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Is Bill Watterson Ghost-Drawing Pearl Before Swine Strips? Yes.

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G

galdevo

Member
Watterson would be cool, I think it could also be Berkeley Breathed of Bloom County. I think the humor in the panel matches more.
 
G

GSR

Member
I had a feeling (I think we all did) but still, wow. It was fantastic to see his art in the paper again, if only for a few days.
 
MisterHero

MisterHero

Super Member
Mister Negative said:
Here's Pastis's blog post about it
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lmao

pb14041144ftf.gif
 
B

Bubble Metropolis

Member
Pearls Before Swine is a comic strip that I always give a glance at when I pick up a paper because I find the art style more engaging than anything else in the comics section, but it's so mind-numbingly dull every time. It's absolutely amazing that Watterson has returned to cartooning, if only briefly, but I am kind of bewildered that people, especially the creator of Calvin & Hobbes, would find Pearls Before Swine funny, or charming, or...anything positive.
 
B

Black Door

Banned
Mike M said:
Yeah, I haven't looked at a comics page in a decade, I have no idea what's going on these days.

I so want to believe that Watterson's growing tired of the hermitage thing. I have recurring dreams where new volumes of Calvin and Hobbes are released all the time : (
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With all of his talk in the 90s of how comic makers should be more independent, being chained to a syndicate is like being deposited in the lowest level of hell, merchandising is selling out, etc., you'd think he'd embrace graphic novels and the internet. But I guess all of that was just the culmination of some sort of problem with being around people
 
J

JasonUresti

Member
Black Door said:
With all of his talk in the 90s of how comic makers should be more independent, being chained to a syndicate is like being deposited in the lowest level of hell, merchandising is selling out, etc., you'd think he'd embrace graphic novels and the internet. But I guess all of that was just the culmination of some sort of problem with being around people
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Watterson is very, very well off. For all his passionate talk about merchandising and what not, the fact that he was making millions certainly made it much easier to stand by that position.
 
Arkos

Arkos

Nose how to spell and rede to
There has never been a person that I respected more who I also think deserves a serious punch in the face. I will now start reading Pearls before Swine lol.
 
C

C4Lukins

Junior Member
Arkos said:
Lol yeah totally, dude is a pretentious self righteous jerk. But he's also brilliant and hilarious :p
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I think there is something remarkable about him turning down hundreds of millions of dollars in merchandising, at the same time, I really would love to buy an official Hobbes plush toy.
 
Arkos

Arkos

Nose how to spell and rede to
C4Lukins said:
I think there is something remarkable about him turning down hundreds of millions of dollars in merchandising, at the same time, I really would love to buy an official Hobbes plush.
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Yeah totally, it's impressive and I respect him for it, but he's also a jerk about it and talks about it like it's an intellectual affront to his high art form to even consider such a trifling thing.
 
E

ElectricBlanketFire

Member
C4Lukins said:
I think there is something remarkable about him turning down hundreds of millions of dollars in merchandising, at the same time, I really would love to buy an official Hobbes plush toy.
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My wife is planning on making a Hobbes doll for our son from scratch. Not a bootleg or Pintrest/Etsy pattern either.
 
K

kess

Member
Watterson has a great sense of perspective and a real unique inking style, too. I haven't seen an imitation that managed to nail it just right.
 
B

BobTheFork

Member
Arkos said:
Yeah totally, it's impressive and I respect him for it, but he's also a jerk about it and talks about it like it's an intellectual affront to his high art form to even consider such a trifling thing.
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He never considered it high art, he thought that merchandising cheapened himself and what he created. This isn't fucking Garfield, Watterson often tried to say something with a tiny newspaper comic and he wanted people to remember what he said, not some stuffed Hobbes on a window.
 
K

kess

Member
animlboogy said:
It's not like Steve Ditko drew Spider-Man and disappeared. There's enough bondage and/or borderline psychotic objectivist comics material from him to go around.

Few outside of comics circles talk about Peanuts the way the general public still talks about C&H, even though the first 20-25 (!!!) years of Peanuts are pretty close to that level of quality. We mostly just remember Snoopy dancing like an idiot in cartoons and those awful insurance ads. Can you imagine how different C&H would be remembered if every time you brought it up, someone was like, "oh the cat from those soda ads?" You can already barely talk about it without Calvin peeing on Ford logos coming up.
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This is a good point, because beloved comic strips and their creators rarely ever get a encore.

Lil' Abner was another strip that had a GOAT run for almost 30 years but ran itself into utter merchandising fatigue, although the creator being an total asshole in his old age probably killed that gravy train. Stuff like "Al Capp on Campus" destroyed the strip's reputation for an entire generation.

Peanuts always struck me a weird thing to license, considering most of the merchandise has nothing to do with the actual strip, thematically. The strip almost got overshadowed by it in its latter days, even though it was still decent until the end.
 
W

whatsinaname

Member
Arkos said:
Lol yeah totally, dude is a pretentious self righteous jerk. But he's also brilliant and hilarious :p
Click to expand...

Arkos said:
Yeah totally, it's impressive and I respect him for it, but he's also a jerk about it and talks about it like it's an intellectual affront to his high art form to even consider such a trifling thing.
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I hate to use the word, but this sounds a bit entitled of you. It is his creation. He can present it in any way he wants and we either take it or leave it. We might even disagree with his stance but I don't think it is correct to call him a jerk (Pretentious or Self-righteous)..
 
Arkos

Arkos

Nose how to spell and rede to
Like I said, I agree with and respect what he has done, I just think he could have been less of a dick in how he expressed his opinions on the matter. Rather than fostering conversation, he set himself apart

Edit: this is my phone's background btw
2643.jpg
 
A

ab.aeterno

Member
Man, Calvin and Hobbes. That comic has such a special place in my heart. It was a huge influence on me as a kid. I seem to remember finding my grandfather's collection and just getting lost in them one day. Fuck, that's something I haven't thought about in a long time, and that memory's all the more poignant now.

I need to get that hardcover book set.
 
Y

yogloo

Member
ab.aeterno said:
Man, Calvin and Hobbes. That comic has such a special place in my heart. It was a huge influence on me as a kid. I seem to remember finding my grandfather's collection and just getting lost in them one day. Fuck, that's something I haven't thought about in a long time, and that memory's all the more poignant now.

I need to get that hardcover book set.
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I have that set. I sleep with it every night. My wife sleeps on the sofa.
 
S

sc0la

Unconfirmed Member
C4Lukins said:
I think there is something remarkable about him turning down hundreds of millions of dollars in merchandising, at the same time, I really would love to buy an official Hobbes plush toy.
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Just make one, it will mean more that way anyways.

http://sukigirl74.blogspot.com/2011/03/free-hobbes-crochet-pattern.html?m=1

http://sukigirl74.blogspot.com/2013/10/heres-another-free-hobbes-crochet_14.html?m=1

My sister in law made my son one. It is fantastic.

(Actually, she made two, the first one got left on vacation :(, I commented to my wife I felt like strip when we were looking for it and we were calling out to a lost hobbes lol
 
T

TheGoddamn

Member
This makes me incredibly happy. I'm finally getting around to reading the complete Calvin and Hobbes, and while it hasn't quite eclipsed Peanuts in my heart, it's sure getting close. I know how influential the latter was to the former, and how Watterson idolized Schulz's craft.

The blog post says it all. What a story.
 
W

Warm Machine

Member
I like that all that remains of Calvin and Hobbes is the comic strip. It is all that needs to exist. Watterson will be wealthy forever based on the sales of the volumes throughout what remains of his life.
 
S

Santerestil

Banned
animlboogy said:
when you give up that marketing control you quickly lose how your characters are presented, and it all reflects back on your strip no matter how good it is.

You can already barely talk about it without Calvin peeing on Ford logos coming up.
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Had Watterson gave up the marketing control of the strip, the peeing Calvin wouldn't be so notorius at all, because It would been taken down as a counterfeit by the corporation holding him.

Instead, no "serious" marketing means nobody cared on copyright infringment, so basically became this counter-cultural own thing that will be "adapted" and used for long time by people who don't even care on the strip.

It's baffling and hilarious at the same time.
 
B

badscooter

Member
This is awesome. Watterson's style and imagination remain god-tier, a true master.

Hopefully we'll see more of him in the future.
 
L

Loxley

Member
Warm Machine said:
I like that all that remains of Calvin and Hobbes is the comic strip. It is all that needs to exist. Watterson will be wealthy forever based on the sales of the volumes throughout what remains of his life.
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It's ludicrous when you think of just how much potential money Waterson has turned down. And I'm not even talking about the absurd ways guys like Jim Davis whored out their creations. Imagine the amount of money he could have pulled in just from an officially-licensed Hobbes plush toy. That alone could have brought in some serious $$$$$, much less other merchandising opportunities.

I don't know if there's a single creator in the comics world that commands more respect than him for that reason. He never ran his creation into the ground and never succumbed to the temptation of the mighty dollar.
 
T

Tagg9

Member
Loxley said:
I don't know if there's a single creator in the comics world that commands more respect than him for that reason. He never ran his creation into the ground and never succumbed to the temptation of the mighty dollar.
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Not just the comic world - any medium. His unwillingness to compromise the integrity of his creation in any way whatsoever is so refreshing.
 
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