engage
Original: engage on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Panel 1:
Man with flame-like orange hair (kneeling, holding a box): Charlotte, will you marry me?
Woman with dark curly hair (Charlotte): What's this little thing in the box?
Panel 2:
Charlotte: A ring. There's a diamond in there.
Man: Ech.
Panel 3:
Man: This is worth two or three months' salary. It's a costly signal of devotion, yes, but some other man might be willing to display a costlier signal.
Panel 4:
Man: I could be that man!
(Caption banner) SEVERAL ITERATIONS LATER...
Panel 5:
Man (now holding an armful of skulls): Here are your engagement skulls! By God! By God they were my friends and now they are skulls!
Panel 6:
Man: It's just like I imagined when I was a girl!
Charlotte: (raises her hands, alarmed/uncertain)
Votey:
A close-up of the man's face.
Man: You can't buy romance at a store. You gotta kill somebody.
Man with flame-like orange hair (kneeling, holding a box): Charlotte, will you marry me?
Woman with dark curly hair (Charlotte): What's this little thing in the box?
Panel 2:
Charlotte: A ring. There's a diamond in there.
Man: Ech.
Panel 3:
Man: This is worth two or three months' salary. It's a costly signal of devotion, yes, but some other man might be willing to display a costlier signal.
Panel 4:
Man: I could be that man!
(Caption banner) SEVERAL ITERATIONS LATER...
Panel 5:
Man (now holding an armful of skulls): Here are your engagement skulls! By God! By God they were my friends and now they are skulls!
Panel 6:
Man: It's just like I imagined when I was a girl!
Charlotte: (raises her hands, alarmed/uncertain)
Votey:
A close-up of the man's face.
Man: You can't buy romance at a store. You gotta kill somebody.
Alt text
A six-panel SMBC comic. An orange-haired man proposes to a dark-haired woman named Charlotte, presenting a box. She asks what the little thing inside is; he says it's a ring with a diamond. She says "Ech." He explains the ring is worth two or three months' salary as a costly signal of devotion, but worries some other man might display a costlier signal, then declares "I could be that man!" A banner reads "Several iterations later..." Now the man holds an armful of human skulls and exclaims, "Here are your engagement skulls! By God! By God they were my friends and now they are skulls!" then adds, "It's just like I imagined when I was a girl!" while Charlotte raises her hands in alarm. Votey: a close-up of the man's face saying, "You can't buy romance at a store. You gotta kill somebody."
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.