prog: (Default)
prog ([personal profile] prog) wrote2005-03-11 12:10 pm

random

I started reading The Sandman years before I became aware of the full array of modern yoot subcultures. My social context at the time was that I had just started college at UMaine, where I was exposed to only those subcultures that thrived in that climate -- most obviously, hippies and "crunchies" (outdoorsy types always dressed for a hike, named after the sound of granola), as well as the unavoidable "chads" (generic binge-drinking chumps) and the geeks I got to know through the compsci program. Before that I had been at a tiny Catholic high school and didn't socialize with peers at all.

And then, the comic concluded just as the Web was really starting to crank up and spreading awareness-slash-mockery of visually interesting subcultures to those who hadn't otherwise been exposed to them.

So I realized only the other day that Death is meant to be a parody (in the generous sense) of goth culture. Seriously, for the last, I dunno, decade when I saw a goth girl I would think on some level "hee hee, she looks like Death from the comix, I wonder if that's on purpose" and leave it at that, never approaching the remarkable similarity from the other direction.

I just thought it was kind of funny.