Category: Cartooning

Lifeless Lettering

Since Garry Trudeau returned from his break a couple of weeks ago it sure looks to me like Doonesbury has computer lettering. I really dislike computer lettering for comics. A quick online check shows others also noticing the change, but nothing definitive.

This is how the lettering looked in one of the Sunday strips that was reprinted in May…

Doonesbury before lettering change

…and this is a panel from today’s Doonesbury.

Doonesbury with computer font?

I’d say there’s no doubt that the switch has been made to computer lettering. Yuck!

After Charles Schulz’s right hand started to shake, he held it steady with his left hand when inking and lettering Peanuts. In fifty years he took no sabbaticals and there were no reprinted strips. I’m not saying all cartoonists should be held to such a standard, but Schulz certainly set the standard.

Peanuts in Providence

We live not too far from Providence, RI, where the Providence Journal has added Peanuts to its comics page lineup. I used to feel that longtime cartoonists should retire and make way for new talent, but later I decided that the merit of a strip, whether new or old, should be the only determining factor.

It appears the managing editor didn’t intend that notice to be published immediately, because it’s dated Sunday. WordPress has an option to schedule the publishing of posts. I haven’t used it often, but I’ve been thinking about coming up with a series of posts on a single subject and scheduling them to appear automatically as sort of a weekly feature.

And out in Minnesota, one of the “150 Minnesota moments we’d just as soon forget” is the St. Paul Dispatch and Pioneer Press dropping Schulz’s first comic strip, Li’l Folks.

The Charles M. Schulz Museum has an excellent collection of the Li’l Folks panels called Charles M. Schulz : Li’l Beginnings. At that link you’ll find it under the Biographical section of books.

Eric’s Anime Pick — Emma

As promised, here’s more anime. Emma, A Victorian Romance, a 24-part series, isn’t Jane Austen, but it’s not giant robot battles, either.

We’ve watched only the first episode of Emma, but the series looks like a good selection for Eric’s girl cousins. I’ve spliced together a couple of scenes. See? No giant battling robots! 😉

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Sibley on Snow

When Laserdisc was the best home video format available, studios would release expensive, deluxe editions of movies with all sorts of extras. I bought a few of them, including a box set from Disney of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. It came with a hardcover book that was co-written by none other than Brian Sibley.

Making of Snow White by Brian Sibley

Eric’s Anime Pick — Grave of the Fireflies

Eric says we’ve depleted his selections of superior Anime, but we’ll be looking through some other titles to see what might be worthy. This one is an oldie we watched before I started blogging. Grave of the Fireflies is from 1988, and it’s one of the most tragic and heart-wrenching movies I’ve ever seen. A teenage boy does everything he can to keep himself and his baby sister alive in Japan during World War II.

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Hajdu, Don’t Make It Bad


Peanuts, June 22, 1952

Comic books, like the movies, were under attack in the 1950’s. Movie people were accused of being communists, and comic book people were accused of causing juvenile delinquency. A book by David Hajdu, called The Ten-Cent Plague: The Great Comic-Book Scare and How It Changed America, gives some serious thought to what happened and how it influenced later events beyond comic books themselves. Stephen Colbert, who’s obviously a comic book fan, interviewed Hajdu a couple of weeks ago.

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There’s irony in the “TV 14” rating that’s so prominent during Colbert’s introduction. It’s almost like the Comics Code Authority seal that appeared on comic books after the big scare. Oh no! How did that commercial get left at the end of the interview?

EC Comics publisher William Gaines did a lousy job testifying before the Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency in 1954. His entire testimony is at this link. He should have emphasized that his horror comics were inspired by radio shows such as Inner Sanctum, Lights Out, and The Whistler. But there was probably no defense against the public sentiment of the day. In a way, losing the comic book business was the best thing that could have happened to Gaines, because he was left with MAD Magazine, which was far more subversive and influential anyway, and it ended up being vastly more successful.

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