Weingarten on Argyle Sweater, Ted Key and best strip cartoonists

From the May 6th chat:

Comi, KS: The current Doonsbury replacement strip, despite the fact that I can't remember its name, has been pretty good. I thought this week's strip was hillarious -- but I'm 39 and I'm barely barely old enough to remember the "Hey, Kool-aid!" ad campaign. Was there a later resurgeance that I missed out on? Or does nobody under 35 stand a prayer of understanding that joke? Seems like the punch line--so to speak--would have worked a lot better in 1978 than 2008.

Gene Weingarten: Yeah, I barely remembered it. I like this strip, though it is one of the more blatant Far Side ripoffs around.

----------------------

and later in the chat,

The Four To, PS: OK, how about the Mount Rushmore of cartoonists?

I think Walt Kelly and Charles Schultz have to be there, but then it gets harder. I have to go with Watterson next, but then that last spot is very, very tough -- my list of possibles includes Feiffer, Trudeau, Breathed, Larson, Hollander, Adams, and MacGruder, all of whom were groundbreaking in different ways.

Who goes on your mountain?

Gene Weingarten: I take Schulz off the list and put Larson and Trudeau up there, but you won't get that many to agree. I don't think you can take Kelly off the list, but both Larson and Trudeau belong there. I am in the minority in my views on Schulz.


Re: Mount Rushmore of Cartoonists: Which weighs more heavily in your decision on this: artistic or writing talent?

Gene Weingarten: Writing. Though Kelly may have been the best cartoon artist ever.

Larson couldn't draw. He still needs to be there.
--------------------

Palookaville: Hey, Gene, can we have a moment of silence for Ted Key, who died recently at 95? Key created Hazel (the Saturday Evening Post cartoons from which the TV show was spun), Diz and Liz and -- which I hadn't realized -- Sherman and Mr. Peabody. An American giant.

Gene Weingarten: I didn't know he did Sherm and Peabody! And Hazel was good, too. Very dry humor. Hazel, as I recall, was a maid with a dry, cynical sense of humor, who basically controlled the household.

9 Chickweed Lane

Neither the Post nor the Times run 9 Chickweed Lane which I can't understand and I really don't get Gene Weingarten's professed dislike especially when it has strips like this.

Cul de Sac lack puzzles columnist at mag back

Gene Weingarten took the following question on his Post chat this week:

Cul de S, AC: Hi Gene -

Sorry if you've already discussed this, but who do we write at the Post to (politely) ask the paper to add the daily version of Richard Thompson's Cul de Sac to the comics page?

I only found out today that there IS a daily version (bwuh?).

I know the comics page is precious real estate, but it seems like the Post of all papers ought to carry the strip. Plus, it's great. Thanks.

Gene Weingarten: I know. I cannot understand why we are not carrying it.

You write to Deborah Heard, Assistant Managing Editor/Style.

Post censors Candorville again

Gene Weingarten posted the information about the Post censoring Candorville again on his chat - again the Post didn't tell us that they were keeping us safe from thinking on the comics page.

Weingarten wrote, Once again, The Post dropped a few Candorvilles because they (see them online here) dealt with security for Barack Obama. I am beginning to think this is a mistake by The Post. Darrin Bell has a point he wants to make: This one is based on stories in the Dallas paper that security was not as tight as it should have been for an Obama visit, given the unusual threats he faces.

They appear to have dropped the whole week of March 3rd strips.

Post on comic strip collective action

The Post has picked up on the February 10th collective protest by cartoonists of a darker shade of pale - "Cartoonists to Protest Lack of Color in the Comics," by Teresa Wiltz, Washington Post Staff Writer, Wednesday, February 6, 2008; C01. The protest is largely the idea of local cartoonist Corey Thomas who does 'Watch Your Head.'

I'm afraid I agree with the opinions that Gene Weingarten expressed in his chat update today, although I like Baldo and La Cucaracha well enough. Boondocks' McGruder's comments in the initial article are interesting too - unfortunately I don't think a lot of the college cartoonists are able to sustain their strip. I was a fan of Watch Your Head when the Post tried it out, but it's become a real one-note strip.

Chatalogical Humor by Gene Weingarten, Washington Post Staff Writer, Tuesday, February 5, 2008; 12:00 PM

Gene Weingarten: Here's an interesting piece in today's Style section, about a planned protest by cartoonists-of-color.

I sympathize with these guys, and many of them produce good strips that are victims of a de facto quota system. But there's a difficult truth that undercuts their argument. In devastating economic times, newspapers are (unwisely, I believe) ruthlessly squeezing the life out of their comics pages. So there is plenty of pandering going on in all directions -- a naked, desperate effort to appeal to every possible perceived constituency -- and that has nothing to do with racism. With limited space, there are quotas for everything. Believe me, the only reason newspapers run the painfully bad Prickly City is that they feel they need to offer a conservative voice on the page, to counterbalance the lefty Doonesbury, Candorville Nonsequitur, etc. The only reason newspapers run Dennis the Menace and Beetle Bailey and Classic Peanuts is to appeal to the oldsters who they believe would feel lost without these mild, mealy things. Family Circus is for very, very young readers, and preposterously stupid adults, and lovers of camp humor. This appeal-to-all-demographics impulse leaves very little room for ANYONE to break into a newspaper.

There is another factor undercutting their argument: For some, the despicable quota system has worked splendidly. The only reason The Post runs the weak Baldo is that the pandering alternative is the weaker La Cucaracha.

It's a pretty bad situation all around.

Post censored Candorville two weeks ago

Earlier this week, Gene Weingarten revealed in his chat's poll that the Post censored January 19th's Candorville which joked about presidential assassination and illegal immigration.

His poll revealed that 73% of his readers thought it was the wrong decision with the other 27% split almost evenly in half over 'correct' and 'not sure.'

I of course, think it was wrong, WRONG, WRONG!

But -

Gene Weingarten: On the poll, this might surprise all of you, but I am not as sure as y'all are that The Post was wrong to pull that Candorville!

And I NEVER come down on that side.

This was a joke not only about assassination, but about the assination of a specific person. I would have had a serious taste question about that. I'm now second guessing myself a little, because so many of you did not.

and a later response that I agree with -

Washington, D.C.: The cartoon should have run because it expressed a sentiment that I think a lot of people are thinking/worried about but no one's saying it. I've only seen one interview with Obama that talked about security and even then it was very broad and he addressed it more broadly and they were off to the next question. I thought the illegal immigrant punchline was a perfect lampooning of where we're at as Americans right now.

Gene Weingarten: I'll buy that. Maybe.

and this one was way off base -

Candorville: The First Amendment and freedom of speech does not cover violence. The Post was right.

Gene Weingarten: Well, it wasn't ADVOCATING violence.

and a few more views -

London, UK : As an outsider you, as a country, can be a tad carefree with your presidents.

What Candorville seems to express is unspoken but not non-existant. The cartoon form is, and has always been, an ideal platform for such free speech.

Gene Weingarten: No one is questioning whether he is free to draw that strip. Of course he is. But newspapers do edit things for taste. It's not censorship, it's editing.

_______________________

Candorville: I read the strip you mention in today's poll last week online, not knowing that it had been cut from the print version of the Post, and I was surprised at it for the same reasons you mention. However, I don't think it's dangerous, and I think it is an important social commentary on the fact that racism and intolerance are still serious problems in American society. For that reason, I think the Post should have run it.

Gene Weingarten: Okay.

and -

Dogtown, Ark.: That Candorville was brilliant! Topical and poignant! What kind of maroon would think it offensive enough to pull from the comics page? Gene, it is your sacred duty to out this philistine so he/she may be duly ridiculed by the Chat.

Gene Weingarten: It was topical, though it was not a really original joke. It was a re-tooling of an old joke to fit a new topic.

and then -

Cambridge, Mass.: I would like to point out, as I'm sure many others already have, that the joke in the Candorville comic is a straight rip-off of a Dave Chapelle bit. Dave talks about how hard it would be to be the first black president and the likelihood of assassination, therefore he would only do it if his vice-president is Mexican, "for a little insurance. So everyone would just leave me and vice-president Santiago to our own devices." Great act by a native-D.C. comic.

Gene Weingarten: Dave was not the first to speculate on strategically having a terrible veep to make sure no one assassinates you. Those jokes were rampant during Dan Quayle's vice presidency.

Ok, after reading all the comments -- they were still wrong to drop it. It wasn't advocating assassination, so I think they just didn't want the outraged letters.

Opus based on Washington Post contest

Gene Weingarten reported on his January 8, 2008 chat:

Some alert readers noticed with outrage something odd about the Opuses of Dec. 9 and Dec. 16. What they noticed, specifically, was that every pun in the strips was lifted from a Style Invitational from 1998.

What they didn't notice, specifically, was that Breathed acknowledged the thievery: Note what Steve Dallas is reading in week one.

To give credit where credit is due, here are the names of the original entrants, and their entries:

Flabbergasted -- adj., appalled over how much weight you have gained. (Michelle Feeley, Arlington)

Coffee -- n., a person who is coughed upon. (David Hoffman, San Diego)

Willy-nilly -- adj., impotent. (Beth Benson, Lanham)

Flatulence -- n., the emergency vehicle that picks you up after you are run over by a steamroller. (Russell Beland, Springfield)

Abdicate -- v., to give up all hope of ever having a flat stomach. (Tom Witte, Gaithersburg)

Later, he also says:

Raleigh, N.C.: I wanted to apprise you of the following depressing sentence on the front page of the section our comics are in, in the Raleigh N & O. "Cathy's coming back, as are Drabble and Hagar!" How will they ever make this betrayal up to me?

Gene Weingarten: Omigod.

How can the same newspaper that chooses to carry my column choose to do something as humor-impaire as that.

Hagar the Horrible has not had an actual joke in it since 1973.

Weingarten on Post's comics shenanigans

In his December 18th Chatalogical Humor chat, Gene Weingarten said,

"Yes, I hate the new Sunday comics squeeze, too. It's bad and I hate it. And I hate that Weekend is losing Tom The Dancing Bug, one of the few remaining strips with a brain.

Hate, hate, hate."

with reader responses of an outpouring of love for Tom the Dancing Bug, and:

Hate, Hate, Hate: Opus has been shrunk to one quarter of its original size. Need reading glasses......

Get down to comics and smack the individual responsible!

Gene Weingarten: They don't listen to me.

and:

Washington, D.C.: Tom the Dancing Bug is going away?! I'd cancel my subscription if I had one. I certainly won't get another subscription now. I had been considering going Friday through Sunday only, but not anymore. What's going in his space? More crap to entertain the dozen kids in the area who don't watch tv nonstop?

Gene Weingarten: I dunno. I am upset.

and:

Bethesda, Md.: Why is Weekend dropping Tom the Dancing Bug? That's the smartest strip around. Can't they move it to Outlook or somewhere else? Should we riot?

Gene Weingarten: I would never personally endorse a riot. In fact, inciting to riot is a crime. So I would never personally endorse RIOTING. But some action is in order short of rioting.

and:

Tom the Dancing Bug:...is available Thursday on Salon.com -- in color no less.

Gene Weingarten: Noted. Boy, I hate posting this. DON'T READ THE POST, READ SALON!

Weingarten on his comic strip and Tom the Dancing Bug

Gene Weingarten*, the Post's main humor writer, is a hardcore comic strip fan and his weekly chat frequently has a comics contest to pick the best strip of the preceeding week. This past week, Chatalogical Humor, as it's known also had two bits on comic strips.

In the first, Mr. W is queried about his plans to do his own comic strip:

Dangenecomic, AL: Welcome back. I know the book's been pressing, but what about the comic you and Dan are doing? When's it coming out? Have you contacted a syndicate? Will Gary, Jeff and Patty be giggling maniacally over your effort(s)?

Gene Weingarten: Dan and I and David Clark, the cartoonist, have finished 12 weeks worth. And as of basically today we are starting to write again. I anticipate you will see it some time after we finish 24 week's worth.

We're trying to make it as unfunny and derivative as possible, because we want to penetrate as many newspaper comics pages as possible.

Ouch. And then a story from this blog, that Comics Reporter picked up, namely the Post dropping Tom the Dancing Bug last week for Cheney-bashing, comes up:

Washington, D.C.: Since The Post did not mention it, most readers are unaware that it did not publish the current "Tom the Dancing Bug." It replaced the strip, which was harshly critical of the Vice President with an old strip. It did link to the strip on the Web site.

While I think that "Tom the Dancing Bug" is generally the the best comic in The Post not written by Richard Thompson, this one is too angry to be good. But as Comics Reporter noted: "...the Post's recent tendency to take a pass on controversial strips for no stated reason and then not tell anyone they're doing so is crappy editorial policy that badly serves the Post's readership..."

Gene Weingarten: I agree about The Post. I want to know when they kill a strip. I also don't understand why they would have the original strip on the website. We are told repeatedly that the fairness standards are the same. So I don't get it.

I believe at this time it is impossible to be unfair to Cheney. I called him "Satan" once. In the high school graduation speech I say he is "the root of all evil."

I mean, really. He makes a decision and a million fish die.

I think this Dancing Bug is quite funny. So over the top it's actually LESS critical that some criticism.

I would have liked the (missing) link to go to me, and not just Tom's blog, but que sera.

*my apologies for initially getting Mr. Weingarten's name wrong; obviously I've got to stop doing these when I'm tired.