Editing 621: Superlative

{{comic
| number    = 621
| date      = August 10, 2009
| title     = Superlative
| image     = superlative.png
| titletext = Stay while I recount the crazy TF2 kill I managed yesterday, my friends.
}}

==Explanation==
The comic parodies a famous advertisement campaign for the {{w|Dos Equis}} beer brand. In the campaign, {{w|Jonathan Goldsmith}} plays "{{w|The Most Interesting Man in the World}}", a suave elderly gentleman with a number of astonishing life experiences and skills. The campaign's format generally includes the narrator presenting hyperbolic descriptions of the man's accomplishments, followed by the man delivering his signature catchphrase, "I don't always drink beer, but when I do, I prefer Dos Equis.", which has been widely adopted as an {{w|internet meme}}.

[[Cueball]] plays the antithesis of the protagonist in the campaign: the ''least'' interesting man in the world. Unlike the stories in the advertisement, his affairs tend to bore the listeners. Being the generic everyman, he possesses no outstanding capabilities at all. While the original is said to "speak French... in Russian", Cueball seems to have forgotten his French altogether. He also has apparently nothing of interest to tell, either in real life or in his blog. Instead, he will talk away about his weird dreams and his success in video games. Moreover, he is unable to stand too much beer and therefore absolutely ill-qualified to advertise it.

A {{wiktionary|superlative}} is a form of description that conveys the quality of being an extreme example (typically the most or least, in some way), and while the comic makes clear that this individual is not extraordinary in so many ways, his sheer ''blandness'' and lack of any exceptionalism is (in its own way) a very extreme position, hence the title describing this obviously unsuperlative individual as "Superlative", though there may be a small complication to this viewpoint that is related to the thwarted search for {{w|Interesting number paradox|'boring' numbers}}.

The title text is a reference to the slogan of the campaign "Stay thirsty, my friends."  It also references {{w|Team Fortress 2}} (TF2), a multi-platform, multi-player {{w|First-person shooter}} game.

==Transcript==
:He has dreams.
:[Cueball is gesturing to Megan.]
:Cueball: I was in this weird cross between work and my old house...
:Which he'll tell you ''all'' about.
:He can speak French.
:Or could in high school, anyway.
:A little.
:Cueball: Man, I knew all these tenses and stuff once.
:His blog has four posts, all apologies for not posting more.
:[Cueball is sitting at a desk, typing.]
:Cueball: Sorry, I've been trying to think of stuff to put here.
:He is
:The least interesting man in the world.
:[Cueball is sitting at a table. Megan and Ponytail are paying no attention to him.]
:Cueball: I don't always drink beer, but when I do, I stick to a glass or two. Any more and I feel sick.

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Cueball]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Megan]]
[[Category:Comics featuring Ponytail]]
[[Category:Internet]]
[[Category:Video games]]