THE NEW SIGNAGE #34:

CONGRATULATIONS. YOU HAVE JUST RIPPED OFF NUMBER ONE’S MASKS TO FIND YOUR OWN FACE STARING BACK AT YOU. THANK YOU.

NOTIONAL HEADLINE #223:

CLASS ACTION LAWSUIT FILED ON BEHALF OF OVER TEN THOUSAND HUMAN-COUCH HYBRIDS CLAIMING DAMAGES FOR TRAUMA CAUSED BY BEING ABANDONED BY VICE PRESIDENT VANCE.

YOUR DRAWING PROMPT #89:

The redactor who redacts himself without being compelled to do so by any order from above or law of the land.

FANTASY MASHUP FORCE #26:

Silent Side Story.

This is West Side Story + Silent Hill.

You’ve got two gangs of monsters-the Nurses and the Grey Children-dance battling to see which team gets to ride in the flying saucer piloted by a dog.

Meanwhile, Pyramid Head and Officer Cybil are a mismatched pair of buddy cops looking to enforce the law upon lawless abominations.

Pyramid Head’s got lots of personal shit. He’s depressed that he’s just the manifestation of some random dude’s desire to be punished. He aspires to be so much more! He’s been taking dance lessons. He’s reading the Stoics. Even though he’s known for wielding a sword he’s been hitting the firing range to expand his repertoire to include the M-60 machine gun, the bazooka, and the person-portable railgun assault system. He sees himself as Protagonist Material, like in a Resident Evil or Doom game. He does mime. He does hosting. He does close magic. He’s working on some fucking amazing singer-songwriter shit-just, like, totally conquering the folkie scene in Silent Hill.

Cybil’s got her own Protagonist Dreams working. Although they’re kinda boring, she figures she could brush up her detective skills by starring in a few of those point-and-click mystery games. She just doesn’t want to get stuck in some godforsaken hidden object purgatory-not even once. But options are scarce these days. She’s gotten a lucrative offer to star in some cutscenes for a video pachislot thing, but that’s another purgatory she’s trying to avoid. She also finds Pyramid Head’s barista-esque pretense of saying,”Oh, but I’m really this other thing” to be incredibly tedious. But she’s also kinda in the same place as him. It’s tough.

The Nurses and the Grey Children have to dodge those trifling cops while winning dance battles to improve their techniques.

Lots of multiple endings tied to various abstruse mechanics will surely guarantee repeat box office as audiences fleeing the suffocating heat of Climate Inferno luxuriate in 4-D air conditioning effects.

Fun for the final survivors of the Human Family!

NOTIONAL HEADLINE #222:

ENORMOUS QUANTITY OF EPSTEIN FILES FOUND LINING THE INSIDE OF ELON MUSK’S SLEEPING BAG.

THE NEW OBVIOUS #44:

Those Vanity Fair pics of the Trump cabinet people?

They’re rather unflattering. 

My guess is that in the next few days there’s going to be an official statement from the spokesvillain for the Dick Tracy Rogues’ Gallery disavowing any connection with this ghastly gang of ghouls.

And these same ghouls can surely forget about launching any Only Fans accounts after the United States government collapses over this Christmas season.

Life is especially tough for those with severe appearance deficits. 

Even more so in this capitalist hellscape that values image over substance, lies over truth, and cruelty over compassion.

Boo-hoo.

THE SECRETS OF FINAL TOWN 88

THE NEW SIGNAGE #33:

CONGRATULATIONS. THE CAST OF NEON GENESIS EVANGELION HAS JUST SURROUNDED YOU IN ORDER TO CONGRATULATE YOU. THANK YOU.

YOUR DRAWING PROMPT #88:

The bauble beyond all price.

NOTIONAL HEADLINE #221:

HOME ALONE REBOOT PROMISES TO TACKLE LONELINESS EPIDEMIC.

FANTASY MASHUP FORCE #25:

Reading Rainblow.

Basically, it’s LeVar Burton getting replaced by Tony Montana. The producers want more of an edgy, 1980s vibe going forward, so Burton gets a pink slip. 

As Tony descends into cocaine psychosis, he starts hearing the voice of his beloved dead sister who tells him that assassins are hiding between the pages of all the books. Tony whips out his “little friend,” and blasts all the books. 

Once all of the books have been killed, Ronald Reagan appears.

“Son, I want to shake your hand!”

Tony Montana-whose heart is about to explode-gets super self-conscious about shaking the Gipper’s hand because his sister is now whispering in his ear that he needs to scrape off all the bugs that are covering his body from crown to soles. Tony excuses himself to go to the bathroom. Reagan stands in place, smiling into the middle distance. We see Tony enter the bathroom, shut the door behind himself. Soon enough, we hear him start to scream. Reagan’s head pops off and flails about on the end of a spring whilst making wacky sound effects. The bathroom door opens, and a gigantic spider comes out, giving us all the impression that Tony’s cocaine-enhanced mentality allowed him to metamorphose into a huge arachnid to eat all the bugs that were tormenting him.

“Okaaaay, Mr. President . . .”

We cut back to Reagan’s flailing, spring-mounted head.

We cut to the giant spider surging directly into the camera.

We cut to the gorgeous Miami skyline at golden hour.

Roll credits.

THE NEW DREAM #50:

I’m cataloguing the largest comic book collection on Earth. 

flash crimson 1990s serial killer music video edgelordy visuals as I sneak into a rich man’s palatial Citizen Kane-ass estate, blade in my hand, song in my heart

I guess it’s my collection now.

I’m soaked in mayhem, howling ecstatically as I run up and down unruly stacks’n’piles of long boxes that constitute a winding, confounding subterranean labyrinth born of some gnawing collector’s pathology

Most of the collection consists of copies of The New Dream #50, a heavily hyped double-sized collector’s edition featuring a holografix foil cover which was touted as a great jumping-on point for new readers. 

I’m vibrating with battlehype, crown to taint, I’ve just slain thousands of goblins and assorted hommunculi to secure the site

They must’ve printed, like, a billion of ‘em.

My aura of victory imprints itself upon huge swathes of the collection, displacing corny old spandex soap operas with my glory 

Totally worthless. 

Later, I try to sell these newly emblazoned comics online, but no one buys ‘em

You find one in every dollar and quarter bin across the land. 

People look at the pics and they think I’m trying to sell fire-damaged backstock

People use ‘em to cover their carpets when they do indoor remodelling. 

Now, when I sleep I get sensations of being dragged down into the earth by some terrible weight

You can find pictures online of people wrapping themselves in its pages so they look like postmodern Pop Art mummies. 

I awake, still inside the Old Dream, but now I know it’s over, it’s been over, it’s never not been over

Oh, the memes with this one. 

I can’t stand the twist on this one, that I’m also the guy who constructed this Citizen Kane-ass mausoleum with pretentions of houseness

Oh, the bonfires where people dress up as criminal clowns, and say, “It’s not about the dreams.”

It’s always about the dreams

So, yes, The New Dream #50 was overhyped and over-printed. 

Flooded the market with dreams

But The New Dream #49, now that one was underhyped and underprinted, because it was a fill-in issue that had little to do with the ongoing storyline. 

Reality is the actual collector’s item, and that one’s even more worthless

The regular writer/artist team quit after The New Dream #48 to start their own independent comic book company. 

It’s like when you go through a dollar or a quarter bin and you end up pulling a full two year run of some high quality independent title

So they brought in some ringers to squeeze out #49, and then they delayed #50 so they could build hype for the new creative team and the new creative direction for about a year. 

And it’s worth less than a Florida Governor during a hurricane

It was all for nothing. 

I mean, sure, you could read it

The New Dream staggered on through #55 before getting all-over shitcanned. 

But what if everybody found out you actually read the comic books you buy?

But The New Dream #49, now that one’s a real Grail, a big ol’ White Whale. 

Would you ever live down the shame of such an exposure?

You never come across that one.

Would you ever be able to build a Citizen Kane-ass mausoleum big enough to hide your pathetic self from the world?

It’s an old dream.

NOTIONAL HEADLINE #220:

WELCOME, BIG DAWG, TO THE HEADLINES: NEW SOCIAL RESEARCH DATA SUGGESTS THAT IF YOU WERE COMPLAINING ABOUT THAT CHICKEN JOCKEY SHIT EARLIER THIS YEAR YOU MAY AS WELL START COMPLAINING ABOUT 6-7 RIGHT DAMN NOW . . . THE UNITED STATES HAS ANNOUNCED A NEW SCHEDULE OF WAR CRIMES TO BE COMMITTED AGAINST BOATING ENTHUSIASTS IN BLUE STATES AS A COMPLEMENT TO THE WAR CRIMES BEING COMMITTED AGAINST VENEZUELA . . . SAUDI ARABIA’S CROWN PRINCE HAS JUST LAUNCHED A VACUOUS FREEFORM PODGRIFT IN THE STYLE OF MARC MARON AND JOE ROGAN. HIS UPCOMING GUEST LIST INCLUDES DAVE CHAPPELLE, BILL BURR, LOUIS C.K., AND KEVIN HART. WHILE MANY LISTENERS LOOK FORWARD TO THE NO DOUBT SCINTILLATING CONVO, MOST OF THE ONLINE FAN CHATTER SEEMS TO BE EXCITED BY THE AD READS FOR OVERPRICED CEREAL, UNDERWEAR, MATTRESSES, DATA HARVESTING THERAPY SCAMS, BONER PILLS, AND FREELANCE DISMEMBERMENT SERVICES . . . AND FINALLY, WE TURN TO PRESIDENT TRUMP WHOSE RECENT SPATE OF MEDICAL EXAMS SHOW DEFINITIVE DIAGNOSTIC PROOF THAT BUBBA’S STILL KNOCKING THEM VOCAL CORDS LOOSE . . .

THE SECRETS OF FINAL TOWN 87

THE NEW SIGNAGE #32:

CONGRATULATIONS. YOU HAVE ENDED NO WARS. IN FACT, YOU HAVE STARTED WARS. GIVE YOURSELF A FAKE PEACE AWARD. OR FIND A CORRUPT ORGANIZATION OR INDIVIDUAL TO GIVE YOU A FAKE PEACE AWARD. TRUST THE BOGUS PROCESS, BIG DAWG. THANK YOU.