By the Comics Curmudgeon
Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the far-off futuristic year 2009! Though the rapidly aging 21st century has repeatedly failed to deliver on its promises -- flying cars, domed cities on the moon and ocean floor, universal peace supervised by a one-world government, shiny jumpsuit-based couture, sex robots -- we still begin each new year with a big dose of Hope! Except this one, obviously, because we're all fucked. So, in our grand tradition of doing Christmas-themed Cartoon Violences a day after Christmas, enjoy this January 2nd meditation on how the new year will kill us all.
If you click on the images, they get bigger. Try it, won't you?
Americans began 2009 the same way they begin every year: watching the first sunrise of the new year with the alcohol that fueled the previous evening's celebration still running through their brains and clouding their senses. But this year, some things were a little different: instead of overindulging at Zach and Shannon's now-foreclosed starter McMansion, Americans did their celebrating in a fetid alley somewhere, and were forced to get blotto on the cheapest of generic hooch. Fortunately, they maintained enough of their dignity to don proper party attire (i.e., bow ties and stupid hats).
But darker doings were afoot that night. Beloved American patriot-king/logo/mascot Uncle Sam drove his beat-up old junker (representing AMERICA) onto the train tracks, then just decided to walk away, whistling. Such a blatant bit of property-destruction won't even earn him an insurance payout -- not that he'd been able to afford insurance for the last six months or so anyway. The helpless America-car must just sit uneasily on the tracks, waiting for the oncoming train to wipe it off the map.
But what about that traditional symbol of Hope, the Baby New Year? Little-known fact: Each year, one woman is selected by lot as the "New Year Host," into whose womb the parasitic time-baby is implanted. For most of the previous year, the tiny top-hat-wearing fetus enjoys nutrients and warmth from the host at no cost and no effort on his part. Naturally, what with 2009 being inevitably terrible, Baby New Year 2009 was reluctant to terminate this arrangement.
Eventually, Baby New Year 2009 was shoved unwillingly out of its host's lady parts and into the world. Because the new year will only accelerate our world's transformation into a cold, unfeeling computerized deathscape actively hostile towards human life, the symbol of the new year turned out to be a terrifying cyborg-thing, with a connection cable for directly accessing the Internet and doing the Facebook or the blogs or the whatever the hell it is the kids do today with the computers and Internets and the hey hey.
After being wiped off, Baby New Year was thrust onto the stage before all of humanity to do his one job: to serve as a cute little metaphor for the promise and hope of the new year, to represent plans just made and good things still in their opening stages. Needless to say, it was impossible. The little time-baby, all too aware of the horror 2009 would bring to so many, could only stand dumbly before the expectant masses, eyes huge and welling up tears -- not the unthinking tears of a real infant, but the heavy, soul-crushing tears of infinite disappointment and helpless sadness.
Then he thought of something that could cheer him up: Cocaine! Lots and lots of cocaine! WHEEE HORSEY RIDE WHEE WHEE WHEE FUN FUN WHEE! YAY 2009! WHEE! HORSEY RIDE! COCAINE! WHEE!