50,000th Visitor to Mike Lynch Blog

From Mililani, Hawaii to Wellington, New Zealand; from Akershus, Norway to Brazil; and Australia, Malaysia, China, India, the United Arab Emirates, Romania, the UK, Canada and the US -- a lot of eyeballs have been looking in.

This is a week where I celebrate a birthday (January 18th). And one of the nicest presents was looking at the above world map from the statistics tracker of this morning's most recent 100 visitors and realizing that this week -- hey, maybe it was on my birthday -- the 50,000th visitor to the Mike Lynch Cartoons blog chose to stop by.

I just began this blog less than a year ago in February 2006. It was on MySpace for a time, and then I switched to Blogger. The blog's readership grew by word of mouth, and by nice shout outs by people like my pal, good ol' Mark Anderson. In the past couple of months, readership has boomed.

So, thanks, 50,000 times, to all of you -- friends, fiends, strangers, pro colleagues, new pals -- cartoon lovers everywhere.

Art Buchwald, Rest in Peace

Art Buchwald has passed away .. and has left us a video obit at the Times.

Buchwald, who went to a hospice last year and was expected to die, outlived the doctors' predictions. He left the hospice, and started writing. Last month, he was on C-Span to promote his new book titled Art Buchwald, Too Soon to Say Goodbye.

Editor and Publisher has a number of stories. "Columnists and Syndicate Execs Pay Tribute to Art Buchwald" is here. His last column, titled "Goodbye, My Friends" is here.

Before his death, he recorded a video obit to be released at the NY Times site. This will, rightly or wrongly, be the first of a series of these.

Garry Trudeau Interview

Garry Trudeau is interviewed by Mother Jones magazine.

Here's some excerpts via E&P:

The interview, linked on Doonesbury.com, was conducted by Elizabeth Gettelman. Here are some other highlights:

GT: My research [for the B.D. strips] was mostly at the VA, and then Vet Centers, where I interviewed counselors. Later trips to VA facilities such as Walter Reed hospital included meeting with veterans. The B.D. story has been a sustained experiment in naturalism. I usually don't tell stories with this much realistic detail, so most weeks there's no need to leave my studio.

MJ: Did the reporting for the B.D. story change how you want to do your strip?

GT: It may have set the bar higher, but I can't research every topic on a granular level. For example, I've already written weeks of strips about MIT, which I've never laid eyes on.

MJ: What kind of reception have you gotten from the troops?

GT: At both readings I've done at the Pentagon, I signed over 400 books, so I can hardly ask for a better reception. I got one drive-by dis from a soldier, but it was over strips that pissed her off during Gulf War I.

The whole interview is here.

MIke Lynch Cartoon in February 2007 Playboy

Playboy magazine is considered a hallmark magazine gag cartoon market. So many great cartoonists have been in there -- Sam Gross, Gahan Wilson, Silverstein, Feiffer, as well as great writers like Bradbury and Jean Shepherd (a particular fave of mine) -- and Playboy is as recognizable a brand as McDonald's and Disney. And so, it's a nice feeling to see a cartoon of mine -- much less a mild PG-13 rated one -- for the first time in this publication. Hey, ma, look! A new market!

This is the original that I sent in. The editor wanted a redraw, so the version in the magazine is a little inkier than this. But I like this version and this is my blog, so I get to show the cartoon I want to. So there.

I remember showing a portfolio of work to a school superintendent. He liked my work, and ultimately hired me to teach cartooning classes to 10 year olds in the school district. He saw this cartoon and warned me that it was inappropriate for children.

As a suburban kid, living in small college towns in the Midwest, I found out about cats and dogs in heat when I was in elementary school. It never crossed my mind that this was now considered risque by an educator. Times change!

I think we've all had the experience of buying some roses and chocolate, only to find out that our lovely date is allergic to both. Now, even worse is dealing with someone of the opposite sex who is only interested in romance once a year, usually in the spring.

Now, we all have learned from STAR TREK, that if you suppress those urges, kids, then you're gonna go a little beserk and you'll wanna fight the Captain.

End of today's lesson.

Tribbles: Old and New

Being a fan of STAR TREK means you obsess over TREK things like Tribbles. Here's a link to a video that compares the original episode THE TROUBLE WITH TRIBBLES (1967) with the revisit to that episode -- one that effectively mixed the original cast with the DEEP SPACE 9 cast via computer effects titled TRIALS AND TRIBBLE-ATIONS (1996).

Non-fans, please excuse this entry.

(Photos; top: original scene of Kirk dressing down the shore leave party from TOS; bottom: a SFX scene inserting 2 of the STAR TREK DEEP SPACE NINE characters in the middle of the line-up.)

1/21/07 UPDATE: A couple more side-by-side comparisons:

• Bar fight
• More from TRIBBLES

Lunchbox Funnies Launch

Lunchbox Funnies is a new all-ages comics site, featuring:

• Aki Alliance by Ryan Estrada
• Astronaut Elementary by Dave Roman
• Butterfly by Dean Trippe
• Cow & Buffalo by Mike Maihack
• Lunchbox by Ovi Nedelcu
• Silent Kimbly by Ryan Sias
• Wally & Osborne by Tyler Martin
• Zip and Li’l Bit by Trade Loeffler

Tyler Martin is the guy who put this all together.

Speaking as a guy who, as a kid, carried a metal lunchbox (PEANUTS, of course!), I find this site pretty cool. And it's nice to see Webcomics promoted as kid-friendly.

Hat tip to good ol' Trade Loeffler!

Video: Al Hirschfeld Drawing

Pixar animator Victor Navone shares a video of Al Hirschfeld drawing a caricature of Paul Newman.

Hat tip to Gerry Mooney!

See You in the (Restored, Reprinted) Funny Papers

Good article by Ben Schwartz about the rise of books of old newspaper comics collections, and the people who are restoring them for publication, in Sunday's NY Times. In previous years, the article says, collections of old comics like "Dick Tracy" and "Prince Valiant" have suffered from lack of readership, but newer literary graphic novels are helping sales.

"But today’s collections show more commercial promise, thanks in large part to graphic literature successes like 'Maus,' 'Jimmy Corrigan,' 'Ghost World' and 'Persepolis.'"

Mike Lynch Cartoon in February 2007 Reader's Digest

There are those that look at cartoons and then forget them. And then there are cartoon connoisseurs. Those are the kind of appreciative, thoughtful, good-looking, kind, reverent and cheerful people that frequent the Mike Lynch Cartoons blog.

There is a kind of serendipitous relationship between the words and picture in a cartoon. Divorce a funny drawing from its gag line, and it all falls apart.

And a good gag is one that you, the reader, has to put together yourself.

A single panel cartoon has a few seconds to show you a drawing and some words. It's up to you too put 'em together and, I hope, then, emit a nice chuckle or laugh or smile.

This is one of those cartoons where I first got the picture of a fellow in what's really a tic-tac-toe kinda cubicle arrangement. I drew the picture in my spiral bound sketch book. I was wondering what a fellow who was caught in the middle would say. Obviously, he can't leave until someone else goes. the line went through a couple of revisions ("I won't be home on time" and "I can't see my way out"). The cartoon was bought by Reader's Digest this past fall. It was turned down by 3 other markets before RD bought it.

New Yorker Cartoonists at Lunch

I missed this article in the NY Times by cartoonist Caroline Dworin this past weekend. I was out of town and it wasn't carried in the national edition.

Napkin Drawings by Stephanie Piro and Mike Lynch

Some jam drawings on napkins. Stephanie Piro and her husband and me and my wife went to a local watering hole in Portsmouth, NH to listen to some traditional Irish music. After a couple of hours, Stephanie started drawing. She drew a female character on a napkin, and pushed the pen and napkin over to me.

I added the rather slimy fellow above, holding a wilted daisy, with the hearts of love around his head. Somehow, he even looks like he's wearing a tacky Sears polyester suit, like I wore to my junior prom in the 1970s! I can tell by her look: he ain't getting far with this fashionable woman.

Next, she drew a smiling cat. Love those little teeth. She passed the napkin and pen to me. I drew the two striped fellows in the background, commenting, "I think she's on the nip!"

Stephanie drew this woman in profile, asking, "What?" She then passed the napkin over to me, and I drew another chintzy guy proffering his love with a ring of deep-fried onion.

Ah, quite the true sentiment! His wandering eye adds to the general unattractiveness! Tis beauty and the beast! Such fun -- and good beer and good music. And patient spouses!

New York Comic Con to Include Newspaper Cartoonists

E&P has the story.

More and more, comics events that used to be for superhero comics (Comicon and so many others) or literary comics (Moccafest and SPX and SPACE) are showcasing syndicated cartoonists. A good reminder to people that newspaper comics have fans too!

With all due respect, the E&P staff writers do not mention (and it's well worth mentioning -- maybe even SHOUTING) that Alison Bechdel is also the woman who wrote "Time Mag's book of the year" FUN HOME. And, hey, let's have Greg Walker share the credit with his Dad Mort for BEETLE BAILEY, okay? Okay!

Cowboys and Aliens Payola?

Platinum Comics published a graphic novel titled COWBOYS AND ALIENS. It sold well last month, and was cited as the #1 best seller during the holidays.

Except that citation was based on ONE comic shop's records.

And Platinum was paying the store (along with other stores as well) to sell it.

"The fundamental question in whether you consider this a “scandal” or not is whether you think Platinum’s plan to reimburse retailers for ordering many copies of the book was somehow underhanded or not," writes THE BEAT's Heidi MacDonald.

Um, yeah.

It's called payola.

Easiest to start here, and then there's more here.

Hat tip to THE BEAT and Journalista!

NY Daily News Drops a Page of Comics

The New York Daily News dropped a page of its comics this year, as I reported last week. No announcement from the News regarding why it was done, and why certain strips were dropped and certain others remained. There seems to be very little information on the Web, aside from my blog entry of last week, so I thought I'd compare a 2006 issue of that paper with the Daily News of January 12, 2007.

NY Daily News Comics Pages - September 20, 2006

From top left, clockwise:

Front page,

Classifieds (2 strips): F-MINUS, TINA'S GROOVE

Horoscope (full page),

Comics Page 1 (7 strips): JUMBLE X-WORD, GASOLINE ALLEY, GET FUZZY, DILBERT, SOUP TO NUTZ, CURTIS, ZITS;

Comics Page 2 (4 panels and 7 strips): Panels: CLOSE TO HOME, THE FLYING MCCOYS, THE LOCKHORNS, MARMADUKE; Strips: GIRLS AND SPORTS, BLONDIE, JUMP START, SHERMAN'S LAGOON, POOCH CAFE, MOTHER GOOSE & GRIMM, MUTTS

Comics Page 3 (7 strips): OVER THE HEDGE, HAGAR THE HORRIBLE, OUT OF THE GENE POOL, PEANUTS CLASSIC, ONE BIG HAPPY, AGNES, BEETLE BAILEY

Comics Page 4 (6 strips): ROSE IS ROSE, ANNIE, PEARLS BEFORE SWINE, FOR BETTER OR FOR WORSE, DOONESBURY, CATHY

And here's the NY Daily News for January 12, 2007:

From top left, clockwise:

Front page;

Horoscope (now 1/2 page, sharing with the weather, and facing the NOW section);

Comics Page 1 (6 strips): ROSE IS ROSE, GASOLINE ALLEY, GET FUZZY, DILBERT, PEARLS BEFORE SWINE, CURTIS, ZITS;

Comics Page 2 (4 panels and 7 strips): Panels: CLOSE TO HOME, THE FLYING MCCOYS, THE LOCKHORNS, MARMADUKE; Strips: SOUP TO NUTZ, BLONDIE, JUMP START, SHERMAN'S LAGOON, HAGAR THE HORRIBLE, MOTHER GOOSE & GRIMM, MUTTS;

Comics Page 3 (7 strips): Panel: CLOSE TO HOME; Strips: OVER THE HEDGE, ANNIE, OUT OF THE GENE POOL, FOR BETTER OR FOR WORSE, ONE BIG HAPPY, DOONESBURY, BEETLE BAILEY;

Classifieds: no comics this day, but GIRLS AND SPORTS was relegated there last week.

One comics page is gone. 8 strips are not running in the Daily News as of 2007. They are:

AGNES

CATHY

F-MINUS

GIRLS AND SPORTS (?)

JUMBLE X-WORD

PEANUTS CLASSIC

POOCH CAFE

TINA'S GROOVE

New Direction for Newspaper Comics?

Scott Kurtz, whose "Player vs. Player" Web strip (better known as "PvP") has spawned comics and merchandise, wanted to give away his comics for free to newspapers. That was last year. This year, he begins with wondering if Webcomics creators and mainstream comics artists (he mentions Bill Amend and Bill Holbrook) can't get together and fuse a new hybrid.

Scott asks:

"What would happen if I got myself, Bill Amend, Bill Hollbrook, Joey Manley, Robert Khoo and a handful of forward thinking features editors all into a room together? Or all on a conference call? I mean, how exciting is that?

"What’s the worse that could happen? We might accidentally usher in the future?

"Who’s interested and what’s our first step?"

More at Scott's blog.

Hat tip to Dirk Deppey.

ABSOLUTELY MAD

ABSOLUTELY MAD collects Mad Magazine on one disc and includes everything from its first issue to 2005. That's 52 years of MAD. MAD is one of those universal things a lotta cartoonists have in common. I had my MAD passion in the 1970s. I remember taking my dough to dad so he could write the check for the subscription. Gathering up those couple of dollars was a tough thing to do, but MAD was worth it.

A couple of people (at Amazon and BoingBoing) have written that ABSOLUTELY MAD is on 1 DVD, not 2 (as Amazon says). Regardless, it sounds better than the previous version -- a multi-DVD-ROM set that is PC-only which came out a while ago. I always have to go through a couple of discs when I do a search for, for instance, Don Martin's "Near Sighted Strongman's Club" cartoon.

The new set also has interviews and SPY VS. SPY animations from MAD TV episodes.

But to hear that there isn't a sound file for the "Gall in the Family Fare" parody -- which was a vinyl record that was stapled into a Mad Special that yours truly carefully pulled out and then played on a record player, over and over and over (and then me and my friends got together and acted it out) -- to hear that this is missing is just plain wrong, kids!

And speaking of the late, great Don Martin, it's just 3 weeks until National Gorilla Suit Day! Don't forget!

Mike Lynch Cartoon in FIRST FOR WOMEN

Another one of those entries wherein I spout off about a cartoon I drew.


"I'll have to call you back. The cat looks really pleased with himself and I gotta find out why."

The cat that I drew is a conglomeration of 2 of our beloved kitties that are no longer with us: Opie (fluffy -- and he'd turn his head like to one side) and Max (who always grinned), so I look at this and remember those 2 sweet kitties.

This is an odd little cartoon that really has no gag per se; no pun, no double entendre, etc. It just hints at a private moment for a pet owner. If you are a pet owner, then you know. I mean those moments when your cat or dog or bird (can birds have expressions?) or iguana (ditto) has a look on his or her furry/feathery/scaly face (a look only you can parse) that tells you that they've done something and that "something" isn't good.

A hat tip to friend Dave Carpenter for the heads up. Like I say, I never know when these appear -- but Dave saw it and called an told me. Thanks, Dave -- old buddy, old pal!

MIke Lynch Cartoon in January 2007 Reader's Digest

This cartoon appears in the current Reader's Digest now on the stands. Just look for Hillary Swank on the cover! I wanted my cartoon on the cover, but was duly informed that Ms. Swank won an Oscar and she'd sell more copies than a couple of cartoon chickens I drew. Harsh words, but true.

A sale to the Digest is tough to do. So many times I've sent dozens of cartoons, only to see no sales. The magazine is highly competitive. I never know what will sell, I just try to send their cartoon editor funny cartoons.

I sold this to RD in April 2005. Usually they publish a cartoon within 90 days. Maybe 4-5 months. So, its been a long time coming. I actually thought that they had all ready published it, but as far as I know they have not.

There is a lot of information here. Every bit is intentional. We are, in this little cartoon, in a world of chickens that wear clothes (but no shoes).

Mrs. Chicken is pregnant with some Grade As, and the reader's eye is following them as they are walking through the frame from left to right. Mr. Chicken looks interested in the nursery, but Mrs. Chicken -- now that I study her (hey, it's been almost 2 years now) -- actually looks like a silly wall-eyed hen with a head fulla nothin'. A bird brain. Well, I guess that those are the types those big he-man roosters like. Can you see that the real estate agent chicken guy has "Real Estate" written on his briefcase? It shows up well in the mag, but is murky in this scan.

I can't remember much about writing the gag. I remember doing a lot of odd cartoons around this time like the ones below:

Above published in UK mag Prospect.

Oprah-Land was printed in Brandweek magazine.

"Can't you just call it 'pretty' and be done with it?" It's "The Rogets on Vacation" from the Chronicle of Higher Education. One of those cartoons that people have looked at and told me they didn't get it.

From BBC Music Mag. Gee whiz, I was more inky back then.

Lyonel Feininger

Lyonel Feininger's art is featured in this 7 minute YouTube video. The video presents his expressionist works of art, and is set to music.

Feininger, who passed away 51 years ago this Saturday, was an artist as well as a cartoonist. He's best known for the short-lived Kin-Der Kids. Here's his bio from Lambiek.

Happy Peter Arno Day

New Yorker Cartoonist Peter Arno has his own day?

Tom Spurgeon tells us at Comics Reporter. Many links!