Addiction
Original: Addiction on Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal
Transcript
Panel 1:
Man in trench coat and fedora (a drug dealer), lurking in an alley, calling out to a young person who is looking at a smartphone: "Hey kid, you want some drugs? First one's free!"
Panel 2:
The young person keeps scrolling on the phone, ignoring him. The dealer, exasperated: "Hey! Stop scrolling! Try drugs!"
Panel 3:
The dealer, leaning in earnestly: "I got cocaine! Meth! Heroin! These were the coolest addictions when I was your age, son!"
Panel 4:
The young person stays absorbed in the phone, scrolling, paying no attention. The dealer stands in the background looking dejected.
Panel 5:
Close-up of the dejected dealer, looking down and forlorn, thinking/saying: "This generation is so lost."
Votey:
Close-up of an older man (the dealer) gazing wistfully upward, a sparkle of nostalgia in his eyes, speech bubble: "Thank god I can deal with my problems with cocaine instead of scrolling TikTok all day."
Man in trench coat and fedora (a drug dealer), lurking in an alley, calling out to a young person who is looking at a smartphone: "Hey kid, you want some drugs? First one's free!"
Panel 2:
The young person keeps scrolling on the phone, ignoring him. The dealer, exasperated: "Hey! Stop scrolling! Try drugs!"
Panel 3:
The dealer, leaning in earnestly: "I got cocaine! Meth! Heroin! These were the coolest addictions when I was your age, son!"
Panel 4:
The young person stays absorbed in the phone, scrolling, paying no attention. The dealer stands in the background looking dejected.
Panel 5:
Close-up of the dejected dealer, looking down and forlorn, thinking/saying: "This generation is so lost."
Votey:
Close-up of an older man (the dealer) gazing wistfully upward, a sparkle of nostalgia in his eyes, speech bubble: "Thank god I can deal with my problems with cocaine instead of scrolling TikTok all day."
Alt text
A five-panel SMBC comic. In a dim alley, a man in a trench coat and fedora -- a stereotypical drug dealer -- tries to pitch hard drugs to a young person who is glued to a smartphone. Panel 1, the dealer: "Hey kid, you want some drugs? First one's free!" Panel 2, the kid keeps scrolling, ignoring him; dealer: "Hey! Stop scrolling! Try drugs!" Panel 3, dealer leans in earnestly: "I got cocaine! Meth! Heroin! These were the coolest addictions when I was your age, son!" Panel 4, the kid stays absorbed in the phone while the dealer slumps in the background. Panel 5, a dejected close-up of the dealer: "This generation is so lost." The joke inverts the usual moral panic -- an old-school drug pusher despairs that today's youth prefer phone addiction to drugs. Votey (bonus panel): a wistful close-up of the dealer gazing upward with a nostalgic sparkle, saying "Thank god I can deal with my problems with cocaine instead of scrolling TikTok all day," framing cocaine as the healthier coping mechanism compared to TikTok.
Transcribed by Claude Opus 4.8.