This remains one of my favorite jokes and represents what I consider my signature style of “offbeat” humor. Offbeat meaning that the first three panels of the strip establish a certain rhythm of time, place and characters, and that said rhythm is abruptly broken in the last panel with a sudden and, sometimes, unexpected change in setting or situation. You’ll see it a lot through Grimstone, especially in these early strips.

My initial work on Grimstone was greatly influenced by a wonderful book I had received by cartoonist Christopher Hart entitled Drawing On the Funny Side of the Brain. That and other books by Hart helped shape my artistic style for Grimstone as well as my writing. In fact, if it weren’t for his books, I may not have returned to doing a web comic (my first being the short-lived and ill-fated My Martian Friends).

Commentary written in 2006.