Filed under: Comic Strips

Chris Browne, cartoonist for “Hagar the Horrible” and creator of “Raising Duncan”, has called Sarasota Florida his home for the last 25 years but is moving because of the over development in the city.Sarasota used to be quaint, Browne said….  He could cruise over the bridge to Longboat Key, and the only thing he’d see was “The Purple Cow” — otherwise known as the Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall.”Now,” he said, “it’s dwarfed by this skyline that looks like Atlanta or Tampa.”It breaks his heart.Chris and his wife will be moving to Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

Another notable change in the comics page line up this week – this time in the Houston Chronicle….  Mark Tatulli’s feature was officially launched yesterday to over 100 newspapers – the Chronicles now being one of them.

The Winston-Salem Journal has dropped three features: Mark Anderson’s “Spot the Frog,” “Peanuts,” and “Beakman & Jax” – a Sunday only educational strip.On the plus side: Michael Fry and T.  Lewis’ “Over the Hedge” and Mark Tatulli’s “Lio” have taken up home on their comic page.

Michael Fry, “Over the Hedge” co-creator, along with film writer and producer Jim Cox have created an internet start-up called RingTales which focus on making animation shorts for mobile devises.  The animations will be based on current comic strips.

A while back I mentioned that Doonesbury character Alex Doonesbury was selecting a college and that Rochester Institute of Technology and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute were colleges that were being considered.  Cornell was also considered and the university actually courted Garry Trudeau in efforts to sway the decision – going as far as mailing admissions material and brochures about the dining halls.

Last week, I told you that Dean Young was opening a sandwich shop franchise….  Interestingly, did you notice Saturday’s strip talked about Dagwood opening up such a store?The sandwich shop now has a web site too.

According to a press release by Universal Press, LIO’s client list will include Los Angeles Times, The Dallas Morning News, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Houston Chronicle, Chicago Sun-Times, Denver?s Rocky Mountain News, The St…. Because it is a wordless strip, he also is debuting in Bel De Morgen, a Brussel’s paper.”Mark Tatulli knows how to deliver a punch line as well as anyone in this business, and in this strip he even delivers without words,” adds John Vivona, vice president of sales for Universal Press Syndicate.

Petersburg Times had made substantial pages to their comics page adding “Lio”, “Watch Your Head”, “Dog Eat Doug”, “F Minus” and “Peach Fuzz” among others….  What perhaps wasn’t clear to me was this site was a new online comics site that would also feature “Pickles,” “Snapshots,” “Opus,” “Watch Your Head.”

The title will be “The War Within: One More Step at a Time” and will focus on his B.D. character that lost his leg in Iraq.  Proceeds of the book will benefit Fisher House which provides temporary homes for families of injured soldiers being treated at military and veteran medical centers.

From Jim Borgman’s blog comes this pointer to an art exhibit in Virginia that is showcasing Jeff MacNelly’s sculptures that runs May 6th through the 28th in Washington VA.  Visit Jim’s blog for more details.You can see some of the artwork online.

Lalo Alcaraz, creator of “La Cucaracha” also has a radio show in California which is getting national attention when Lalo advocated a contest for illegal immigrants called “Name Your Baby Lou Dobbs Challenge.”According to the Universal Press Syndicate press release, the challenge is:The challenge is simple enough?the first undocumented immigrant to name their U.S. born child “Lou Dobbs,” before Sept. 16, 2006, will win $500 worth of baby nursery items from participating East Los Angeles merchants supporting the Name Your Baby Lou Dobbs Challenge.

With the launch of “Garfield 2” later this summer, The Game Factory will be releasing the video game, based on the movie, for the PS2, Nintendo DC and the PC.

The Detroit Free Press ran a blurp about some changes to their Sunday comics.  They’ve picked up Cory Thomas’ “Watch Your Head” they debuted in April to take advantage of the Boondocks hiatus.

According to his web site, he is giving away an original framed painting of his characters to one lucky individual who either emails the editor of their newspaper asking them to subscribe to Dog Eat Doug (if the paper doesn’t carry it) or thank the editor for running the feature (if the paper already susbscribes)….  The winner will be randomly selected at the end of this month and announced on his web site.You can see the artwork that will be given away on his web site.

With less than 2 weeks before the public release of Michael Fry and T….  From the New York Times, comes an article that will step you though the history of how RJ made it to the Silver Screen and the challenges that had to be overcome to get the movie to the public.