I was a mere 12 year old when I first learned about JTHM (way too young to be reading it in my personal opinion lol). I used to walk home with this girl who was 3 years older than me, who was a good childhood friend of mine. Her and her sister and I used to walk home together from school, since they lived a block over. We would talk about our current hyperfixations at the time, and what I would be making at the time. Any typical middleschooler/highschooler things I suppose.

Her and I were HUGE fans of Invader Zim, and if she wasn't watching clips of the show on a computer library, she would come to my house to show them to me on my computer. We used to shout Zim and Gir quotes at each other, and giggle at our own inside jokes. She would stand up for me if the mean middle school boys would pick on us on our way home. We'd giggle to ourselves how we would stab them or something.

One day, she asked me "have you ever heard of Johnny the Homicidal Maniac?" to which I responded, slight caution to the words "homicidal maniac", said "No, I havent...". She looked at me with wide eyes of excitement, and she said "I'll show you!!" Then that afternoon we spent the rest of the day watching old comic dubs with shitty audio quality of it on youtube, as well as other fan videos and a few AMVs. The humor was SO funny, and so much more dark than Invader Zim!! It wasn't for kids, and it had lots of violence and gore.

I started exploring what I could of JTHM on my windows XP computer online. My obsession for it grew bigger and bigger, to the point when it started influencing my creations, my online life, and even... unfortunetly,... my view on life.

It was an outlet for me, and I felt like I was weirdly understood, as an angry teenager who was angry at the world and my peers in school who always outcasted me. Johnny as a character was an incredibly flawed person, a fucking HOMICIDAL man, who had so much self hatred, hatred of the world, and suicidal thoughts. How could a depressed teenager like me not relate to that?

I would share my hyperfixation about it to my online friends, and they soon became fans of the comic too. (I learned some of them lied about reading it to fit in and be cool, lol. thank fucking god, I dont think we were old enough to read it) My irl close friends at school would obviously learn about it too, and be sucked into my big heap of a hyperfixation about it in our teenage world.

(yes, thats actually me at 13. being excited to finally obtain the director's cut)

I've met some friends on the internet due to our shared interest in this comic, some who I am still friends with to this day. JTHM has existed on the internet for as long as the internet became social for people.

The art I made slowly started to become darker, and even started drawing gore as well. I even made my own little comic insired by JTHM called The Creep as an outlet for my anger of my life at the time. Like how Jhonen wrote Johnny, the character I made, Noname, was what Johnny was for Jhonen.

In for Forward at the beginning of JTHM: Directors Cut, Rob Schrab writes about how everyone has a little monster inside them thats from pure animal instinct to kill. That in your head, that little monster lives out the fantasies of taking your anger out on someone whos wronged you, pissed you off, or hurt you. :

"As humans, we are taught to forget that we are animals. Animals kill to survive and its just as natural for us. To deny nature is to deny life. Now that youve committed murder in your dream world, relax. Take a deep breath, give your monster a high five and put him away. You've just used an evil fantasy to keep you civilized and sane.

.....

Johnny the Homicidal Maniac gives our monster something to chew on. Its pain-food that wears its teeth down. Johnny represents Jhonen Vasquezs monster."

That pretty much inspired me to draw as much violence and anger as I want in my own created fiction. Despite the inner termoil of wether or not I'd lose my mind in this hyperfixation, if it makes me a bad person for doing so, I persisted in my creative endeavors to do as I please.

It's nearly been 17 years, many years of personal growth and discovering myself. I still find myself from time-to-time to look back at this old hyperfixation of mine. Even when I re-read the comic with my adult mind and chaining my perspective on the comic, I still find it enjoyable.