History Creator / Zerocalcare

In February 2023, the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2iqhrNRvkMk teaser trailer]] for his next animated project, titled ''Questo mondo non mi renderà cattivo'' (translated: ''This world is not going to make me evil''), was unveiled during the Sanremo Music Festival, Italy's most important music competition akin to the Eurovision music festival. As with his previous series, it is going to be a six-episode season featuring Zero, Secco and all the others, still all voiced by Zerocalcare himself, but it won't be a direct sequel to ''Tear Along the Dotted Line''.

In December 2020 Creator/{{Netflix}} unveiled the teaser trailer for an animated series called ''Strappare lungo i bordi'' (English title: ''WesternAnimation/TearAlongTheDottedLine''), created, written and directed by Rech himself, as a much more polished version of the animated experiments from his [[https://www.youtube.com/user/zerocalcare/featured YouTube channel]]. It features Zero, his friends Sarah and Secco, the Armadillo, a girl named Alice plus other characters. The series was released worldwide on November 17, 2021, in the form of a six-episode season; the Italian version has Rech voicing [[TalkingToHimself every character]] minus the Armadillo, who is voiced by popular Italian actor Valerio Mastandrea (who was also one of the movie's scriptwriters). Unlike the live-action movie, the series was praised as a very faithful and well-made adaptation of Zerocalcare's comics, and as a poignant example of adult animation that doesn't need to rely on violence and vulgar humor.

In 2014 Rech himself made a post about TheMovie of his first book ''La profezia dell'armadillo'' being made, with him as one of the scriptwriters. However, the years passed with no other news about it, so most people assumed it had been cancelled. Then in late 2017 it was apparently SavedFromDevelopmentHell, and it eventually came out in September 2018, but with no further comments by Rech who apparently disassociated himself from the project. It was probably for the best, since it was critically panned for being formulaic, badly acted and not even trying to adapt the comic medium to the big screen, with some embarrassing missteps (such as the Armadillo being portrayed by a guy in a [[UncannyValley creepy costume]]).

* ReferenceOverdosed: Every one of his strips is packed with references to famous icons of [[TheEighties 80s]] and [[TheNineties 90s]] popular culture. It's not just to show [[JustForFun/OneOfUs his knowledge]] of nerd culture, but he uses the references to immediately denote his characters and abstract feelings [[ShowDontTell without the need]] to give too many explanations, while also to avoid using their real likenesses. Example: he always draws Zero's mother as Lady Kluck from ''WesternAnimation/RobinHood'' to signify she's maternal but also tough and strong-willed. Another example is his friend [[StraightGay Sarah]], whose girlfriend he always draws as [[Franchise/SailorMoon Sailor Uranus]]. Likewise, negative feelings take the form of Freddy Krueger, Darth Vader and other villains from popular culture.

Zerocalcareis the nickname of Italian comic book artist and blogger Michele Rech (Cortona, Italy, 1983), and also the name of his most popular character and the [[http://www.zerocalcare.it/ eponymous blog]] where his stories are collected. As the description implies, Zerocalcare's stories are mostly autobiographical, with several embellishments when not outright mixed with fantastic elements.

'''Zerocalcare''' is the nickname of Italian comic book artist and blogger '''Michele Rech''' (Cortona, Italy, 1983), and also the name of his most popular character and the [[http://www.zerocalcare.it/ eponymous blog]] where his stories are collected. As the description implies, Zerocalcare's stories are mostly autobiographical, with several embellishments when not outright mixed with fantastic elements.

In 2014 Rech himself made a post about TheMovie of his first book ''La profezia dell'armadillo'' being made, with him as one of the scriptwriters. However, the years passed with no other news about it, so most people assumed it had been cancelled. Then in late 2017 it was apparently SavedFromDevelopmentHell, and it eventually came out in September 2018, but with no further comments by Rech who apparently disassociated himself from the project. It was probably for the best, since it was critically panned for being formulaic, badly acted and not even trying to adapt the comic medium to the big screen, with some embarrassing missteps (such as the Armadillo being portrayed by a guy in a poorly-done costume).

In December 2020 Creator/{{Netflix}} unveiled the teaser trailer for an animated series called ''Strappare lungo i bordi'' (English title: ''WesternAnimation/TearAlongTheDottedLine''), created, written and directed by Rech himself, as a much more polished version of the animated experiments from his [[https://www.youtube.com/user/zerocalcare/featured YouTube channel]]. It features Zero, his friends Sarah and Secco, the Armadillo, a girl named Alice plus other characters. The series was released worldwide on November 17, 2021, in the form of a six-episode season; the Italian version has Rech voicing [[TalkingToHimself every character]] minus the Armadillo, who is voiced by popular Italian actor Valerio Mastandrea. Unlike the live-action movie, the series was praised as a very faithful and well-made adaptation of Zerocalcare's comics.

* ReferenceOverdosed: Every one of his strips is packed with references to famous icons of [[TheEighties 80s]] and [[TheNineties 90s]] popular culture. It's not just to show [[JustForFun/OneOfUs his knowledge]] of nerd culture, but he uses the references to immediately denote his characters and abstract feelings [[ShowDontTell without the need]] to give too many explanations, while also to avoid using their real likenesses. Example: he always draws Zero's mother as Lady Kluck from ''WesternAnimation/RobinHood'' to signify she's maternal but also tough and strong-willed. Another example is his friend [[StraightGay Sarah]], whose girlfriend he always draws as [[Franchise/SailorMoon Sailor Saturn]]. Likewise, negative feelings take the form of Freddy Krueger, Darth Vader and other villains from popular culture.

* ReferenceOverdosed: Every one of his strips is packed with references to famous icons of [[TheEighties 80s]] and [[TheNineties 90s]] popular culture. It's not just to show [[JustForFun/OneOfUs his knowledge]] of nerd culture, but he uses the references to immediately denote his characters and abstract feelings [[ShowDontTell without the need]] to give too many explanations, while also to avoid using their real likenesses. Example: he always draws Zero's mother as Lady Kluck from ''WesternAnimation/RobinHood'' to signify she's maternal but also tough and strong-willed. Likewise, negative feelings take the form of Freddy Krueger, Darth Vader and other villains from popular culture.

!!The animated series includes the following tropes:
* AnimatedActors: Episode four starts like this, with the characters getting ready to film the scene and an assistant drawing Zero's BigOlEyebrows with a marker! The end of the sixth and final episode also implies this.
* AnimateInanimateObject: Zero's house is seen as a parody of WesternAnimation/TheBraveLittleToaster series mixed with Series/GameOfThrones, with every knick-knack and useless junk inside Zero's house conspiring to take ownership of his house and actively arguing and fighting for control with their owner.
* ArtShift: A few scenes are drawn in a style different from Zerocalcare's one, for example resembling childish doodles, or the part with Zero changing his car's tire drawn as an instruction manual of sorts.
** SuddenVideoGameMoment: In one episode Zero compares getting bored to tears by an old woman's ramblings to a ''Street Fighter II''-esque 16-bit fighting game, where he is getting walloped by the old lady's special moves.
* CanNotSpitItOut: The ultimate cause of everything bad in Zero's life and beyond.
** Zero lives a cheerful, friendly relationship with Alice. He's able to be somewhat affectionate only by text messages, and even so he goes to great lenghts to avoid spilling his true feelings. In the end [[spoiler: it becomes his greatest regret]].
** Also Zero is shown unable to tell everyone else what's hurting him, hiding his feeling on a goofy facade. His own antropomorphic consciousness (a talking Armadillo) goes so far to make him admit he has problems, but telling him he doesn't have to voice them to other people if he doesn't want to.
** Also, Alice shares the same issue. Going so far [[spoiler: to take her own life, because, in her father's words, she was "too kind to dare stepping on someone". Summing up, she avoided telling her feeling to Zero as much as he did, she had her share of abusive relationships and suffered them without a complain and refused to tell her parents how bad she felt as a jobless, pennyless adult woman until she killed herself over it.]]
* TheDividual: As one of his various part-time jobs, Zero gives remedial classes to several kids. They are usually represented as funny animals (or [[VideoGame/StreetFighterII Blanka]] in one famous case). Two of them are girls depicted as mice, who are so inseparable despite not being related that Zero remembers/depicts them as one body with two heads. When Zero meets by chance one of them ten years later, he can't believe that she has her own life and the other one is no longer around... so naturally he imagines that they were separated with some horrific surgical procedure.
* DoomedByCanon: If you ever read ''La Profezia dell'Armadillo'', you're going to already know what's going to happen.
* GrowingUpSucks: Part of the season one theme: Zero is well in his thirties, yet he claims he mastered the art of ''dodging life'', choosing to live as an awkward manchild because he feels unwilling to lose [[StatusQuoIsGod the simple life he managed to build for himself]] and fighting an universe of constant change. Eventually, he has to find a precarious equilibrium between change and status quo, learning a few lessons along the way
* TheCameo:
** Several characters from his books (such as Cinghiale, Katja, Deprecabile, Corrado etc.) make short appearances, either silent or voiced.
** The last couple of episodes feature appearances of someone looking like [[https://www.instagram.com/apandapiace/ the Panda]] from ''A Panda piace...'', the webcomic by Rech's fellow comic book artist Giacomo Bevilacqua (see "Orphaned Series" above). He's not a FunnyAnimal like several others that appear, but clearly a man wearing a mask, so he likely represents Bevilacqua himself.
* FreezeFrameBonus: As part of the ReferenceOverdosed nature of Rech's works, there are several sight gags and sentences that can only be caught by pausing the video.
** WordOfGod states that every single detail is based out of real items Rech own: Zero's cellphone shares Rech's wallpaper, the "Series/GameOfThrones" scene at Zero's place is based on the real Rech's house, down to the messy couch and even his backpack is an animated rendition of one Rech actually owns.
* FlashbackMontageRealization: Basically, the sense of the whole season.
* FunnyTerrainCrossSection: Another example of FreezeFrameBonus, right at the beginning of episode 1. There is a pan from Rome's subway system to the surface, where the terrain is filled with all kinds of stuff: Roman relics and treasures, but also monstrous skeletons, items from Italy's pop culture in the 90s, random junk and [[SelfDeprecation Rech's own comic books.]]
* GuiltComplex: A huge deal of Zero's mindset. Zero is shown as easy feeling guilt for basically everything to the point of of self-deprecation. Kid!Zero is shown beating himself up over bad grades, as he truly believes he failed his teachers causing them to suffer, Young Adult!Zero feels guilt wherever he fails to be a good example and an outstanding member of his community, and Adult!Zero [[spoiler: actively blames himself for Alice's suicide]]. It takes the combined efforts of everyone of his friends to make him stop claiming ItsAllMyFault with every breath he has.
* ItsAllAboutMe: Cue GuiltComplex. Zero truly believes himself the center of everyone's else attention, going so far to shoulder everything bad happening around him and people he even barely knows.
** See TalkingToHimself: [[spoiler: the exact moment Zero stops beating himself for Alice's ultimate fate and start seeing himself as a simple human being and not a failure bringing unhappines and shame to everyone who dares becoming close to him, his friends gain true voices and not a voiceover of the author and we finally are able to hear Alice's voice and not the creepy robotic monotone signalling the fact Zero was able only to remember the times he disappointed her, and not even how her voice sounded]].
* LateArrivalSpoiler: Everyone who read ''La Profezia dell'Armadillo...'' can already pierce [[spoiler: what exactly means being Zero's first love and how Camille was DoomedByCanon all along]]
* TheLostLenore: A walking spoiler trope [[spoiler: Alice's death sends Zero into a spiral of guilt, selfhatred and reflection. He pushes himself to realize he cared for her, even had romantic affections towards her, and starts to believe he could have saved her by confessing everything when he could]].
* LimitedWardrobe: Much life in the strips, every character wears only the same clothes, with Zero apparently owning only two shirts: the iconic "Punisher" black shirt with a white skull, and a reversed one as his sleeping gear.
* MediumBlending: Mostly used in episodes 1 and 2, with sightings of barely-animated cut-outs of real historical figures such as Mao Zedong, Friedrich Nietzsche and Adolf Hitler ([[RuleOfFunny all speaking]] [[TalkingToHimself in Rech's voice]]). Episode 2 has a scene of Zero imagining he has become president, featuring photos of Michele Rech's real actual face.
* MoodWhiplash:
** A constant in Rech's works, his life and problems are represented both by goofy, comical gags and references to other works, and by personal and painful memories where the metaphors are completely serious. In this case the story revolves around Zero's friendship with a girl named Alice [[spoiler:who is involved in a toxic relationship and later takes her own life.]]
** An example is when Zero and Secco go to a pizzeria and Zero's indecision on whether to order the usual pizza margherita or try some new tastes is presented as a monumental task (even getting compared to Plato's Cavern) in a humorous way. However, Zero's [[AdultFear fear of not being able to change in a harsh world that rapidly evolves]] and being left behind by friends and younger people is very real and leads to some painful introspection.
* MyGreatestFailure: Even for the master of [[GuiltComplex Martyr Complex]], Zero believes there's a sin in his life that may never be forgiven: [[spoiler: Alice's suicide, because he never confessed his feeling to her and, when Alice was at her lowest, he choose to avoid hearing her out and sent her away with a hug and some ice cream]].
** Also the reason [[spoiler: Alice took her life, as she could never forgive himself for being a jobless young woman living out of her parents' money]].
* RealLifeWritesThePlot: Not quite a biography, but almost. Every single Rech's writing or animation is a disguised part of his life. WordOfGod states that every single character is a mix-and-match creation made by different parts of different people in his life, shuffled around enough to protect their privacy, modesty and allow them to go on with their lives without being burdened by their animated counteparts.
** "The Prince of Tripping people"/"Il principe degli sgambetti" was a story for kids that Rech actually wrote and illustrated in his youth.
* ReferenceOverdosed: Downplayed compared to the comic books, but there's still plenty of nods to films, cartoons, anime, TV series and novelty items. Even one of the trailers is this: to show how Zero feels about getting on Netflix, the scene starts with him and the Armadillo sitting on the sofa as usual, then becoming bemused as they're joined in rapid succession by a robber from ''Series/MoneyHeist'', [[Series/StrangerThings the Demogorgon]] and ''Series/SquidGame'''s robot doll.
* RightForTheWrongReasons: Early in the story, Alice, friend and love interest of Zero, asks him to write a children's tale. Zero, attempting to avoid being involved and starting a relationship with her sends her a wacky, zany story about a child bullied by the "Prince of Tripping people", a bully who loves tripping a child and when the child becomes a world famous scientist, TookALevelInJerkass and straight up murdered him as the "Prince of Stabbing". While it gets PlayedForLaughs, with Alice claiming the story is obviously unsuitable for children [[spoiler: and also as a proof of their mutual feelings]]. However after [[spoiler: Alice's death it shown that not only Alice cherished the story, but was fond of it and loved to tell the first part to children taking Zero's unwilling advice by heart. Life will hurt and scar you (or at least your knees), but until you're alive your scars will become the proof you lived and someone remembered you]].
* RunningGag: Secco asking to go eat some ice cream, especially at inappropriate moments.
* SignsOfDisrepair: In one episode Zero imagines his part-time job about teaching kids as a run-down factory named "Ripetizioni di Calcare" (more or less, "Calcare's Remedial Classes"). The L from the sign falls down, turning it into "Ripetizioni di Cacare" or, roughly, "Shitty Remedial Classes". (In Italian "cacare" means "to take a shit", and "fa cacare" is equivalent to "it sucks")
* ScarsAreForever: The reason [[spoiler: Alice invested herself in boxing before her suicide. Her obituary, and Zero's story he wrote for her, flatly states that Alice wanted to die as a ''scarred old woman'', with every scar tied to a fond memory, rather than a ''clean, unchanging doll'']].
* TakeThat: In the ImagineSpot described above, where Zero becomes president, there's a poster with Michele Rech's actual face and the words "L'ultimo faggiano" on it. That is a parody of [[https://www.repstatic.it/content/localirep/img/espresso/2020/11/20/045142750--aa1940c0-988b-4e6e-8741-543803e5c763.jpg the actual cover]] of an important Italian magazine that in late 2020 took a random photo of Rech and put it on the cover, paired with the text "L'ultimo intellettuale" ("The Last Intellectual"). Rech wasn't consulted and didn't know about it, and when he found out, he was reportedly furious and embarrassed, and even ranted about it on his social media profiles.
* TalkingToHimself: As stated above, Rech voices everyone minus the Armadillo, and other international editions also have two people, or even just one actor, voicing everyone. [[spoiler:The second half of the final episode suddenly averts this, with Sarah, Secco, Alice and her parents getting different voice actors. A clever way to show that they're based on real people and not just cartoon caricatures, meaning that Zero finally understands that people are more complex than the image he has of them and that he needs to get outside of his own head - also represented by the Armadillo momentarily leaving him.]]
* VoiceForTheVoiceless: Alice, Zero's on-and-off love interest during his teenage and college years is always shown speaking with an eerie ComputerVoice, as Zero constantly states he's unable to remember how her real voice does actually sound. [[spoiler: The exact moment where Zero is forced to remember, is the most emotional part of the whole season]].
* WhamLine: The very end of episode 5, where Secco bluntly states [[spoiler:that Alice has died.]] The old couple that Zero, Secco and Sarah went to visit are thus revealed as [[spoiler:Alice's parents, that they reached since they needed a place to stay before attending Alice's funeral.]]

In December 2020 Creator/{{Netflix}} unveiled the teaser trailer for an animated series called ''Strappare lungo i bordi'' ("Tear along the dotted lines"), created, written and directed by Rech himself, as a much more polished version of the animated experiments from his [[https://www.youtube.com/user/zerocalcare/featured YouTube channel]]. It features Zero, the Armadillo and his friends Sarah and Secco, a girl named Alice plus other characters. The series was released worldwide on November 17, 2021, in the form of a six-episode season; the Italian version has Rech voicing [[TalkingToHimself every character]] minus the Armadillo, who is voiced by popular Italian actor Valerio Mastandrea. Unlike the live-action movie, the series was praised as a very faithful and well-made adaptation of Zerocalcare's comics.

* FreezeFrameBonus: As part of the ReferenceOverdosed nature of Rech's works, there are several sight gags and sentences that can only be caught by pausing the video, for example the terrain between the subway and the surface at the beginning of episode 1.

* AnimateInanimateObject: Zero's house is seen as a parody of TheBraveLittleToaster series mixed with GameOfThrones, with every knick-knack and useless junk inside Zero's house conspiring to take ownership of his house and actively arguing and fighting for control with their owner.

** Also, Alice shares the same issue. Going so far [[spoiler: to take her own life, because, in her father's words, she was "too kind to dare stepping on someone". Summing up, she avoided telling her feeling to Zero as much as he did, she had her share of abusive relationships and suffered them without a complain and refused to tell her parents how bad she felt as a jobless, pennyless adult woman until she killed herself over it]]

** The last couple of episodes feature appearances of someone looking like [[https://www.instagram.com/apandapiace/ the Panda]] from ''A Panda piace...'', the webcomic by Rech's fellow comic book artist Giacomo Bevilacqua (see "Orphaned Series" above). He's not a FunnyAnimal like several others that appear, but clearly a man wearing a mask, so he could possibly represent Bevilacqua himself.

** WordOfGod states that every single detail is based out of real items Rech own: Zero's cellphone shares Rech's wallpaper, the "GameOfThrones" scene at Zero's place is based on the real Rech's house, down to the messy couch and even his backpack is an animated rendition of one Rech actually owns.

* TheLostLenore: A walking spoiler trope [[spoiler: Alice's death sends Zero into a spiral of guilt, selfhathred and reflection. He pushes himself to realize he cared for her, even had romantic affections towards her, and starts to believe he could have saved her by confessing everything when he could]].

* MediumBlending: Mostly used in episodes 1 and 2, with brief sightings of barely-animated cut-outs of real historical figures such as Mao Zedong, Friedrich Nietzsche and Adolf Hitler ([[RuleOfFunny all speaking]] [[TalkingToHimself in Rech's voice]]). Episode 2 has a scene of Zero imagining he has become president, featuring photos of Michele Rech's real actual face.

* TalkingToHimself: As stated above, Rech voices everyone minus the Armadillo, and other international editions also have two people, or even just one actor, voicing everyone. [[spoiler:The second half of the final episode suddenly averts this, with Sarah, Secco and Alice's parents getting different voice actors. A clever way to show that they're based on real people and not just cartoon caricatures, meaning that Zero finally understands that people are more complex than the image he has of them and that he needs to get outside of his own head - also represented by the Armadillo momentarily leaving him.]]
* VoiceForTheVoiceless: Alice, Zero's on-and-off love interest during his teenage and college years is always shown speaking with an eerie ComputerVoice, as Zero constantly states he's unable to remember how her real voice does actually sound. [[spoiler: the exact moment where Zero is forced to remember, is the most emotional part of the whole season]].
* WhamLine: The very end of episode 5, where Secco bluntly states [[spoiler:that Alice has died.]] The old couple that Zero, Secco and Sarah went to visit are thus revealed as [[spoiler:Alice's parents, that they got in touch with in order to take part to Alice's funeral.]]

* ItsAllAboutMe: A benign version of the trope. Despite not being a malicious and egocentric being, Zero is shown believing himself the center of everyone's else attention, believing himself the cause of everything bad happening to his friends, relative or even people he barely know.

In December 2020 Creator/{{Netflix}} unveiled the teaser trailer for an animated series called ''Strappare lungo i bordi'' (roughly meaning "Tear along the dotted lines"), created, written and directed by Rech himself, as a much more polished version of the animated experiments from his [[https://www.youtube.com/user/zerocalcare/featured YouTube channel]]. It features Zero, the Armadillo and his friends Sarah and Secco, a girl named Alice plus other characters. The series was released worldwide on November 17, 2021, in the form of a six-episode season; the Italian version has Rech voicing [[TalkingToHimself every character]] minus the Armadillo, who is voiced by famed Italian actor Valerio Mastandrea. Unlike the live-action movie, the series was praised as a very faithful and well-made adaptation of Zerocalcare's comics.

* RunningGag: Secco asking to go eat some ice cream, mostly (and especially) at inappropriate moments.

* MoodWhiplash: A constant in Rech's works, his life and problems are represented both by goofy, comical gags and references to other works, and by personal and painful memories where the metaphors are completely serious. In this case the story revolves around Zero's friendship with a girl named Alice [[spoiler:who is involved in a toxic relationship and later takes her own life.]]

In December 2020 Creator/{{Netflix}} unveiled the teaser trailer for an animated series called ''Strappare lungo i bordi'' (roughly meaning "Tear along the dotted lines"), created, written and directed by Rech himself, as a much more polished version of the animated experiments from his [[https://www.youtube.com/user/zerocalcare/featured YouTube channel]]. It features Zero, the Armadillo and his friends Sarah and Secco plus other characters. The series was released worldwide on November 17, 2021, in the form of a six-episode season; the Italian version has Rech voicing [[TalkingToHimself every character]] minus the Armadillo, who is voiced by famed Italian actor Valerio Mastandrea. Unlike the live-action movie, the series was praised as a very faithful and well-made adaptation of Zerocalcare's comics.

In December 2020 Creator/{{Netflix}} unveiled the teaser trailer for an animated series called ''Strappare lungo i bordi'' (roughly meaning "Tear along the dotted lines"), created, written and directed by Rech himself, as an expansion of the animated experiments from his [[https://www.youtube.com/user/zerocalcare/featured YouTube channel]]. It features Zero, the Armadillo and his friends Sarah and Secco plus other characters. The series was released worldwide on November 17, 2021, in the form of a six-episode season; Rech voices [[TalkingToHimself every character]] minus the Armadillo, who is voiced by famed Italian actor Valerio Mastandrea.

At the end of 2020 Creator/{{Netflix}} unveiled the teaser trailer for an animated series called ''Strappare lungo i bordi'', written and directed by Rech himself and that will feature Zero, the Armadillo and all the main characters from his comic strips. The date of release is November 2021, in the form of a six episode season, with Rech voicing [[TalkingToHimself ''every'' character]] minus the Armadillo, who is voiced by famed Italian actor Valerio Mastandrea.

At the end of 2020 Creator/{{Netflix}} unveiled the teaser trailer for an animated series called ''Strappare lungo i bordi'', which is going to be written and directed by Rech himself and will feature Zero, the Armadillo and all the main characters from his comic strips.

* BigOlEyebrows: His AuthorAvatar has enormous bushy ones. Thankfully his brows in real life aren't quite as thick.

* OccidentalOtaku: Zero in his youth had shades of this. He went to a cultural centre to learn Japanese language and culture because he said he liked Japanese girls and people, and half-jokingly said that ninjas and Godzilla were an integral part of his culture. Anime are also a fairly large part of the [[ReferenceOverdosed many, many references]] he makes.