How Matthew Inman’s Viral Cartoon ‘My Dog: The Parad…

In 2012, artist Matthew Inman published two comics on his popular comedy website The Oatmeal. One was a personal piece called “My Dog: The Paradox” about the weird habits of his pet canine, Rambo. The other was a timely take on the latest iPhone. “I did both …

In 2012, artist Matthew Inman published two comics on his popular comedy website The Oatmeal. One was a personal piece called “My Dog: The Paradox” about the weird habits of his pet canine, Rambo. The other was a timely take on the latest iPhone. “I did both because I thought, ‘This dog one’s gonna bomb,’” Inman admits. “It was too long. At the time, my comics were mostly listicles and nonsense like ‘Five Reasons I Love Bacon More Than My Family.’ It was the first one with a bit of a narrative and a through-line.

I figured no one would read it.”

 Much to his surprise, “Nobody liked the iPhone one and the dog one went crazy.” It turned out readers loved and related to the straightforward panels featuring Rambo eating his own feces/vomit, being afraid of hair dryers and sharing his daily agenda (“11 a.m. lick balls.”) It was a pivotal moment for Inman, professionally and personally. “I’d had hits before, but this was the first one where I started to feel, ‘Okay, I don’t have to pander to the internet,’” he notes.

“Prior to that, I thought every frame had to be a joke.” He also realized that he had, unintentionally, made a deeply touching ode to that strange bond people have with their pets. And the fact that we know one day they will leave us. “I didn’t mean to make it emotional at all. But people were really touched by the ending – they could feel it, even if I wasn’t saying it.” A published book came in 2013, and Inman’s career continued to flourish.

He also published a collection of comics “How to Tell if Your Cat is Plotting to Kill You” and created the wildly successful card game Exploding Kittens. That led to the creation of an entire gaming empire, founded with former Xbox designer Elan Lee, also called Exploding Kittens, which now has over 50 titles and has sold more than 50 million games. The original game was even spun off into an animated Netflix series in July 2024 about God and the Devil living on Earth in the form of cats.

Inman also worked for Illumination, where he did punch-up on films like “The Secret Life of Pets” franchise. And now Rambo will hit the big screen when Inman premieres his animated short film “My Dog: The Paradox,” premiering Friday, Feb. 13 at the Newmark Theatre in Portland, OR. Inman will attend and do a joint interview with author Allie Brosh, followed by a free autograph session. Though tickets are already sold out, Inman plans to hit the festival circuit this year.
It was a good reset for Inman after serving as showrunner on the “Exploding Kittens” series – a series he’s proud of and grateful to have made, but was discouraged by the five years it took to make.

“I wanted to work on something shorter, more succinct, where I could control every frame,” he notes. In comparison, he estimates “My Dog” took about nine months, and that was in his spare time from his other ventures. He also viewed the experience as a test run for something longer form. “I picked it because it’s a very dear comic to me and I knew I could make it in six minutes and make it pretty good.

It’s great practice for something bigger and longer.” Inman also took the opportunity to make a few changes to the original comic – adding some new material and removing some jokes he felt didn’t work. There’s also changes to the characters – the owner “Matt” in the film is heavier and now sports a beard. “When I used to draw myself I didn’t really know how, so I would make myself look as generic as possible,” Inman notes.

“It was an oval and a bigger oval and that was me. I wanted to add a bit more of a look to Matt. Also, I’ve gained weight since the comic and felt I should expand with myself.” And without giving anything away, he has reworked the ending. Partially because Rambo passed in 2021, but also because now that he’s aware of how people responded to the comic, he’s leaned into the melancholy. “I wanted to own the fact that there is sadness to the story,” he says.

“I didn’t want to crash and burn with ‘Rambo is dead,’ I wanted to make the ending also uplifting, I wanted people to feel good about their time with their dog.”

Inman also encountered the new step of having to cast his characters – the voices of the Narrator, Matt and Rambo the dog. Inman voices Matt, who doesn’t speak much, and for the Narrator, he cast Eric Bryan Moore. But he knew it was vital to get the voice of Rambo just right.

“I’ve seen this struggle with other cartoonist friends; when you put a comic in animated force, the wrong voice will ruin your joke,” he says. He auditioned over 40 people for Rambo, but they all tended to play him in “as a smart aleck.” Inman imagined him more like Dug, the dog from “Up,” and had already voiced some dog animations on The Oatmeal using that as his North Star. “Those mostly did well, so I felt like it gave me permission to do the voice.

I really, really didn’t want to but it was better than what I was hearing and it had already done well on the Internet.” Though he hopes to make a longer film, Inman hopes to continue to make more shorts. Some will be adapted from existing material – he would love for his next one to be “Mantis,” about the “sociopathic undersea party clown” mantis shrimp, which has also been made into a card game.

And he enjoys writing about science – one of his favorite creations to date is “Gene’s Jeans,” featuring a shirtless talk show host whose “scientific” explanations get increasingly weird. “I made two and they were the worst performing shorts I’ve done in a long time,” he admits with a laugh. “Nobody liked them, but I think they are the greatest thing I’ve ever made and wish I could make them all day long.” For updates and screening information on “My Dog: The Paradox,” visit theoatmeal.com.

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This report covers the latest developments in iphone. The information presented highlights key changes and updates that are relevant to those following this topic.

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