This tale starts off with Rocko at work. If you have seen the cartoon you’re aware that he works at a call center. If you haven’t let me elaborate a little more on that. Rocko works at a call center where customer satisfaction is of the utmost importance.
I hope you catch my drift there because you can’t see me winking, but trust me I was totally winking while typing that. Or, wait did he work in IT? Hmm..Rocko has never really seemed to love this job in the past and he has been chewed out multiple times by his boss. He finally got a call from the wrong customer and wasn’t able to satisfy them. So, he gets called into his boss’ office and is finally let go after many years of employment.
Rocko leaves with office with cautious optimism as he takes a walk around O-town looking at all the businesses that have closed or filed for bankruptcy, and there’s also the panhandlers. He thinks surely he can find another job, right?
As soon as Rocko gets home Heffer and Filburt show up and the want to eat everything in Rocko’s fridge. That’s when Rocko admits to his friends that he has been fired. The trio brain-storm to find Rocko a job so they can eat soon.
Filburt starts fixing up Rocko’s resume and finding job listings online while Heffer checks out the newspaper for job postings. Eventually they run across a rental ad, but in this case the person is willing to pay any amount for rental space. They call him up and he immediately comes over and gives Rocko first month’s rent and a security deposit. This new guy is named Chalmers and he looks like a party bro, but so far everything is kosher.
After Chalmers gets all his stuff moved in Rocko is determined to get up early and go on a job hunt. While he’s prepping for bed he promises Spunky (his dog in case you are new/forgot) that he will have food soon. Just as Rocko’s head hits the pillow loud dance music starts to play. Rocko confronts Chalmers asking him to turn it down, but Chalmers is a party bro that doesn’t. So, Rocko lays in bed and gets no sleep.
That morning Rocko looks like a zombie, but heads out anyway. His first stop is to Kind-of-a-lot-of-comics. He asks about employment and the staff appears in cloaks and starts quizzing him about what happens in certain issues of Punch-Dude Man. Rocko is clueless so they make fun of him and deny him employment. They go so far as to call him a fake nerd. Rocko tries another local business, Chunkey Chicken.
As soon as Rocko asks for employment at Chunkey Chicken an employee that has worked there for years is fired, and Rocko is hired on the spot. Sad cause this happens in real life all the time. A person with experience gets fired because they’re making more than minimum wage, but the company wants to save money. If you will recall Rocko is clumsy…and operating a deep fryer without any experience doesn’t seem like a great idea to me. I’ll let you read to see what happens next to avoid a spoiler. Plus you’ll want to see how Rocko handles Chalmers at the end of this issue.
There’s also another tale in this issue called Dentist with Mr. Bighead. Remember Dr. Hutchinson? The always cheery dentist with the hook hand? Yea, that dentist. Mr. Bighead has been grinding his teeth and is afraid of Dr. Hutchinson’s hook hand, but he’s relieved to learn he will be seeing a new dentist by the name of Dr. O’Doherty. This dentist is equipped with 6 hooks. Imagine Mr. Bighead’s reaction to seeing that. After Mr. Bighead admits his fears of scraping and the like Dr. O’Doherty takes offense but understands and calls in an intern to ease Mr. Bighead’s worries. I won’t tell you what the intern looks like.
Can you hear the B-52’s Rocko theme song as you see this cover? Cause I can, but I wasn’t sure on what to expect when I first picked up this issue. I was happy that it was a new tale and a continuation of the story. I also really liked how realistic (in some aspects anyway) yet absurd Rocko’s job hunt went, because I’ve had some go almost as ridiculous as his did. The writers did a really good job of setting the scene for modern day job hunts. And, another really strong point was the writers really captured our main characters Rocko, Filburt, and Heffer. The language and mannerisms they all use/have was exactly like the nostalgic cartoon
And, another thing I would like to touch on is that scene with the comic book store was all too real for me 10 years ago. A female that walks into a comic book store? Better quiz her to see if she’s legit, no fake nerds. I haven’t had that experience in a long time thankfully. But, I felt terrible when the comic nazi’s called Rocko a “fake nerd.” As a fan of the cartoon since I can remember I found this issue to be pretty hilarious. I would like to read a review from a person who has never seen the cartoon to get their take on it. If you want some nostalgic feels with a new Rocko tale pick up this issue at your local comic store.
Rating: 8/10
