All cartoons are tragedies by default. Have you ever noticed that?

 

Anvils and dynamite, trick pistols and phantom floors that disappear the moment you look down. Some self-aware prey flashing signs soaked in irony as the predator fails to catch his life’s desire, doomed by a sham corporation whose products never fail to arrive faulty.

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We laugh at these poor characters because some artist somewhere has sketched them into obscurity, misfortune, and calamity. We are only able to laugh at their misery because it’s not our own.

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I’m not sure if I’m describing the definition of comedy here or just human nature in general.