Obituary: Joe Matt, and Self-Pitying Horny Comic Biographies

Just recently, Joe Matt died of a heart attack, found slumped at his drawing board.  Fittingly, this was something that was penned by Chester Brown of the triumvirate of the Toronto Three, Seth and Chester Brown, two Canadian Cartoonists who were close friends, though you’d never know it from how often they were portrayed complaining about his complaining.

The sad part is that due to Joe Matt's cheapness, he would put off his health, refusing to go to a hospital which would cost him money, which likely heightened his possibilities of dying sooner.

Coincidentally, I was thinking about the caricatured portrayal of comic biographies and how they tended to have a negative outlook.  The general image of a comic autobiography is to have a nebbish protagonist constantly narrate inner insecurities about life all while remaining indecisive about girls, exemplified by Robert Crumb who took his fears and fetishes onto the comic page.  A trait inspired and endlessly plagiarized by countless imitator cartoonists who no doubt greatly identified with this self-loathing portrayal.

I had these thoughts during the comic I was reading, Fun by Paolo Bacilieri, about the history of crosswords started out fairly interesting, then it segued to a cartoonist who exhibited the kind of nerdish fascination and narrative sensibilities, seeking reconciliation from an ex-girlfriend abroad.  Even though there are much better and varied comic biographies out there, that’s the general image that tends to stick in people’s consciousness.  The genre is still tainted by the prospect of Woody Allen-like main characters.

As such, Joe Matt’s comics about his issues tend to be rather repetitive, constantly complaining about being alone, seeking impossible feminine ideals that Seth described as ‘being caught on a treadmill’.

The thing was, as much as these comics might have had a certain appeal towards a certain segment of the comics market, I never really had these moments of introspection in narrative detail, being more concerned with getting through the day.  My thoughts would likely only come into being after I put some thought to it.

As casually interesting as these comics were, I never really identified with them, since they indulged in extraneous inner turmoil in excessive verbiage and constant pining for unrequited lusts, something I had no real desire for, since it would mean having to open myself up, an ordeal further exacerbated by my social anxiety in talking to complete strangers who I’d have to inform that I was deaf, needed them to face me, emphasize key words, and making sure they understood English; a process that would have to be repeated ad nauseam with every new person.  Not to mention that I was more comfortable being alone anyways.

For a time, I had a brief online relationship with a female German comic blogger, correcting her translation of a comic, and the two of us enjoyed a rapport.  Eventually, it led to video conversations, with the helpful option of writing notes by the side, clarifying details that I would’ve missed.

She helped me with doing the basic translations for the first 2 volumes of Red Ketchup, and I did the rewriting and scanlation edits myself.  We continued our relationship past simple translations by sharing books, something I was reluctant to do, but she shipped her English versions of Walter Moers’ titles, The 13½ Lives of Captain Bluebear, Rumo and The City of Dreaming Books over with no hesitation.  In return, I recommended the comic series, Finder by Carla Speed McNeil.  It might’ve been a little too ambitious for her taste, since she said she wasn’t too crazy about it.  I wasn’t that crazy about Bluebear, so it was fair.  (She enjoyed my recommendation of the early writings of Gordon Kormon though)

Then one day, she said that she would be moving to my country, just one province over in Kitchener, and offered the option to come over to my house.  I was enthusiastic for the possibility of having a physical friend over, someone I had several things in common.  I even pointed out the possibility that she might’ve had Autism, since she certainly matched some of the symptoms exactly.  She had Prosopagnosia (facial blindness), and mentioned having a kind of synesthesia where she ‘heard’ voices in colour, and she said mine was orange, her favorite colour.

I took her sightseeing, showing her my favorite places to find comics and second-hand books, but then I fell sick, and had to lie low for a day while my Mother took her to an Oral training seminar teaching deaf students on how to lipread.  Before she left, I handed over some Neal Shusterman books (the Dark Fusion trilogy of Fairy Tale retellings, Duckling Ugly being the best among them)

The last time I heard from her, she said she was getting married to someone living in Toronto.  I didn’t fall into a screaming fit of outrage.  I just simply accepted this news the same way one would getting an evening weather report.

Upon reflection, I realized that other than giving advice on grammar and toning up her vocabulary to sound more natural, I basically had nothing to offer her.  I had no basic survival skills, couldn’t manage a full-time job, didn’t even have the courage to travel across province to where she lived.  It's also possible that our tastes weren't compatible.

I was always worried about the possibility that I would be alone.  But ever since I self-diagnosed myself as being Asexual, I now KNOW that I’ll be alone, and am fine with it.  I don’t have to share my bed with somebody and worry about my personal space being invaded.

What really hurt was that after she got married, we were no longer in communication with each other.  I still would’ve liked to remain friends after all we’d done together.  She still has my Neal Shusterman books.

Interpreting Primer

I’m currently in the process of helping clean my Mother’s office up, which has been consistently cluttered for years, yet I never saw anything wrong with her setup, being accustomed to working in messy environments before.  The reason for the sudden rush for tidying when we weren’t having any company over was because we were running out of scrap printer paper, not having had the opportunity to take home any work documents in the 2 years we’ve been under quarantine.

A lot of items had to be checked beforehand deciding to shred, recycle or reuse, which was another procrastination factor.  Not to mention the messy business of removing staples, poring over pages for confidential information and cutting away said information in smaller portions for easier shredding use.

In the process, I came across an information pamphlet as a primer to oral interpreting in the classroom.  It may seem obvious to have assistance for handicapped students, but there was a lot of resistance in even having oral interpreters present.

The argument presented was that College and University deaf students were allowed access, but this service was denied for High School students, when their formative years were still taking place.

A trial run was agreed on, only having interpreters present for half of my non-essential classes.  At the end of the first semester, the teachers in the classes I had no interpreters present commented on how sullen and uncooperative I was, but in the classes an interpreter was present, the teachers commented on how enthusiastic and funny I was.  I’ve mentioned it before, but it bears repeating.  I’m much more likely to engage when I understand what’s going on.

The artwork and humour isn't nearly anywhere near Larry Gonick's level, but it does the job.  The Interpreting Services Student Package started out with an introductory page that clearly took inspiration from a popular animated movie at the time:

WELCOME TO HIGH SCHOOL!

AND WELCOME TO OUR INTERPRETING SERVICE!

This is a big step for you.

You are now a high school student!

A.S.L.

Interpreter

You are a high school student using an interpreter.

That means that on top of having to do all the things a hearing high school student has to do.

THERE’S ALSO AN INTERPRETER TO WATCH.

It may be the first time you use an interpreter so here are some guidelines for things for you to know about interpreting and being a high school student.

• The student uses A.S.L, sign language, or communicates orally.
• The student is the person who goes to class, does the homework and writes the exams.
• We have coordinators to do the scheduling of interpreters.
• Some students may prefer to voice or speak for themselves.
• If the student is late..... The interpreter will wait 10 minutes before leaving the class.

STAFF ROOM

Inform the interpreter about other interpreting needs, like study groups, tutoring sessions, meetings with the teacher...

As you can see, there are lots of things to think about when you start high school.  You have new challenges and new responsibilities.

If you feel the need to talk to someone about your courses or about the interpreting services, here are some names and phone numbers that may be useful.

(CONTACTS REDACTED)

The second page of the Student Package had a foreword that consisted of the following:

F O R E W O R D

Dear students,

Welcome to college which you have reached after plenty of hard work and good will.  We sincerely hope that your “transit” there will also be fruitful and rewarding as the months go by.

In order to facilitate your way through college and university, the Service à l’intégration des élèves from the Cègep du Vieux Montréal have adapted a documents from the National Technical Institute for the Deaf (NTID) which provides you with information pertaining to oral and sign language interpreter’s services, note taking, etc... which will be useful throughout your studies.

This booklet is designed with comic strips which illustrate different ways of getting various services.

Special thanks go to Louise Daoust who worked on this project along with the anglophone team of interpreters.

We hope that you will read it for your own information and enjoy it as well.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The information in this handbook is based and adapted from:

Vancouver Community College: Student’s Package 

NTID: Principles of Interpreting

Texts and Drawings by Louise Daoust

There was also an alternate condensed version of the above for the Montreal Metro Region, which continues as follows:

Also included are two pages of outtakes or alternate pages.  There's a slight modification made to the first that may look very similar to the 6th page Student image above, but has a slight difference.  The second page below isn't included anywhere, which is a shame since I find the third panel to be somewhat cute.

The Gravity of the Situation

Ever since he has looked heavenwards in envy, man has wanted to fly, consequences be damned.

On a random comment board, it was mentioned in passing that of all the mechanism failures that occurred on Star Trek, ranging from Holodeck Malfunctions to Warp Core Explosions, the one standing feature that remained intact during all these disaster scenarios was the gravity controls.  No matter how dire, it was imperative that everybody keep their feet on the ground.  Other Sci-fi shows with a higher budget such as The Expanse managed to expand on that concept, showing just how unfeasible it could be to survive on a gravity-free zone.  The major reason that these far-concept shows had such a stranglehold on the gravity controls is that they were mainly filmed on Earth.  (Sorry for spoiling the illusion guys!)

All this stemming from news that the latest Tom Cruise movie, Vyozov (The Challenge)’s marketing gimmick would be the first film that would be filmed entirely in space.  By a Russian crew, no less.  (Whether it’d be any good is immaterial)

This led to a discussion of realistic portrayal of living in a stimulated environment, and there were very few comics that accurately reflected what it’d be like to live in a world without gravity.  The ones that did, showed just how ubiquitous gravity surrounds us to the extent that we don’t think about it.  This page from chapter 21 of Grease Monkey by Tim Eldred shows what happens when it's not around, and how much of a mess keeping everything floating around would be.

I started thinking about this after reading the entirety of Skyward, written by Joe Henderson, and drawn by Antonio Fabela and Lee Garbett.  At first, Skyward seems to openly embrace this concept with open arms, when one day all of a sudden, gravity just seems to cease working properly.  But then this open-world policy quickly devolves into cliched territory, making for a less satisfactory read than would otherwise be expected.

There are scenes of imaginative worldbuilding such as having millionaires fitted with magnetic boots to recapture life like it was before, and people using slotted buckets to capture water from an incoming storm, but for the most part, it’s filled with flawed leaps of imagination.

One of the failed suspensions of disbelief is the inclusion of a disabled love interest who would prefer to remain in this gravity-free world where where a return to normalcy would mean being tied down.

That in itself isn’t a bad idea.  The problem is, all portrayal of him shows him as being at the same height of everyone, regardless of his missing legs or not.

Standing around like a disembodied leg guy from that episode of Quantum Leap.

Whether this fault lies at the hands of the author or the writer, I couldn’t say, but it’s safe that neither of them are sufficiently handicapped.

Segueing back to Tim "Grease Monkey" Eldred, his other online work, Pitsberg, has a much more nuanced take on amputees closer to The Expanse, where condemned miners of space minerals (there's a lot of exposition involved, but space minerals is what we're working with) have to undergo required extraction of body parts in order to reduce expenses.  And in a gravity-free zone, legs are just one of the many deemed minor unnecessary "inconveniences" to go.  As such, there's a greater variety of legless bodies in a floating environment to deal with.

For the most part, until someone is able to spend sufficient time in a gravity-free zone and have the imaginative insight to document a wider-spread alternate reality, such fantastic concepts would be better suited to the realm of short stories.

For me, the one comic that manages to succeed in this where others fail would be Sherwin Tjia’s Plummet, where a young woman wakes up and finds herself falling mid-air.

It sounds like a Mr. Boffo joke, but it’s one of the best underrated Canadian comics you’ve never read.

Being in perpetual free-fall with numerous random objects appearing out of nowhere means you’re never fully prepared for what may happen next.  One of the falling objects happens to be a section of an apartment building, which has potential for housing valuable supplies like food and clothing.  Of course, navigating inside isn’t as easy as it first seems.

Trying to eat or sleep in these conditions is impossible without proper preparation or a little luck.  And when it does come, it’s recommended to jump at the chance whenever it occurs.  Eventually, she meets other people caught in the same situation as her, some who’ve managed to build something out for themselves, others who’re just as clueless as she is, some are friendly, and some are not.  In the afterword, Sherwin Tjia writes that the format for this ambitious comic was written to be a road story.  Well, a vertical road story, always going forward, never looking back.

The best thing about this comic is while there are various theories bandied about, the circumstances that caused this is never explained.  Any potentially plausible explanation would RUIN the experience.  If you get the chance, I heavily recommend you pick it up.  Doubtless it’d be far more intriguing than whatever the upcoming Tom Cruise movie plot is.

Unseen Garfield Submissions

Back when I hesitantly gave my first comic submission to Square Root of Minus Garfield, there was only a small smattering of volunteers who were willing to give a try.  That pond has now grown larger than its current output of one comic a day can provide.

The backlog of SROMG has grown so large that the chances of my later strips being seen anytime in the future is now increasingly remote.  I Almost submitted the missing ones on my blog last year, but then, my entry, Suicide Hotline, (which I was particularly proud of) showed up, and I decided to wait another year.  If none of my other comics showed up until then, I wouldn't show them.

These comics haven't been seen by anybody, save for the moderator of SROMG who switched owners in 2015 to its current moderator, who has their own backlog of new comics coming in all the time.  They haven't been seen since I made them in... (checks creation date) 2013, so they're a little overdue.  And not seeing my works shown up in rapid succession has been a major damper in my creative process.  I haven't made any new Garfield comics since then, including what I thought would be my Last comic - a collection of all of Lyman's appearances into one comprehensive Lyman contribution strip.

With that out of the way, here's the remainder of my Garfield Comics, with author commentary at the bottom:

REALLY Sophisticated Tastes

Considering that there are food connoisseurs out there who can deduct the quality and quantity of foods down to their most basic cooking instructions to how long each ingredient was prepared, 

it only seemed natural that the reciprocal for such a talent would eventually find its way through breaking down cat food to the basic elements.  There are sophisticated snobs concerned about how much meat Fido gets in their Bowl-o-chunks.  Probably the ONLY ingredient missing from the vast list of chemicals would be artificial food dye, but since their addition is more for the owners buying food and not their colourblind pets, this omission is somewhat understandable.

Randomized Garfield in 2053

It occurred to me that after seeing the static lazy use of repeat panels that it would only be a matter of time before all future Garfield panels were virtually indistinguishable from each other, down to the background colour.  Also, considering it's not impossible for a Garfield generator to use two different panels of the same strip, the probability of having similar-looking panels becomes considerably higher.

Following that train of logic, it would only be a matter of time before there were some repeat panels from the later years, and a higher chance of seeing duplicate panels next to each other.  Therefore, what would normally be the punchline would become the opening panel, with the remaining panels being exact copies.

Originally, this was going to have the first panel at the end, but I thought it would get its point across if it was shown from the start.  If you look closely, you can see the copyright text between panels is mixed and matched between the two as typical of various randomized Garfields.

The monologue comes from two variations of a Blender comic.

Just Look At That Gorgeous Garfield Minus Garfield

This one is going to take some explaining.

A frequent contributor, Manyhills, submitted a Garfield puzzle that left many readers baffled as to the content of the hidden word, which is (was) still being debated on in the forums.  Even with all the hints dropped in, hardly anybody got close to getting an answer.

The original comic in question.

The ACTUAL solution turned out to be a chain of random tactics so obtuse that you'd need to be a mind reader or web hacker to be able to figure it out.  The answer was a series of numbers referring to the date of a comic where Jon asked himself what the Capital of Nebraska was.  (Bismark)

What made this really infuriating is that the answer was so far from obvious, and it was labeled "Easy".  (Check the difficulty rating on mine.)  So I thought, why not make an already hard puzzle more difficult?  The result is something akin to a Mondrian painting, only with more colours between the lines.  It's my first time editoralizing someone else's work to reflect the audience's reaction, but I think it fits.  Bonus points if my comic managed to generate more answers than the former.

Real Cats...

This was largely inspired by crossing Real Men Don't Eat Quiche with the children's book, All Cats have Asperger's Syndrome.  I shared this with members of my Asperger group, but wondered why it never showed up on SROMG.  It wasn't until now that I realized that I never actually submitted it as an entry.  Kind of a waste - I insisted on privacy, wanting to wait until this comic would show up on a veritable site before sharing with a wider audience, and wound up self-sabotaging myself in the process.

Jon's Everyday Letter

These are all things Jon admitted to doing in front of Garfield on a regular basis.  One wonders just how he would be able to relay this level of weirdness to his parents.  It would be on a level of open honesty.  In an early strip, Jon pretty much admitted to his mother on the phone that his washing machine spat out his jockey shorts.  Since his mom and brother routinely sent letters along the lines of "The chicken died", and had their picture taken next to the world's largest corn cob, this kind of reply of everyday routine wouldn't be entirely out of character or place.  Without the visual aid of weirdness or the surprise setup, something's bound to get lost in the transition.

Chinese Garfield

Actually, a more accurate description for this would be “Canadian Garfield”, since this parody showed up in a long-running French children’s science/nature magazine, Les Debrouillards, drawn by the indefatigable Jacques Goldstyn.  The children are accompanied by their mascot, a talking frog named Beppo who provides the role of the chorus.  Interestingly enough, a spinoff of one of Jacques’ characters, Ivan the inventor is also published in China.

I had planned to showcase a feature on Debrouillards, and requested the moderator of SROMG not to release this until then.  But since that would require scanlating French comics, my desire to do so kept falling away over time, and I never got around to it.

Fatty Arbuckle

I'm surprised no one's thought to make a correlation between the real-life Arbuckle and Garfield's owner, especially considering the implications of his film nickname, "Fatty".

Bye Bye Love

Although I'm deaf, I was still part of mandatory auditorium attendance in Grade school where we were to sing out lyrics to 50's songs such as Rag Mop and Anything You Can Do.  The presence of an overhead projector showing the words made following along much easier, and is only how I'm aware of these ditties in the first place.  It's probably funnier if you sing the lyrics to the tune of George Harrison's Bye Bye Love.  What's amusing is how little I had to change the words to most of these.  I was considering doing something similar for "Shoo Fly", but couldn't find enough references, since music isn't really my thing.  That's more Manyhill's field.

Nermal Manga - Director's Cut

Years ago, I made a Nermal Manga using Chi's Sweet Home as a base.  (An obvious reference.)  What is less known is that I submitted a potential sequel later.  This was something I'd planned to use in the first comic, but felt it was already running on for too long, and couldn't figure out where to place it anyways.  If you interpret the dialogue there, it could seem like "Nermal" is waking up in the last panel.

The Big Bang Melody

Inspired in part by the infamous Kitty song from The Big Bang Theory.  Only, I couldn't leave it well enough alone, since I wasn't entirely sure if there were instances of either Nermal or Odie being bounced around.  After some customary searching, I found results for both, and decided not to remove either, but keep both, and show how the lyrics for one would've inspired the other.

I also wanted to use a more lively atomic particle in a similar vein to BBT's animation segments, but couldn't find one.

(In case it's not obvious, Nermal hiding in Garfield's jacket in the 2nd panel is a "hot" item.)

Odie's Blog

I found a silent French comic titled Odi's Blog by Sergio Garcia and Lola Moral, and naturally thought of having it somehow tie in with the dumb dog who occasionally shows flashes of genius from time to time.  Even Jim Davis is somewhat elusive about the full extent of Odie's mental capacities.  It's also an apt metaphor for how uncommunicative people think in unconventional means.  Just because somebody is nonverbal doesn't mean that they're not smart in other ways. Dyslexics manage to be incredibly inventive despite their handicap of not being able to read.

Anime Opening

 






This is probably the most obscure referential material I've ever done.  The song lyrics are from ShakespeareHemmingway's legendary so bad it's good fanfic: Garfield, Prince of Tragedy in "Royal Rescue Part 2".

I started thinking about what the opening for Garfield & Friends would be like if it were done as an Anime, with their lingering quality and extended length of J-Pop lyrics.  Originally, I started out trying to find the Japanese version, but that was hampered by a lack of knowledge of foreign countries' translations and lazy internet searching.  (I gave up after two pages)  The result is something less than Every Anime Opening Ever Made and something more along the lines of an Anime music video.

My intention was to use double-entendres for the Japanese lyrics, but the lack of matching imagery and text meshing together forced me to revise this plan entirely, and I could only use my proposal for a select few scenes that had a happy coincidence.  Turns out there are a LOT of Anime openings with the word "Love" in them, which helped salvage my search somewhat.

For less enthusiastic Otakus out there confused about the frames, What follows below are the Animes I used, along with some notes for fansubbed lyrics that closely resembled the homaged song at the relevant screenshot in question:

3x3 Eyes

Love Hina (In the next shot, Shinobu is hanging up some laundry, which is another interpretation of the "making pants rise" line)

Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo

You're Under Arrest!

Excel Saga - "I love, but I’m not loved."

Kirby of the Stars

Hale nochi Guu - "LOVE LOVE LOVE"

Tsukiyomi ~ Moon Phase

Hajime no Ippo

Clannad - "A kind sweet bean dango" (This is kind of a cheat, since it comes from the ending theme song, not the opening)

Yakitate Japan

Lupin III

Escaflowne - "I love you. I love you."

Argento Soma - "Until we feel the melting of ourselves gently into each other"

Ruronin Kenshin - "I love you I love you I love you"

Corpse Princess (Those are hungry ghosts. I would've liked to use Attack on Titan, but there weren't any scenes of eating people in the opening, surprisingly enough)

Toriko

Wolf's Rain

Berserk

Revolutionary Girl Utena

Key the Metal Idol - "Why can't I show (Love you so)"

Azumanga Daioh - "The temptation of wheat" (a fair assessment of "One serving is never enough")

Pita-Ten - I wish “Hello, I say “I love U”

Club to Death Angel Dokuro-chan - "I’ll cut you, punch you, toy with you..." (This was the gentlest relevant torture scene I could find)

Kodomo no Omocha - "Today’s incident is burning love!"

Samurai Pizza Cats - "Go eat a pizza pie!"  (From the vastly superior American version)

Cardcaptor Sakura - "I’m - in - love - with - you!"

Groove Adventure Rave - "I'll give you paradise" (The main inspiration that led to all this)

For Garfield's finishing lines of "What good singer.  Could use lasagna cigarette", I referenced mangled Engrish and how yellow subtitles would look practically invisible without proper shading.