4-cent_garbage.com
4-cent_garbage.com is Chris's representation of Encyclopedia Dramatica and 4chan. Since he blames ED for breaking up the closest thing to a relationship that he ever had, he must naturally demonize it in his comics.
It is worth noting that this is the closest Chris has ever made it to creating an actual parody.
Inspiration
In 2007, while innocently stroking his ego, Chris discovered ED's page satirizing him and his comic. What really ground his gears about the page was the "fan art" of Rosechu with a penis. Beginning 10 November 2007, Chris embarked on a quest to make the website less scathing by uploading hideously drawn Rule 34 of his little abominations (and Mary Lee Walsh), along with the infamous ShecameforCWC.JPG to his page.
How Chris first encountered 4chan is less clear. An e-mail from a white knight on 5 November 2007 attempted to alert him to the ED page, and referred to the article as being created and written by the same people making fun of Chris on 4chan's /v/ board. Whether he paid any attention to the message or not, what is known is that on 12 November 2007, Chris first acknowledged 4chan when he made another edit to the "Chris-chan" article:
| “ | Christian Weston Chandler would like ED and 4chan to know the following: I will continue to Shove The True Facts From My Heart and Soul Down Your Throats, only until you take this WHOLE PAGE Down For Good. | ” |
From this, it can be reasonably assumed that Chris discovered 4chan and ED around the same time, and that he considered the them to be essentially one and the same. Chris would continue his Sisyphean edit war against ED well into 2008, but ultimately, all he succeeded in doing was to alienate Megan Schroeder.
By August 2008, Chris was finishing Sonichu #7, and he apparently felt the need to address these recent developments in the pages of his comic. Issue #7 opened with Megan as a supporting character in the story, but with the real Megan wanting nothing more to do with Chris, he decided to write her out of the story. As for ED and 4chan, Chris would lump these two concepts together and dub them "4-cent_garbage_Magazine.com." The name is a slight mystery, because underscores (_) are not permitted in Internet domain names.
Introduction: Sonichu #7
Sonichu #7 was the first issue of the series to be influenced by Chris's interactions with online trolls. While Chris didn't finish the comic until 20 August 2008, the events of the issue are all set in 2 November 2007, one day before the ED article was created. Just as past issues of Sonichu were very loosely based on Chris's real life, he must have wanted to acknowledge the conflict with ED/4chan and his estrangement from Megan in #7. But all of that happened after 2 November 2007.
Chris's solution: The Time Void a poorly-defined realm where Chris's character would be trapped for the next two issues. While stranded in the Time Void, Chris would somehow experience events going on in his real life while the fictional events in the comics unfolded without him. Upon entering the Time Void, Chris found himself assaulted by "random...new memories...popping in...my head!" These were memories of things that happened after 2 November 2007, so Chris was essentially using the Time Void to "remember" the future. Along with fictional events like the Battle of CWCville, Chris also experienced "memories" of Joshua Martinez setting him up with "Lori Lopez", and Megan "dumping" him via e-mail.
| “ | Dumping me? But why?!! 4-cent_garbage_Magazine.com? Mocking me? Slanderous Filth?!!! A drawing of me and Meg-Chan... Intimate? And I drew that?!! She dumped me over that? Oh... that hurts! Still. Curse your 4-cent garbage! | ” |
| Chris first mentions 4-cent_garbage in the Time Void, Sonichu #7 | ||
It became clear from this scene that once Chris escaped from the Time Void, he would do battle with 4-cent_Garbage as a proxy for ED and 4chan, just as he had battled Jerkops and Manajerks as proxies for those who interfered with his Love Quest.
Conflict with Sonichu and Rosechu: Sonichu #8
In the first part of Sonichu #8, "Rage Against the Garbage", 4-cent_garbage was formally introduced as a villainous organization dedicated to slandering people for the sake of amusement. Rosechu discovers the site on 3 November, 2007, which just happens to be the date that Jason Kendrick Howell created the "Chris-Chan" article on ED. The site's content includes a page that slanders Sonichu, Chris, and her, along with "lifelike" drawings of Rosechu with a pickle. While Sonichu is overcome with the stress of seeing his mate depicted with a penis, Rosechu decides to fight fire with fire by editing the site, just as Chris had tried in real life. She crawls into her dirty, mildew-laden bathroom and takes pictures of herself in the nude, then uploads them onto the 4-cent website, an attempt which proved futile in countering the abundance of dickgirl images. But 4-cent_garbage simply adds more dickgirl pictures, and she realizes that her plan will never work.
Instead, she travels with Sonichu and Wild to 4-cent_garbage's headquarters in Clarksville, Tennessee, to confront the leader of the organization. While Wild sneaks into the building in search of one of the Sonichu Balls, Sonichu and Rosechu take the elevator to the top floor, and meet Jason Kendrick Howell and his "womanslave" Kathleen Nicole Wallace, who were introduced in issue #7. The meeting is civil at first, but when Jason refuses to take down the "Chris-Chan" page, Sonichu tries to fight him, and loses. Rosechu fares better as The Incredible Lioness, but the page is still up, and their mission is ultimately a failure.
The Fall of 4-cent_garbage: Sonichu #10
Upon Chris's return from the Time Void on 9 August 2007, he immediately coordinates an attack on the 4-cent_garbage HQ, ordering Sonichu, Wild, Black Sonichu, Punchy Sonichu, and Son-Chu to meet him in front of the building. Chris arrives first as Chris-Chan Sonichu, and Jason and Beel lay a trap for him and try to steal his medallion. However, Chris discovers that the TRUE AND HONEST source of his Anchuent powers is his high school ring, which he uses to retrieve the Medallion and free himself.
Later, when Chris's allies arrive, he orders Son-Chu to transform into a sound stage for Christian and the Hedgehog Boys. Using his Guitar Hero guitar, Chris leads the band in a live performance of Revive Zordon, and the intense power of their music begins to shake the building apart. Inside, Jason converts his throne into an escape pod, and flees with Kathleen, leaving the others behind. Jason declares that he is retiring from trolling, in order to settle down with Kathleen and live a normal life. Beel takes shelter in the basement, explaining that he will be reassigned to Count Graduon once the building has been destroyed. This leaves Clyde Cash and Jack Thaddeus alone on the top floor with no way out. Refusing to die at the hands of Chris, they choose to commit suicide by leaping together down the elevator shaft just as the building collapses.
Sonichu #10 reports that of the 1500 people who were in the building...
- 500 were "prefectly unharmed".
- 250 were too drunk to escape on their own.
- 125 of these drunk trolls managed to get out alive with help from sober trolls.
- 125 of the drunk trolls were hurt, injured or killed.
- 125 sober trolls were hurt, injured or killed.
- 250 others were injured.
- 150 others were "safe but hurt".
- 100 were killed.
Note that this only accounts for 1,375 people.
Despite destroying the building and killing at least 100 people, Chris calls for ambulances and he and his band helps rescue survivors. Afterward, he weeps for the victims of his own mass murder.
Supposedly, destroying 4-cent_garbage's headquarters disabled its website as well, along with Encylcopedia Dramatica's website, such that both sites' data was irrevocably lost, and neither would ever be restored.
The 4-cent_garbage Building
4-cent_garbage appears to be a multimedia operation, with a website and possibly a print magazine operated from a brick-and-mortar building in Clarksville, Tennessee. The location of the building is probably intended to refer to where Jason Howell lives, or at least where Chris thinks he lives.
The 4-cent_garbage Building is 72 stories tall (66+6, as described by Beel), and the interior is painted bright red to resemble Hell. On the ground floor, Beel sits at the receptionist desk and directs visitors to an elevator on the far side of the atrium. Employees are seen on several higher floors drinking an alcoholic beverage called "REEB", and passing out on the floor when their shift is over. Their work seems to involve sitting at computer terminals, uploading and editing images of Chris and his characters.
On the 72nd floor, Jason Kendrick Howell holds court with his womanslave Kathleen at his side. It is unknown where Clyde Cash and Jack Thaddeus were stationed in the building, or what their jobs were before the building's destruction.
Security in the building was incredibly lax. Wild Sonichu turned invisible to sneak into the upper floors in search of a Sonichu Ball, only to find it left on a desk. Once he took the ball, his invisibility wore off, but he was still able to slip back out of the building unnoticed.
The elevator gags
A large part of "Rage Against the Garbage" features Sonichu and Rosechu exploring different floors in the 4-cent_garbage Building. Why Sonichu and Rosechu would stop at so many different floors to look around at whatever's going on is never explained, but they clearly react to whatever is depicted, meaning that they must have pressed all the buttons on the elevator controls for no good reason.
This appears to have been one of Chris's attempts to employ some of his trademark random-access humor, by showing wacky stuff on each floor. Much of the material featured in these pages were images lifted directly from Encyclopedia Dramatica, whether Chris understood their context or not. In some strange attempt at foreshadowing, Chris located these images on ED and then put them on his user page while he was still trying to edit the site.
| “ | You'll be seeing the following images AGAIN Soon Enough. | ” |
| Christian Weston Chandler, on the images he put on his ED user page, which would later be used in Sonichu #8. | ||
Whatever his reasons, Chris seemed to believe that using images from ED in one of his comics would somehow be a big deal. The floors used in the comic are listed below, along with a description of what Chris put on each one.
- 2nd floor: Chris draws 4-cent_garbage.com employees passing out drunk at their workstations. When the second shift comes to relieve the first, they begin drinking "REEB" while the first shifters lay unconscious on the floor.
- 3rd floor: Pedobear in a bathtub with the Powerpuff Girls. Sonichu doesn't understand the joke.
- 4th floor: Banner reading "I hate SMRS", a reference to "Sonicrocksmysocks", from the ED article of the same name.
- 7th floor: A 4-cent_garbage.com employee works on a drawing of Rosechu with a dick. Rosechu angrily leaves the elevator to punch him in the face, shouting "I have a vagina, uterus, and ovaries, you freak!!!"
- 8th floor: Sonichu spin dashes a 4-cent_garbage.com employee working on a picture of Mary Lee Walsh, nude and leading Sonichu by a leash.
- 9th floor: Sonichu and Rosechu electrocute an employee as he works on a picture of Sonichu sucking Rosechu's penis.
- 10th floor: Chris emerges from the Time Void to attack an employee working on a picture of Chris using the Oversized Drinking Straw of Fail. Sonichu and Rosechu cheer him on in unison.
- 11th floor: Troll parody of artwork by Branca, a batshit insane fan of the animated band The Gorillaz.
- 12th floor: Fan art of Knuckles as a gangster, surrounded by sexualized versions of female "Sonic" characters. Sonichu naïvely wonders when he became so popular.
- 13th floor: Female versions of Sonic, Knuckles, and Tails. Sonichu and Rosechu are dumbfounded.
- 14th floor; Pedobear, depicted to resemble Phoenix Wright.
- 21st floor: Les Grandes Baigneuses an 1887 painting by Paul Cézanne. ED has a copy of the image which has been edited with captions to reference the "Branca" article on ED.
- 22nd floor: Yu-Gi-Oh! Rule 34, from the ED article. Sonichu innocently considers it an impressive dark magic attack.
- 23rd floor: An anthropomorphized Charmeleon with her arms handcuffed behind her back spreads her asscheeks, as if for sexual activity. More Rule 34 from ED's Pokémon article. Sonichu ignores the sexualized content, and boasts that he could easily defeat the Charmeleon. Well, duh, it's handcuffed.
- 24th floor: Hate art of Snapesnogger's hermaphrodite naga character drawn by Zeriara.
- 33rd floor: Rule 34 Art from ED's Transformers page.
- 34th floor: Sonic/Amy Rose Rule 34. Sonichu cheers on his "pal" as they watch him have sex in a position very similar to the "missionary cowgirl" used by Sonichu earlier in the issue..
- 35th floor: Nude artwork of Amy Rose, Rouge the Bat, and Cream the Bunny. Sonichu and Rosechu shout "Holy Crap!" in unison.
- 36th floor: Strip poker game featuring various female characters from Sonic the Hedgehog. The image has been adapted into a parody of a Magic: The Gathering Card.
- 51st floor: The entire White House, with John McCain, Sarah Palin, and Hillary Clinton, looking on while Barack Obama paints the wall black. George W. Bush cheerfully knocks his eventual successor off his ladder. Sonichu and Rosechu offer no discernible reaction. Chris notes that his father Bob Chandler came up with this "joke." Recall that this story is set in the fall of 2007, so the joke really makes no sense for that year.
- 61st floor: Erotic artwork of Dot Warner, from Animaniacs.
- 62nd floor: Erotic artwork of Lois Griffin, from Family Guy.
- 63rd floor: Erotic artwork of Marge Simpson, from The Simpsons.
- 64th floor: Rule 34 of Misty and a Starmie, from Pokémon. Sonichu and Rosechu make out during this and the preceding three floors.
- 69th floor: Image of "XBOX 360-ko", an anime-style character patterned after design elements of the XBox 360. As the following floor features an XBOX360 console being destroyed, Chris includes a disclaimer, stating that his hatred of the HEXBox should not be connected to any lingering resentment of women.
- 70th floor: Drawing by Chris of an Xbox 360 console being chopped in half with a meat cleaver. Sonichu and Rosechu applaud the instrument's destruction. The imagery is a clear indication that Chris secretly desires to murder women.
- 71st floor: PS3 message congratulating whoever murdered the HEXBox. It states that you may "now play your PlayStation 3 or Nintendo Wii in peace", as though the existence of a single Xbox somehow interfered with such activity.
Business and Staff
| “ | I am a troll with no such beliefs, I know that we are born, then we die. I intend to make the most of my pitiful life by tormenting every person within my grasp until they all die from the shame and the distress of their existance. The page will stay up; this meeting is over! | ” |
| Jason Kendrick Howell, responding to Sonichu's request to remove the "Chris-Chan" page, Sonichu #8 | ||
4-cent_garbage does not appear to have any clear marketing objective. While this may seem like an oversight on Chris's part, it may well be a genuine commentary on the pointlessness of 4-chan and ED's activities. While most people would consider them to be entertainment sites, with no other purpose than to provide humor or diversion, Chris obviously doesn't find them funny, and so he depicted 4-cent_garbage as a tower of bullies, mass-producing cruelty for its own sake. In the comic, Jason says his only goal in life is to hurt as many people as he can before he dies. While he may have only been speaking for himself, this seems to be the raison d'être for everyone else who works there.
In Sonichu #10, Beel explains that "this trolling gig is my hell", suggesting that he has been condemned to work there, possibly because he had once been "main assistant to Adolf Hitler". Unable to die, Beel would simply be damned to serve yet another villain, Count Graduon, once the 4-cent_garbage Building was destroyed.
While Clyde Cash had been depicted in Sonichu Special #1 as an agent of Mary Lee Walsh, he appears to also support 4-cent_garbage in some capacity. This may not be a contradiction, as the exact relationship between 4-cent_garbage and PVCC is never explained.
See also
- Sonichu #7
- Sonichu #8
- Sonichu #10
- Jason Kendrick Howell
- Kathleen Nicole Wallace
- Beel
- Clyde Cash
- Jack Thaddeus
- The Incredible Lioness
- Revive Zordon
- Twin Falling Towers
- Chris and death
