8 Sketchbook Zits

Zits is a comic strip written by Jerry Scott and illustrated by Jim Borgman following the life of Jeremy Duncan, a fifteen-year old high school sophomore. The comic debuted in July 1997 in over 200 newspapers and has since become popular worldwide and received multiple awards. As of 2008, it continues to be syndicated by King Features.

The strip is set in suburbia and centers on Jeremy as he tries to balance life while hanging out with his friends, developing an awkward relationship with his on-and-off girlfriend, struggling through school projects, practicing to become a rock god, and tolerating his embarrassing parents. The strip features a variety of core characters that surround Jeremy and supplement his adolescent character.

Origin

By the year 1996, Jerry Scott was already known for Baby Blues, a comic strip on raising children. He realized, however, that his profession as an independent cartoonist was limited to whatever joke he could write up next. A friend suggested he begin a strip about a teenager and Scott heeded the proposition and began to draw. Unfortunately, he was unsatisfied with the characters he drew up, as they looked like ones he had drawn before. He mentioned the problem to his friend, Jim Borgman, and the two met to discuss the problem. Over the next few months, the artists corresponded with one another, and eventually hammered out the characters that would soon become the Duncans. King Features Syndicate, already distributing Baby Blues and Borgman's editorial cartoons, began running the new comic strip in 1997.

Main characters

Jeremy Duncan

He is named after Jeremy Clyde of the 1960s rock duo Chad and Jeremy. Jeremy Michael Duncan is an intelligent fifteen-year-old high school sophomore who aspires to be a "rock god". He spends much of his time with his best friend, Hector Garcia and trying to impress his on-again-off-again girlfriend, Sara Toomey. When not at school or with his friends, Jeremy suffers the embarrassment and nagging of his parents, Walt and Connie Duncan. He is mortified of being seen in public with them, as can be seen in the following exchange:

He has an uncanny knack for knowing who's calling on the phone and for what reason when it rings, sometimes even before it rings ("Caller ID is for wimps!").

He commonly wears his wrinkled purple shirt, blue jeans, and oversized sneakers. Jeremy spends time restoring a 1962 VW Type 2 van with Hector, which they hope to drive across the country when they turn sixteen. Jeremy is also the lead singer and guitarist of his garage band, which goes by many names. It was after the band debuted in a Battle of the Bands competition that Jeremy received his first kiss from Sara and the awkward relationship took off. Since then, Jeremy and Sara have endured countless arguments, breakups and reconciliations. For all of Jeremy's quirky, comical flaws, however, he retains a high sense of morality and integrity as can be seen in the story arc where he steals a signpost with his name on it. Jeremy soon returns the sign to the police to free himself of the guilt he feels. On another occasion, Jeremy is overwhelmed by a school essay he has to write and all the other commitments he has made. A fellow student, Phoebe, suggests he use a website to pull a bootleg essay off the internet. Despite being swamped by work and exhaustion, Jeremy's sense of ethics overcomes the desire to plagiarize and he spends the night writing the essay himself. Jeremy recently received his learners' permit, although it has been suggested that he has had it in the past. Also, Jeremy recently took his parent's car in the night and drove 63 times past his friend Viral's house trying to impress her (which may suggest Sara isn't his girlfriend anymore), being arrested in the process. The weeks that followed that strip mostly featured his parents lecturing and yelling at him. In September 2007, Jeremy apparently moved onto his sophomore year of high school after apparently being a freshman for the last ten years. This change was revealed by his mother reading a list and commenting that she had told him the sophomore year would be hard. His mother is also constantly commenting on the fact that Jeremy's room is constantly becoming a pile, and you can only enter the room by digging a tunnel. He is also known for eating a whole 3 person dinner by himself, without knowing it was supposed to be for his family that night. He was also known to eat a whole ham in one bite.

Connie Duncan

Connie Duncan is Jeremy's forty-three year old mother. She is a child psychologist, but would work only part time after Jeremy's birth, and her profession is rarely ever mentioned except in early strips. She is also an aspiring writer, having begun work on a book titled: Coping Effectively with your Teen. Unfortunately, Jeremy constantly interrupts her work with menial requests or by being too loud and she has yet to even finish the first chapter. Besides being the family homemaker, Connie acts the disciplinarian for Jeremy. She is frequently seen waking him up for school, berating him for not following directions, and driving him to various destinations. Though Jeremy does not share much with his parents, Connie is always more than willing to listen to him. She describes a conversation with him as "trying to coax a smile out of a clam full of Botox". In the strip, she is portrayed a few times as a forgetful airhead.

Walt Duncan

Walt Duncan is Jeremy's father, an orthodontist who, like Connie, finds it almost impossible to hold a conversation with his son. Walt is absolutely clueless and old-fashioned about technology, especially computers. Despite Jeremy's attempts to explain how to use devices, Walt is unable to comprehend even the most basic functions. Walt is shown as having problems with math, able to offer little or no help to Jeremy. His interactions with Jeremy's peers cause intense embarrassment for his son, as Walt makes comments such as "What's up, dood ?", not knowing the meaning behind them. He is the designated clothes launderer, often getting into arguments with Jeremy over notes in pockets, socks inside-out, and other pet peeves. Walt constantly wears oversized blue pants, plain white T-shirt, black vest, and a pathetic combover. Walt occasionally reveals memories that attest to a wilder youth. In one instance, Walt recalls how uninhibited he felt one night at a Moby Grape concert. This shocking recollection causes him to forbid Jeremy from attending a similar concert. Another time, Walt reveals he has had a peace sign tattooed on his rear end since the late 1960s, which has expanded along with his rear end, and is described to now be the size of a stop sign.

Hector Garcia

Hector Garcia is Jeremy's best friend and is a guitarist/vocalist in Jeremy's band. The two spend a lot of their time hanging out, much of it trying to restore the VW van and dreaming about where their future road trip will take them. In practice, the two have not gotten far toward repairing the van, as the boys usually end up lying on the roof of the van, talking. Hector dates Autumn, a radical vegetarian who refers to Jeremy as "carnivore", "predator", "vampire", and "flesh-eater" or the like whenever she sees him with meat. He has the ability to grow facial hair on command. Hector is from a Spanish-speaking family and lives with his parents, grandparents, and multiple younger siblings.

Sara Toomey

Sara Toomey is Jeremy's on-again/off-again girlfriend (although right now Jeremy's interest appears to be in Becker). Although Jeremy thinks the world of her, she apparently likes Jeremy a lot, but has thought of him as a "salvageable male". Her parents are divorced and her behavior wavers between kindness and aggravation. She and Jeremy have broken up many times, but they always seem to make up sooner or later. Sara's genuine kindness and generosity is evident in one story arc where she cuts her hair short and donates her ponytail to a charity for children undergoing chemotherapy. In a recent strip, Jeremy revealed that he didn't want to date Sara exclusively anymore, but was upset when she wasn't devastated over that fact. It was recently revealed that Sara has a locker next to Jeremy, to which Jeremy takes delight in "having a locker next to a hot girl" as a good omen for sophomore year. This goes on until he realizes that the "hot" girl is actually Sara, who has a new appearance. She now wears her hair down and wears cooler clothes and accessories.

Pierce

Pierce is another of Jeremy's close friends, and a member of Jeremy's band who, as his name aptly implies, has much of his body pierced. Unlike most of Jeremy's clos

8 Sketchbook Zits

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Zits (comic strip) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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