# B.C. and the period in which it's set **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [July 2, 2004, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236 "2004-07-02T17:10:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/1 "2004-07-02T17:10:04Z")
I can’t find it but there’s a thread around here somewhere which, at least in part, tries to figure out in what period the B.C. comic strip is set. If [the strip for 30 June](http://www.comics.com/creators/bc/archive/bc-20040630.html) is any indication, it’s definately set in the future. ---
**Author:** ![Winston\_Bongo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a9adbd/32.png) [@Winston\_Bongo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Winston_Bongo)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/2 "2004-07-02T17:33:19Z")
Hey, that explains a lot! I always wondered why Hart, who doesn’t hide his Christian beliefs, would set his strip Before Christ and then have his characters make apparently anachronistic Christian references. But if it takes place in some post-apocalyptic future, it all makes sense. Even the title – it could refer to the Second Coming. Furthermore, we now have an explanation for the talking clams: mutations caused by radiation from the nuclear war that sent the world back into the stone age! Wow. It’s just like Gene Wolfe’s _Book of the New Sun_, only with more lame jokes. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/3 "2004-07-02T18:26:52Z")
BC isn’t set in any coherent time period and never was, given the dinosaur that says “gronk” coexisting with the cavemen, the archeopteryx, and the two nameless “girls”. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/4 "2004-07-02T18:47:11Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > the dinosaur that says “gronk” coexisting with the cavemen Couldn’t have Jurassic Park-style dinosarus running around the funny pages. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![pravnik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8edcca/32.png) [@pravnik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pravnik)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/5 "2004-07-02T19:06:58Z")
The girls have names, or maybe titles: Cute Chick and Fat Broad. ---
**Author:** ![Ethilrist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ethilrist/32/4604_2.png) [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/6 "2004-07-02T19:19:40Z")
Well, of course it’s in the future! Everybody knows clams don’t have legs… _yet!_ :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/7 "2004-07-02T19:32:42Z")
> [@Ethilrist](#): > > Well, of course it’s in the future! Everybody knows clams don’t have legs… _yet!_ No, they already do. Just because _you_ haven’t seen 'em… What’s with the rolleyes? It’s just a comic strip, a usually lame one these days. ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 7:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/8 "2004-07-02T19:52:59Z")
Maybe it’s in “The Land Of The Lost,” which IIRC has people/creatures from many different times. Has anybody seen a sleestack in any of the strips? ---
**Author:** ![Fiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e274bd/32.png) [@Fiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiver)\ **Post date:** [July 2, 2004, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/9 "2004-07-02T21:22:39Z")
> [@AHunter3](#): > > BC isn’t set in any coherent time period and never was, given the dinosaur that says “gronk” coexisting with the cavemen, the archeopteryx, and the two nameless “girls”. You don’t know Johnny Hart very well if you think he doesn’t believe these creatures all coexisted. ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Smithee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@Alan\_Smithee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Smithee)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2004, 4:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/10 "2004-07-03T04:38:45Z")
I, too, was rather taken aback by this strip, and not only because it was almost mildly amusing. I had always believed that Hart in a _B.C._, like _The Wizard of Id_, in deliberately ambiguous setting–a _Flintstones_-like parallel universe where the technology and costumes are clearly prehistoric (or medieval, in TWoI), but the characters are free to comment on things like baseball, American history, and the Internet. This never really bothered me–having cavemen talk about Jesus isn’t really much bigger a conceit than talking animals or any of the stuff that happens in superhero comics. This one really seemed to shatter that, however, and place _B.C._\* unambiguously in the future. I mean come on! “An **old** science magaxine from **back in 2004** ”! If they had mentioned an old magazine from back in 1977, I would have written it off as run-of-the-mill anachronism, but I can’t see any other meaning for those words than that Hart clearly intends the strip to be set in the future. Has he hinted at this anywhere before? BTW, although I don’t find the strip any funnier than the rest of you, I have to admit I admire Hart for his ambitious extended plotline a couple of years ago when he introduced Conahonty and the other new characters. (It was quite a dramatic change for a comic as old and established as this one–I wish it had actually worked to freshen things up a bit, but I like Hart for trying, anyway.) Since I missed most of it, I now have a perverse and almost masochistic desire to read the whole thing. Are those strips archived anywhere online or available in a print collection? ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Smithee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@Alan\_Smithee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Smithee)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2004, 4:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/11 "2004-07-03T04:43:04Z")
**Cn:** \* I had always believed that Hart had placed \*B.C., \*like \*The Wizard of Id, _in a deliberately ambiguous setting. . . ._ ---
**Author:** ![Kaitlyn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/73ab20/32.png) [@Kaitlyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kaitlyn)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2004, 10:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/12 "2004-07-03T10:08:07Z")
> [@Ethilrist](#): > > Well, of course it’s in the future! Everybody knows clams don’t have legs… _yet!_ > > :rolleyes: Of course clams have legs! They just haven’t any feet. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [July 3, 2004, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/13 "2004-07-03T23:44:25Z")
> [@Fiver](#): > > You don’t know Johnny Hart very well if you think he doesn’t believe these creatures all coexisted. Given Hart’s obvious beliefs, I always wondered what to make of Grog, who appears to be a Neanderthal or _Homo erectus_ or something, implying an acceptance of human evolution. ---
**Author:** ![BraheSilver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ecccb3/32.png) [@BraheSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BraheSilver)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2004, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/14 "2004-07-04T00:35:08Z")
I’ve got it! B.C. takes place on Earth after the Apocalypse, and is set in the burned-out husk of Earth following full nuclear war and the God/Satan smackdown. The human cast is small because everybody else is either dead or raptured, and strange demonic/mutant creatures thrive (even forming full societies, like the ants). The references to Christianity are due to the hoping of the people that they, too, may eventually be spirited away from the irradiated desert wasteland they currently inhabit. It’s a story about grim survival and reclaiming faith, despite evidence to the contrary. It all makes sense now. ---
**Author:** ![Sam\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Sam\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sam_Stone)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2004, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/15 "2004-07-04T00:35:34Z")
I haven’t read B.C. in a long time. Has it gone downhill? Because when I was younger, I thought it was hilarious. I even collected the books. My favorite exchange: B.C. : “CLAMS GOT LEGS!” Clam: “Now I have to kill him.” B.C. : “Why do you have to kill me?” Clam: “Because if I don’t, the other clams will kill me for giving away the secret.” B.C.: “How will they do that?” Clam: “If I know them, they’ll probably kick me to death.” B.C.: “Okay, tell you what. You agree not to kill me, and I’ll keep your secret safe. Deal?” Clam: “Deal. Shake on it.” B.C.: “CLAMS GOT HANDS!” My other favorite involved the ants. Dad ant is at home, and his daughter and brings home her fiance’ to meet Dad. This is the exhange: Dad Ant: “So, what do you do for a living?” Fiance’ Ant: “Nothing.” Dad: “Well, what do you plan to do?” Fiance’: “Nothing.” Dad: “So, you’re telling me you’re a professional bum?” Fiance’: “Nah. I don’t turn pro until the wedding.” ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2004, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/16 "2004-07-04T01:16:35Z")
> [@Number Six](#): > > Of course clams have legs! They just haven’t any feet. You are clearly thinking of _oysters_. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Fiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e274bd/32.png) [@Fiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fiver)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2004, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/17 "2004-07-04T01:28:13Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Given Hart’s obvious beliefs, I always wondered what to make of Grog, who appears to be a Neanderthal or _Homo erectus_ or something, implying an acceptance of human evolution. Oh, easy! There were Neanderthals and _H. erectus_ and so forth, they were just created separately, like all the others. ---
**Author:** ![Rube\_E.Tewesday](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f0a364/32.png) [@Rube\_E.Tewesday](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rube_E.Tewesday)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2004, 11:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/18 "2004-07-04T11:58:43Z")
> [@Sam Stone](#): > > I haven’t read B.C. in a long time. Has it gone downhill? Because when I was younger, I thought it was hilarious. I even collected the books. Like you, I thought it was hilarious and collected the books when I was young. Unlike you, I have been foolish enough to read it in the past 20 years. Trust me: preserve your memories – they’re all that’s left you. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2004, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/19 "2004-07-04T17:33:25Z")
I still read it in hopes of a good visual pun turning up. Doesn’t pay off very often though. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [July 4, 2004, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236/20 "2004-07-04T18:13:31Z")
While it’s lately turned into a forum for Hart to vent his questionable theology, my distinct impression is that the conception of the entire strip is one massive anachronism joke – cave-men characters having anachronistic knowledge of the present day, and riffing humor off that rich field of possibilities. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/b-c-and-the-period-in-which-its-set/253236.md?page=2)