wife-2
Explanation
This comic shows a man covered in tattoos looking at a tattooed note on his body. He reads: "I think this tattooed note to myself says my wife was murdered, but it could also say I didn't finish writing it. Hold up, what was I doing? Oh, finding the killer. Man— wait wait, I'm gonna spend six hours color-coding my inbox."
The caption reads: "There should be a version of Memento where the protagonist just has ADHD."
The joke is a parody of the 2000 Christopher Nolan film "Memento," in which the protagonist Leonard Shelby suffers from anterograde amnesia (the inability to form new memories) and uses tattoos, notes, and Polaroid photos to track clues about his wife's murder. The film is a taut psychological thriller built around Leonard's disability.
The comic reimagines this premise but replaces the amnesia with ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder). Instead of being unable to form new memories, this version of the protagonist simply cannot stay focused. He starts reading his murder-investigation notes, gets distracted mid-thought, briefly remembers his mission, then immediately gets sidetracked by the urge to spend six hours color-coding his email inbox — a classic ADHD behavior pattern where a person abandons an important task in favor of a less urgent but more immediately satisfying organizational project.
The humor works because it takes the dramatic, tragic premise of Memento and deflates it with the very relatable (for many people) experience of ADHD-driven task-switching and procrastination. The idea of someone trying to solve a murder but getting derailed by inbox organization is both absurd and painfully recognizable to anyone who has experienced executive dysfunction.