If you were breathing and had an internet connection in the mid-2000s, you couldn't escape it. The "B^U" face. The endless word balloons. The guy who really, really loved his Xbox. Tim Buckley created Ctrl Alt Del (CAD) in 2002, and for a solid decade, it was the poster child for "gamer webcomics"—both the kind people loved and the kind they loved to hate.
Honestly, it's hard to explain to someone today just how big the rivalry between Penny Arcade and Ctrl Alt Del felt back then. It was like the Beatles vs. the Stones, if the Beatles were two guys on a couch making jokes about Halo and the Stones were... also two guys on a couch making jokes about Halo.
But then came June 2, 2008.
That’s the day everything changed. Not just for Tim Buckley, but for the entire history of internet memes. He posted a four-panel comic titled "Loss," and the ripples from that single update are still felt in 2026.
The Tonal Whiplash of Tim Buckley's Ctrl Alt Del
For years, the formula for CAD was simple. Ethan was the wacky, video-game-obsessed man-child. Lucas was the straight man. They made jokes about World of Warcraft and graphics cards. Occasionally, Ethan would build a sentient robot named Zeke out of an Xbox. It was "gag-a-day" stuff. High-brow? No. Popular? Massive.
Then Buckley decided he wanted to be a storyteller.
He introduced a long-term relationship between Ethan and a girl named Lilah. They got engaged. They got pregnant. And then, without any warning or tonal setup, Buckley dropped a silent comic where Lilah suffers a miscarriage.
Why "Loss" Became a Permanent Meme
People didn't just dislike the "Loss" comic; they were baffled by it. You have to remember that the comic immediately preceding it was a wacky gaming joke. To go from "silly gaming antics" to "unspoken hospital tragedy" in 24 hours is the definition of tonal whiplash.
Critics like Ben "Yahtzee" Croshaw and the creators of Penny Arcade didn't hold back. They called it maudlin. They called it unearned. But the internet did something else: it turned it into a code.
$| \quad ||$
$|| \quad |_$
If you see those lines today, you know what they mean. It’s a minimalist representation of the four panels: Ethan entering the hospital, talking to the receptionist, talking to the doctor, and finally standing over Lilah. It became the ultimate "Rickroll" of visual layouts. You think you're looking at a photo of a kitchen or a pattern of logs, but then—bam—it's Loss.
What Most People Get Wrong About the Reboot
By 2012, Buckley realized the original storyline had painted him into a corner. Ethan had become a "Mary Sue" who won every argument, and the baggage of the drama was weighing down the jokes. So, he did what any gamer would do.
He hit the reset button.
In a storyline that felt like a fever dream, Ethan basically sacrificed himself to stop a dark future, and the comic "rebooted" into what Buckley called CAD 2.0. The main comic shifted away from the long-form soap opera of Ethan and Lucas and back toward what it started as: topical gaming gags featuring "Players 1 through 4."
But Ethan and Lucas didn't actually die. Buckley moved them into their own separate universe called "Analog and D-Pad," which he still works on today. It’s a bit of a "multiverse" approach before that was the cool thing to do in movies.
Where is Tim Buckley in 2026?
If you check cad-comic.com right now, the site is still alive and kicking. It’s actually impressive. While most webcomics from that era have vanished or moved to Instagram, Buckley is still grinding.
He recently shifted his schedule to twice-a-week updates for the general public, with a third day reserved for Patreon supporters. It’s a survival tactic. In a world where ad revenue for independent websites has basically tanked, he’s relying on a hardcore core of fans who have been following him for over twenty years.
He’s also been busy "remastering" the old stuff. If you look at his recent Kickstarter projects, he’s been cleaning up the art from the early 2010s and putting them into high-quality hardcovers.
The Real Legacy of CAD
Is Tim Buckley a "good" writer? That depends on who you ask. His early work was criticized for being too wordy—basically "walls of text" where the art didn't matter. His art style, specifically the "B^U" face (referring to the way he drew mouths and eyes), became a shorthand for lazy webcomic design.
But you can't argue with the longevity.
- Longevity: The comic has been running for 24 years.
- Adaptability: He survived the "Loss" controversy and a total reboot.
- Cultural Impact: He created the most recognizable visual meme in internet history.
He’s admitted in past blog posts that some of the "Loss" era was inspired by his own toxic relationships and personal struggles. Whether or not the execution was "good," it was a creator trying to do something more than just "guy jokes about a controller."
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Your Next Steps for Exploring the CAD Archive
If you're looking to revisit the saga or see what the fuss was about, here is how you should approach it:
- Read the "Loss" Arc with Context: Don't just look at the meme. Start about ten comics before the miscarriage strip (late May 2008) to feel the full weight of the tonal shift. It’s a masterclass in how not to transition a narrative.
- Check out CAD 2.0: If you hated the old drama, the "Player 1-4" strips are much closer to the original 2002 vibe. They are quick, punchy, and actually about games.
- Look for the "Loss" Code: Now that you know the $| \quad || \quad || \quad |_$ pattern, try to find it in the wild. It shows up in everything from Minecraft builds to high-end architectural photography.
The story of Tim Buckley and Ctrl Alt Del isn't just about a comic; it's about the first generation of the "Creator Economy" figuring out how to grow up in front of a million people who were ready to pounce on every mistake. It wasn't always pretty, but it was never boring.