Part Two of The Komic’s Origin Story
All great superheroes need to have an origin story.
The Komic T-shirt is available at Cafepress. Be the first on your block, if not your state, to own one.
Quick Recap of Part 1:
A newborn flew out of a hospital window and landed on her head. Bonnie Watson who ran the mortuary next door took the waif home and named her Lily Puddly. When Lily Puddly was 35, Bonnie Watson contracted a terminal brain disease. She and Lily Puddly go to the Odd Port Comedy Club on open-mike night hoping to distract themselves, but none of the comedians are any good. Bonnie Watson says to Lily Puddly that she tells far better jokes than that lot, and she should try her hand at stand up.
Afraid she’ll bomb and embarrass herself, Lily Puddly wears a disguise: Groucho Mark glasses and a T- shirt that says, The Komic.” She’s a hit. Bonnie Watson tells Lily Puddly that listening to her tell jokes in a room full of laughing people is better at relieving her pain than any of her prescription medicine, so Lily Puddly, always wearing her disguise, became a regular at the Comedy Club. One time when Bonnie Watson was wracked with pain at home, she asked Lily Puddly to tell her a joke so funny that she’d die laughing. Lily Puddly told the best joke she had ever written, and when she finished the punch line, Bonnie Watson, tears of laughter rolling down her cheek, took her last breath.
BTW, I’ve only drawn one quick sketch for The Komic, so I’m interspersing some of other superhero cartoons through out this post.
Part 2: Grappling With The Responsibility of Having a Super Power
“Do I really have the ability to make people die laughing?” Lily Puddly wondered while cremating Bonnie Watson. “Am I killer comedian? If so, it would be as bad as Midas’s touch that turned everyone into gold.”
Did she dare go back on stage? She did go back to the Comedy Club sans disguise hoping it would ease her depression.
It didn’t.
She could hear people whispering around her, “There’s brain damaged Lily Puddly. How’s she going to manage without kindly Bonnie Watson looking after her? She should have been sent to a home years ago.”
All of the comedians’ jokes fell flat that night and every night thereafter for a month. Every night people asked, “Where is The Komic?”
No one knew she was in their midst since Lily Puddly wasn’t wearing her Groucho Marx glasses and The Komic T-shirt she got at Cafepress for $21.99.
Lily Puddly missed hearing laughter almost as much as she missed Bonnie Watson, so she donned her disguise and returned the Comedy Club where she received a standing ovation even before she opened her mouth.
Instead of a series of jokes, she told a funny story with lots of asides, a story that she drug out as long as possible. The audience’s laughter increased with every amusing aside. “Should I tell the punch line?” she kept asking herself.
“Gads, I’ve forgotten the rest of the joke,” she said bowing a little bow and walked off stage.
This became The Komic’s shtick: the comic who never finished a joke.
The Komic advised and tutored other comics, so even though none could match her humor, delivery technique, turn of phrase or timing, the quality of their performances did improve.
One night when two producers from Comedy Central were in the audience Max Marie had a particularly good set. They offered him a contract for his own show. The Komic was ecstatic for her protégé. Max Marie was so excited he almost wet himself so excused himself for a moment.
The producers approached The Komic and said, “You know, you’re the one we’d really like to sign on.”
“Thanks,” the Komic said. “I’m happy here.”
“Do you really not remember the punch lines,” one of the producers asked, “or is it all part of the act?” The Komic laughed nervously.
“Come on,” the other producer said. “Spit a punch line out. I can tell you want to.”
And she really did want to. Holding in punch lines all the time was a strain worse than holding in a sneeze or an orgasm.
License Medical Cartoon 1995
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One of the producers held up his cell phone camera and said, “We’re waiting.” The Komic hadn’t told a punch line since Bonnie Watson died laughing. But did she die laughing? “Maybe she died while laughing,” The Komic thought to herself. “Maybe it was coincidence. Maybe her brain disease had run its course and I had nothing to do with her death.”
The Komic said the punch line to the joke she had started that evening, “Pinocchio.”
Max Marie came out of the restroom just in time to see the producers and a bartender who was with in earshot dying laughing.
“What did you do?” he screamed at The Komic. “You killed them, and I hadn’t signed the contract yet.”
“All I did was a finish a joke,” The Komic said almost inaudibly.
Max Marie became The Komic’s archenemy. Every superhero has to have an archenemy.
Lily Puddly a.k.a. The Komic was wracked with guilt.
The video from the producers’ cell phones went viral. Everyone wanted to know what the punch line was, but the producers laughter was so loud no one could hear it and their hands were shaking so much no one could read her lips.
One computer geek spent weeks filtering and tweaking the audio, doing all the technical stuff geeks do that mere mortals can’t, and when he finally was able to decipher the punch line, he died laughing. Or did he simply drop dead of a heart attack at the age of 19?
Next: The Komic uses her super power to stop evil because stopping evil is what all great super heroes do.