Extraordinarily High Quality Amazing
What greets the viewer at the start of this journey.
A collaborative 27-page series split into five sections, with which the final page ends on a cliffhanger. EHQA focuses on the life of Dildom Andes, an ARTIST who speaks about the ARTS, and those around him.
Trigger Warnings: While there's been tons of heavy stuff in Cate's works, I still want to lay out some TW for topics just to be safe. In the comic there's graphic death and violence, gore, bits of drawn nudity, nsfw subjects, slurs, suicide, torture, abuse mention, and child death. It is important to remember this comic is approximately 5-6 years old and does not reflect current works such as Crow Cillers, which is incredibly toned down in comparison. Please if reading this comic gets too much for you, disconnect for your health!
THE FATHER[]
The first section, THE FATHER, sets our protagonist at a restaurant where he narrates the story of a father. Watching young women dining together, he goes on about how they will get married, a father will disprove, the father will die, and how much of a shame it will be. He then goes on to talk about how his 'son' has made him proud and that he will wait in the bathroom for his son to call him for a chat. It never happens, leaving Andes to wish he would have pretended to be his father sooner.
The next sequence deals with Dildom confronting one of the women from earlier, speaking to her from the outside window of her home. Urging her to speak about her plan to murder her father, she is afraid and calls her husband Daryl to deal with Dildom. Subsequently, the cops are called and he tells the woman "I think you are grounded now see, now you can't kill him." What ensues for the remaining pages of the section would take too long to explain in full as done here, as you may already be bored by now. Andes comes home and visits his (not visible) brother to tell him how the day went and how great of a father he would be. Three panels of Smokes go by during this explanation. Now, the ARTIST speaks of the ARTS as he breaks down the forms of man, animal, and plant. How each group interacts with a Dairy Queen "Dilly Bar" designates their form status.The final page of the section details the struggle of Dildom in a supermarket trying to apologize to a customer about his comments about how they supposedly killing their own father. Wow, just wow.
THE FAMILY[]
Welcome to an exciting family barbecue discussion board where things seem to be relatively calm as everyone enjoys the great outdoors lays out details of their many fursona designs. Eventually fighting ensues and it's up to Dildom to shoot back against the gunmen. The fighting discussion ends with Dildom taking cover as a city burns asking about whether or not his dolphin character should have wings.
Having suffered a temporary shot to the head, Dildom finds himself questioning a dog why it killed its father and where's its remorse. Realizing there's more than meets the eye, he assumes that someone is in a nearby shed and promptly investigates it. All that lays inside is a mop and a paint bucket. Questioning who is the assumed person there, he grabs a brush and paints a smiley face on the wall. Of course, Dildom knows this face well, as it is a representation of the 'real man' he's spoken to many times. He then reflects on their conversations from the past.
Dildom then speaks to the viewer about how giving a name to something creates a daily routine. As he speaks, he slowly brings the brush to the face and finds himself appearing in front of an extravagant building. Exploring this building leaves him confused as it is not one he's ever been in; these are not his memories.
Venturing up the steps of the building, he opens a door and is revealed to a couple. It's the husband's birthday and the wife brings him a large amount of DVDs. Then there's even more DVDs. Even more arrive. On the fourth encounter it's made clear that the wife has gotten sick, but she ignores her husband's request that she drinks water. Finally, Dildom walks in and is noticed by the husband.
"hey you wanna watch seven samurai again" - Husband
Dildom promptly leaves, and so ends the section.
THE MOTHER[]
Our ARTIST is found by a random woman, and being the gentleman he is Dildom asks her why did she have to kill her father. In the first sequence his responses are ignored as the woman plans to get her sister to come help him with his problems. She is then arguing with on the phone with her sister as Dildom keeps turning up the television in the other room. When confronted by the woman, the television is broken. There's some skeletons and being dead is fun!
The second part of the mini story focuses on the woman guiding Dildom across town. A fly is seen coming from his hand and time, and soon visual space, becomes messy. Dildom follows the bug until he can kill it. The traveling with the woman soon ends as a letter A from a Gas n' Glug crushes her and Dildom moves on.
"the bug is dead. LONG LIVE THE BUG." - Dildom Andes
The last two pages of the story focus on a lesson and an experience. In the lesson, Dildom Andes educates through visuals and brief descriptions on the 11 kinds of dead men. Reaching the final type, he shoots himself in the head and recommends a person nearby to buy an album from a garage sale.
In the experience, we are greeted to a different kind of Dildom: the office worker. With his hair in a ponytail, he provides customer service within his cubicle. Soon he finds himself being harassed by his co-workers. These co-workers, which are classic newspaper comic stars such as Garfield and Dilbert, proceed to beat up and torture Dildom as they spout off queries about television shows. It gets graphic as it goes on, and it finally ends with a repetition of panels showing a non-anthropomorphic (as he was otherwise before) Garfield beating up Odie.
THE DOG COP[]
DOG COP, the superhero with the power of murder. It is here his origin story begins as Dildom has another chat with his brother. DOG COP's adventures begin in a museum where a celebrity birthday party is held inside. However, the celebrities are being poisoned one by one! Through cunning detective work, the actor is shot dead by DOG COP and the case is closed. Then the shit mayor is choked by him for being an actor as much as THE actor.
Through his second case, DOG COP finds himself once again in the museum, investigating a devil cult performing satan rituals. When confronting the cult, he finds their claims of summoning satan to be flimsy. To prove such claims, DOG COP performs the ritual with them and soon emerges through the 'WAVES' summoning circle.
"we are all going to jail" - DOG COP
DOG COP's last case is in the same area as before. But this case is special: it is not a case, it is a Christmas party. Standing before a man holding a DOG COP book, he shoots off rounds repeatedly as the man keeps chanting "there is a god we all must answer to." And then, or more-so Andes, returns with a head shot to DOG COP. A christmas tree is shot repeatedly, the museum is torched, and DOG COP is dead.
THE "NEW DEAD AMERICA"[]
Final stretch of Dildom Andes' story. Don't touch that dial now, you're not going to want to miss this! First page is a quick scene of someone trying to climb up a mountain, as Dildom messes with the viewer about the person's fate. Afterwards is yet another chat between Dildom and his brother Matt. Here we are introduced to the "NEW DEAD AMERICA," a concept that is better experienced in person then here. Dildom laments on the fact he isn't listened to at times even though he knows he is right.
There is a short animated page where the viewer clicks vote buttons to guide Dildom. Loading music prior to this interaction is provided by Car Seat Headrest. The scene shifts to two people moving a fridge. One of them discovers a stack of papers and soon reveals it is only nonsense. Dildom tries to claim he wrote the papers but places the blame on one of the movers as the papers are terrible. And then Dildom is jailed.
After attempting to walk out of jail, Dildom is shot repeatedly by the returning superhero DOG COP for breaking the law. Having nothing to do, DOG COP and the shit mayor go to the museum for a beach birthday party. After showing off and bringing up small talk, DOG COP gets bored and leaves as the shit mayor is being eaten by a horned creature. He then finds a family and shoots everyone and everything. Yeah.
Returning from THE MOTHER section, the woman who previously was crushed by a sign letter is fixed up good as new by a doctor. She then travels to find her father and promptly kills him. Then she has sex with her mother. She is killed once again by a falling sign letter, this time one from the hospital sign. No longer does she ever return.
In the second to last page, Dildom goes on an adventure between print and reality. He first can be seen rising from grave exclaiming about unrest in culture. Using a physical eraser, he leaves the flat surface of paper to travel around someone's room in real life. After chatting with "NEW DEAD AMERICA," he attempts to escape through the window of the room only to fall into a trashcan.
The final page of this comic is set in a classroom, once again back in comic format as opposed to reality. Dildom Andes climbs out of a trashcan. Realizing where he is, he tries to fool the students into thinking he's not a teacher. When they question his identity he then hides behind the desk. It is important to note that the students of this classroom all have bleeding eyes and are from multiple comics such as Lamezine 001 and 002, Smokes, and even Asscastle.
Ru'mel and Somers get into an argument about not having homework. Telling him to not worry, Ru'mel then spends the rest of the time trying to take someone else's homework for Somers. It turns out to be a bust in the end, so Ru'Mel changes the class assignment to murder. The students then all fight each other as Dildom escapes the classroom. The comic ends with Dildom sitting in front of the classroom's now shut door, wondering if the school is now his new home.