‘Law & Order: SVU’ Stars Have Sense of Humor, Love Webcomic

The Law & Order franchise created by Dick Wolf is is beloved by audiences around the world, but perhaps especially by those of us who work as writers, artists, designers or any other profession where isolation is a matter of course. The methodical plots and general monotony of Law & Order make the series and its numerous spin-offs comfort food for the mind of the lonely creative professional, and it helps that there are hundreds and hundreds of hours to watch in the background as work continues late into the night.

One such person is A.K. Tettenborn, author of the webcomics Fudge That Sugar and Twice Shy, who actually created a strip about Law & Order: Special Victims Unit that earned the praise of that series' creators and stars. With news breaking this week that lead actor Christopher Meloni will not return for SVU's next season, it seemed the right time to point the spotlight on Tettenborn's work.Law & Order fans have been dealt a number of brutal blows in recent times. The original series was cancelled after 20 seasons; Law & Order: Los Angeles was cancelled after just one year; Law & Order: Criminal Intent was retooled, recast and relocated to another network only to get cancelled and brought back again; and news broke this week that Christopher Meloni, star of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (the most commercially successful of the franchise), will not return next season. If this trend continues, we're going to run out of comfortingly familiar cop dramas very quickly and be forced to watch soap operas instead.

"SVU will be way less rad without Det. Stabler punching a bunch of perps in the face for no reason," A.K. Tettenborn told ComicsAlliance, and she would know. Back in the happier times of 2010, the cartoonist lampooned the typical formula of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit in an installment of her webcomic, Twice Shy.

The comic was read by SVU co-star Ice T and passed on to Meloni, whose assistant contacted Tettenborn about producing some signed copies of the humorous strip. The copies were framed and given to Meloni, Ice-T and co-star Mariska Hargitay, as well as producers Dick Wolf and Neal Baer.

For her part, Tettenborn was pleased.

HOLY SH*T, YOU GUYS. Christopher Meloni owns a signed copy of my comic. Oh, and he gave the other framed copies to Ice T, Mariska Hargitay, and executive producers Dick Wolf and Neal Baer. YEAH. THAT HAPPENED.

I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say this is the COOLEST THING THAT HAS EVER HAPPENED. ("What about the Renaissance?" This is cooler.) Christopher Meloni, you are the most awesome mothereffer I've ever been in contact with (and your assistant is awesome!). Thanks for liking my comic and not sending me a cease-and-desist order.

CHUNG CHUNG!