Comic Strips -News and Views
Skip to comments
With Alison (Rudy and Trevor) Mason, Patrick (Mutts) McDonnell, USA Today Play (Prince Valiant), The Daily News (Gasoline Alley), The Pit graphic newspaper (with Madison Tom), Trino (El Rey Chiquito) Camacho, and Mort Todd. But without Emi (Olive) Burdge.
The Adventures of Rudy and Trevor by Alison Mason
Here I was ready to announce a new comic strip, then I found it has been around for five years. Just not in my neck of the woods. Alison Mason of The Adventures of Rudy and Trevor fame is profiled.
From Amy Cobb at Kentucky Living:
Alison Mason, a circulation librarian at the Cumberland County Public Library and South Kentucky RECC consumer member, has always been into art and drawing. But living a life of uncertainty as so many others were during the 2020 pandemic, Mason—a college student at the time—wanted to do something that would “bring a little sunshine and fun into the world.”
As a longtime fan of the classic comic strips Peanuts and Calvin and Hobbes, Mason thought, “Well, maybe I can do a comic strip. I don’t think it’s that hard.” She had previously written one story about a farm-dwelling mouse named Rudy and another about Trevor, a mouse who lived in a snow globe. So, Mason decided to create a four-block comic strip, starring both Rudy and Trevor, her “mice pals,” as she calls them.
The Adventures of Rudy and Trevor has now reached six states, appearing in 30 newspapers and two magazines. Unlike other cartoonists, Mason doesn’t have a publisher or receive payment for her comic strips. “It’s all for fun,” she says. “I like to use it as a reminder that life is fun and deserves to be enjoyed, despite the scary and uncertain days we’re living in.”
From Columbia Magazine earlier this year:
My name is Alison Mason, and I’m a native of Albany, Kentucky … I’m an author, illustrator, and cartoonist of the Adventures of Rudy and Trevor comic strip, which has been running since 2020.
Olive & Popeye
Last week we wondered what was going to happen to Olive & Popeye with Emi Burdge taking a sabbatical. Now we know.
For the time being it looks as if the Olive & Popeye comic will continue without the Olive portion. That still leaves open the question of what newspapers carrying “Olive by Emi Burdge” from the King Features Weekly Service will do.
Patrick McDonnell’s Gift of Everything Promotion Continues
MUTTS creator Patrick McDonnell celebrated the 20th anniversary of his all-ages magnum opus, The Gift of Nothing, with a heartfelt follow-up, The Gift of Everything. Both The Gift of Everything and The Gift of Nothing Anniversary Edition [link added] were published on October 7, 2025, published by Little, Brown Books for Young Readers.
Ollie Kaplan at The Beat interviews Patrick McDonnell.
KAPLAN: How has your artwork—from your comic strips to your large-scale paintings—evolved throughout your career?
MCDONNELL: When you do something like a comic strip almost every day you can’t help but evolve with it. It’s a slow, steady growth. You’re not even aware of the changes. The characters, the storytelling, the art style all naturally transform. You can see that looking at the history of any particular comic strip.
I also see an evolution in my paintings, but it is happening at a faster pace. That medium leaves much more room for experimenting and play.
It’s about learning things, but it’s also about unlearning things. You live for the happy surprises. It’s all part of one creative practice.
USA TODAY Launches USA TODAY PLAY
From Gannett’s media relations:
USA TODAY, part of Gannett Co., Inc. (NYSE: GCI) announced the launch of USA TODAY PLAY, a unified digital hub for casual entertainment and gaming including puzzles, comics, horoscopes, and more. PLAY offers a break from news and allows users to engage in fun and interactive experiences that appeal to readers and new audiences.
Designed to align with the daily habits of USA TODAY readers, PLAY features everything from morning horoscopes and comics to afternoon puzzles in one convenient location. Quizzes will be introduced in the coming months…
While the new USA TODAY PLAY includes comics as the name indicates it is mainly a game platform.
This probably concerns no one but me but the old USA Today comics page was how I kept up with the Prince Valiant title panel changes in real time. It was the one place that posted the title panel (most/half of the time) the same Sunday as the Prince Valiant comic was issued. I’m afraid the change will include dropping the title paneI and I may now have to wait a month for newspapers.com to play catch up.
Back in My Day
99 year old comics reader says 107 year old Gasoline Alley has gone on long enough.
From the New York Daily News – scroll to the bottom (or here):
Brooklyn: I’m 99-years-old and have been reading The News since it was 2 cents and came out the evening before, sometimes as a pink 2-cent issue. It knocked the Daily Mirror out of business, but The New York Times keeps rolling on. I love the comics sections immensely, especially “Dick Tracy,” “Little Orphan Annie,” “Harold Teen,” “Smilin’ Jack,” “Winnie Winkle” and “Gasoline Alley.” Please advise Jim Scancarelli that “Gasoline Alley” has run out of gas. Bring back “Winnie Winkle” and “Smilin’ Jack” and you will sell more newspapers. It’s time to keep Uncle Walt buried and quiet!
The Pit is a cartoon-filled newspaper about swamps, mommies and ice fishing
From Paul Moore at It’s Nice That comes information about a new quarterly alternative newspaper.
The Pit is a quarterly themed newspaper mostly distributed around coffee shops in Providence, [Rhode Island], but if you happen to pass by its creator Jules Sharpe’s studio, you’ll see it in a physical newspaper box that’s been redesigned as a house on fire, a symbolic representation of the newspaper itself. Clustered, quirky and cute, The Pit is a multi-layered, multi-media project from Jules’ cartoon-filled mind.
Each issue of The Pit follows a new theme, whether it be about ice fishing or swamps. One is even themed around mommies. The colour schemes and art styles follow suit, with a frosty blue palette for the ice fishing issue and sickly greens for the swamp – the intuitive colouring immediately makes the viewer feel like they’ve been placed in a lively cartoon world. The drawings feature ‘halloween pickers’, talking dogs, quaint characters fishing on a frozen over lake and a ton of hand-drawn letters that make the universe inside The Pit feel completely handmade.
Check out the first four issues of The Pit here.
Trino Camacho Visits Las Vegas
Karla Salinas for KVVU-TV Las Vegas profiles cartoonist Trino Camacho (Jose Trinidad Camacho Orozco).
One of Mexico’s most beloved cartoonists has left his artistic mark in Las Vegas, creating a vibrant mural that celebrates the Latino community at the Mexican Consulate.
Trino Camacho, known throughout Latin America for his quick wit and endearing characters, recently visited Las Vegas where he traded his traditional ink pen for a permanent marker to create something special for the valley’s Latino residents.
“I’m going to talk about making humor in these times, which is so difficult. Not just in Mexico, but everywhere,” Camacho said during his visit.
Mort Todd is Dead
John Kelly for The Comics Journal writes an obituary for Mort Todd, aka Michael DelleFemine.
DelleFemine was a colorful character who played a key role in the early professional careers of a number of artists, including Daniel Clowes and Peter Bagge. He also provided several veteran cartoonists opportunities to work, later in their careers, through the many comics-related projects he concocted. Among their ranks was the notoriously private Steve Ditko, whom DelleFemine befriended and frequently collaborated with.
He leaves behind a body of work that touched virtually every area of the comics world, from early self-published ventures (Psycho Comics), to working for both Marvel and DC, to relaunching a comics franchise (Charlton), to the improbable editorship of a national humor magazine (Cracked).
The obit includes memories from Peter Bagge, Cliff Mott, Rick Altergott, Molly McCann, Pat Redding Scanlon, Rick Parker, Nicky Wheeler-Nicholson, Mark Arnold, Karl Bollers, Chet Jasper Reams, Sean Moran, and Douglas DelleFemine.
Comments 1
Comments are closed.