2014-12-18
Explanation
The Joke
A child wishes his snowman were alive. The snowman suddenly comes to life and exclaims "What the--" The snowman is horrified: "No. What. I'm... I'm a mind. In a body made of ice." He turns on the child: "You made me out of ice, you sh*t! I can feel myself coming apart!"
The child asks "Why?" and explains "So I can watch myself die? Is that what you want? It's not enough to destroy something -- the thing has to watch its own destruction?"
In the "Soon" panel, someone asks "Bobby, why did you take everything out of the freezer?" and the final panel shows the snowman crammed inside the freezer saying "Frosty lives here now!!"
The Humor
The comic takes the cheerful premise of "Frosty the Snowman" and follows it to its horrifying logical conclusion. A snowman brought to life would immediately realize it is a conscious being trapped in a body that is actively melting -- essentially born dying. The snowman's existential crisis is played for dark comedy, as it furiously confronts the child who created it with the cruelty of bringing a sentient being into existence in a form guaranteed to perish. The sweet resolution of the snowman living in the freezer is both funny and oddly touching -- the child found a practical solution to an existential nightmare.