130.49.71.243
Since: Dec, 1969
03/16/2011 00:00:00
The truth is usually very, very, unfunny.
spambot
Since: Sep, 2010
03/16/2011 00:00:00
On one of the Zits compilations, the authors ran a list of names of people who sent them the message "you must have a camera in our house"
Westrim
Since: Jan, 2001
08/29/2011 00:00:00
On another of the compilations, they have a long list of crossed out potential names for the comic, with Zits at the end- accompanied by the quote at the top of the main page.
I rarely visit the forums to avoid the cynicism ooze.Leave a Comment:
It's funny because it's true
Zits has the most horribly generic name you can come up with for a comic strip about adolescence. It's like they didn't even try. And yet, the strip itself does an excellent job of being relate-able to anyone who either is or was a teenager, or who is the parent or relative of one.
Jeremy is... well, he's a regular teenager, and that's all we need to know about him, because he's the perfect stand-in. He fixes simple problems his parents can't solve (like working a DVD player remote control), gets into arguments about dumb things like putting on a jacket, holds many simultaneous conversations at once on his computer and phone ("I wish Jeremy would just talk... to us!"), and is a cartoonish exaggeration of the general American teenager. Chances are you know, or were, a Jeremy.
Funny thing about that jacket comic. Weeks before it was printed, my younger brother got into a big argument about why he shouldn't wear a coat in clearly cold weather, and made a huge deal out of it. Then suddenly, Zits runs this comic about Jeremy arguing with his mom ("No-one wears coats anymore, Mom." "Well, you're gonna wear yours!") and intentionally putting the jacket on wrong many times, until the two complain to each other, "Why must you make my life so difficult?" An exaggeration? Yes, but I cut the comic out and gave it to my mom, who hung it on the refrigerator. It was funny because it was true - ridiculous arguments like that do happen in families with teenagers.
And that's pretty much the jist of what makes the comic so good. You can relate to either Jeremy or the parents, or if nothing else, the situation. And yet, it's cartoonishly exaggerated, but based in enough reality that you can see both the truth in the humor, and the humor in the real life situation it parodies.
Parents have been said to find relief in this comic, as through its many situations, it reminds them that, yes, this weird situation your kid put you through is in fact normal and commonplace. If it weren't, it wouldn't be in the comic. Teens, meanwhile, have found fun in comparing their parents to Jeremy's clueless mom and dad.
It's surprising that a humor strip is about to educate people about life and how others think, but simply by speaking truth in an approachable, funny way, Zits has managed to do just that.