I remember their first appearance being random, and not really meshing well with what was happening up until that point. I forgot just how odd this all seems at first.
Something that always kinda bugged me is how we’re supposed to see Mrs. Walkerton’s (supposed) complete Martian genocide as a horrible, horrible thing, and not think twice about the thoughtless murder of countless Aliens throughout the comic–in spite of the Aliens having distinct personalities and being smaller threats on an individual level than the Martians.
Don’t get me wrong, there’s plenty of moral ambiguity throughout the comic–hell, the murder of Joyce’s clone has repercussions, something I didn’t think would happen when the storyline initially ended–but I feel like the Alien mooks got a raw deal.
With fictional characters, the murder of sentient beings is perfectly acceptable if they are obnoxious.
Imagine a small child being put through a woodchipper. Horrifying, right? You’d never want such a thing to happen, even in a work of fiction. Now imagine the child in question is Scrappy Doo. Suddenly it is a laudable deed, and hilarious to boot.
Horror movies are based entirely on this premise, to make you root for the villain. Those annoying drunk frat boys and bitchy sluts? Dogmeat. The nice girl? Survives. Practically guaranteed.
That’s because you’re thinking about it the wrong way. They are constantly getting the heroes’ attention because they WANT to die. The Alien mooks are not very bright, overworked, are given jobs that even they don’t understand, and their leader only keeps them around in order to fuel his own ego. They are already dead inside, and only the idea of sweet release from the protagonists keeps them going.
I think it was more that the Aliens being important coincided with the comic’s Cerebus syndrome, and that coupled with a shift away from the comics’ leads turned people off.
TV Tropes defines Cerebus Syndrome as “a Tone Shift towards Dramedy over the course of a comedy series’ run, named for the process undergone by the print comic Cerebus the Aardvark. It’s any story/series which starts out light, episodic, and comedic, and then assumes dramatic elements and a more coherent continuity.”
See also the definition over at Websnark (where it was coined) and the definition of First and Ten Syndrome on the same page.
The short version is: When a non-serious work takes a turn for the serious.
The long version is: Apparently there was a comic called Cerebus that started as a Conan the Barbarian parody. Then the creator shifted it into a more dramatic series. Then the creator had a nervous breakdown from the overwork and his comic began reflecting that.
Cerebus is (in)famous for starting out as a light comedy before becoming much more dramatic and serious. (It’s also infamous for its aggressively anti-feminist views, but that’s not what the syndrome is referring to.)
While Roomies!/It’s Walky! never dropped comedy entirely it began asking us to take the characters and their plights far more seriously, which got it accusations of Cerebus syndrome leveled at it continuously for most of it’s run starting around when Ruth showed up. (Appropriate, seeing as Cerebus also started getting serious relatively early.)
Basically, it means that a originally lighthearted series gets a more and more serious tone. You can check tvtropes.org for a more detailed explanation.
Thanks for all the responses. I had no idea Cerebus started off as a comedic series. Form all I’ve heard, I thought it was a very serious work centered on the authors perceptions of gender relation.
I know one person who didn’t like the shift from Collage-stuff to Sci-fi stuff. I’m guessing that the problem was less the Sci-fi stuff itself (she doesn’t have a problem with that sort of things usually) but the rather clumsy shift.
Eh, this is just the same ‘kookyzany’ that every late-90s college webcomic is required to had. I’m sure the author will drop it for perfectly mundane college-appropriate hijinks within 15 years or so. No worries!
Extreme technological prowess. He showed it incredibly often, from creating a glider out of a scooter and a ping-pong table in Roomies! Redux to building Ultra-Car with no high-tech resources whatsoever in It’s Walky!. In fact his job at SEMME for quite some time was assisting Doc and building mechs. His brilliance was a big part of Dina’s feelings of inadequacy character arc.
A popular fan theory back in the day said Joe had enhanced pheromones, but I don’t think that was ever canon.
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I remember their first appearance being random, and not really meshing well with what was happening up until that point. I forgot just how odd this all seems at first.
I didn’t know they had names, I just thought they were random anonymous mooks. I’m sorry Fred and Stan.
People named Stan deserve everything they get.
That explains all the goings-on in South Park.
Like when Shawn Michaels hit Sweet Chin Music?
“You see that? I JUST KICKED STAN!”
Dammit, I was hoping to set up someone pointing out I have ‘stan’ in my name, so I could say, “Bah, I’m worth three of any Stan you care to name.”
Once again, the internet has failed my stupidly obscure sense of humour!
Something that always kinda bugged me is how we’re supposed to see Mrs. Walkerton’s (supposed) complete Martian genocide as a horrible, horrible thing, and not think twice about the thoughtless murder of countless Aliens throughout the comic–in spite of the Aliens having distinct personalities and being smaller threats on an individual level than the Martians.
Don’t get me wrong, there’s plenty of moral ambiguity throughout the comic–hell, the murder of Joyce’s clone has repercussions, something I didn’t think would happen when the storyline initially ended–but I feel like the Alien mooks got a raw deal.
With fictional characters, the murder of sentient beings is perfectly acceptable if they are obnoxious.
Imagine a small child being put through a woodchipper. Horrifying, right? You’d never want such a thing to happen, even in a work of fiction. Now imagine the child in question is Scrappy Doo. Suddenly it is a laudable deed, and hilarious to boot.
Horror movies are based entirely on this premise, to make you root for the villain. Those annoying drunk frat boys and bitchy sluts? Dogmeat. The nice girl? Survives. Practically guaranteed.
That’s because you’re thinking about it the wrong way. They are constantly getting the heroes’ attention because they WANT to die. The Alien mooks are not very bright, overworked, are given jobs that even they don’t understand, and their leader only keeps them around in order to fuel his own ego. They are already dead inside, and only the idea of sweet release from the protagonists keeps them going.
Guess what, Joe!
This is going to bite you in the ass later. *Grinning*
Wow. To think you were already planning It’s Walky at this early stage…
Maybe he wasn’t, but later took the idea and ran with it. Or merged it with an older one that he wanted to do
Didn’t I read some comments from SP! or DoA that people were actually turned off by the comic because of the aliens?
Or am I remembering something that wasn’t real?
I think it was more that the Aliens being important coincided with the comic’s Cerebus syndrome, and that coupled with a shift away from the comics’ leads turned people off.
What’s a Cerebus syndrome? I ask as someone who never read more then a few pages of a cerebus comic…
TV Tropes defines Cerebus Syndrome as “a Tone Shift towards Dramedy over the course of a comedy series’ run, named for the process undergone by the print comic Cerebus the Aardvark. It’s any story/series which starts out light, episodic, and comedic, and then assumes dramatic elements and a more coherent continuity.”
See also the definition over at Websnark (where it was coined) and the definition of First and Ten Syndrome on the same page.
You linked to TV Tropes…
The short version is: When a non-serious work takes a turn for the serious.
The long version is: Apparently there was a comic called Cerebus that started as a Conan the Barbarian parody. Then the creator shifted it into a more dramatic series. Then the creator had a nervous breakdown from the overwork and his comic began reflecting that.
Cerebus is (in)famous for starting out as a light comedy before becoming much more dramatic and serious. (It’s also infamous for its aggressively anti-feminist views, but that’s not what the syndrome is referring to.)
While Roomies!/It’s Walky! never dropped comedy entirely it began asking us to take the characters and their plights far more seriously, which got it accusations of Cerebus syndrome leveled at it continuously for most of it’s run starting around when Ruth showed up. (Appropriate, seeing as Cerebus also started getting serious relatively early.)
Basically, it means that a originally lighthearted series gets a more and more serious tone. You can check tvtropes.org for a more detailed explanation.
And yeah, it’s going to hit in HARD.
Thanks for all the responses. I had no idea Cerebus started off as a comedic series. Form all I’ve heard, I thought it was a very serious work centered on the authors perceptions of gender relation.
I know one person who didn’t like the shift from Collage-stuff to Sci-fi stuff. I’m guessing that the problem was less the Sci-fi stuff itself (she doesn’t have a problem with that sort of things usually) but the rather clumsy shift.
Stan is very important later on.
Sure hope that duct tape isn’t important 15 years from now.
Eh, this is just the same ‘kookyzany’ that every late-90s college webcomic is required to had. I’m sure the author will drop it for perfectly mundane college-appropriate hijinks within 15 years or so. No worries!
Joe’s left arm is stuck to his shirt. The aliens are clearly not very adroit with duct tape.
It doesn’t matter, so long as the duct tape is attached somewhere his arm’s useless.
“Joe’s been abducted by aliens:” is probably the greatest non sequitur in webcomic history.
So wait…does Joe have any abductee powers?
I can’t remember him ever showing any.
Extreme technological prowess. He showed it incredibly often, from creating a glider out of a scooter and a ping-pong table in Roomies! Redux to building Ultra-Car with no high-tech resources whatsoever in It’s Walky!. In fact his job at SEMME for quite some time was assisting Doc and building mechs. His brilliance was a big part of Dina’s feelings of inadequacy character arc.
A popular fan theory back in the day said Joe had enhanced pheromones, but I don’t think that was ever canon.
The Potential destroyer’s of Mankind everyone!
it was about here that i started thinking to myself “its only paranoia if you’re wrong”….then i got to the last panel. i was wrong.
“Tenticalled” = Proof that Joe’s been skipping English class.
Originally posted:
October 20, 1997