Innocent At First Glance, These 30 Comics By Ben Zaehringer Take A Darkly Funny Turn (New Pics)

"I've been doing these cartoon drawings for as long as I can remember," Ben shared with Bored Panda. "My mom's cousin, Steve Moore, is a cartoonist, so right away I thought of cartooning as a vocation. My first comics were all in the style of newspaper comic strips, like FoxTrot and Peanuts, only bad instead of good."

Ben sees it a bit differently when it comes to humor and storytelling. Instead of viewing humor as a tool for storytelling, he believes that storytelling is actually a powerful way to deliver humor. "My goal is to get a laugh, and storytelling is a means to that end. Stories play with expectations, and that’s useful for humor because a really good joke seems to come out of nowhere. Using a story to get a laugh is like putting a reader on a treadmill, letting them get comfortable, and then, when they least expect it, reversing the direction, or pulling the plug, or turning the speed up to 100 mph, leaving them in stitches.”

Ben shared that he draws inspiration from anything that makes him laugh. "When I'm on top of it, I try to keep a list of one-word prompts based on things that made me laugh, to refer to when I'm writing. In the world of comics, my big influences are The Perry Bible Fellowship, Three Word Phrase, and Chainsawsuit. Other formative influences: my cousin Steve Moore, who drew the newspaper comic In the Bleachers. He inspired me to make comics in the first place. And my friend Kevin Garvey, who drew comics with me at the library every day after school for years."

"Drawing comics fills my days with a sense of purpose and creative fulfillment that is only rivaled by playing video games," Ben shared when asked what he finds most rewarding about creating comics. "Except I don’t feel guilty spending hours drawing comics. (Whereas looking at my 'Tears of the Kingdom' playtime fills me with existential dread)."