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Two classic comic strips, one classic gag
Compare and Contrast exercise:
Peanuts by Charles M. Schulz (first published December 18, 1950):
Cul de Sac by Richard Thompson (first published December 28, 2007):
GoComics has been re-running Richard Thompson’s excellent comic strip Cul de Sac since his recent retirement due to Parkinson’s disease. I’ve been reading the reruns, and I also happen to be reading Fantagraphics’ The Complete Peanuts: 1950-1952. Both of the above installments occur early in the respective strips’ syndicated runs, about 2-3 months after their debuts.
Thompson is a beloved, award-winning cartoonist, and for good reason. You could fairly easily draw a straight line from the legendary Peanuts to Calvin & Hobbes to Cul de Sac in regard to popularity, skill and influence. The benefit book Team Cul de Sac is chock full of artists paying tribute to Thompson and his comic strip. It was released last year to help raise funds to battle Parkinson’s.
Is an accusation of plagiarism, committed sub-consciously or not, appropriate? I think we can reasonably dismiss that while at the same time taking a closer look at both strips. Acknowledgments to the Peanuts comic appear to be too overt to be a sub-conscious swipe. Charlie Brown and Nara in the last panels have similar expressions, opened-mouth and stunned, even looking down at similar angles. The zig-zag on Alice’s hat seems to be a clear reference to Charlie Brown’s iconic yellow shirt (not yet created in the 1950 strip above). Thompson would also be foolish to consciously try to rip off Peanuts, which has a world-wide fan-base that would surely catch the offense. Indeed a commenter at GoComics at the 2007 link above pretty quickly makes the connection. The opening line about a “new model” is also a likely reference to a Peanuts strip first published a little over a month later from the original adult conversation comic, on January 29, 1951:
Thompson concluded his strip by taking the adult conversation joke one step further. Alice’s rhetorical question is probably implied in Schulz’s strip, but it could be Thompson acknowledging the past and picking up the baton. Charlie Brown walks off alone to contemplate his future as a mundane adult. Alice arrives alone but leaves with a friend, perhaps in the next moment promising each other they’ll be different when they grow up.
These are some of the thoughts I had when looking at these two comics. What about you? Whatever the real reasons and intentions behind both comics, they offer a great opportunity to take a closer look at two masters.
Free Comic Book Day is Tomorrow
One of the biggest days in comics is happening tomorrow – Free Comic Book Day! This is an annual event where free comics are given away to anyone who walks into a comic book store, and many stores have special sales and events, as well as artists on hand for free sketches, and lots more. Check out FreeComicBookDay.com for more details and to find participating stores near you.
The LA comedy quartet Jawiin put together this video to explain how Free Comic Book Day works (while addressing some confusion about the day):
Here is just a sampling of what local stores here in Los Angeles are doing:
Golden Apple Comics is opening at 10 am with free Gamma Labs and Hubert’s Lemonade drinks and a Cinco de Mayo taco bar with purchase. Our own Scott Shaw! will be doing Simpsons sketches, plus there’s a sidewalk sale, $5 grab bags, a kids play area, a bounce house, and more. Plus signings by Felicia Day and the cast of The Guild, Andrew Chambliss (Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 9), Scott Davis (Wrath of the Titans), Marc Andreyko (Manhunter), David B. Schwartz (Idolized), Peter Calloway (Anti), and Geoffrey Thorne (Prodigal: Egg of First Light).
Meltdown Comics will hold their Free Comic Book Day festivities from 11 am to 9 pm. As if giving away free comics wasn’t enough, they’ll also give you a 20% discount on any Marvel Comics products if you show your Avengers movie ticket stub. Plus a 50% off sale from 11 am to noon, 30% off all back issues, sidewalk comics by the pound ($3/lbs.), a Marvel Comics grab bag of 10 comics for $10, and more. Greg Weisman (Gargoyles), Victor Cook (Mecha-Nation), Caleb Monroe (The Remnant), Brandon Easton (Shadow Law), Scott Lobdell (Teen Titans) and creators from Archaia Entertainment (writers Tim Beedle [Fraggle Rock], Mike Kennedy [Bleedout] and Heather Nuhfer [Fraggle Rock]) will all be signing throughout the day.
Collector’s Paradise in Winnetka and Pasadena wasn’t content just having Free Comic Book Day. They’re expanding it to Free Comic Book Month with special events, signings and sales throughout May. But for tomorrow, there’s a 3-for-1 sale, and appearances by writers Ed Brubaker (Fatale), Steve Niles (30 Days of Night), Joshua Fialkov (I, Vampire), writer Corinna Bechko and writer/artist Gabriel Hardman (Planet of the Apes), writer Kyle Higgins (Nightwing), the Mind the Gap team of writer Jim McCann and artists Rodin Esquejo and Sonia Oback, Shane and Chris Houghton (Reed Gunther), and Matt Whitlock (Peanuts).
The Comic Bug in Manhattan Beach has so many creators, like Richard Starkings (Elephantmen), Joshua Dysart (Harbinger), and Jeff Stokely (Fraggle Rock) and fun stuff to give away, they made a 20-minute preview video (special password at the end of the video gives you a 25% discount!):
Simpsons writer lampoons comics world in Learn To Draw vids
The Simpsons writer/producer and The Doozies cartoonist Tom Gammill has a fun video series called Learn to Draw that, despite the title, will not teach aspiring cartoonists how to draw. Instead it offers a fun glimpse into the world of comics as what is possibly the world’s first comedy web-series about comics and cartooning.
Tom Gammill started the web-series three years ago (almost to the date – the first video was posted to YouTube on November 12, 2008) and has since seen guest appearances by Jerry Scott and Jim Borgman (Zits), Stephan Pastis (Pearls Before Swine), Tony Carrillo (F Minus), Mell Lazarus (Momma), Cathy Guisewite (Cathy), Jeff Keane (The Family Circus), Matt Groening (The Simpsons, Life in Hell), Bill Amend (Foxtrot) and even Jeannie Schulz, the widow of Charles M. Schulz (Peanuts). Gammill and/or his writing partner Max Pross is an excellent director able to get these non-actors to loosen up and do some pretty silly things. Or maybe it’s that after year years and decades of creating comedy every day, cartoonists have built a natural ability to perform with good comedic timing. Whatever the reason, it’s a
Here are a few favorites, culminating in the crazy Arnold Roth episode:
My List of the 10 Favorite / Best / Most Significant Comics Works
Yesterday morning, the Hooded Utilitarian posted my list along with 21 others who contributed to a giant survey of comic book creators, retailers, publishers, educators, commentators (like me) and other industry folk from all over the world to determine the 10 Best Comics. In total, 211 people responded.
I sent my list on June 15, in response to the question, “What are the ten comics works you consider your favorites, the best, or the most significant?” I started my email response to the Hooded Utilitarian with the following: “I want you to know, this is IMPOSSIBLE.”
And it is. But despite that…
My list:
- Asterios Polyp by David Mazzucchelli
- Bone by Jeff Smith
- Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson
- Hark! A Vagrant by Kate Beaton
- Maus: A Survivor’s Tale by Art Spiegelman
- Peanuts by Charles M. Schulz
- Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi
- Scott Pilgrim by Bryan Lee O’Malley
- Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art by Scott McCloud
- The Walking Dead by Robert Kirkman, Tony Moore and Charlie Adlard
Start clicking and see if something interests you.
There are plenty of comics that are just as good as the above that deserve to be listed, and even some that are better. But I had a few guidelines to help focus my list down to a manageable size.
First, I had to have actually read the material. Of the above, only Peanuts has material that I have never read. But I’ve read enough of it that what I haven’t read would have to be an absolute bomb for it to tarnish the goodwill. That means there was some material that I am fully expecting to love and that I love for its mere existence and concept that I had to leave out. I really wanted to include Carol Tyler’s You’ll Never Know on my list. It sits by my desk in my to-read pile from last year‘s Comic-Con.
Second, I leaned much heavier on the “most significant” portion of the question. As some have pointed out, the question asked by The Hooded Utilitarian is really three different questions which could result in three very different lists. Because what interests me is comics’ efforts to find new audiences, I interpreted “most significant” as the comics that have been most successful in winning over new readers. That was probably my biggest barometer. Each of the above have helped establish a genre or publishing strategy or level of skill that has expanded what comics can be and are today. In retrospect, I might’ve leaned a little too heavy on modern material but I think some of the most innovative and inclusive material is being made now (if you know where to find it).
OK, so let’s hear it. What did I miss?
(More random thoughts after the jump.)
Good Grief, Charlie Brown! The Peanuts gang is all grown up!
It’s something many people have imagined. What happened to Charlie Brown and his friends when they became adults?
The seminal Peanuts comic strip by Charles M. Schulz ran for 50 wonderful years (1950-2000). The characters have lived on in new TV specials, a graphic novel, reruns of timeless TV specials like A Charlie Brown Christmas and It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, the Charles M. Schulz Museum, and a reprinting project of every Peanuts comic strip ever in chronological order. There’s even a campaign to get a Snoopy license plate in California. The strip’s uncanny ability to tap into a childlike perspective has resonated with generations of fans. And as fans have grown up, it’s only natural to wonder how Charlie Brown grew up.
Director/writer Brandon Ford Green had the same thoughts, and is putting his theories into film with an independent feature currently in development. Good Grief is a dramatic comedy about eight friends who return to their home town to attend the funeral of the one person that was the bridge between them. Growing up tends to change people, so this actually gives Brandon a lot of freedom in crafting his own characters and stories that end up being very loosely based on Peanuts. But it’s still fun for those familiar with the strip to imagine “what if”.
Prequel shorts spotlighting each character have been getting previewed online but only for a brief time before they’re taken down again. This weekend, from Friday, July 1st at 10 AM to Monday, July 4th at 10 PM Pacific, you’ll get to see the video for Penn.
To follow the film’s progress and get the link for the Penn video, be sure to check out the Good Grief Facebook page.
Someone make this: Searchable database of comic strips in major newspapers throughout history
I was trying to figure out what comic strips were running in The Boston Globe when I started reading the comics section as a young lad. I know there was Garfield, probably the Amazing Spider-Man strip, Peanuts most likely, For Better or For Worse probably, but I can’t really remember what else. I think I started regularly reading the comics pages just before Calvin and Hobbes started, as I remember that being “the new strip”. So probably around 1984? I would love to have that information.
I was hoping I could find a scan of a random page from the ’80s to help refresh my memory. You can find everything online, so I figured this might take some clever Googling but should be doable. Well, apparently not. (Or I’m just not a very good Googler.) I did an image search at “the Google” for said random scan but no such luck. Then I did a search of all the internets, every single one of them, hoping for some ugly GeoCities fan site created by an obsessive-compulsive Globe reader who had cataloged every comics page, preferably using HTML tables and yellow font on a gaudy background. Maybe a dancing Calvin & Hobbes gif to really seal the deal? Well, GeoCities is gone, so maybe it took this hypothetical site with it. Once again, no such luck.
So this got me thinking. This is something that should be out there. All of the major newspapers with comics sections: The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune – it would be a great historical resource to know which strips ran in which papers when and for how long. (Last night on Twitter, I mistakenly included the New York Times in my initial wish list, but they don’t have a comics section.) Getting smaller papers would be great too but at least the major papers initially. And this information undoubtedly exists. The syndicates surely have extensive records of this information and more, although they probably have little motivation to provide it. So it will likely fall to the people to collect this information. So come on, everyone, let’s head to our local library‘s microfiche and get this going!
Today in Comics History: Charles M. Schulz
Today in 1922, Charles Monroe Schulz was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota. He would grow up to create the comic strips “Li’l Folks” (1947-1949), “Peanuts” (1950-2000) and “It’s Only A Game” (1957-1959). “Peanuts” is what he’s widely remembered for, and what has influenced hundreds of artists. The popularity and international appeal of the strip’s characters was nearly without equal during its run. Out of respect for Schulz and his family’s wishes, United Feature Syndicate did not hire a replacement following Schulz’s retirement and subsequent death. For the last six years, the strip has been re-run in newspapers, still remaining one of the most popular and widely syndicated strips today. (Sources: Charles M. Schulz Museum and Research Center, Wikipedia)
(Photo by Brian Lanker, from the Charles M. Schulz Museum and Research Center in Santa Rosa, California.)