Let’s start with the obvious, because sometimes pointing out the obvious is the best you can do. Dave Granlund points out that Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination is getting different treatment from the Republican majority than Merritt Garland’s nomination received. Ditto with Matt Wuerker‘s commentary, which does not break any new ground or display any unexpected insight but […]
George Gene Gustines over at the New York Times weighs in on the Benders retirement from “Alley Oop” and the strip’s future.From Carole Bender:“Alley Oop has been our constant companion for a big chunk of our lives. Jack started drawing Alley Oop 28 years ago, and I joined him as an assistant 27 years ago. We […]
Over at The Comics’ Journal, there’s a nice piece from Frank M. Young on how Roy Crane handled marriage in his King Features’ comic “Buz Sawyer.”From the piece:This is the triumph of Buz Sawyer. Though full of violence—with moments of stark brutality that rival Chester Gould’s Dick Tracy—Sawyer is a character study that inverts the romantic notion of the […]
King Features is launching “Macanudo” this month from Argentinian cartoonist and recent Eisner-award winner Ricardo “Liniers” Siri. It’s unclear from King’s release what day in September it is launching.One of the launch clients appears to be The Aberdeen News in Aberdeen, South Dakota. They’ve done a welcoming article here (with paywall, unfortunately). update:Today (September 4) King […]
Let’s start with David Fitzsimmons‘ panel today, because, while he’s not the first to point out that Evangelicals are willing to overlook the entire New Testament and substantial portions of the Old, his depiction of Trump brought something to mind.When I was younger, and not a whole lot younger, I was always bothered by Exodus […]
100 years ago this year.Covington native Robert Franc Schulkers published the first adventure of the “Fair & Square Boys Club”– as told by Gregory Hawkins, the club “seckatary” – on Feb. 3, 1918, in the Enquirer. At the height of its popularity, the newspaper serial and comic strip reached 10 million households and spawned 30 […]
Sally From Peanuts Made Me a Better TeacherSally, the younger sister of Peanuts’ Charlie Brown, did not perform well in school. She wrote reports the morning they were due. She failed multiple exams. As an overachieving child, I attributed her poor performance to laziness. But now that I’m an educator, I understand where she was […]
Earlier today one of the points of Mike’s column was the casual portrayal of same sex partnerships in the Bliss panel. Commenters at the GoComics page also noticed.I tried to pass on commenting, but can’t resist.As mentioned in the Bliss comments Bud Fisher‘s Mutt and Jeff have been doing the same bed thing for 100 […]
What is today’s Arlo and Janis? Is it an homage? An encomium? Or perhaps a panegyric to Ernie Bushmiller’s 1969 (below) Labor Day Comic. Whatever you may call it, Jimmy Johnson has done it and now it belongs to the world.www.gocomics.com/arloandjanisInteresting to note, that new Nancy creator Olivia Jaimes has also turned in an “I’m […]
I don’t think you could have a better Labor Day commentary than this Clay Bennett cartoon.It could have run just about any time in the past year and a half, because Trump repeatedly takes credit for things that haven’t happened or that he had nothing to do with.But Trump has been particularly vocal lately in […]
Today’s installment of “Hi and Lois” features a remembrance of its co-founder Mort Walker (with Dik Browne). The strip (currently done by Mort’s sons Brian and Greg) is a nice tribute to the cartooning great as we approach what would have been his 95th birthday on September 3rd.See the strip here.
above: the first four Alley Oop comic strips, December 5 – 8, 1932. The Alley Oop comic strip began on December 5, 1932 from the small Bonnet-Brown Syndicate. above: the last Bonnet-Brown strip, April 24, 1933The strip ended abruptly on April 24, 1933 with the bankruptcy of Bonnet-Brown. The strip disappeared for four months, during which […]
Non Sequitur leads us off with this concise history of Labor Day and how it almost worked and then pretty much fell apart, though he applies the principle that history is written by the victors, so it seems, on the surface, to have a happy ending.I blame George Westinghouse, the son of a bitch who […]
Animator/cartoonist Paul Carlson has passed away. PAUL WAYNE CARLSON DECEMBER 27, 1932 – AUGUST 22, 2018 Paul got his start in the animation business at the Walt Disney studio on Lady and the Tramp, filling in the drawings between the animator’s key drawings, a position known in industry parlance as an inbetweener. He contributed to Frank […]
More letters celebrating the obvious greatness of comics (and puzzles). This time it’s from The Greensboro (N.C.) News & Record.From the letter:That’s almost enough to make me drop my subscription, but the comics page and puzzles are still pretty good and probably worth the price. Besides, those diversions keep me occupied so I can’t focus […]