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
I can't stop worrying. I invent worries. Even after thirty years of making a
living at this business, I feel my career is precarious. I can always
find dark clouds even though the sun is shining. But I have a plan to consolidate my worries. I'm going to try to find a shrink
who can talk all my worries from my head down to my arm, then to my
hand, then finally down to one long fingernail. Then—wham!—all I have
to do is clip the fingernail, and all my worries will be gone.
Virgil Franklin Partch II (1916-1984)
Friday, October 17th, was the 109th anniversary of the birth of cartoonist Virgil Partch, who often signed his work with the abbreviation "ViP." He's one of my all-time favorites, for his art, his humor, and his (fear-based) work ethic. Partch typically started drawing at 5:00 AM and finished up by noon, after which he'd hang out with drinking buddies at a boating club or bar. Apparently, he also had a strong play ethic.
Partch created two syndicated comics: a daily panel called Big George and a strip called Captain's Gig. However, his gag cartoons for magazines, which predated the newspaper comics, were his strongest work. The gags were wild and surreal, and were reprinted in many books.
Although the humor in his newspaper comics was more conventional than his magazine gags, much of the art in early Big George panels was fantastic. He had a confident, bold line, inked with a brush, and was quite effective and tasteful in his use of Zip-A-Tone shading film.
Mid-1960s "Big George" art by ViP
Happy birthday, Vip, from an earthbound fan.
Today's canine pipe pic comes from cartoon colleague Jonathan Lemon, creator of the comic strip Rabbits Against Magic.
Mr. Lemon sent this caption:
Mascot dog from World War One, complete with his own jacket and rank button, feldmutze with cockade and his very own Iron Cross Second Class
It's a shame that someone went to the trouble of dressing their dog in a tiny uniform and training it to hold a pipe almost a hundred years before Instagram.
Big thanks to Jonathan Lemon for forwarding the image to me.
I've been in the illustration and cartooning game for more than thirty years, and will soon be starting my ninth year as Bizarro's daily cartoonist. I may not worry as obsessively as Vip did, but his fears are undoubtedly at least part of what keeps me going.
We kicked off with a wordless gag that adds a culinary touch to the legend of Saint George and the dragon.
To quote underground cartoonist Robert Crumb, 'Twas ever thus.
He was hoping for the pizza delivery driver.
My favorite part of drawing this was the products on the shelves. Here's a closer look:
Now you know.
We started the week with a wordless gag, and ended with a word that isn't really a word. It's a gag that sprang from a typo.
Thanks for reading my ramblings and looking at my drawings. I'll be back next Saturday with more cartoons and commentary.
Bonus Track
Stan Freberg: "St. George and the Dragonet"
Capitol Records single, 1953
Stan Freberg, one of the great humorists of the last century, offers his take on the Saint George legend, mashed up with Dragnet.
Jack Webb's Dragnet, a massive hit on TV and radio, inspired many parodies, including this one from Jay Ward studios:
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