Big Boom Theory

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 created Bizarro in the late twentieth century and continues to do the Sunday comic from Rancho Bizarro in Mexico.

Wayno

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One has to look out for engineers—they begin with sewing machines and end up with the atomic bomb.
Marcel Pagnol (1895-1974)

Marcel Pagnol was a French playwright, novelist, and film director, and the source of the pithy quote above. Surprisingly, humanity survived the Cold War period (late 1940s to around 1991) without blowing up the planet, although people's lives were probably shortened by stress brought on by the constant dread of nuclear annihilation.

Unfortunately, the human race instead opted for a prolonged form of self-destruction built on (among other factors) good old-fashioned fossil fuels. Take that, atomic energy.

Pagnol generalizes, but there are exceptions. Your cartoonist actually obtained an engineering degree (if just barely) but eventually managed to escape that unsuitable environment. So in my case, it was circuit boards to the drawing board. I'm much happier here, and, I hope, doing a better job than I did in that other world.

These musings were prompted by one of the week's cartoons, which we'll get to in a bit, but first, we have a monumental pipe pic to share.

This magnificent thing is located in Saint Claude, Manitoba, Canada. It was built in commemoration of early settlers who came from Saint-Claude, France, where the main industry was the manufacture of smoking pipes. This one is 19 feet long and 5 feet high and weighs just over 400 pounds.

For scale, here's a small human in front of the giant pipe.

Big thanks to Bizarro Jazz Pickle Joe S for hipping me to the Saint Claude pipe, and for reminding me that a few years ago, I posed in front of a giant coffee pot on Route 30 in Bedford, Pennsylvania.

Unfortunately, it's no longer an operating coffee shop, but it does make for a fun souvenir photo.

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This week's Bizarro cartoons were definitely fueled by the consumption of caffeinated beverages. Let's see if your cartoonist had a steady hand.

Monday's comic commemorates an early version of remote working.

Next, would you post a review?

Generally, we try to be economical with our word balloons, but occasionally verbosity is called for. The most difficult part of writing this was editing the text to fill the balloon while having relatively uniform line breaks. I did not want to add hyphens to the mix.

I'll sometimes place a character in front of their word balloon to provide a little more airspace around the text. This is the first time two characters overlap the balloon.

I reversed the staging for the strip version so the reader would encounter the name Waffle House only after reading the long-winded dialog.

If Thursday's panel had run prior to July of this year, I suspect that fewer readers would get the caption, so I'd like to thank the makers of the Oppenheimer film for giving me the opportunity to make this joke.

The cartoon prompted a Reader Comment of the Week, which came from my old pal Mark J:

Have we forgotten the legacy of John Jacob Oppenheimer Schmidt? His bomb is my bomb too.

Thanks for the earworm, buddy.

Their intro music is a classical piece, The Abdominal Membrane Variations.

Reality plus the tiniest bit of exaggeration equals Saturday's panel.

That wraps up yet another week of gags from Bizarro Studios North.

Thanks for reading the comics, the blog, and the newsletter. We hope to have you back next week with an offering of more words and pictures.

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Bonus Track #1 

The Pilgrim Travelers
"Jesus Hits Like the Atom Bomb"
Specialty Records, 1950

This might be the most threatening gospel song ever recorded.

Bonus Track #2 

Dr. Feelgood
"Boom Boom"
from The Geordie Scene, Tyne Tees Television 1975

The greatest pub rock band of all time with a live version of John Lee Hooker's "Boom Boom." On this number, the group's guitarist and songwriter, Wilko Johnson, handles lead vocals while the regular singer, Lee Brilleaux, wails on harmonica.

The clip features the Feelgoods' four founding members: Wilko and Brilleaux with bassist John B Sparks and drummer The Big Figure. The band was formed in 1971, and a version with no original members still records and tours, but no configuration has ever matched the classic original lineup.

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