Alex Norris tells the story of their "Oh No" comic and its “badly drawn blob” star

If you’ve not seen Alex Norris’ hilariously relatable panel comics then where have you been? Readers of It’s Nice That will recognise the “badly drawn blob” character of the Webcomic Name series for its punchline “oh no”, and the inevitably disappointing situations it gets itself into. At Nicer Tuesdays, Alex took us back to the beginning of their comic work, and the ideas and inspirations that led them to where they are now.

“When I finished uni, I wanted to be a writer, so I decided to make web comics because not many people make them, but a lot of people read them,” they explained. At first, their comics were highly conceptual and meta, playing with the format of the panel comic, because, they joke, “I cared a lot about being clever”.

As Alex simplified his ideas, they came up with Webcomic Name, a self-coined “bad webcomic – look how awful this drawing is – where the punchline is always the same”. Using a purposefully naive and joyfully colourful style, the comics simultaneously poke fun at familiar situations and, in themselves, parody relatable comics, about which Alex is happily self-deprecating to brilliant comedic effect.