Jersey Circus is a webcomic

Webcomic

Webcomics, online comics, or Internet comics are comics published on a website. While many are published exclusively on the web, others are also published in magazines, newspapers or often in self-published books....

 by a team of seven writers, six of whom are from Pennsylvania

Pennsylvania

The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is a U.S. state that is located in the Northeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. The state borders Delaware and Maryland to the south, West Virginia to the southwest, Ohio to the west, New York and Ontario, Canada, to the north, and New Jersey to...

, launched in August 2010. It is a mashup

Mashup (digital)

A digital mashup usually is in reference to:1. Digital media content containing any or all of text, graphics, audio, video and animation drawn from pre-existing sources, to create a new derivative work...

 of images from the long-running The Family Circus

The Family Circus

The Family Circus is a syndicated comic strip created by cartoonist Bil Keane and currently written, inked, and colored by his son, Jeff Keane. The strip generally uses a single captioned panel with a round border, hence the original name of the series, which was changed following objections from...

newspaper comic strip and dialogue from the popular MTV

MTV

MTV, formerly an initialism of Music Television, is an American network based in New York City that launched on August 1, 1981. The original purpose of the channel was to play music videos guided by on-air hosts known as VJs....

 television series Jersey Shore

Jersey Shore (TV series)

Jersey Shore is an American reality television series that premiered on MTV on December 3, 2009 in the United States. The series follows the lives of eight housemates spending their summer at the Jersey Shore in the U.S. state of New Jersey. Season 2 followed the cast escaping the cold northeast...

. The comic's title is a combination of the names of its parody

Parody

A parody , in current usage, is an imitative work created to mock, comment on, or trivialise an original work, its subject, author, style, or some other target, by means of humorous, satiric or ironic imitation...

 targets.

The creators of Jersey Circus state that their mission is to reconcile their "guilty delight in Jersey Shore, a bastion of trash" with their "eye-rolling fondness for the Family Circus." Critically well-received and the focus of intense media scrutiny when it launched, the site stressed that it was a parody, not connected to either the comic strip or the television series in any way.

Art

The parody comics, like The Family Circus originals from which they are created, are a single circular panel with a line of Jersey Shore dialogue below the artwork plus occasional additional dialogue in the panel itself. The art in Jersey Circus is taken from several different decades of the 50-year history of The Family Circus. The meme was reversed in an August 10, 2010, panel where the image was a photograph of a Jersey Shore cast member and the dialogue was lifted intact from a Family Circus panel.

Critical reaction

Noting that "Family Circus is ripe for parody on the Internet," Megan Friedman of Time

Time (magazine)

Time is an American news magazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong...

, said "There's something about the innocence of the comic's kids that just needs a little dark humor thrown in. Enter Jersey Circus, which gives little Jeffy some Jersey Shore flair." Sarah Walker of VH1

VH1

VH1 or Vh1 is an American cable television network based in New York City. Launched on January 1, 1985 in the old space of Turner Broadcasting's short-lived Cable Music Channel, the original purpose of the channel was to build on the success of MTV by playing music videos, but targeting a slightly...

's Best Week Ever

Best Week Ever

Best Week Ever is a weekly television program on the United States cable/satellite network VH1. It started airing in 2004 and was put on hiatus in the summer of 2009...

said that while it's "not the most original idea" that Jersey Circus "is still great". Josh Jackson of Paste

Paste (magazine)

Paste is a monthly music and entertainment digital magazine published in the United States by Wolfgang's Vault. Its tagline is "Signs of Life in Music, Film and Culture."-History:...

magazine noted the parody's broad appeal and that readers "don’t have to be a [Jersey Shore] fan" to "appreciate the discordant humor". Mike Pomeranz, a researcher for Comedy Central

Comedy Central

Comedy Central is an American cable television and satellite television channel that carries comedy programming, both original and syndicated....

's Tosh.0

Tosh.0

Tosh.0 is an American television series hosted by comedian Daniel Tosh, who provides sarcastic commentary on online video clips, society, celebrities, and other parts of popular culture.-History:...

, is "not sure why it takes a team of seven writers to create these things" but describes the webcomic as "pretty fun".