Technically, John Cole’s cartoon is from yesterday, but editorial cartoons tend to float a little bit in the distribution channel and I didn’t see it until last night. So it’s here today, in part because it’s a good drawing and I think he’s laid it out well, but mostly becauseA: It’s an incredibly appropriate gag […]
Some strips are more autobiographical, or perhaps self-referential, than others. It’s a dangerous game to play, because the more you base any work on personal experience, the more you risk a kind of slavish dependence on real events, and a tunnel vision about what it all means, that keep it from being universal. Which, in […]
There are many things I like about Cul de Sac, but high on the list is the way Alice and her cohorts can come up with some random association and elevate it to center stage. Alice has decided that, since camp likely involves nature study, there will certainly be fish-slapping bears and she will, no […]
Lynn Johnston famously stood her ground when she was offered the chance to syndicate “For Better or For Worse” and insisted on making postal boxes red instead of blue, of celebrating Thanksgiving in October and of calling November 11 “Remembrance Day.” Other Canadian cartoonists have followed the preferences of their editors and Yankified their strips, […]
Today’s xkcd is not at all funny, which is why it made me laugh.I’ve been through enough media revolutions to see how they fit together. And, if I hadn’t, I could still watch the movie Idiocracy for a look at the results.I worked at a local TV station 30 years ago, when only about half […]
“The Knight Life” is as much a journal as it is a comic strip, and this Sunday’s entry provides yet another insight into the frustration of, not just Keith Knight, but a number of African-American cartoonists.Some time ago, there was a quiet protest in which several black artists used the same gag on the same […]
(This is one of a series of cartoonist profiles I did in 2003 for the Post-Star of Glens Falls NY)When Dana Summers needs to find an idea for a “Bound & Gagged” cartoon, he knows where to look.In the Yellow Pages.”That shows how desperate you can get,” he laughs. But silly as it sounds, […]
Dog Eat Doug is a strip about a young lab and a human baby. That might seem like a limiting premise but, in fact, it’s very open ended, because Sophie and Doug occasionally have extended imaginary adventures, and sometimes they simply behave like a young pup and a baby.Having shared a home with young pups […]
I’m going to take a break today and, instead of posting one cartoon I think is particularly funny, offer 10 cartoons of which I think maybe two have some promise.The Washington Post is in the midst of a contest to choose “America’s Next Great Cartoonist” and, the judges having narrowed 500 entries down to 10, […]
Dave Coverly’s Speed Bump has a type of madness to it that really appeals to me. There’s often just a little moment of “What?” before the laugh that fits perfectly between the gag that is too obvious to be funny and the one that requires too much analysis.
Arlo & Janis often features philosophical ponderings on the transitory nature of life, but it also houses Ludwig, the most realistic cat in comicdom. Today’s strip has some relation to a Far Side in which two dogs are about to be fed and one of them is saying, “Oh boy! Dog food again!” But that […]
At least Cul de Sac’s Miss Bliss, dotty as she might be, has always projected some affection for the kids. What was really strange were the teachers who harangued you all year long and then went soft and squishy on the last day. Were they visited by three spirits the night before school ended?And things […]
Though I’m generally against “zombie strips,” it’s a shame for this one to end, since the current team had done such a good job of revitalizing it. I’ll let a strip that certainly isn’t 86 years old provide guest commentary today.
(This profile of Luann creator Greg Evans is one of a series I did in 2003 for the Post-Star of Glens Falls NY)The comic strip, “Luann,”is 18 years old. The comic strip character, Luann, is not 18 and may never be.Then again, you never know.A few years ago,when Luann and her friends suddenly made the […]
It’s not surprising that South Africa is excited over hosting the World Cup, but the emotional impact of having the Cup there is a bit overwhelming. Today’s Madam & Eve doesn’t even try to make a gag and simply celebrates South Africa’s emergence into the modern community of nations that was particularly visible in its […]