Calvin & Hobbes C or D

Favourite strip? Either the one where Calvin burps outrageously at the dinner table and his whole face contorts astonishingly before he says summat like "Better out than in!" and summat else exquisitely unpolite before his mom says "Three strikes and you're out kiddo"; or else the one that's on my desktop wallpaper;

Calvin & Hobbes listening to the radio; Calvin breaks into lengthy spiel...

Calvin - "The problem with rock n roll is that the generation that created it is now the establishment. Rock pretends it's rebellious with it's video posturing, but who believes it? The stars are 45-year-old zillionaires or they endorse soft drinks! The 'revolution' is a capitalist industry! Give me a break! Fortunately, I've found some protest music for today's youth! This stuff really offends mom and dad!"

Hobbes - "Easy-listening muzak?"

Calvin - "I play it real quiet too."

The only times he seems to want to step outside that reality - the valentine for Suzy scenario - it adds a layer of awkwardness that doesn't really work (tho it's cute, obv), and Watterson says the same.

Totally, unequivocally classic.

http://www.ksu.edu/english/nelp/images/johnson.books/barnaby_and_mr_omalley.sm.jpeg

mark s - Can you find any pix of Calvin's snowmen when he goes all avante garde and surrealist? They're so cool...

When viewed in these terms, the inevitable vistory of C&H is made clear.

No, hang on, what d'you mean explain? It's Calvin & Hobbes! It's about the inner world, imaginary friends and so on (apart from the bits about the aliens). IT'S TWEE, ALLRIGHT?

Also-living in a disatant suburb doesn't necesairly make you interact more w/ ppl in sk00l; I did, too, and my social life wasn't much more active than Calvin's.

CLASSIC CLASSIC CLASSIC of course.

http://www.whirlybird.org.uk/fgs.jpg

(hobbes = in purple)

I think Schulz was a writer of astonishing greatness and Waterson learnt a lot from him, but C&H is funnier and better drawn. The only basis on which I'd nonetheless rate Peanuts above C&H is that there is around five times as much Peanuts. There hasn't been a humour artist as good as Waterson come along in newspaper strips since the form's great heyday in the first half of the 20th Century - Herriman, Segar, Sterrett, maybe a few others (McManus, Capp), though they're the only three I'd confidently rate above Waterson. It's even more extraordinary when you look at the much tighter limitations, the smaller space allowed (there is an excellent C&H about this).

And Hobbes is so adorable. I wish there was a cuddly toy.

As a matter of fact, some independant animator somewhere did do a brief short Calvin & Hobbes film. He sent the film off to Watterson for his approval, and Watterson replied with something along the lines of "I think this is a good film, but I'd rather you not release it or make anymore". So it hasn't been seen by anyone except a chosen few. I think some of the actors who voiced it have the film mentioned on their IMDb entries.

The idea of the possibly brilliant C&H film that no one can see has me ripping my hair out in frustration right now.

I adored Calvin and Hobbes as a kid and at some point determined it was too sentimental, which it is at times. But I think I'm ready to appreciate it again.

"It's psychosomatic. You need a lobotomy. I'll get a saw."

http://www.berkeleybreathed.com/opus_returns.html

I preferred his daily strips though.

this is one from of the funniest strips. i love those ones where watterson does (what he declares to be) lame marvel rip offs, they are so silly. also into the poantheon of greatness- the one where he starts seeling homemade lemonade for $5 a glass, and as Mark S noted, every single one that involved snowmen or sculpture in snow. esp the modern art ones. kinda obvious but they hurt my sides, sort of....

Your right, though, Outland kinda petered out.

Favorite C&H strips? I love the one drawn up in 50s film noir involving Calvin and Susie, when they're playing house, and Calvin's character, puffing a pipe, longs for a divorce and rejects their "baby" (a plush pg, if I remember). I also like the one where Calvin scuplts his parents an ashtray, and Hobbes points out that Calbvin's parents don't smoke, and Calvin shouts "OK, Michaelangelo, YOU sculpt something!!" But of course, it's all in the drawings. I can't do any of them justice.

Favorite snowman strip is when Calvin gathers a crowd of horrified onlooking snowmen gasping at the sight of a dismembered snowman lying at the foot of his father's parked car. Calvin's dad: "I think we better get that kid to a psychiatrist."

The hundred-and-first viewing will change that, I promise.

Family Circus is the most accurate representation of childhood evah.

i am also going to scratch off the letters so that instead of toyota it says either "YO" or "TOY" it's going to be AWESOME

Let's enter Nerve.com's bad erotica writing contest!

WOW

Separately I have a really really distinct memory as a kid of the very first Calvin and Hobbes strip in the newspaper. I would read the comic section every morning religiously, and even as a 10-year-old or maybe even especially as a 10-year-old I recognized immediately that this was a cut above everything else. That and peanuts were my top two for life from then on.

bloom county and far side to complete the late 80s set imo

I’ve got the same collection of C&H books I started acquiring with babysitting money as a child and BW is one of those guys where despite my love for C&H I’m just not interested in the new material. I thought about why and I think it’s partly the fear that he turns out to be personally dodgy in a way that ruins his work for me (cf Morrissey) and also, it just doesn’t seem intrinsically that interesting compared to the stuff I know him for.

Pulled a few boxes of books out of the basement last week and realized I had the first 3 big C&H anthologies down there. When I unpack the boxes again I'm gonna dive into those for sure.

loved those treasuries back in the day, even though i also had most of the 'regular' books.... having the color Sundays and the bonus stories was great. iirc, Watterson sort of rolls his eyes at those publications in the must-own Tenth Anniversary book, pointing out that he named them The Essential, The Indispensable, and The Authoritative "since the books were obviously none of these things."

i'm periodically tempted by the idea of owning The Complete paperback set. somehow though it feels like something would be lost not having things grouped under "Yukon Ho!" and "Scientific Progress Goes Boink."

Separately I have a really really distinct memory as a kid of the very first Calvin and Hobbes strip in the newspaper. I would read the comic section every morning religiously, and even as a 10-year-old or maybe even especially as a 10-year-old I recognized immediately that this was a cut above everything else. That and peanuts were my top two for life from then on.

― omar little, Wednesday, February 22, 2023 12:10 PM (fifty-seven minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I remember that, too! I was immediately struck by the design of the characters -- Calvin's Pac-Man mouth, mainly -- and how clever it was right out of the gate. I mean, the first week or so of C&H was exponentially more funny and creative than the previous 10-15 years of Beetle Bailey or Garfield or whatever combined. It felt like risks were being taken, and apart from Bloom County and The Far Side (as Tracer Hand pointed out), few other (if any) late '80s strips had that spirit.

The only strips that come even close to C&H are Peanuts and Pogo.

the artwork and lettering on pogo probably better than those two; C&H owes a big debt to walt kelly for those heavily inked stumps and trees and crags he was so fond of

pogo really so amazing. not sure any other comic has a book of sheet music?

There are few things in this world I enjoy as much as the small moments in Calvin and Hobbes when Calvin’s parents do something that make it clear that Calvin got his entire personality from them (even the parts that drive them crazy) https://t.co/CPzcXPN69T pic.twitter.com/GBEACE1eOO

— Billie Takespeare (@maynardgang) December 16, 2023

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GBeIDqtXwAAf_3u?format=jpg&name=medium

In case strip doesn’t show in preview

Calvin’s parents the undeniable heroes of C&H. The strips with Calvin’s dad having a nightmare of a family holiday just ruin me

https://i.postimg.cc/X7GbyvQb/IMG-4358.jpg

Same

It’s amazing how invested the strip gets you