The Syrup Trap
Humor zine, Nick Zarzycki (editor), 16 pgs, syruptrap.ca, $7
So where does an American start, trying to place a Canadian student satire magazine in some context for review? In any case, the story apparently goes that some University of British Columbia students had their UBC-focused satire thing going strong, and decided to take it national. It was an online satirical news project, and has now been inaugurated as a print magazine issued together with Geist.
With that potentially redundant factual overview completed, what I can tell you for sure is that this thing is funny as hell. Okay, there are a few things I donǯt have the context for (Canada! I honestly wish I knew all your inside jokes!), but from start to finish, there are so many hilarious nuggets to find. Editor-in-chief Nick Zarzycki and company do a terrific job of simultaneously doing a send-up and a tear-down of the magazine as a form, right down to the details of mocking mastheads, and knocking it out of the park with long-form satirical pieces. My favorite feature: An apology to the followers of my doomsday cult in which Ryan admits his miscalculations about the earth being swallowed by a giant space eagle yesterday; it didn’t happen. Copping the aesthetics of The New Yorker makes The Syrup Trap look that much more legit and more hilarious. Advertisements, comics, obituaries, classifieds – they’ve killed it on all levels. Even pull quotes, such as this one: “This is the pull quote for this article. It won’t help you understand the article, it’s just here to fill space. Fill space. Fill space. Fiiiilllll spaaacceee.” This is great. Get it. (Joshua Barton)