Chris and reality

Reality is the universe from which Chris is quite detached. While most fiction operates on the assumption that the fictional world is in some way separate from that which actually exists, for Chris such lines are difficult to grasp. While some might assume Chris is exploring meta-fictional devices, he is nowhere near that clever. He's just too stupid to get reality straight.

The mechanics of the CWCiverse

As experts understand it, CWCville exists outside the confines of normal spacetime; a pocket universe with principal access located through a Narnia-esque portal made of a DDR pad in Chris's room (why he has a DDR pad in the first place when he has no coordination or stamina is a mystery). CWCville is located in Virginia, but not in any tangible sense. Confusingly, in Episode 12.5, Chris said it would take a "long walk" to get to CWCville from his house, implying that CWCville actually does have a real location in Virginia and the DDR pad is just a shortcut. The geography of CWCville is incomprehensible by normal means, and it is speculated that only idiot rationale can make sense of this paradox.

It is important to remember that by Chris's standards, CWCville is 100% real. When directly confronted on the subject, as by Alec Benson Leary, he will give some ground as far as accepting a line between his fantasies and reality, but left on his own he defaults to believing that his creations have a life of their own.

In the comic — and within Chris's mind — the citizens of his imaginary universe operate with an understanding of both CWCville and the world outside it. Sonichu was born of an unholy union and bizarre pseudo-scientific and fantasy bullshit (as in any good sci-fi story, radiation can do anything!) involving Sonic the Hedgehog, Pokémon, radiation, and a rainbow. He is also, however, the creation and figurative "son" of Chris (despite being of a different species), and is aware of this fact, referring to Chris as his "Father". Theoretically, this should also make Chris the "father" of Rosechu (and, in fact, Rosechu as well occasionally refers to Chris as "Father", or, more often, "Papa"), but either Chris hasn't given that much thought to the implications of what he writes, or he does not wish to dwell on the obvious incestuous undertones.

This duality extends to the sentience of CWCville's inhabitants. They are Chris's inventions and act at his bidding when he wants them to, yet he also fully believes they are self-willed beings: "I don't have to Justify Sonichu and Rosechu; they can take of that themselves."

Documentary or fictional fiction?

And you thought the straw was the worst part, just think of the implications...

Defining Sonichu Canon is a difficult prospect. Chris (the character) exists not only as Mayor of CWCville, but as writer of the comic depicting its own reality, his Mary Sue, and as creator of the universe. A given character exists in varying states of self-awareness. On one hand, Sonichu is having his real life adventures, but will at other times speak of discussions with fans, within continuity.

It's not just the comics that define CWCville. Even Chris's spoken words have the power, in his mind, to reshape his fantasy world in a way that has lasting consequences. It was only with some reluctance that he obeyed BlueSpike's order to declare BILLY MAYS the new mayor, and he subsequently wrote and drew entire pages of the comic intended to reverse the effect of what a sane person would consider meaningless nonsense.

In one sub-episode, Chris incorporates his own misadventures into his fictional universe through the use of a stand-in location. Within what can only reasonably assumed to be Chris's comic universe, Chris spends his time drawing his comic universe.

Things took an even sharper turn in the land of insanity with Sonichu 10, where Chris addresses the world of Asperchu. In the Asperchu series, the Chaotic Combo appeared, though with some changes (the most notable being that Wild Sonichu is now dating Simonchu instead of Simonla, as per Evan's wishes.) As the comic is hosted on its own wiki, with a regular update schedule, and with fans constantly pestering him about it, the comic essentially seemed as "real" to Chris as his own Sonichu comics. As such he felt the need, in his own series, to clarify that the characters in Alec's comic were, in fact, a completely different set of Sonichus and Rosechus that were forced into imitating the Chaotic Combo against their will. Using Ultra Sonichu, he "cures" them of their various problems (in particular, Asperchu's Asperger's Syndrome), and gives them all a makeover. At this point he then expects Alec to take these events as canon and completely change his own series to accommodate Chris's ridiculous ideas (similar to Sonichu 9, where Chris recreated timmys1984's fan promo, and expected the slight changes he added to be implemented to the animations).

It's entirely possible that Chris feels the need to recognize these other comics, because not treating them as "real" (in a sense) makes it more difficult for him to perceive CWCville as "real."

Chris himself, however, isn't above stealing other people's characters for his own nefarious purposes. In correspondence with Evan, Chris comes up with the mad concept that Simonchu (Evan's original character) had traveled to CWCville in an attempt to take his "sister" Simonla back to ECGville (Simonchu's hometown), but was defeated by Wild Sonichu. It's hard to tell what is more shocking: the fact that Chris felt the need to justify Simonla's fictional presence via the fictional conflict with Simonchu, or the blatant hypocrisy in misusing another person's character to push his own agenda. The irony is that Evan's main question is if Chris thinks CWCville is real, which this diatribe answered very clearly.

Chris furthers his insanity in an update to his CWCipedia entry on Simonla.

“	I had previously stated inspiration from Evan George's Simonchu Character; that was a fabrication, and I apologize for leaving the lie up for this whole time. Simonchu was Never an Inspiration, or had Anything to do with Simonla Rosechu's creation whatsoever. Thank you for being patient while I had thought further on Simonla's Background Story.	”
Chris, on Simonla

Somewhere in his frustration with Evan's reasonable requests, Chris decided he could retcon real life, by pretending to have forgotten he made up Simonla on his own. Chris has the power to dictate reality.

The fantasy

It's clear to anyone with eyes that CWCville only exists as a crutch for Chris's warped psyche. While Chris feels the need to retreat to his womb-like room, he cannot totally withdraw from his need for social interaction. Therefore, CWCville becomes an extension of his personal world, more real to Chris than what he sees as a world out to Kick the Autistic. He retreats from a world where he has no control to a world where he has total control, a world defined by his whims. In his world, he can decide the laws and mores of the citizens. In his world, he can stalk and loiter to his heart's content.

While many children fantasize about being President or ruling their own city, as they get older, they realize that without the dedication, drive, and personality, it's not very fun having so much responsibility. For Chris, "responsibility" isn't in his vocabulary. All that the mayor does is have power, paying no heed to the well-being of the town's citizens, economy, or education. Just pure power. He set the rules and to hell with anyone who disobeys him. You know what they say about how power corrupts even the best people…

Video games

The CWCiverse is populated by video game characters. Sometimes, however, these characters know they are video game characters:

• Chris-Chan Sonichu dodging right and left with button presses in Sonichu Special 1
• Jiggliami referring to Blanca as "the Guitar Hero of this stage" in Sonichu 8
• Darkbind "leveling up with experience by practicing his swordmanship" in Sonichu 9
• …and let's not forget the whole confusing Yu-Gi-Oh! trading card game bullshit in Sonichu 5.

Normally, the rule of thumb is that characters shouldn't break the fourth wall like this, unless the creators are deliberately making a series based on multiple crossovers. Chris can't decide whether he's making an original story, or one that's a deliberate and blatant mix of different source works. Most surprisingly, despite the fact that the characters are aware of their video game origins and video games in general, the characters seem oblivious to their sources of influence most of the time, and we only get an epic backstory for Sonichu, Rosechu and subsequently the Chaotic Combo. Just why doesn't Darkbind question which video games he was ripped off from?

We can conclude from the actions of the characters that, in a way, the CWCiverse works a bit like a terrible version of the old Saturday-morning Captain N cartoon and its comic adaptation, where it was taken as a given that all NES video game characters and settings occupied one larger meta-universe. Likewise, in Chris's world, it's a given that Sonic the Hedgehog's universe intersects the Pokémon universe and the universe of whatever else Chris decides to rip off. Instead of video game characters teaming up to defeat video game antagonists, though, we get a mixed-up bunch of character combinations and recolors fighting villains who themselves are character combinations and recolors; Captain N characters are the same as in the source material and instantly recognizable for any Nintendo fan, while Sonichu pretends to be original, and people are busy figuring out where the characters have been ripped off from. Instead of a Zapper and a cool NES controller belt that Kevin Keene had in Captain N, Chris was handed a boring power to do absolutely everything, limited only by his imagination (and boy, does that ever limit things). And there's no Samus. And it's no longer the early 1990s, so this weirdness won't be tolerated anymore.

List of confusion

1. Sonichu is both a fictional "creation" of Chris's and a sentient being that is able to communicate through Chris.
2. Mary Lee Walsh was replaced by a not-evil doppelgänger sometime in 2000 in our world, leaving her free to wreak terrible havoc upon CWCville. It should be noted that it doesn't appear as though the real Mary was replaced by the comic version in Chris's mind, but that the Mary Lee Walsh Chris met at Piedmont Virginia Community College was the comic version, who was later replaced in the real world with a second, good Mary Lee Walsh.
3. Chris's car is a Transformer.
4. Chris is the TRUE and HONEST mayor of his fantasy land. Elections are not held because he founded the town, so there's no need for them. He'll be damned if he's replaced.
5. His dog is alive. As a bipedal anthropomorphic cartoon character.
6. Sonichu and Rosechu seem to have two different lives: One within the pages and one outside the pages, as evidenced by their marriage and children.
7. Sonichu was created when a Pikachu bumped into Sonic the Hedgehog with some Chaos Emeralds nearby, but Sonichu is also aware that he is a fictional creation of Christian Weston Chandler, and is capable of speaking to Chris in CWCville and even commenting on the quality of the comics in which he exists.

Outside of the comics

Chris's shaky grasp on reality extends beyond the comic pages. Somewhat subtly, there is his tendency to exaggerate or grossly misunderstand measurements of length, weight, and strength. When bragging about the size of his junk, he seems to claim that his glans is of normal length and his testes outstandingly small. When trying to show off his strength and fitness, he thinks that everyday objects like chairs and twelve-pack cans of soda have absurdly high weight, and that it's impressive he can even lift two twelve-packs of soda at a time, or lift an office chair, or do thirty extremely poor pushups. He once claimed that Patti's dog house weighed five to ten tons (and not in the hyperbolic use of the word), and that he managed to lift that. It seems to go beyond being incapable of measurement; he seems to think that since he's the hero, everything he does has some kind of epic element to it. Even Lord Byron would find this ridiculous.

To date, the most telling evidence of this is the Sonichu Presentation videos. The majority of his babble in this video is just typical delusions of grandeur: Sonichu is a profitable concept, Chris could direct cartoons, etc. Near the end though, things take a turn towards scary.

“	CWCville Shopping Center does get built... And it has a Mayor's Office... right here, above the... front of—up above the main front entrance of the building...	”
Chris, suggesting CWCville Shopping center might actually be built

Even if we accept Chris's vision of a world where Sega, Sony, Nintendo, and Cartoon Network all get behind Chris and let him turn Sonichu into a gigantic cultural phenomenon, and if we accept the concept that the Sonichu craze will become so huge that a physical mall could be built in its honor, why would that mall need a Mayor's office? Just as a tribute to the series, or does Chris really think he's the Mayor of CWCville, in dire need of his office?

THIS IS WHAT CHRIS ACTUALLY BELIEVES.

A leaked series of phone calls with Alec Benson Leary confirm that Chris does believe his characters and CWCville, along with all other fictional worlds, are real. In the second phone call with Alec Chris says that he believes that there exists a "Toon World" á la Who Framed Roger Rabbit? where every created cartoon character exists in a plane of reality. When Alec calls this delusion into question, Chris calls him naïve. This revelation goes a long way toward explaining why Chris gets so upset over other people using his characters in ways he doesn't like, as well as his bizarre need to retcon these non-canon depictions: while a sane creator would ignore such things or, at most, be upset over how his creations are depicted, Chris perceives this as changing the very nature of reality, which necessitates changing it back to the way things were.

This goes some degrees to explaining how Chris can justify the multitude of ideas he steals from. The concept that Sonichu is a derivative of Sonic the Hedgehog and Pikachu doesn't occur to him, because Sonichu is a separate character, and thus exists. Just as he doesn't consider himself a derivative of his parents, but rather, as his own individual, so too does he think his derivative characters to be free of any potential copyright issues because, by existing they are "real", and thus can't be altered based on arbitrary things like issues of legality.

It goes to say a lot that Chris has absolutely no empathy for real people, but can feel for cartoon characters.

Chris and Magic

See also: Chris the Shaman

In addition, Chris has come to the belief that he has real magical powers. The most notorious example is the Curse-ye-ha-me-ha, a power that supposedly bestows terrible fortune on the recipient; Chris has performed this curse on innumerable occasions, both over the internet and in public. He has even retracted the curse albeit reluctantly on at least three occasions (see Curse-ye-ha-me-ha Retraction, One Blessing, and One Curse and I am Alive) with a "Forgiveness Blessings'" which further cements Chris's belief in its efficacy. He also believes that he has the power to brainwash people into following his commands and to sic the spirit of his dead dog to attack people in their sleep. Chris believes that he may have other latent powers that he may discover when the opportunity presents itself. All of this magic is supposedly powered by his Medallion of Fail and/or his Amnyfest Ring.

When asked by a fan how he came to learn of his powers, Chris replied:

“	I have learned about the Curses actually working firstly when I cursed the real-life Mary Lee Walsh; then I later heard that her reputation at PVCC went DOWN (yes, mostly due to my references in the pages), but then things got worse for her, and even though I forgave her for her misdeed on interrupting my Sweetheart Search, I feel she definitely got what she deserved for her misdeed. Later, I cursed one specific Troll (I forget who); shortly later, I learn that troll came down with a life-threatening ailment.	”
Chris, Mailbag 18

This is textbook magical thinking, where people attribute one phenomenon to being responsible for a completely unrelated phenomenon, when in reality it is simply a coincidence (assuming that these reports are true; Chris is not exactly the most reliable source of information). Like his belief in the reality of CWCville and other fictional entities, this belief gives Chris the some degree of power over his own life, no matter how illusory. This use of fantasy is considered by the psychological community to be an immature psychological defense mechanism.

Conspiracy Theories

Conspiracy theories are generally used as crutches for people who have difficulty accepting the fact that they live in a chaotic and amoral universe. This, combined with Chris's innate gullibility, perhaps made it inevitable that he would cultivate a few such conspiracies. For instance, Chris as of late 2009 believed that Autism came from "a shot the doctor's optionally give to the child after birth," somehow bastardizing the already discredited Autism-vaccination link conspiracy. However, Chris also believes in two conspiracy theories particular to him, and both show much evidence of his "unique" reasoning skills; most conspiracies, even if widely implausible, at least make sense on a superficial level -- generally connecting motive to a perceived gain of some kind -- while Chris is unburdened by this constraint.

The first, best-known, and probably earliest conspiracy theory Chris holds to is the conspiracy against his Love Quest, which is wide enough to include deans of community colleges, police officers, and proprietors of businesses, as well as garden-variety trolls. Chris has stated several times that the goal of this conspiracy is to "make true love illegal," either in Virginia or nation-wide; this choice of words suggests that Chris believes that he is entitled to a girlfriend, and that people are attempting to take legal action to deprive him of this alleged right. Of course, a motive for this conspiracy is conspicuous by its absence; if the goal is simple eugenics, there are simpler ways of doing that. But Chris created this conspiracy because he cannot or will not believe that these people are merely reacting in a normal manner to his unacceptable behavior, so he must ascribe malice where none exists.

The second conspiracy theory that Chris believes in is an effort on the part of the Greene County school board to deprive him of friends; which involves conspiracy with realtors to keep him in Ruckersville and with Michael Snyder to keep him out of his favorite hangout. Again, there is no motive behind this conspiracy, but, like the first conspiracy, admitting this would be admitting that the real reason Chris has no friends is because he is a thoroughly unlikeable social retard, and serious introspection is anathema to Chris.