apocalack
Original: apocalack on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Panel 1:
Younger man (red hair): Whatcha doing?
Older bearded man (digging): Digging a bunker to live in, in case the apocalypse doesn't happen.
Panel 2:
Younger man: Oh?
Bearded man: My whole life I've been saying "It can't go on like this for five more years, something's gotta give." Then, nothing gives.
Panel 3 (the bearded man standing in a dug trench, holding a shovel-handle and shading his eyes):
Bearded man: I mean the worst things ever in history keep happening, but history keeps shambling forward like a zombie riddled with bullet holes. Even if there was a nuclear world war, the survivors would rebuild in a few centuries. They'd read about us in a history class but get the dates wrong, and then they'd blow themselves up, rebuild, forget.
Panel 4:
Bearded man: Not for me, man. No more wheel of fate. I'm gonna dig a hole, climb into it, then eat cans of beans and tell myself there's been a cataclysmic denouement for everything I hold dear.
Panel 5 (the bearded man standing in the trench holding a shovel; the red-haired younger man stands above):
Younger man: You got room for two in there?
Panel 6 (silhouette/dark scene, the younger man standing at the edge above, the bearded man down in the hole, pointing up):
Bearded man: Sorry son, it'd kill the fantasy.
Votey:
A close-up of the bearded man's face looking upward.
Bearded man: Dammit! I thought I saw a nuclear blast but it's just a low-lying cloud.
Younger man (red hair): Whatcha doing?
Older bearded man (digging): Digging a bunker to live in, in case the apocalypse doesn't happen.
Panel 2:
Younger man: Oh?
Bearded man: My whole life I've been saying "It can't go on like this for five more years, something's gotta give." Then, nothing gives.
Panel 3 (the bearded man standing in a dug trench, holding a shovel-handle and shading his eyes):
Bearded man: I mean the worst things ever in history keep happening, but history keeps shambling forward like a zombie riddled with bullet holes. Even if there was a nuclear world war, the survivors would rebuild in a few centuries. They'd read about us in a history class but get the dates wrong, and then they'd blow themselves up, rebuild, forget.
Panel 4:
Bearded man: Not for me, man. No more wheel of fate. I'm gonna dig a hole, climb into it, then eat cans of beans and tell myself there's been a cataclysmic denouement for everything I hold dear.
Panel 5 (the bearded man standing in the trench holding a shovel; the red-haired younger man stands above):
Younger man: You got room for two in there?
Panel 6 (silhouette/dark scene, the younger man standing at the edge above, the bearded man down in the hole, pointing up):
Bearded man: Sorry son, it'd kill the fantasy.
Votey:
A close-up of the bearded man's face looking upward.
Bearded man: Dammit! I thought I saw a nuclear blast but it's just a low-lying cloud.
Alt text
A six-panel comic. An older bearded man with glasses is digging a deep trench/bunker in the ground with a shovel. A younger man with red hair and a red shirt asks what he's doing. The bearded man explains he's digging a bunker to live in 'in case the apocalypse doesn't happen,' because his whole life he's expected catastrophe and it never comes. He rants that history just keeps shambling forward 'like a zombie riddled with bullet holes,' that even a nuclear world war would only lead survivors to rebuild, forget, and repeat. He declares he's done with the 'wheel of fate' and will climb into the hole, eat canned beans, and pretend a cataclysm has destroyed everything he holds dear. In the final dark, silhouetted panel, the younger man (standing above the pit) asks 'You got room for two in there?' and the bearded man, down in the hole pointing up, replies 'Sorry son, it'd kill the fantasy.' Votey (aftercomic): a close-up of the bearded man's face gazing upward, saying 'Dammit! I thought I saw a nuclear blast but it's just a low-lying cloud.'
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.