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Nietzsche Family Circus: Die at the Right Time

There are a lot of Family Circus detournements* on the Internet. I chalk it up to two factors: 1. The strip is annoyingly, cloyingly terrible. 2. It has decent art and lots of characters. The former provides the impetus, while the latter increases the interesting options. Proof: Ziggy is equally, if not more, terrible,** yet it only ever really features Ziggy, so manipulation possibilities are less dynamic and therefore less interesting. My favorite Family Circus mash-up is The Nietzsche Family Circus, which combines random Family Circus panels with random qoutes from that powerfully impotent philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche. The combinations often seem surprisingly deliberate and relevant, but that could just be the pattern matching module in my brain creating meaning out of nothingness. *This is a fancy way of saying "fucking around." **I once thought of a really great Ziggy cartoon: Ziggy is standing on a slightly bowed horizon while a crudely drawn smiling sun sets (or is it rising?). Ziggy is looking directly at the reader and the word balloon says, in shaky, trembling lettering, "Everytime I think I am in a groove, it turns out I am just in a rut." I am truly an ubermensch.