Did You "Get" the Jokes?

A lot of my comics are kind of weird, and would make a lot more sense if I could just explain them a little. Others have little details or sub jokes that aren't very obvious that I want people to notice. So, I decided to make an annotated strip archive, where hopefully all your questions can be answered. I'mnot done yet, and I know the last few links look kind of bad without anny annotations, but it'll be fixed soon.

Spring Semester, 2000

203- Combat Program
It isn't hard to build a robot, we've had the technology for decades. The problem is the programming. There isn't much good software for robots, I don't think they can even get two arms to coordinate well, let alone a anthopomorphic construction with 30+ degrees of freedom. Of course a Dreamcast couldn't handle the calculations, but I was thinking that a very large amount of programming efforts are made in the realm of video games. So here, Exoth is making use of that programming to drive his robot armies. Of course, he doesn't get quite what he wants, but that doesn't keep him from making the best of the situation. Also I wanted to draw a killer robot dancing like Parrapa, and to say "Deathmatch Death-thousand".
204- Anti-Theft Device
This one should have been four panels. Just because, there's no change in expression to match the chnge in Chappy's mood when he realizes he can fight Robocop. Notice the shading and detail in the vending machine. That pissed me off. As usual, the buisinessman's name is Business Mann. By the way, Robocop was what I thought when I noticed the "anti-theft device statement on vending machines.
205- Get out of Jail pt. I
There's not much to be said about this one. We see some more of Officer Death, the cyborg policeman, directly after a comic about Robocop. Notice how Exoth is wholly unrepentant, and in fact speaks sarcastically.
206- Get out of Jail pt.II
The same thing again. The joke in this one is that Chappy still hasn't realized that monopoly rules do not apply to actual jail. Of course, Beireia wants him to go back to jail, but since he can get out so easily, there's not much to be gained.
207- The Atomic Bum
Another pun-inspired comic. I like the idea of a homeless superhero. How does Tatanya know what plutonium smells like? I guess you should be asking me. Actually, now that I think about it, plutonium oxide is really poisonous, in addition to emmiting deadly ionizing radiation. What do you thing of my pictorial representation of silent, invisible gamma rays? It's stupid to do, but I need to show it somehow. In cartoons, radiation is always green. If you actually look at the core of a nuclear reactor, it glows blue, because of the water curving the path of the beta particles. Whenever you accelerate a charged particle, a photon is emitted, in this case the wavelength is that of a specific shade of blue. It's quite pretty, not at all what you'd expect from scary old nuclear power.
208- Journey to the Underground City
There actually is an underground city under UT. It is really used for maintenance, ostensibly at least. Beireia is a treasure hunter, which comes up again later. I don't know why she'd go underground if she wasn't expecting to see any treasure.
209- More Deception
Exoth plays more stupid jokes on Beireia. If you look at Tatanya's Robot disguise in the second panel, you should notice the masklike quality. Exoth and Beireia's faces look bad in that panel, also. I still can't do that angle well.
210- Extreme Snowboarding
Why are the symbols for HOV lanes, bike lanes, and expert level ski slopes all the same? Are we that uncreative? I suppose I could do the reverse of this, and have a minivan barrelling down a snowy mountain. Once is enough, though. I guess this strip makes Tatanya a murderer as well, or at least an involuntary manslaughter-er. Everyone seems pretty okay with it.
303- Fortune Cookie Fun
Jeff Young, of Buffman fame, and I were eating at a korean restaurant and decided to both do fortune cookie strips the next day. I followed through, but something came up and he couldn't. At least not that day. Once again, rather than make a character design for a waitress, I just stole someone else's character.
212- The Other Part of Natural Selection
The Ninja Professor is always going on about natural selection. But there's more to it than just not getting killed, you also have to pass on your genes. So the assignment should be for the students to all go out and get laid, but he has instead turned it to his own advantage.
213- Tranquilizer Dart
After the last one, this strip was inevitable. Fortunately, the Ninja Professor has some scruples. You may have noticed that using a blowgun at that range is totally pointless. Nevertheless, poison darts come out of blowguns, as we all know. If you notice Beireia's scarf, that's because it was February, and I wanted to make some concession to the weather. Chappy does not feel cold, of course, so it was up to Beireia.
214- Meditation
This one was meant to be a time saver, since I only had to draw one panel. As it turned out, however, I spent a lot of time on it, maybe more than if I had just drawn a regular one. Panel copying is only helpful if you don't need to change anything, or if you've been doing a lot of it. The design for a ninja house is based on one episode of ChaCha where they go to Orrin's house.
215- Conclusion
I like to think that this is one of my few comics that is actually funny, not just weird. I'm probably flattering myself, though. I almost forgot to change Chappy's clothes. No time passed for me.
216- Y? Because we hate you.
Exoth shares my love for crappy jokes. So does the sherrif amoeba. Not many other people.
217- The Sadistic Theory of Humor
This is an actual theory that I use. I'lll tell some stupid joke, and people will be confused, since jokes should be funny. But it was, just not to them. I laugh at their discomfort, caused by my stupid joke. Also, I wanted to congratulate myself for not making any Y2K jokes up to this point, despite the temptation. So I did.. by telling some stupid Y2K jokes.
218- Exoth's rival returns
This guy makes another appearance. We see that he is an inferior inventor to Exoth, and I get to mention the Car Eating Robot again. All in all, this isn't much of a comic. The delivery is weak, especially the last panel.
219- We all scream for ice cream
It's true, we really DO all scream for ice cream. It's so good and cold and sweet. Notice that the sherrif is getting in on the screaming action. I like that Victor Banana is so willing to inflict pain upon himself to stop Chappy and Tatanya
220- Robotic Robot
Exoth's rival notices that he has been lagging behind, and decides to do something about it. While getting an assistant would probably be a big help, the decision to make it a robotic version of Exoth's assistant seems to be a poor one, from every angle. The real reason for his decision is synchronicity between the universe of the Irritability comic and the Irritability story. Read the Irritablity story.
221- Robotic Robot attacks!
Well, not so much he attacks, as he continues to exist. This is one of my favorites, I think the idea is pretty good, and the execution for once does not lag behind. Exoth likes to stir up trouble for his own amusement, notice how disappointed he is that Robot fails to react aggressively.
222- Car thief
I've often seen a guy in a car I wanted, and thought about how easy it would be to punch him, and drag him out the window. Then I'd have a car for about three minutes until the cops caught up with me. Of course Chappy doesn't have this problem, since the cops are all afraid of him. In the original, I had spelled thief differently from one panel to the next. One of the texan's guys noticed this, and I was embarrased.
223- Beireia's cat
Looking at some flyers hoping to locate a missing animal, I wondered at their sincerity. How do I know that they own this creature? they could just be trying to acquire a free pet. Except for the reward ones, I guess. Anyway, that's how I came up with the plan. Notice that Chappy has scratches all over him, since the cat does not know him.
224- Mediation
This one is of course based on two diferent accounts of king Solomon's solution to the disputed child dillema. I couldn't decide on one, so I combined the two. I got a hate mail from some foolish person over this. They claimed to be an animal lover, and that they had some objection to the suggestion of a cat's demise. Now, I've had numerous graphic depictions of the deaths of people, none of which ellicited a response from this person. That the lives of animals would be held in such higher regard by someone than those of their fellow humans is repugnant to me.
225- Chappy vs. Giant Plankton
This is one of those comics that I like, but probably noone else does. The joke, you see, is that a giant plankton might still be quite small, as plankton are microscopic in their usual size.
226- France
The echelon project is a real one, and France really tried to sue us over it, allegedly. My reaction to hearing about this was the same as Chappy's. If those froggies have a problem, they can make their own internet. There are a number of Canadian sites I like, so I guess they could complain, but as far as I know, France has contributed nothing. che.
227- Pick a hand
Here is the classic no-win situation. This poor guy is gonna get it either way. Do you remember Willow? The succession to the villaige wizard was decided by a similar problem. This comic also shows that the world of Irritability is inhabited by more extraordinary people than just Chappy, Exoth, and co. There's also random guy with telepathy.
228- Chappy is a pro wrestler
I don't know why Chappy would want to have a little kid as his manager. Here she's got him wrestling Starro in the Pawtucket, NJ civic center. I forgot to point out the location in the actual comic. It's important to illustrating the insignificance of venue, and therefore, the inadequacy of Tatanya's managerial skills.
229- Genetic Engineering is bad, Exoth is worse
This comic held the esteemed title of "longest title in an irritability comic" for a while, I suppose it has been surpassed by now. I kind of like it, but there's not much to say. The idea for the Cow/Chicken comes from an actual genetic engineering protester, featured on the Daily Show. I have no idea what his/her motivations were. Are they against technology in general? do they advocate living in caves and eating raw meat? I guess I don't care.
230- Lego my Egggo!
Since the beginning of time, I'v hated these stupid commercials. Especially the one where grandma moves faster than light to get the eggo before the rest of her family. Why can't these damn people just wait their turn? or get a four slice toaster, if they really have that subhumanly low a level of self control. I like legos a lot, though.
231- Beware the Idiots of March!
I had to go to the public library and get a picture book on rome from the kids section for the picture of caesar. It also took a long time to draw all these people. Looking back at this, I'm a little disturbed. Involving kids in a sport killing isn't morally ambiguaous, it's quite clearly bad. It's not like this was the first time I've done something bad in the comic, though.
232- Two Caesars
I liked this one as well as the one before it. Both caesars were pretty funny to me. Whose room are they in, though? I drew my younger brother's dorm room, since that was the only place I played crazy taxi, but it doesn't fit into the comic at all. Neither Chappy nor Exoth have a bunk bed.
- If you lived in a ditch
Those advertisements are pretty dumb, I think. Obviously you'd be home now if you lived wherever you happen to be when you read that. That doesn't mean anything, it says nothing good about the place of residence. Neither Chappy nor Exoth are willing to lift a finger to prevent a car wreck. Chappy's wrists look broken in the last panel. His arms are too long, also.
234- La Nina
This is a pretty dated joke already. I mainly did this comic to have an excuse to change Tatanya's wardrobe. Now she has her own clothes, which makes things a little more complicated. I originally had some "It was the prize in a cereal box" type joke planned, but went with this instead.
235- The evil Mr. Frog
This is pretty obviously derivative of those Calvin and Hobbes comics where he's playing tea party or house or whatever with susie, and they seem to disagree wildly as to the rules of the game. If I had had more time, I would have used a more ominous font for mister frog's speech. Chappy seems to be enjoying himself, which I guess should be no surprise. He is rather childish.
236- The cure for cancer
This is kind of an Oscar the grouch type joke. Robot is scolded for doing something good, when he is payed to advance the cause of evil. The headlines on Exoth's paper read: Exoth finds cure for cancer, keeps to self. below that: "what a bastard!" and on the back page: lazy assistant moves boxes.
237- Mike Harnish's switch day strip
Well, If I ever track this one down, I'll write an annotation for it.
238- Beireia moves in
I can't remember why I wanted Beireia to move in with the Bananas. I also can't decide if that was a good decision or not. On one hand, it's easier to fit her into events plausibly, and the comic flows a lot better, but on the other hand, ever since this event, the comic has moved more and more toward polarization into the Chappy camp and the Exoth camp, with the two interacting only rarely. "Salt Town" is what the gangstaz call Galveston.
239- An Elephant Never Forgets
I had a lot of trouble trying to make an onomonopaeia (my spelling isn't too hot normally, but I think I just topped myself) word for an elephant's trumpet. This strip looks pretty ugly to me now.
240- Superhero Attack no. 2
This guy is, of course, based on the marvel comics character daredevil. Did anyone ever try this on daredevil? It seems like extra sensitive hearing could easily be as big an disadvantage as an advantage, if your enemies knew about it. So far, this is the only type of formula joke in irritability.
241- Scary Larry sees a UFO
This one is pretty bad. Except for the little frog with fangs and a cape. He rules.
242- Chappy Sees a UFO
I like Beireia's skepticism in the face of all evidence. One might also wonder why Chappy brought back the alien corpses, and stored them in Tatanya's room. If you played X-com, you'd know. That's just something alien hunters do.
243- Give Blood!
Christ, how many blood drive comics have I made? I recently came up with the script for one where Ourorya's coat is at the cleaners, so he wants one of the free T shirts because he's cold. The guy says, hey you need to give blood to take those, Ourorya cuts himself and bleeds all over the place, the guy freaks out, Ourorya assumes he hasn't given enough blood, so cuts himself deeper and bleeds some more. It was unnecessary, though, since both blood drive humor and self mutilation humor are quite thoroughly represented elsewhere in the comic.
244- Exoth's Ultimate Weapon
In the end, if a weapon has too much power, it's useless, because you can't use it. Unless, of course, you're totally prepared to die, as Exoth is. I'm actually kind of surprised I haven't ever seen the PeRFeC idea in sci-fi stuff before. Did my explanation make sense? basically it induces the big crunch.
245- Everyone's Dead!
Hell was fun to draw, but I had no Idea how to draw the devil. So I drew Exoth, only slightly different, thus implying that the two share some common origins. The other characters are not surprised, to the point of not even commenting on it.
246- Chappy Enters Business World, Hell
This is more synchronicity with the Irritability story. I wanted to make Chappy's business outfit look like Ryu from street fighter. Then I wanted to draw hell again, so I did.
247- Another Stupid Monopoly Joke
This is probably the best example of 'third panel syndrome', where I start a comic with no clear idea how to finish it, and end up grafting something else entirely onto the previous two. I like this one, though. The radical tooth reminds me of stickers the dentist giezes you when you're a kid. Or I should say 'were', I guess.
248- Look out for land mines
This one was easy to draw, and is kind of funny. I meticulously drew a detailed plume of smoke, but it looked too wimpy, so I put a big sharpie scribble over it, thinking it would look realistic enough. It doesn't, but that's okay, I guess. Do landmines even give off smoke?
249- Freeloaders
My favorite part of this is the bit where Ionil's words bounce off Chappy's head. I like treating word balloons as physical objects, even if that's not entirely original. Beireia's wearing something uncharacteristic here, I must have ssen it in a magazine or something. It's pretty hard for me to decise what the girls are going to be wearing, if I haven't mentioned that before.
250- Ebola virus
Do the Bananas really look sick here? I drew Tatanya's hair more straight, with less body, so to speak, which seems ot have worked. But I'm not sure why this implication is so. Does the sickness prevent them from shampooing their hair? The only part of this comic I really like is Victor's line in the third panel. I guess I like the whole improbability of it, too. How do they know they've got ebola if their just lying around in the living room? They probably just have the flu. Oh, and Plotcebo is the film group that made RFKB2.
251- My brother's guest comic 1
My younger brother, Matt, did some comics for me, all about this Ant-Man fellow, a bipedal ant in shakespeare garb. The inspiration for this character is a villain in G-force, or gatchaman, or whatever. The villain, of course, was a bipedal ant in shakespeare garb.
252- My brother's guest comic 2
See 'My brother's guest comic 1'
253- Reverse psychology cartooning?
I drew this one using a different technique than usual. Each panel was about 8x11", and it was drawn using a sharpie. This allowed me to be much more sloppy than usual, so it got done quite quickly. The haste with which it was thrown together, however, is evident in the quality of the writing, unfortunately.

Fall Semester, 2000

295- Back 2 Skool
I was a little dissappointed with this one, because there was a lot I wanted to do with it that I didn't get to. It's not really clear that little kid Chappy is taking the other kid's lunch money, and I wanted to draw the teacher as a ninja, a different one from the ninja professor. also, I don't think it's clear that Tatanya isn't going to school because all her pencils are the inferior number three variety, rather than the required number two.
296- Roughing it
The inspiration for this one was a camping trip I went on right before I drew this. We drove up to Colorado, slept in bear-resistant sleeing bags, built fires and cooked our own food. It was a lot of fun, so I wanted to draw a comic about it. I figured Chappy would probably have a hard time building a useful campfire, despite his pyrokinesis.
297- Ninja Professor again
Theoretically, Chappy should have different professors every semester. It's pretty unlikely that you'd get one guy every single time. But I wanted to stick with the ninja professor, so I made this strip to justify it a little. In the first panel, Chappy's shirt says: "Avada Cadavera", and in the last panel, his backpack has spikes on it, just like mine. The ninja technique thing is totally extraneous, I just wanted to play around with drawing shadows, and the professor hadn't done any ninja-ish things in a while, so there you go.
298- Review
The name says it all. For the benefit of freshmen reading the strip for the first time, I drew a very short character review so my readers would be able to follow the comic.
299- Addendum to the review
And... I forgot Scary Larry in the review, and I felt bad about it, even though he isn't real... so I drew this one to make up for it.
300- The third only color Irritablity strip ever
Coloring is not one of my strong points, and I think this strip exemplifies that. I like the first panel, but in the second, I used purple for the haze hat outlines them, when I should have used black. That looks pretty bad, I think. As does the blue-white-yellow gradient I used in the third panel. I should have used clouds of dust for the background.
301- Tatanya gets a job
Uhh.. There's not much to say about this one. If you'll notice, this and the color one are part of the "Beat up Chappy and Exoth Inc." storyline, in that they establish that both Tatanya and Beireia are looking for jobs.
302- Beat up Chappy and Exoth Inc.
For jobs, it's always best to do something you love. I also think that some sort of organization to hold those two accountable for all the trouble they've caused would inevitably form. This is the longest storyline In Irritability, since it also includes the "Beireias's Quest" comics.
303- Chappy reveals his strength
You should never tell your enemies what your weaknesses are, but you should never tell them what won't hurt you either. I didn't have anything for Tatanya to do or say in the last panel, so I just had her throwing up the deuce. By the way, the Javelin antitank missile Beireia has is a real system. It's made by Raytheon, and it's fire and forget... but you don't really care, do you?
304- Exoth narrowly avoids death
It's very difficult to get the better of Exoth, the only effective way is to use his self destructive nature. If you can see, Exoth is flipping them off in the monitor in the third panel.
305- Beadazzled!
I wasn't sure if everyone would know what a Beadazzler is, so I'll explain here. It's this dumb thing they have ads for on really late night TV, it puts beads on to fabric, and costs $49.95, presumably. Also, I like how Exoth is quite clearly NOT a tarbaby in the first panel. If you can't read it, Tatanya's shirt says "kick me". The reason she can't just change her shirt is because she doesn't have any. She wears her dad's shirts.
306- Death of Head Leg
The point of head leg is to be a frankenstein's monster sort of creature, leading a cursed life full of suffering and anguish. He's a character that I sadistically heap misfortune upon. Universally despised, and possessing an almost worthless body, I thought giving him a meager lifespan would top it all off nicely. But I ended up bringing him back.
307- Mardak, Dark Pigeon of Chaos
There actually was a dark pigeon of chaos on campus once. Just by looking at him, you could tell Apocalypse was right around the corner. So I drew this comic.
308- Raised by Otters
My brother gave me the idea for this. We don't really have an eating area in my apartment, so I just put the plate on my lap and sit in a chair. But that time I was in the recliner, almost lying down, so I looked like an otter, apparently. (Otters eat by putting clams and such on their belly and smashing them open with a rock.)
309- +3 Brutal Mace of Craftsmanship
I got Diablo II shortly before this. I like the first panel because it's implied that Chappy did something embarassing, but we have no idea what it is.
310- The Next Soccer Superstar
I remembered that in soccer you can only hit the ball with your feet or your head. That makes Head leg the ultimate soccer player, since he has none of the weaknesses of other players. His memories carry over, that is, head leg II has all the memories of the original head leg who died of not enough organs.
311- Stars
I don't know what I was thinking with this one. I thought it up when I was half asleep. "This is hilarious! great!" I thought to myself. Now I just think it's weird.
312- Robot's dying wish
It seems like you can't make your final, dying wish be "not dying". That's cheating. In the second and third panels, I drew Beireia wearing that nightgown thing, and it looked awfully skanky to wear out of doors. So I decided she would be in her room about to go to sleep when Exoth came in uninvited to tell her his stupid story about what a bastard he is. That's something he'd do.
313- Master Splinter
The reason for this is hard to explain. Somewhere on the internet is this weird kid's webpage with sound files of the weird prank calls he made. One of them involves him pretending to be "Master Shredder!" The desire to do a comic with master Splinter in it comes from that. The comic is really just a frame for that.
314- Pigeon Extinction Plan
Pogeons are awful creatures. In seventh grade or so I did a report on homing pigeons and learned all their endearing and useful qualities, and I still hate them. I had gone on a dove hunting trip a few days before I drew this, so I had been acting on a pigeon extinction pIan of my own. I didn't think of the third panel until the last minute. I think it's a pretty good ending.
315- Bugs can talk
I like the idea of some animal species waiting patiently for thousands of years for human civilization to bridge the communications gap between them. Then, when the fated day comes, they give the statement they've been preparing all this time, and it turns out to be just a stupid goddamn pun. I like stupid goddamn puns.
316- Crabs can talk
This comic, and the bugs can talk one, are based on T shirts my 12 year old brother has. I guess he likes puns, too.
317- Sherrif Amoeba speaks
I don't really have an excuse for this. I was running late, and I needed a comic that would be really easy to draw, and this fit the bill quite nicely. The sarcastic clapping is from a SNL skit, the sarcastic clapping family.
318- Beireia's Quest
This series is my favorite so far. I like that it only pops up once every week, and you don't see Beireia in the other four of the week. I also like Indiana Jones, I guess it shows. The sword at the pawn shop is Soul Crusher, from Lodoss War. Also, this is yet another comic with a last minute third panel.
319- Garbage
Looking back at this one, Ionil and Chappy are acting like mother and child, especially how she can predict his actions completely. I guess it's not hard, considering his level of tactics. For a while, I had planned on having the Bananas be a relatively normal family, with Chappy as a corrupting element of insanity. That kind of broke down with the 'Ionil Banana's Flashback' series, where it was revealed that they too were pretty much nuts from the very beginning as well.
320- Tatanya's Trap
Tatanya has a serious problem with correctly gauging her enemies' ability. Really, even if Chappy HAD fallen for the trap, would having a cardboard bo dropped on him really have given him any trouble? of course not. In the second panel, I tried to make him look kind of embarrased that someone had really tried that old trick, but it didn't come out too well.
321- Olympics
Someone once asked me why Chappy didn't go into some sort of professional sport, even though he could totally dominate almost any field he chose to enter. This, and the wrestling one, derive from that idea. Also, even though I don't like to involve current events in the strip, I thought I ought to at least mention the olympics. Notice how, in the ancient Greece panel, the grrk guy looks like a statue, and Chappy is wearing ancient-type clothes, but definitely not ancient Greek-type clothes. By the way, Null-O is from a Phillip K. Dick short story.
322- Antimatter Pie
Exoth can cook, as well. He is such a great chef, that he can bake antimatter, using only flour, eggs, and sugar! Most people need huge particle accelerators. The bald kid is "Henry" from the comic strip of the same name. Pretty much every one of that strip was about Henry stealing a pie from a windowsill, so I figured he'd be the perfect culprit.
323- Beireia's Quest II
This one was incredibly hard to draw. That armor takes a long time, though not as long as it did in Beireia's Quest III. My brother had a Godzilla cigarrette lighter, (a cigarrette lighter shaped like Godzilla, not a lighter of Godzilla cigarrettes.) and I remember thinking that an ancient civilization would see it as a miraculous artifact. Also, in RPGs, I often question the reliability of information that the characters just accept unconditionally. That wise old man might not be so much "wise" as "senile", as was the case here.
324- Exoth's In-laws
Here we have exoth just making up outrageous lies for no good reason, again. The cyborg skull he's trying not to talk to is an actual product available for sale. And, for those interested in the back story behind Irritability Exoth actually was married at one point, back before he was evil.
325- Fangs
Fake plastic fangs are cool, but it's even cooler to put candy corn on your teeth. In an unrelated incident, the symbol on Chappy's shirt is the mark of a sacrifice to godhand in Berserk. Gatts and Caska have it branded into their flesh.
326- One demon bug is better than two!
I really can't explain this one... I was thinking about demon bugs because the true form of the spear Beireia weilds in the Beireia's quest series is a shape changing insect demon. Some of its forms are weapons. Does anyone remember Mr. Rogers, from Mr Rogers' Neighborhood? With the trolley and everything?
327- Surprise attack
Call me lazy for using the same panel twice, but it was a really difficult panel to draw. Exoth's extra-bubble comment may seem strange, but don't cicada's sound like they're taunting someone to you? nnnnnnnyyyyeeeeh nyeh nyeh nyeh! they say.
328- Skate and/or Die!
Skate or Die was an old skateboarding video game. With Chappy Chappy's method, you can do both!
329- Beireia's Quest III
Finally, Beireia's glorious return. I just noticed that you can't see Chappy's left hand in the third panel. I guess he's feeling her up without even thinking about it. But since she's got a full suit of armor on, he can't be having much success.
330- Live to fight another day
I meant to have the batteries missing from the destroy the universe remote a long time ago, as I was starting to annoy even myself with that gag a while back. It's not too noticeable, but in the second panel, the sheriff amoeba's eyes are similar to Exoth's. And the escape pod is very similar to those in Dragon Ball Z. The dragon ball manga is a lot better, by the way.
331- Beireia's Quest Concluded
Bluffing doesn't always work, even if you can do it well. I'm pleased with Beireia's armor, particularly the shading on it. If only I had shaded the entire suit rather than just a few plates. Plus, the stabbing looks akward, since it seems to be going in at an angle, and is not even centered.
332- Snid Kicks Ass XIVXXXYZ
Okay, I admit this one is just because I was really pressed for time, and needed a strip that I could compete in less than an hour. (they usually take me 3 or more hours each). Snid isn't even my character, he was created by my brother's friend about seven years ago, or so. For more information, consult Seven.
333- Human Etiquitte
Based on a true story. A friend of mine was giving a presentation, and some guy came in and ate their pizza. He then left without listening to the presentation, then he came back in the middle and took some more. He even had the audacity to come back and ask if he could take some home after it was over. So, I was asked to draw a comic berating his behaviour. My friend was pleased with the result, I hope it was vindicating for him.
334- Explosion week I
Why did I do this? I know I was thinking something.... I guess I wanted to have a theme week, but didn't want to spend more than 15 minutes thining about it.
335- Explosion week II
I lost the original for this one. I left it in a scanner at school, like an imbecile, and someone made off with it before I could go back and get it. This is the best of the explosion week series, too. Not much of an honor, mind you.
336- Explosion week III
I've said all I have to say.
337- How to impress girls
See, the joke here is that this is NOT the way to impress girls. Chappy's eyes look weird in the third panel, and he was supposed to be saying something in the second panel, and his shirt doesn't say anything. All the little screw ups in this one are centered around Chappy, how odd.
338- Daylight savings
I kept getting messed up by daylight savings, it even screwed me today, months later! My own fault, of course, for not setting that one clock back.. anyway, I like the art in this one a lot. I think I've done too many alcoholic type jokes, I don't even drink all that much... Also, the third panel was weak, there were a lot of jokes, but none of them were particularly good, and they did not work well together.
339- The "Brain Virus"
This probably could work, in theory. It would be impracticable, however, since you would need intimate knowledge of the inner workings of your victim's mind, and each virus would have to be custom tailored for each individual, and any random occurance that happened during the execution of the virus would throw it off, or at least have to be factored in... but still!
340- Popularity poll2
A character recap probably would have been helpful here, but I've done so many of those, and I really hate recaps. Anyway, I had been meaning to introduce a number of other characters from the back story of Irritability, but this guy is the only one so far. I'm glad he got voted for.
341- Chappy's time machine
It seems it would be reallly easy to fake time travel in a comic, that's why I did this. I wanted to give Chappy a big curly moustasche as a disguise, I forget why I didn't. Maybe there wasn't enough space for a label. Also, I'm glad I got to use Victor Banana. He was such an important character in the story, and now he's so... not.
342- The consequences of skipping class
Again, I didn't want to use a professor other than the Ninja Professor. This year especially, Chappy and company just haven't been going to class, this comic kind of addresses that. Look at the Professor's shirt. I ran out of 10% formatt a while ago, and this is the result. It seems that formatt has gone out of business, I haven't been able to get any, no matter where I look. Recent comics are shaded in the "cyber realm" of my computer, with photoshop.
343- Exoth's subordinates complain
Whenever I have to draw Robot working, I'm at a loss as to what he should be doing. What kind of grunt work goes on in an evil genius' lab? I'm pretty pleased with the art in this one. It's kind of hard to see, but in the third panel, head-leg is emitting sound waves, like a bat.
344- Hyper Absorbant
The inspiration for this one, of course, is that commercial where the woman stops the tidal wave with one square of bounty. When I saw that, I thought "they don't REALLY do that." which is, of course, true, but also irrelevant. Anyway, I guess I could have spent a bit more time on precipitator's design, but I find character design difficult, and precipitator is supposed to be dumb. Just look at his name. I'm slightly pleased with the water in the third panel, as it doesn't look like total ass. However, I don't really think it looks too good, either. I think I made it too dark, or not regular enough. Oh well.
345- Comic "Strip"
Olen, my roommate, thought this one up. he kept bugging me to do it, and I finally did. I couldn't think of a picture from the internet to put in the third panel, obviously I couldn't use porn like I said I was going to. I eventually just drew that stupid blob-thing, whatever it is. If you were hoping to get an explanation for that, sorry. Even I don't know. this sort of thing is becoming a little too common.
346- You can be a hammer brother!
Beleive it or not, this actually is one of my career goals. If cartooning falls through, and the Molecular Assembler proves unattainable, I want to wear a big turtle shell, get a bunch of hammers, and start throwing them at things. Another option is the "Wild 'n' Krazy" Taxidermy studio, in which I would combine the corpses of various animals and stuff them. I want to see a wolf with vulture wings, and a snake coming out of its mouth, with the eyes lighting up, and making noises and such. It'd be cool. Oh yeah, and this comic and stuff. Notice the mario star on Chappy's shirt. It's not the first time he's worn it.
347- Public Service Announcement
I thought it was kind of irresponsible of me to encourage the consumption of mushrooms, so I had Chappy explain the need for caution in consuming fungi. I'm not aware of any poisonous flower, so I told people to eat flowers and shoot fireballs. It really works, too. You can trust me. By the way, this is supposed to look like those NBC "the more you know" things.
348- Ionil Banana's Flashback I
Time for some discontinuities. If you're an attentive reader of Irritability, you'll remember that Chappy and Victor said they had never met when officer Death brought them together. Well, they were lying. I'm starting to make the Irritability comic match the Irritability story, and this bit is part of that, hinting at the questing past of our heros.
349- Ionil Banana's Flashback II
Likewise, more RPG stuff. In the story, Ionil Banana has really bad memory, that hasn't manifested in the comic until now. It should be obvious that nothing she said ever happened, especially not the last part. Notice that we have backgrounds in each panel. I suppose that means I'm maturing as an artist. That I'm taking the time to draw boring things like beds and chairs that, while not as fun as characters, add depth to the picture as a whole. Or maybe I had some extra time that day.
350- Exploding Zombies
Zombies are cool, and Explosions are cool... therefore exploding zombies should be not just cool, but awesome... maybe even radical! However, as Robot points out, a large group of expoding zombies is easily dispatched, making them much less scary, which means you give up a lot of your zombie appeal. This one was pretty easy to draw.
351- Vigilante Justice
I don't know if I made this clear, but I realy hate Austin traffic. Not that I ever LIKE traffic, but in Houston, and in Galveston, the drivers at least seem to exhibit the same motivations and logic processes as normal human beings. Here in Austin, however, they're like bad guys in some 8 bit video game, with movements that are either random, or indicative of a complete willingness to lay down their lives for the cause, the cause being making me either late for class or dead. Exoth's feelings in this comic closely mirror my own.
352- Telepathy
It looks like Robot is becoming a talented inventor on his own. I would imagine a telepathy machine would be difficult to make. An STM of course, is a scanning tunnelling microcope, a device that can look at and move individual atoms. I had meant to say some things like "If he doesn't know that I know what he's thinking.." but there wasn't enough room, and the comic makes that much less sense. I guess it doesn't really matter.
353- Suit of Armor
Here's another RPG ish joke. Any time I play an RPG where you can equip "T shirt" and "Cool Jacket" and the like, I always start wondering what kind of defense I'm getting out of MY clothes. Should I wear the jeans, and get more defense, or the power pants, to increase my strength? Also, the salesman in this comic is supposed to be black, but you can't really tell, I don't think. It would have helped if I had used some screen tone, but screeen tone on people usually just looks like some skin disease.
354- A Crazed Mongoose of Flavor
My roommate didn't understand this, but it seems as though everyone else did. Chappy's unusual phrase is a takeoff on the superlative comments satisfied consumers make in some food commercials. (like there's a party in my mouth, and everyone's invited!) although Chappy's seems a lot less appealing. This is another one where I had no idea how it was going to end, all I had when I started was the first panel. I'm actually pleasd with this ending, though, for once.
355- The Bananas Vacation
One day, when I am rich and mighty, I am going to build a castle, with a dense forest surrounding it, the Forest of Peril. The forest will be filled with genetically engineered monsters that carry around gold and herbs and such. If they are killed, a small speaker implanted in their body will play the Final Fantasy victory music. So anyway, this is where Tatanya wants to go. That "you used that excuse when I wanted go to Florida" bit is the closest I got to making a florida election joke, see, Victor was implying that all those people fussing about chads were horrid beasts. Though I doubt you'd get any GP from killing them.
356- To be a Sullen Youth
At first, I was going to have them smoke in order to be sullen. Since Robot knows how to cure cancer, the points against smoking decrease significantly in their case. There's still emphysema, and I didn't really want to encourage 13 year olds to smoke, regardless of how it fits into the story, so I threw that out. Again, there was no third panel joke, so Exoth just comes in and gives his unwanted two cents. I'd be displeased with that, except for the martini he's holding. That makes it all okay.
357- Shed
I think this is one of my best comics ever. I like every panel, It's fairly well drawn, the characters are not just standding around, and there are a bunch of jokes. Beireia's closing line is pretty weak, but by now I've accepted that as a given. Notice that Tatanya exclaims "a beautiful specimen!", like the crocodile hunter. I couldn't tell you where the idea for this came from, other than I was half asleep when I got it.
358- Experiments
"Head Leg hasn't suffered much lately." I thought one day, and drew this comic. It's three panels of Exoth torturing the poor bastard, ostensibly in the name of science, though what catching him in a bear trap is supposed to prove is beyond me. This comic actually has a strong third panel. I finally did it! All in all, I'm very pleased with this one as well.
359- Silver and Gold
This is the "Christmas Special" comic. On the subject of keys, I'm always pissed when video game characters run into a locked door, and give up just like that. "Well, I can kill a dragon with one punch, and shatter this door effortlessly, but I think I'll look for the key instead. I like a challenge." Even in Resident Evil, when you have Jill, the self-proclaimed "Master of Unlocking", she often would be thwarted by some lock or another. I just wasn't impressed by her effort.
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