Rick's Story (comics)

Rick's Story
Cover to the Rick's Story collection (Aardvark-Vanaheim, 1998)
Series	Cerebus
Page count	246 pages
Publisher	Aardvark-Vanaheim
Creative team
Writers	Dave Sim
Artists	Dave Sim Gerhard
Original publication
Published in	Cerebus
Issues	220-231
Language	English
ISBN
Chronology
Preceded by	Guys
Followed by	Going Home

Rick's Story is the eighth novel in Canadian cartoonist Dave Sim's Cerebus comic book series. It is made up of issues #220-231 of Cerebus. It was collected as Rick's Story in one volume in November 1998, and was the 12th collected "phonebook" volume.

Rick, Jaka's ex-husband from Jaka's Story, unexpectedly shows up in the tavern that Cerebus has inhabited for the duration of Guys. Rick is writing a book about his relationship with Jaka. He looks up to Cerebus and constantly pesters him for advice. Cerebus feels like his babysitter and constantly tries to get Rick to leave, even try to get him married off to Joanne from Minds, who has also shown up. Rick has descended into religious madness, and starts telling the story of Cerebus as an angel/demon in faux-King James Bible-style English.

Picking up where Guys left off, Cerebus is confronted with a strangely familiar face. When he can't quite figure out who this character is, he's given a hint: "You once told me that you were in love with my wife."

Rick is writing a book, entitled Rick's Story, about his breakup with Jaka. He was monogamous by nature, and it irrevocably changed him when his marriage with Jaka collapsed at the end of Jaka's Story. He has become an alcoholic, and the story he tells Cerebus of his life since last they met is convoluted and contradictory. He breaks down crying after being hit with a ball when playing Five Bar Gate. Cerebus resents becoming Rick's babysitter and desperately tries to get Rick to suck it up, be a man and get on with life, telling him to "Go on! Beat It! Scram!" which for Rick takes on the character of religious teaching. Following this, Rick begins a Cerebus-centred religion, in which Cerebus represents both god and the devil.

Rick reads out his version of the "Books of Genesis" in a style reminiscent of the King James Version of the Bible. He eventually descends into religious insanity, eventually leading to gory, drunken self-flagellation resulting in mortification.