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Peanuts? What is your all-time favorite syndicated comic strip?

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Calvin and Hobbes... for me it's the perfect strip, nearly always mixing equal parts wittiness, insightfulness, humorous fun. It really captured the world of a six year old boy (imaginary stories, dealing with girls, dealing with your parents), and the unwavering/unquestioning love of a best (imaginary) friend. But the strip could also deal with difficult topics everyone has dealt with and can relate to like sadness (the baby raccoon storyline), fear (Moe the bully), loss of security (house being robbed, Hobbes missing), being misunderstood by adults(Miss Wormwood, his dad), etc....

 

cal_hobb-raccoon7.jpg

 

And also, what a great artist Bill Watterson is...

 

bill4.gif

 

After that, I'd lump together Peanuts and Far Side as 2a and 2b, I especially love the art in the first years of the Peanuts strip, not so much in the later years. And in third place, Dilbert.

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I've never understood the love for Bloom County. (shrug)

 

Over-the-top histronics & the political subtlety of a sledgehammer. :P

 

 

Seems to be quite popular with boardies - I thought it was just okay, and I didn't care much for Breathed's art.

 

While I enjoy well-done overtly political strips as much as anyone, they don't really have a long shelf-life. Personally, I find political history fascinating, and can get into unraveling the political subtext and deciphering the caricatures in a vintage Pogo strip, but as clever as strips like that or Doonesbury can seem at the time, they often lack the perennial appeal of other classic strips (though obviously not always - as both strips contained broader obsvervations at times).

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All time I would have to go with Calvin and Hobbes. I enjoyed Haggar, For Better or Worse, Farside, BC and Wizard of ID too.

 

For current strips by far my favorite is Alex. He's crass and pretentious and just so totally sums up the world of investment banking.

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I've never understood the love for Bloom County. (shrug)

 

Over-the-top histronics & the political subtlety of a sledgehammer. :P

 

+1000

 

It was THE hot comic strip when I was in college, and I never understood why.

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For current strips by far my favorite is Alex. He's crass and pretentious and just so totally sums up the world of investment banking.

Forgot Alex. Definitely the only new comic strip to have registered with me since Dilbert.

 

But maybe doesn`t play as well to general audiences.

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I've never understood the love for Bloom County. (shrug)

 

Over-the-top histronics & the political subtlety of a sledgehammer. :P

 

 

Oh I love Bloom County. Not consistent throughout it's run but there were gems in between some of the clunkers. The child scientist kid who experimented with hair growth on his Dad is downright hilarious. And Bill the Cat was brilliant. I still miss reading that strip...

 

I wasn't a big fan of his spin-off strips though...

 

Jim

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Bloom County. It took me a while to learn about it (I was young, and as young, the artwork didn't appeal to me). Once I did - I thought it was great. I was wondering how I had missed it all those years. Agreed about it being inconsistent (or maybe I was just missing the jokes).

 

Garfield started in the late 70s, so while it was alright, it stopped being alright about 25 years ago. He has survived on cutesy artwork ever since.

 

My newspaper never syndicated Peanuts - so I'm not as familiar with it (particularly the apparently classic 60s stuff). But I remember the Red Barron - so its worth me looking into getting an anthology.

 

Far Side. Definitely classic.

 

Calvin and Hobbes. Discovered it by anthology. After reading a few strips, I wanted the whole set. Compellingly great read.

 

B.C., while not legendary, is a good strip. Same can be said for Born Loser.

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My newspaper never syndicated Peanuts - so I'm not as familiar with it (particularly the apparently classic 60s stuff). But I remember the Red Barron - so its worth me looking into getting an anthology.

 

Mid '50s to mid '60s is the highpoint IMO (thumbs u

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There are many historic comic strips that I enjoy...Peanuts, Calvin, Far Side, Bloom County are my favorite humor strips.

 

I also enjoy rare strips from the 50's and early 60's like Googy. I also enjoy classic TV based cartoon strips from the early 60s like Flintstones and Yogi Bear!

 

The only current strip that I enjoy is ZITS. The "Jeremy" character kind of reminds me of Calvin and what he might have been like as a teenager.

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