Week 11: Masterpiece Comics

For this week's reading I read Masterpiece Comics. This graphic novel is filled with several mini comics. The comics inside this graphic novel are mature parody comics of classics such as Garfield and Bazooka Joe. These comics got me cracking up right from the start with their intent to directly copy the characters and art style but change the text and appearances slightly to call it their own.

One of the mini comics I read was Mephistofield; a parody of Garfield. In this comic, the main character Jon is a simple man who wants some excitement and power in his life. He practices dark magic and conjures up a devil version of Garfield called Mephistofield; a demon from Hell. With Mephistofiled's help. Jon sold his soul to the Devil and was given power. This power he would use to pull pranks on others such as turning invisible so he could slap the pope in the face with a chicken leg. Jon even scammed a man for a $400 car that dissolves in water; even a simple puddle would destroy it. Jon could even bring people back from the dead and sleep with them like he did with Helen of towards the end of the comic before he was about to die.

These mini comic stories in Masterpiece Comics are hilarious. I love how the stories copy well-known beloved comic characters that all of us know and love and put a spicy twist on them. Something as kid-friendly and innocent as Garfield turned into a story of a satanic worshiping man with a pet devil cat demon from Hell that gives him powers to pull pranks on people and sleep with deceased historical figures. Something this funny and clever is truly a masterpiece comic!

Week 12: My Favorite Things is Monsters

For this week's reading I read My Favorite Things is Monsters by Emil Ferris. This story takes place in 1968 Chicago. The story is told in the first person of a middle school girl named Karen. In this story there is a death that happens in the neighborhood that is believed to be caused by suicide. However Karen isn't convinced and thinks that her neighbor was murdered! Karen decides to go all out Sherlock Holmes and solve the murder while at the same time documenting her findings in the journal.

What drew me to this comic was it's unique artistic style, it's something that I have never seen before. The book's illustrations look as if they were all drawn with ball point pen. On top of that the pages they were drawn on were lined notebook paper and the occasional math test. This really sold the gimmick of giving off the appearance and believe ability of the comic being the personal journal of the protagonist. It's something that I personally have never seen before and it drew me in because of how immersed it made me feel with the story. Knowing that the story is nothing but fiction, it still had a realistic and believable quality to it that had me completely immersed. I love sketchy, loose style of the line-work and on the medium it was drawn on. 

My Favorite Things is Monsters is something that is not so mundane like a regular Archie or Marvel comic. Both of those stories are works of fiction just like this one but with this story in particular, it has that certain quality to it that other books just don't have. The illustration style is both unique and immersive. The formatting of the book alone makes the story feel real; having looked like it was drawn by an actual middle school girl with a ball point pen on notebooks and tests. At times it made me feel part of the story. I mean I knew that the story was fake but for those split seconds of complete immersion, it was priceless. I hope to read more stories like these and will definitely be checking out the next My Favorite Things is Monsters graphic novel as I heard there is a sequel. I want there to be more books like this in the future and hopefully by this graphic novel's release we will potentially see more storytellers go with this stylistic approach.

Week 14: JL8 Web Comic

For this week’s reading I took a look at the web comic JL8 by Yale Stewart. This web comic is based off of the heroes of DC comics. However, this is no ordinary, generic superhero comic. In this story the heroes are little kids attending elementary school.

What I like about this web comic is that I was drawn to it immediately because the fact of it being a superhero comic. I am very fond of the super hero genre and it’s my favorite subject matter to read about when reading comics. It’s funny to see the DC characters in their adolescents and how they would interact with one another if they were kids. The story plays around with origins and iconic tropes of the super heroes. One example is that in the beginning of the comic Bruce Wayne was out of his dark bat suits and instead had to wear a more 60’s blue Batman suit. With the 66’ Batman, it was a common trope that Batman would have a utility belt filled with various replants for things such as shark replant. In this web comic series they played with this trope when Batman thought Superman got cooties from Wonder Woman. Batman, not wanting to get infected with cooties used a “cootie replant” to protect himself. This was hilarious as it played with the cliche elementary school idea of cooties while tying it in with a classic Batman trope.

If you are a fan of DC characters, super heroes, and humor then this web comic is just for you! I highly recommend everyone to read this series as it does not disappoint; it is quite the page turner. You can read JL8 here: https://goo.gl/N53xMt

"Killing Joke" Assessment

     My reaction to The Killing Joke is just plain out wow! I felt so bad for the Joker. I felt bad how he was just a simple man struggling to provide for his family and then all of a sudden his whole world came crashing down when his wife suddenly perished. Not to mention he was in too deep with some illegal business that he couldn't depart of. Life seemed to always be cruel and unjust to The Joker. He left his good-paying job as a lab assistant to pursue his life long goal of being a comedian. It is because of this that he had been struggling to find work. It is because of this that he got involved with crime to make money for his family. It is because of this that he loses his family. It is because of this that he ended up falling into a tub of chemicals that bleached his skin white, turned his hair green and made him looney. It is because of this, because of this one bad day that turned this simple man mad.

     The Killing Joke goes back and forth between flashbacks of the Joker before he went mad. The underlying theme of the graphic novel (at least what I got out of it) was that life is cruel and there is no such thing as a happy ending. How everything can be taken away from you in an instant and you end up losing your sanity. Prior to The Killing Joke we never looked at the Joker as a normal person with emotions and feelings of empathy. We see him killing people off for fun because he is just a crazy lunatic but underneath all that he is just like you and me. He had his hopes and dreams, a family, he had his life together. That is until one day where everything changed. Everything he loved in the world was taken from him and in an instant this simple man turned looney. Just like in the real world you could go out one night having a good time drinking with friends. Then the next thing you know you wake up in a hospital somewhere and the doctors tell you that you got into a serious accident. All your friends died in the crash except for you. To make it worse, you were the driver. Now you have to live with that guilt for the rest of your life. You just lost everything that night. This story of The Killing Joke though fictional is something that could easily reflect onto real life.

     It is hard to bring The Killing Joke into another form of media as there is already an animated film adaptation of this work. However I think that if it were to be brought into another form of media it could possibly be brought to virtual reality. With virtual reality things are much more immersive for the viewer that simply cannot be achieved through reading text off of a page. With virtual reality you can literally put yourself in a character's shoes and experience their life and world around them. If I were to bring this story to vr (virtual reality) I would change it so that the perspective is more so on the side of the Joker. Batman himself would just be a secondary character that you interact with in the vr experience. The user would put on the vr headset and actually become the Joker. You would start off in the past, living the normal life of the Joker as you slowly drift towards insanity. Everything the Joker does, when he hears about his wife's death, to falling into a tub of chemicals, to shooting Barbara Gordon. What was he feeling internally? Through vr I feel that we could dive deeper into the phycological aspect of the Joker.

Week 13: "The Killing Joke"

For this week’s reading I read Alan Moore’s The Killing Joke. This graphic novel tells one of the darkest (if not the darkest) Batman stories of all time. It is one of my favorite graphic novels that I tend to keep reading over and over again. I tend not to read something more than once unless. That however, isn’t the case with “The Killing Joke”.

This story focuses on Batman and Joker and how one of them is going to have to kill the other in the end, hence the name The Killing Joke. At the same time, The Killing Joke gives us a glimpse into the past through flashbacks of the Joker before he went all crazy. It’s nice to see an origin story for this infamous comic book villain as his origins, prior to this was shrouded in mystery.

The illustrations in The Killing Joke have a lot of interesting line work and coloring to them. It is very dark-lit and dramatic for such a story as this. The camera angles of each panel worked very well in the telling of the story. That combined with the beautiful illustrations made it very interesting to read. That is one of the main reasons, aside from the story of why I find The Killing Joke so enjoyable to consume. The drawings are quite detailed and have a sort of ominous feel to them which helps set the tone for the story.

If you haven’t read The Killing Joke I highly recommend that you should. It is one of the best Batman stories that I have ever read. The story sets itself up in a dramatic deathly tone. Aside from the story itself, the dramatic and detailed illustrations are very interesting to look at and are quite the page turner. We also learn about the Joker’s origins for the first time and how one bad day drove a simple man mad.

Week 10: Astro Boy

Astro Boy

      Astro Boy was one of the most popular anime’s when it first aired in 1963. The anime was adapted from a manga, based on the same name about 10 years earlier (Known as the “God of Manga”). Astro Boy was also the first anime to be broadcasted overseas and became a smashing success! In Japans alone it was watched by more than 40% of the population of people with TV’s.

      In the first episode of Astro Boy, a scientist loses his son in a car crash. He is devastated by this and as a result decides to make a robot in his son’s likeness. Realizing that he could never get his son back, and that this thing he created is not his son, it is a robot that could never age. The scientist, filled with anger sells the robot to the circus. The robot (Astro Boy) has to fight other robots in this circus.

      “Astro Boy” had a very clean-cut animation style to it. The show seemed to be heavily inspired by other, American animations at the time. This show would eventually set the standards for Japanese anime for years to come. This style of animation (anime) was used to caricature the American people. Anime heavily exaggerated the big, round eyes of Americans. At the same time the anime style is much more adult-oriented and realistically detailed than American animation.

      I was very pleased with Astro Boy. It was way ahead of it’s time, no wonder why it was such a smash hit when it first aired back in 1963. I was actually first exposed to “Astro Boy” when the 3D animated movie from 2009 was released. The movie itself seemed to be heavily based on the first episode of the original “Astro Boy” tv series. Of course in the movie, the robot runs away and the scientist spends the whole movie worrying about the robot instead of casting it away to the circus. It was interesting to see how true to the show the film was and how the differences to the characters from the show to the movie really change the feeling of the franchise.

Week 9: A Wide World of Comics Response

An Analysis of Persepolis   

      What happened in Persepolis? This week I took a look at one of the alternative readings, Persepolis. This, I would say is a coming of age story. We are introduced to this young girl named Marji. She has to deal with the changes of growing up while at the same time has to live through a violence-infested world, pretending things are all normal. Marji lives in a major turning point in history for Iran. The country was in constant ruins and violence was everywhere. It became so bad that Marji had to leave to go live and grow-up somewhere else.

      A year after the Iranian Revolution, Marji attends an all girls school. The thing is, this school is no ordinary school. It is a private religious institution. Marji and her family never really practiced religion but Marji had no choice but to attend. You can imagine how hard it must have been for her to get used to that type of environment.

     There is constant violence in the streets. It became so bad to the point where Iraq started to bomb Tehran. Marji and her family had to take cover in a bomb shelter. A neighboring Jewish family was even blown up during the process. The thing is, growing up in your teens you are already dealing with a lot of emotional and physical stress. On top of trying to live like a normal girl Marji also had the issue of dealing with the violence that surrounded her everyday.

     Marji became rebellious and started listening to punk music and wearing American clothes. She did this as an out of her everyday life, a break from reality for just a little bit. Upset with her behavior, Marji’s parents sent her off to Austria to attend a new school all by herself. While she was there Marji begins to experiment with sex and starts to sell drugs. Her then boyfriend Markus cheats on her. As a result Marji goes to live on the streets. Only two months in, Marji winds up in the hospital, sick with bronchitis. After her parents find out about this they have Marji come back home to them.

     Having to re-adjust to a new life once more, it took a heavy emotional and psychological toll on Marji. She couldn’t handle what was happening to her and tried to commit suicide. Her attempt at suicide ended up in failure. Instead, Marji decided to re-invent herself. She got a new hair style, clothes, along with a new attitude. She got a job as an aerobics instructor and enrolled into art school. Marji realizes that this life of heres isn’t really meant for her. She makes the decision to leave once more and start fresh somewhere else. She says goodbye to her parents at the airport and leaves. This is just like how she left for Austria when she was a young girl, but now she has grown up. She is now a strong, independent woman.

     I thought Persepolis was a very interesting and unique take on a coming of age story. Growing up, I couldn’t imagine going through what Marji went through. Living every day not knowing if you were going to get blown up or not must have been a lot to deal with. Especially when you are a young girl already stressed with the reality of developing into a young woman. Having to move from one place to another must have been a lot for Marji as well. Trying to find that place where she could call home, to have a normal life for once must have been a very scary part in her life. If I were in her shoes I wouldn’t know what to do. I would just walk around aimlessly, all alone and constantly be scared of this new, foreign place that I’m living. I feel that being in Marji’s situation, as a young kid especially, you become very lost in the world. I’m sure that is what Marji was going through internally. Eventually she goes back home and finds out that life there isn’t meant for her, and so she leaves once more. It was a giant roller coaster to get to where Marji is at the end of the story. Everything she had to go through, she finally found out who she wants to be and where she belongs.

Understanding Comics Response

Understanding Comics Response

McCloud discusses how people should take comics more seriously and acceptable by adults. If
the art style was more sophisticated in comic books then people would appreciate them more. Years after McCloud's Understanding Comics, we now have more sophisticated artwork from comic artists working for DC and Marvel. Scott McCampbell, Jim Lee, Frank Miller, are just a few of the sophisticated comic artists in modern-day comics. These illustrators' works are appreciated by millions and have even been turned into blockbuster movie hits, video games, toys, underwear, you name it! I believe that McCloud's idea for a better future for comic books has been recognized.

I love the way McCloud illustrates his tellings of industry secrets, his opinion of the comic book industry and so forth. It's unlike other, more traditional "How to" or "Comic book this..." kinds of books. McCloud uses comics to talk about comics! How clever is that? Honestly it was one of the most interesting and fun ways to learn about an industry such as the comic book world. McCloud also talked about the cartoon vacuum and how we become part of that world when we are exposed to such media. For example, he drew himself as a simple cartoon but then in the next panel made himself into a more realistic style and said "Would you have listened to me if I looked like this?". This was a very clever way to have the reader react and understand McCloud's knowledge and insight into the creation of comic books that many people don't think of or simply overlook.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading Understanding Comics. It was a fun and engaging way to go about the creation of comic books as well as Scott McCloud's own opinions and ideas of the medium. I agree tremendously with McCloud's idea of sophisticated artwork in comic books. I believe that people will appreciate comics more and have done so already. Given the fact of how huge pop culture is in our society today is a great indicator of that. The majority of pop culture is centered around cartoons and comic books. So much so that all of them have been adapted into other forms of media such and movies and video games.

Maus Reading Response

Maus Reading Response

            Maus is one of those stories that just tugs at your heart strings. I can’t imagine being this character, Vladek and have so many horrible things happen to you. Even though I did not go through the troubles and hardships like Vladek did I still felt a lot of empathy towards him and the other people in this story. If you aren’t familiar with Maus, it was the first graphic novel to really get the graphic novel genre popular. It is so sophisticated in it’s writing that it feels like you are reading a serious novel but it’s merely a comic book. When people think comic book they think of silly looking characters and a bunch of gags or people with superpowers in tights. Maus is unlike any of these stories as it is a story based in reality.

            What I like visually about this story is that the illustrator plays with the idea of cat and mice. They turn the innocent people into mice and have them running away and hiding from the evil Nazi cats. What I like about that decision was that this is exactly how cats and mice interact in real life as well as other works of media. It is staying true to the whole feel of being based in reality which is what this story is so much about.

            Maus was extremely difficult to read. Reminded that these events, of WWII actually happened. It made the story that much more of a depressing narrative to consume. The entire time I was reading I just sat there and thought to myself; "wow, I couldn’t imagine being in Vladek’s shoes." With all the destruction in the world, having your business destroyed, being thrown in concentration camps, separated from your family and losing all of your loved ones. We sometimes forget that stuff like this has happened, because we didn't live through it. This story really hits you in the head, reminding us about the harsh and cruel reality of humanity.

            I had a family member who grew up in Poland during World War 2. Joe was his name. He was about 5 years old when the Nazis took him and his family to concentration camps. The worst part of it all though was that the Nazis separated him from the rest of his family. Joe was all alone, 5 years old at this camp. He was forced to work on an assembly line, making wallets for the Nazi soldiers. Joe lived a full life until he recently passed away, last year at the age of 89. In all that time of his life, Joe never found out what happened to his family nor ever reunited with them. Maus is a story that makes you stop and think that something as far fetched as a story like this has to be fake, it has to be made up. It can’t be real, but it is. This story stands as a reminder of humanities horrific past during World War 2 and of how many families were destroyed during this time in our history.

Fat Freddy's Cat Reading Response

Fat Freddy's Cat Reading Response

Fat Freddy’s Cat was definitely something I wasn’t expecting to enjoy. Knowing that the material I would be reading had nudity, violence, and drugs; didn’t really make me that excited. In the first few panels of the story we are introduced to this cat; Fat Freddy’s Cat. This cat destroys everything in his path, picks fights with random cats and ruins people’s days. Immediately I thought, ok this is going to be a crude parody version of Garfield. Also why is he named Fat Freddy’s Cat? Who is Fat Freddy? Nobody knows. The entire story focuses on this one character; Fat Freddy’s Cat who remains himself a mystery.

All of a sudden the story goes from normal cat shenanigans to a completely different direction. The cat tells us that he wasn’t always Fat Freddy’s Cat. He told this story through a flashback of how he was a spy for the White House. During his mission, the cat had to go stop a group of invaders from polluting the United State’s water supply with Hee Hee Hee juice. It was a drug which made whoever drank it turn queer. Talk about coming out of left field! The story just keeps on going. The cat finds a colony of nudists who he thinks are actually the invaders but in disguise. He then proceeds to kill all of them, then finds out that he killed the wrong people. He then goes off to another location where he finds a man who is holding a big barrel. Thinking the contents of the barrel was the Hee Hee Hee juice; the cat shot and killed the man. However it turns out that the man was innocent and was just taking out the trash.

Fat Freddy’s Cat fails his mission after finding out the invaders had already poisoned the nation’s coffee supply. He goes back to the White House and sees the President drinking out of a cup of coffee. Thinking that the coffee had already been filled with the Hee Hee Hee juice the cat shoots the President in the back of the head, the end. What a crazy humorous comic! After reading the story I could not believe how stupid this cat was and his personality kind of reminded me of Marvel Comics’ Deadpool. We started off with a cliche cat, Garfield-esk story and end up reading something completely unexpected. Ultimately I really enjoyed reading Fat Freddy’s Cat and I encourage everyone to read it if they haven’t done so already.

Will Eisner vs. Craig Thompson

Will Eisner vs. Craig Thompson

Will Eisner’s “Contract with God” was a very unique story in the way it was depicted both in written word and illustration. The illustrations were done in a very loose, sketchy style. Eisner made very sophisticated works of art by adding in a tremendous amount of detail, more so than your average comic strip. This gave the piece a very true and honest gritty feel to it which helped immensely with the story’s overall feel. The story follows a Jewish man who loses his daughter. It is because of this that the story progressively gets darker as the main character loses all faith in God. That is why the artwork goes hand in hand with the story. It has a very dark and imperfect feel to it that accompanies the nature of the story quite well. “Blankets” by Craig Thompson is similar to Eisner’s “Contract with God” in the way the illustrations are created. Both works utilize the use of black and white, sketchy and loose linework. The storytelling is very similar as it is with most comics. I will say though that I was drawn to “Blankets” more just because of the sheer fact of the use of the minimal word count. I’m not a huge fan of reading large amounts of text while reading comic books. I also found Thompson’s  illustrations more appealing and intriguing to view rather than that of Will Eisner. Thompson has a better understanding of the use of camera angles and composition for his panels. Overall both graphic novels are constructed and are visually similar. It is my personal preference, however that I find Craig Thompson’s work more appealing and enjoyable to read rather than Will Eisner’s “Contract with God”.

Blog Post Week 4

Blog Post Week 4

Tales of the Crypt: This comic series took a break from superheroes and focused on the horror genre. With very well-detailed drawings it made the subject matter even more creepy. They were extremely detailed to a point where we are able to see the wrinkles on people’s faces, it was sort of uncanny. The story I was reading; Haunt of Fear, opened up with a cliché story of somebody getting killed by a werewolf and a vampire. Then all of a sudden the story took a completely different turn when the werewolf and vampire wanted to get married. It’s very interesting to see this take on monsters. When people think of monster we don’t necessarily picture them as these beings who are capable of loving and compassion. We no longer see them as these vicious, gruesome creatures who want nothing but terror and death. It’s a very cool concept to think about, nothing has ever been done like this with monsters before in the media. For years books and movies portrayed monsters in a very specific way. It was nice to see a new take on them.

Uncle Scrooge: The artwork is fun and colorful. The storyline is a bit extreme but entertaining. In the story, I read; House of Haunts, Scrooge is obsessed with his money (As always). He hides it from the Beegle Boys who recently escaped prison. While in prison the Beegle, Boys were educated, and received diplomas. They used their new-found skills from their prison education to try and find a way to get Scrooge’s money. Scrooge wanted to dive into his money but Donald locked him up in a closet so he couldn’t go swimming in it. The Beegle Boys saw this as an opportunity so they toss a saw through the closet window so that scrooge may cut a hole out for himself to escape. As Scrooge ran away the Beegle Boys spray him with this glow in the dark paint so they could easily track Scrooge in the dark. They followed Scrooge to a castle but Scrooge stops in his tracks as he believes there is a glowing ghost following him when in actuality he was just looking at his own glowing reflection. This ultimately backfired on the Beegle Boys when Scrooge runs out of the castle and doesn’t lead the Beegle Boys to his treasure. In the end the Beegle Boys don’t succeed in obtaining Scrooge’s money and Scrooge gets to swim in his piles and piles of money.

Tin Tin: Beautifully illustrated characters and environments. The color pallet is very inviting to look at. There is a great dynamic between the Captain and Tin Tin. The captain seems like he can have a bit of a temper and bitter view on the world where Tin Tin; on the other hand, embraces the world he’s in and sees nothing but the good. There is a lot of time spent in the same locations rather than other books that jump to several locations in a span of a page or two. For example, in one of the Tin Tin stories; Tin Tin in Tibet, Tin Tin and the captain are up in the mountain wandering around in a giant freezing climate. There are a lot of panels dedicated to this one scene, giving us the sense of it going on for a long time. Knowing how snow can be tricky to trek in on foot, plus having the darkness of night and the severe coldness of the climate, we feel empathy towards the characters. These books make you feel part of the adventure by firstly inviting you into these gorgeous worlds. They also do a great job of crafting the story in a way where we, the viewer can relate and feel for the characters. This book takes us on an adventure and feel like a part of it.

Closer Look Into the Comic Strip

A Closer Look into the Comic Strip

In this week’s reading we took a closer look into some well-renowned comic strip illustrators. The illustrators we looked at where Windsor McCay; best known for his “Little Nemo” comics, George Herriman; for his “Krazy Kat” comics, and who could forget “Peanuts”; created by Charles Shultz.

What separates these comic strips apart are their defining characteristics. Starting off with Windsor McCay’s “Little Nemo” it is a weird, mystical comic series in which a little boy by the name of “Nemo” is woken up and taken on an adventure. Of course, none of this is actually happening to Nemo and is most likely a dream, or is it? Some context clues that give this away that these adventures Nemo is having are nothing more than dreams is by looking at the name of the place he ventures off to; Slumberland. Not only does this place literally have the word “slumber” in it but the types of adventures he goes on, racing through space without a space suit and being able to ride a horse against a giant kangaroo. Sounds pretty farfetched to be real, right? The “Little Nemo” comics are super entertaining to read and has a cool concept for storytelling.

Secondly there is George Herriman’s “Krazy Kat”. Krazy Kat isn’t as whimsical and adventurous as “Little Nemo”. Some of the first “Krazy Kat” comics to come out where extremely short and simple; using nothing but a clear white background and simple drawings. This was probably due to the production of the comic strips as it would take a long time to make a very detailed and well-illustrated comic. Being very short, it’s hard to really tell a full story in about 4 panels of art. For that reason, it can be hard for the reader to comprehend what is going on as in “Krazy Kat” the reader is thrown in the middle of a situation with very little context clues. For example, the very first “Krazy Kat” comic strip we see a cat running away from a mouse. In the next panel, we see the mouse follow the cat and then in the panel after that they walk off screen. In the last panel, we see both the cat and mouse walking off with papers in their hands. We’re not quite sure what is happening here. Why is the cat scared of the mouse? Aren’t cats supposed to chase mice? Also, what is the paper they both get at the end and why are they happy about it? This was very confusing to comprehend and really ruined the story of the comics.

Last but certainly not least we have “Peanuts” by Charles Shultz. Shultz’ illustrations are both appealing and the stories are short but you can understand them and they are hilariously entertaining to read. That’s something that Windsor McCay and George Herriman were missing from their comic strips. Sure, Windsor McCay had sophisticated artwork and everything was in color however the artwork wasn’t as appealing as Shultz’s work. “Krazy Kat” failed at creating a storyline with a minimal number of panels whereas Shultz used up about the same number of panels for his comics but the story was more understandable. The stories that Shultz creates are so mundane but he somehow makes them very entertaining. For example, in one of the comic strips, Violet Gray called up a boy and told him to stop calling him. In the next panel, we see the boy on the phone who tells Violet that she called him. She ferociously hangs up the phone, looks at the audience as she exclaims “How come you never get a wrong number when you need one?” None of this makes sense, nobody wants a wrong number calling them?