Saturday, July 09, 2022

Honk if You Read Comics

This is the weekly dispatch from Bizarro Studios North, where I have been writing and drawing the Monday through Saturday Bizarro comics since 2018. My partner and friend, Dan Piraro, who created Bizarro in the late twentieth century, continues to do the Sunday comic from Rancho Bizarro in Mexico.

Wayno



July is whizzing past us, but it wouldn't be a Saturday without a new post sharing the week's cartoons, would it?

I'm trying to get a little further ahead of schedule, and have also started working on a surprise project that came my way, so this entry will be much less verbose than usual.

Our pipe pic of the week is a rare example of understated advertising from the tobacco industry.

Now, it's on to the week in cartoons.


We started off with an Independence Day gag. As an old friend of mine used to say when observing his kids engaging in a questionable activity, "Somebody's gonna end up crying."

Note that the employee accomplished much without making mistakes, whereas management avoided errors by doing no actual work.

A nature documentary that featured a segment on wood frogs inspired this comic. That, and calculating our quarterly estimated taxes.

My internal editor (and second-guesser) suggests that the word "always" could have been deleted from this gag, and I can't disagree.

Friday's panel made me doubly happy, being a clown gag and wordless. Many readers mentioned experiencing a slightly delayed payoff, which always pleases a cartoonist.


This is a musical we wish existed.

That's the latest batch. Thanks for popping by. We'll be back in a week with more words and pictures.

Don't forget to visit Dan Piraro's blog for additional commentary, and to marvel at his latest gorgeous Sunday Bizarro panel.

There's no bonus track this week. Please choose an appropriate tune that you like, and pretend it appears here.
 

See you in seven days.

 




15 comments:

  1. I'm playing in a production of Sweeney Todd that opens next week. We had our first sing-through with the cast last night and the night before. Today our director emailed us all the Sweeney Toddler panel (correctly attributed). That's some serious synchronicity.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Please convey my appreciation to your director.

      And, break a leg!

      Delete
    2. Anonymous5:56 AM

      You all had better have strong throats...

      Delete
  2. Anonymous6:18 PM

    Special Project: designing the cover of the 2028 LA Olympics Magazine; acceptance speech for the 2022 Comic-Con Eisner Comic Industry Award.
    That pipe has quite the sales pitch!
    If you remove "always" from the bug bedroom, it does that make this a one night stand?
    Humming as I read this week's blog.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Humming is also perfectly acceptable.

      Those are some fine guesses, too.

      Delete
  3. My guess as to your Special Project is that you've been asked to draw yourself performing in a disco band. Please include all 13 Secret Symbols.

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    Replies
    1. A wonderful guess, Tim! Now if I can only locate my grotesquely clunky platform shoes from 1974...

      Delete
  4. Anonymous6:10 PM

    For gags like the praying mantis one, where you have two possible wordings you're trying to decide between (one with the word "always" and one without), have you ever considered running both versions? One wording in the panel layout and the other wording in the strip layout? It seems like that'd be a convenient way to not have to decide between them when you're on the fence, since you're already producing two versions anyways. Or is there some policy that the words have to be identical?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I've never done different punchlines, and probably wouldn't, for my own sanity and that of my editors. I usually have to adjust line breaks in the dialog when formatting the strip, and very occasionally I might change the word "and" to an ampersand symbol, or vice versa, but I even try to avoid that.

      Delete
  5. Anonymous8:45 PM

    I’m sure I’m not the first whose mind continued the gag to: “…the demon baby of Fleet Street.” , but just in case…

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    Replies
    1. It does flow naturally, doesn't it.

      Delete
  6. Anonymous10:48 PM

    The "military-grade sparkler" panel is priceless - I laughed so hard, which I really needed! Can't find the 3rd symbol on the amphibian one - only the alien & eyeball?

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  7. The third symbol is one of the letter/number combos, and it's kind of between the alien and eyeball.

    So glad to know we gave you a healthy laugh!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Mick Rakam7:48 PM

    Perhaps the mantis gag would read better if the 'always' was merely moved to precede 'watching'.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Anonymous8:32 PM

    Perhaps the mantis gag would read better if the 'always' were moved to precede 'watching'.

    ReplyDelete