oh yes

Being human – self-aware, cognizant of your own mortality, sentient, capable of feeling pain, sorrow, and embarrassment (etc.) – can really suck sometimes. (Most times.) Luckily there are little moments of joy, like Alex Norris’s webcomic Webcomic Name, featuring the delightfully non-gendered little pink blob of oh nos. Pinky wields the catchphrase “oh no” (and self-referential panels about the running gag) like a … sword? Baseball bat? Pillow over the face? Blanket fort with which to deflect the outside world? I’m not exactly sure, but the result is at once comically entertaining and morbidly depressing.

Norris tackles disappointments both small (stepping on a friend’s shoe; making accidental eye contact on the bus; cooking fails) and large (poor self-esteem; environmental degradation; the powerlessness on the individual in the face of megacorporations; death), all met with the same refrain: oh no. It’s absurd, it’s portentous, it’s relevant and relatable AF – for better or worse. Mostly worse.

Bonus points for the anti-zoo strip. Truer panels have never been scribbled.