The Triumphant Return of Mr Butterchips
Get set. One seriously maniacal monkey is about to be unleashed on the unsuspecting public! On May 5th, weekly installments of Mr Butterchips by Alex Schumacher (The Unemployment Adventures of Aqualung, Defiling the Literati), will launch on SLG Publishing, accompanied by new apparel to help fans show their love for the celebrated curmudgeonly capuchin.
Mr Butterchips illustrates the day-to-day antics of a prickly organ grinder’s monkey set in a surreal fictional West Coast town, which is populated by an array of quirky characters. It’s through this satirical hallucinogenic lens that the pitfalls of a “gig economy” are examined, while touching on such timely issues as class disparity and intolerance; amplifying the absurdity of what it means to be alive in a world which seemingly becomes more insane by the second.
“When offered the opportunity by SLG Publishing, I decided to retrofit Mr Butterchips for a new era and a broader audience,” said Alex Schumacher. “While the comic will now be set in the hallucinogenic fictional town of Los Puritanos, readers who enjoyed the salty simian’s tenure at Drunk Monkeys Magazine will be pleased to know his low threshold for stupidity and intolerance remains wholly intact.”
When asked about his relationship with Mr Butterchips, Schumacher said:
“Beginning life as an ancillary foil in a submission for the comic strip syndicates, Mr Butterchips burrowed his way into the dark recesses of my mind. He was the only character out of that initial ensemble that I found compelling enough to warrant a series of his own (at some point). When the decision was made to develop a pastiche of classic underground comics in 2016, the salty simian was somehow recalled as the perfect vessel to spout irreverent observations regarding the human condition.”
But how has the pop cultural satire of Mr Butterchips evolved in this new instalment with so much political upheaval always in the background? Schumacher summed it up by saying:
“Producing satirical content in any capacity can be a dicey prospect. While I had focused Mr. Butterchips’ righteous indignation on a certain former repugnant administration, their ousting has provided an opportunity of sorts. The freedom to ridicule ignorance in its many forms, and the pivot from a monthly to a weekly format, will allow me to not only broaden the scope of humor but the very world in which the monkey inhabits as well.“
For those unfamiliar with Mr Butterchips, the comic first appeared in the online literary magazine Drunk Monkeys beginning in April of 2016. SLG Publishing released Mr. Butterchips: A Collection of Cantankerous Commentary in 2020, assembling the initial run of the webcomic along with a 22-page standalone acid trip of a story entitled “Psychotropic San Francisco Sojourn.”
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