I'm not sure if it's the total nostalgia of my youth looking at this and saying " This is exactly what I expect from a Heathcliff comic." Or the beers and port wine I've drank but there is no way for this to remain the same or be more absurdist anti-joke without the titular character.
It took a few years but this is the perfect example of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle all agreeing on the proper form of orange cat named Heathcliff.
Replace Heathcliff with green orb, easy
That's someone else's gig