Category: Cartooning

Eric’s Animé Pick

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This time around is the opening to Azumanga Daioh, along with a couple of gags.  Azumanga Daioh is so totally nonsensical it defies description.  Originally a 4-panel comic strip, it was then turned into a daily 5-minute Animé for TV.

Since this video preview is already wacky, for contrast I’ll tack on a single-gag cartoon done of the 4-panel comic strip Peanuts, way back in 1963.  This was some of the first animation produced to test Charlie Brown and the gang for television.

Accurate Color

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This week’s Spider-Man comic, inserted in the Sunday paper, starts reprinting issue #5, from 1963. Spidey is hopelessly mis-matched, battling Doctor Doom, one of the principal character inspirations for Darth Vader.

I was impressed that the colorist for this little freebie comic made the TV a black & white set, as it was originally, 43 years ago; emphasizing that the comics were in color, but TV (for the most part) wasn’t. Nice touch.

Sparky

I’m a very big admirer of the late cartoonist Charles Schulz.  Someday I’ll visit The Charles M. Schulz Museum.  The museum has released a DVD of the long-neglected 1963 TV show, A Boy Named Charlie Brown.  How neglected?  It was never shown!

I’m providing 2 minutes of footage from the show as an enticement for you to buy it.  His ideas were very similar to those of Fred Rogers, don’t you think?
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Order the DVD here.  Unfortunately, the museum doesn’t take orders online, and you’ll have to click the “Videos” link to see the ordering information for the DVD.

The show also includes the first Peanuts animation, done a full two years before the ground-breaking special, A Charlie Brown Christimas.  For a measly $15, anybody who is interested in the work and life of Schulz must have this unique DVD!

Feed Me My Strips

A blogger named Ian “iSnoop” Anthony has come up with a nifty and free service that lets you pick comic strips for delivery via e-mail.  He calls it the Comic Strip Snagger.  It was offline for a while, but it’s working again, so give it a try.  Not every syndicate makes its comics available for this sort of access (RSS feed), but there’s still a nice collection to choose from.

At last! Comics in the Times.

Click for full-size image
Click for full-size image.

The New York Times, which has never carried regular comic strips, ran a feature last Friday called “See You in the Funny Papers.”  Credit for bringing this to my attention goes to my well-read friend Morris.

The Times being the way it is, access to the article may be iffy, so here it is. Please note that the illustration above is of Dreams of the Rarebit Fiend by Winsor McCay, which has been featured twice already in this blog, here and here.

Continue reading At last! Comics in the Times.

This Week’s Comics

Lately, the fun in the Sunday comics hasn’t been in the strips, which are mostly mediocre, but with a comic-book that’s being inserted with the flyers.  It features reprints of the earliest Spider-Man stories by Stan Lee and Steve Ditko.

Each comic is 16 pages total, the printing quality is excellent and, hey, they’re free!  This nifty promotion is from SmartSource, the coupon distributor.  To see a list of all the participating newspapers, click here.