lady. Now she’s at the forefront of Earth’s defense against the Ratulon invasion. Amazing the difference a commercial break can make. That said, it’s entirely possible that she is still managing to have her priorities all out of whack.

Trying something new this time. I made the mistake of looking at my strips one someone else’s machine. Turns out that my strip’s a skoash … big. Strange how I never noticed that on this bigass widescreen monitor of mine. So I dropped ‘em down to 500 pixels wide. Some background stuff might be a little harder to read in some strips, but otherwise I think it’s a much more reasonable width. Yell at me here, on Twitter, or through e-mail if you feel so inclined. (Contact info’s on the About page.)

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Ah, good ol’ fashioned violence. Well. More or less. Not particularly violent violence, but someone did die, so it still counts.

I’d like to feel that this strip answers the age-old question of why men have nipples. Obviously it’s so that we can utilize them as spray nozzles for cybernetic implants. I suppose you wouldn’t have to put acid in them. But really, given the option, why wouldn’t you?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Ah, sweet hubris. “Nah, that jokes not going anywhere. I’ll write it down later.” When I think of all the immature dick and poo jokes lost to the abyssal recesses of my mind and unshared with the world because I simply didn’t put pen to paper… Ah, no greater a tragedy can I see.

Do not listen to that little voice in your head that says you’ll remember something later. That voice? That voice is an asshole. Write shit down.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Get it? ‘Cause his dick is frozen to a pole. It’s a really bizzare, somewhat obtuse, and frankly disturbing dick joke.

Sorry. Weird week. Had do something quick and dirty (literally) so I wouldn’t miss my deadline. But! I am resolved to get my shit together. I will! I swear it! Soon.

Ish.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

And then they both get hit by a train. Or possibly Pinkie Pie. The SFX is somewhat flexible in that regard.

Yeah, I’ve been watching My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. Yeah, I thought it was pretty amazing. Yeah, I kinda had to get this out of my system. But hey, I got a Freakazoid reference in there, so I figure that oughta even things out for those readers who find ponies distasteful. And The Matrix.

Ah, who am I kidding. This is the Internet. If there’s one place I can be sure I can safely make a Friendship is Magic joke, it’s here.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Internet critics of the world, I poke fun at thee. Actually, I’m really a huge fan of The Spoony Experiment, The Cinema Snob, and some of the other “angry critics” of their ilk. I’m extremely impressed with their talent, ambition, and body of work. It’s an acerbic, violent sort of wit, but it’s how nerds of my generation make fun of things, so naturally I eat it up like fucking candy.

That will not, of course, prevent me from making fun of them. Comedy is a beast, and it must be fed.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Don’t mind me. Just working on some more ways to make with the funny. Obviously, we’re not there yet, but I’m certain we’ll get there eventually! I hope. Maybe.

Also, it’s amazing how many panels you can draw when you don’t include a background. And also let Photoshop do some of the heavy lifting. That said, I’m still experimenting and playing around with ways to construct this comic. Man, art is hard. They should, like, teach it in schools or something.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I know, sorry, another One-Panel Pun. I’m afraid it’s true. I am creatively bankrupt.

Nah, I just needed a quick and easy one to give me a little mental breathing room again. Was in a bit of a rut and didn’t have any proper jokes to tell. But I’ve turned that around now and I should have another normal strip next time. See you then!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Always wondered how pirates paid their rent or purchased sundries when they always seem to be burying their hard-won doubloons. This activity, performed by any other group of people, would be considered mental illness. But then, I suppose I shouldn’t expect good sense from people who consider wooden prosthetics fashionable accessories.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

She’s gotta be doing something with all those teeth, right?

Lucky for her, Golhorphaxz, Feaster of Bones isn’t a picky eater. Does raise another question, though. Where the hell is she getting the money she leaves behind?

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Based on a real conversation I had at work one day.

It was a really, really, really slow day at work.

When the question of “what super power” comes up, I’ve always found stuff like “flight” or “invisibility” to be dreadfully boring answers. Indeed, boring answers are perhaps the worst sin one can commit on this spinning little blue ball of ours. So whenever this topic comes up, I like to play dirty.

Strangely, I’ve noticed that on a long enough time line many people simply stop asking me questions.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Part of me wants to apologize for what I just did there. But only part of me. The rest of me is just happy to have gotten a comic done in time. Pushed this one a little later than I meant to. Writer’s block decided to move in and start eating everything in my fridge. Gonna see if I can’t at least get the little asshole to pay rent. In the meantime, you folks will have to make do with this one-panel pun.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Just playing around with some of the classics. Don’t mind me.

There’s a few little gaffs here and there in this one. For example, the detective on the left has his vest tucked in. I didn’t realize I’d done that until I started coloring the strip. Oh well! It’ll give me something to fix when I do the double deluxe super limited director’s cut edition of this strip when I collect Sketched Comedy into book form. Which will be happening sometime shortly after people start reading the strip. Which current projections put at… Um, 2073-ish. Hm. Anyone who preorders might be waiting on a while on that one.

But enough bitching about my art. While I kid that nobody is reading this thing, I do enjoy and appreciate all the feedback I’ve gotten from people thus far. Thanks for sticking with me as I stumble my way through the webcomic minefield. I promise to try and deliver a bi-weekly dose of random hilarity to brighten up your otherwise me-less existence. And feel free to send me your comments, compliments, and comminations by posting here, twitting towards @Fox_Barrett, or sending an e-mail to fox@sketched-comedy.com.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Can you really blame him? He’s a barbarian. He probably has some urgently needed shopping to do, and being a warrior tribesman ordained by Fate to do battle with the Forces of Evil does not pay well. Just look at his dad. And besides, it’ll probably all work itself out. Somehow. Eventually. Probably.

Look, they can find a new place to live, okay? Maybe even someplace less menaced by an unspeakable evil of terrifying power and fury. They should be thanking him, really. Upsetting the balance of power may very well be the best thing that’s ever happened to his fellow barbarians.

And besides… four hundred gold buys a lot of whores, people.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Nuff’ said.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Here we see illustrated the dangers of taking proverbs just a little too far.

So I’m experimenting with shadows a bit. Trying to make the art pop more. Long time watchers (hah!) will notice that this is why the art looks significantly less like ass than usual. This is primarily all Shadlyn’s fault, however. She’s a proper artist that does, like, paintings ‘n shit, so I’ve enlisted her aid on how shading should work. Among other things. Many… many… many other things… Oh, god… So many art things to learn.

So! If you like the less-ass-ness of Sketched Comedy, you can show your appreciation by reading Shadlyn’s novel, Moonstruck. If I actually manage to push any traffic her way (hah! x 2) it will make her feel good about herself, which in turn will make her more eager to help with my comic, which in turn will result in better art and jokes for you people. It might also help get me laid. Everybody wins. So go read Moonstruck. It can be found over here.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

This guy was always intended to be recurring. And so now he has recurred. Which, as a time traveler, is probably something that happens to him a lot. Dude does has a tendency to cavort about the timestream with nary a thought to his effect on causality. Y’know, what with him being a douchebag and all.

I suppose, in all fairness, that poor guy was gonna get hit by the Great Depression regardless of his financial investiture. Even banked his money wasn’t gonna be safe. Still. That was a pretty douchey thing to do, Brad.

Trying something new with the art. Maybe it works, maybe it don’t. We shall see.

For those of you reading this in the US: happy 4th of July. Yay for patriotism and stuff. For those of you not reading this in US: happy normal day that has absolutely nothing to do with the liberation of your country from the tyranny of taxation without representation. Yay for Google changing it’s banner image to celebrate something you probably couldn’t give less of a crap about.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Since the dawn of man, we have laughed at people falling down. So long as we continue to do so, all is right with the world. They day the banana peel joke no longer works is the day humanity is well and truly fucked.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Old people and guerrillas, together at last.

Yeah, not much to say this time around. I made a comic! It’s up there! I hope you enjoyed it. If you didn’t please return the unused portion for a full refund!

And now I’m gonna go to bed. I, ah, kinda forgot I had some stuff to do this weekend. Also, I got just a teensy, tiny, itty, bitty, really, amazingly, incredibly, plastered last weekend. So I had to rush this one together. Indeed, it’s only about 20 minutes to my midnight deadline. But you didn’t ask! And you don’t care! And it’s late enough that I’m not sure I’m even still making sense. So let’s move on, huh? My time go sleepy bed place now.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Based on a true story. That means something akin to the above hilarity did actually happen here in meatspace, but that I took a few liberties to expand the comedic potential. For example, I would never climb a rock wall with my hair down. That’s just silly. And thus, a comedic liberty I have taken with the story.

I will not comment on whether or not I actually fell on my ass after only going a foot up the wall.

I will, however, mention that I managed to screw up one my fingers a bit. That’s why Monday’s strip was just a really, really simple one-paneler. Looking at it now, my extremely underperforming mutant healing factor seems to have kicked in and I have retained full use of my hand. And that would be why you got this seven panel monstrosity. Lucky you.

That actual quality of the art, however, remains wholly the result of my innate abilities, and is in no way a reflection of the (thankfully temporary) damage that my hand sustained. No matter how much I wish it were otherwise.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I went rock climbing this weekend, and as such am in a great deal of pain. Though the magic of my artwork, I have decided to share this pain with you in the form of a visual pun. You’re welcome.

With any luck I’ll have a proper strip up next Thursday for your enjoyment. For now I’m going to go lie on the floor whimper incoherently while the skin on my hands regenerates. For I have known Hell, and it is filled with rocks.

The truest sign of my all-encompassing madness, however, is that I’m already thinking about when I want to go again. Help me.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Bam. Menstruation joke and a dick joke in the same comic. Achievement unlocked, baby. And now that I’ve proven that this strip can be violent, weird, and crass, I can comfortably retire, secure in the knowledge that I’ve covered all bases with this little art project of mine.

This is great! Freed from the obligation of Sketched Comedy, I’ll finally have plenty of time to… Um… Work on… Um… Uh…

Fuck.

See you Monday!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

While most women are attracted to shiny objects because they use them to decorate the intricate nests they build in chimneys, gutters, and highway overpasses, I find that diamonds are typically put to more nefarious purposes. Please keep this in mind if your fiancé is insistent on a diamond engagement ring.

The real question here, of course, is why a bank robber with a genuine super power is hanging out with a dude that looks like the Hamburglar. Maybe they met over the Internet with some internet dating service for super villains. I can only imagine what that first conversation must have been like.

“I thought you had a melt gun or something! Y’know, so we’d have this whole ‘fire and ice’ theme.”

“No, but see, I’m The Burglar. I burgle.”

“Ugh, God, whatever, let’s just go.”

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Hope ya like words. If you’re very good and eat all your vegetables, I might just include some art with Monday’s strip. Now, be good and share this with all your little friends.

With E3 going on and the big reveal that Nintendo’s new console was going to be called the “Wii U,” I very briefly considered trying to make a joke about unbelievably fucking silly the name Wii U is for a product. But I’ll be honest, after having this many years with something called a Wii in my house – and that thing not being, in actuality, a penis – I’m sort of numb to pointing out the absurdity of it all. I can do naught by facepalm. And, of course, point to the obligatory Perry Bible Fellowship comic.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

And now it’s time for some art. See? This can be a classy webcomic. It doesn’t always have to be violence and poo jokes. Sometimes it can be a trio of parodies based on an 80-year-old painting by some Belgian dude. High concept stuff, this. Classy.

Also really easy to draw. Which, to be honest, is important to me. It allows me to be lazy. To spend more of my days goofing off. Playing video games. Writing sentence fragments. What have you.

Um, it should also be noted that I failed French in high school. So, y’know… don’t put too much stock in my translations up there.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Sometimes you need say something that speaks to human condition. You need to put together a piece of art that helps people better understand the world around them and their place in it. You need to make art – proper art – that enriches us all.

And sometimes you need to tell a joke about a man in a shark costume getting hit with a harpoon.

This is one of those times.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

This is the place where I try to put some funny words, but I’m kinda rushed today, so we’ll skip the clever stuff and just go straight to the punchline. I mean, nobody’s reading this anyway, right? So, without further ado:

Cocks, doodie, fart, and… pfft, let’s go with humdinger. That one always sounded dirty to me.

And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got to dash out the door to go see Brentalfloss live. Woo!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I have not as yet seen Pirates o’ da Cari’been 4 just yet, but I’m certain it’ll find its way in front of me soon enough. For those of you that have, please enjoy this pirate-based joke. Come to think of it, I suppose those of you who have not seen On Stranger Tides yet can also enjoy it. Perhaps in lieu of seeing the movie, even. My comic is certainly cheaper, and if you don’t like it, at least it’s over quickly.

Uuuuh, oh! Actual news! So my sister pointed out this nifty thing some nice Swedish people are doing called Flattr. The short version is that it lets you set up this little account that you pay a little cash into. Then, you go around to websites that ya like and you “flattr” them. At the end of the month, the money you paid in gets divvied up even among all the things you flattered. Cool, huh? Well, I thought so. Anyway, I’ve got a Flattr button up now because… well, because I’m a greedy whore who wants of all your money so he can swim around in it all Scrooge McDuck style.

That’s not to try an be all presumptuous about my art. There’s a very good reason Sketched Comedy is, y’know, free. Still, I figure there’s no harm it putting it out there, right? You can click it or not, I shan’t begrudge you. But the idea looked cool and, well, it seems classier than a raw PayPal button just hanging on the page. (Which is what I will continue to think right up until I get around to putting up that PayPal link I’ve been meaning to add…)

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

And more robots! Or more robot, at any rate. I like robots. Yay.

Eeeeh, and that’s it. Sorry, I’m just not feelin’ it today. I’ve got nothing to ramble about, so… No rant for you!

(Actually, I’m cutting this short because I haven’t been feeling well and I’m headachey and blah and nobody gives a shit about any of that and I didn’t want to sit here and whine on the Internet about Poor Little Me and now I’ve gone on longer than I intended and well I guess you did get a rant-like thing after all and stuff.)

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Yeah, I’ve never really bought into the whole “things were better when blah was blah back in derp derp derp.” Typically, that’s just short hand for “things were better for my group specifically, and now things aren’t actually any worse for me beyond the fact that I’m slightly inconvenience by how much better it is for these other people.” Well, that, and a heavy dose of what Wayne’s World had to say about change.

Caveat: if you lived during the Dark Ages, then… okay, yeah. Things were probably a bit better before then. But that’s- wait, okay, I suppose if you were a Jew living in 1940s Germany… okay, yeah. Things were probably a bit better before then, too. Look, what I’m trying to say is that unless people are being burned alive when previously they were not being immolated so, then you should probably shut the fuck up.

And hey, it’s this guy, back by popular demand! Which is to say, a couple people said they liked the robot. And that just has to pass for “popular demand” around here.

Actually, I always wanted to bring the little guy back. I just like the idea of a cylinder with a boxing glove arm exacting petty vengeance upon people. Will we see ‘im s’more? Mmm, I suppose that depends entirely on just how funny violence remains in the coming days.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Originally I thought about drawing a strip with a cat tossing a cigarette out a car window. A kitty littering, if you will. However, I needed a reference to draw it, and do you have any idea how hard it is to get a cat to smoke?

Man, I haven’t had plan backfire that badly since I tried to teach babies to skateboard. Well, since I put a baby on a skateboard. Well… tied a baby to a skateboard, if you want to get really technical about it.

Um. Anyway. Kitties!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Yup. Video games. I’m angling for the big times, baby! I’m gonna be the next big thing! Making comics about video games is like a fucking license to print money on the Internet. Few more of these babies and I’ll finally be able to afford that hip replacement. Oh, there’s nothing wrong with my hip. I’ve just decided that that’s my Rich Guy Eccentricity. Random hip replacements.

Aaaaaanyway. I’m not sure exactly which iteration of the Legend of Zelda that’s supposed to be. The text is like Ocarina, but the key is not unlike Zelda the first. And his outfit is like an amalgam of Adult Link and Young link. And since when do you find shit on pedestals? Treasure comes in chests! But then, hey, since when is Zelda about continuity, am I right, fellas? Huh? Huh?

(And now a rant about Zelda! -ed.) Seriously, though, I swear to god that if anyone says the phrase “dual timeline theory” again I will cut a bitch; I’m not even kidding. They’re self-contained, people. We must accept this, lest we find ourselves cast adrift in the nerdy abyss of trying to make fourteen and a half disjointed stories about a magical, sword-wielding elf who saves an imaginary kingdom from an evil gypsy sorcerer pig-man fit into neat, tidy rows. Sometimes you simply must cut your losses.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Sex, violence, and rock & roll. Gotta love a strip that covers all the bases.

I’ve added a StumbleUpon button to the website in an effort to help drive a little more traffic for my humble home of humorification. If you like what you see, stumble it! Or don’t! Do what you like! Live your own life, free from the constraints placed upon you by others!

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Situation: I have been watching a lot of Scrubs on Netflix’s Watch Instantly. Result: You get a joke about doctors.

Wanna take a moment here to thank my dearest Shadlyn for helping me with this stuff. It’s nice to have another head to bounce ideas off of, but mostly, well… she’s an artist. Like, a proper artist. So I’m constantly asking her for advice on how to draw this or that.

Boobs, for example. Boobs are hard to draw.

And now that I’ve gotten to write the word “boobs” twice (three times, now!), I feel I should use my remaining space to plug something of Shadlyn’s. Well, there’s her blog Practically Creative. It’s about philosophy, minimalism, creative pursuits, and stuff. And there’s her Etsy store. It has pretty paintings. There. Two links for two boobs.

And that makes four times. It’s been a good day.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

Violence, mean-spirited humor, a grieving family… what more could a joke possibly want?

Well, some better art would be nice. I mean, everyone gets that those multicolored tube-things in panel 2 are the snakes from the surprise-snake-in-a-can gag, right? I mean, we’re all working with a humor base that originates from the fucking 70s, right? Okay, cool. Just making sure we’re on the same page.

Speaking of which, quick shout out to my friend Dan over at Manifest Destiny. He has moved to a new URL, having quickly and quietly vacated ComicFury to forge his own destiny. We wish him all the best. (By “we,” I of course mean myself and the screaming Martian cavemen that live inside my brain.) Please, go read his webcomic. It’s quite, quite good.

And then come back and read this one some more. Please? If not for me, then for the children.

Ads by Project Wonderful! Your ad here, right now: $0

I mean, honestly, what else could it be? There’s just no other explanation for it. It’s logic, really.