Ahhh, Bloom County, we hardly knew ye. My favorite strip of all time. I don’t believe I’ve got all the anthologies, but I’m certain I’ve got most of them. And my Boingers LP has never been played (but now that I’ve got a record player, I’ll rectify that quickly!).
It’s funny - yes, BC can be dated, but I’m finding all the strips funnier now that I’m older. I know more about life, liberty, and my 1980s political history than when I read them as a kid that I laugh harder now. Plus, some of the strips are surprisingly topical (especially with a Republican back in office!). In fact, I’ve got one of these on my cubicle wall right now (has nothing to do with politics).
Binkley’s just finished shooting Star Wars with George Lucas. He asks, “Is that it? Is it a wrap?” Lucas responds, telling a disbelieving Binkley that no, that’s not it, he’s got six more to shoot and he’ll finish by, oh, 1998. Binkley then cuts Lucas’s head off with his lightsaber, saying “Jedi Knights don’t wait for sequals.”
I’d just finished watching AotC when I read that, and I laughed like a hysterical child for 15 minutes.
Wish Binkley would’ve actually cut Lucas’s head off.
And yeah, they’re available - try Half Price Books, if one’s near you. They’re priceless.
I beg to differ. The “thing that brings meaning to your meaningless lives” strip and the “wimp or shrimp” 1988 election strip, to name but two, were priceless, milk-out-the-nose funny classics.
I goofed–that one was Bloom County. I associate it with Outland because it’s in the One Last Little Peek collection, which consists of the last batch of Outland strips plus a selection of older classics. It’s the only book of either strip I still have.
Classic Outland: Bill, Opus, and the cockroach are sitting around clad only in tighty-whities, bitchin’ 'bout wimminfolk. Random woman walks by and gives them a piece of her mind, ending with the line, “I suggest you “men” take a good, long look at the only thing that makes your pathetic lives worth living.”
Last panel is all three of them looking down the front of their underwear.
I remember when I first saw the strip where Opus got a nose job. During the whole week of building up to it, something would get in the way. When I saw what his nose looked like, I laughed all day.
Incidentally, one of my most prized books is “Classics of Western Literature,” the last Bloom County collection. With a personalized signature from Brethed himself, on the very last strip of Opus trudging off into the great white void of the last, unfinished panel.
My friend, who was at the same signing, did me one better and had Brethed sign a slightly yellowed newsprint copy of the same comic, clipped from the original newspaper appearance a few years before hand. He later laminated and framed it.
I had a friend in college (1989) who had this final strip framed and signed on his dormroom wall. That’s still the one detail I remember most clearly of that dorm hall…Opus with his bulging, trailing suitcase trudging off into whiteout.
Bloom County, at it’s peak, was as funny as any daily strip I’ve ever seen (I include Calvin and Hobbes in that statement). Yes, it is true that some of the humor didn’t age well - this is an unavoidable consequence of cartoonists who choose to comment on current events. Breathed probably achieved much of his fame for his political commentary (he was occasionally called the right wing version of Gary Trudeau, which was way off base. Breathed skewered everybody, left, right, and center) but a large portion of his work simply addressed the often silly way we humans go about our lives and some of his strips are timeless classics. Some of those mentioned in this thread can be viewed at http://www.berkleybreathed.com.
I agree with those that said that Outland never approached the brilliance of Bloom County. In fact, at the beginning Outland was downright awful. It was only after he had imported some of the essential characters from Bloom County (Opus springs to mind) that Outland occasionally captured the magic that he had found with Bloom County.
Due to a sad lack of comics in our newspaper I was introduced quite late to Bloom County and Outland, so I tend to get them mixed up. I also loved the Enterprise ones, being a geek and all.
The boys sitting around wishing on a shooting star:
Opus: “Yow! Bill wished he’s turn into a giant weiner?”
Milquetoast: “Actually, I wished he would. Got any mustard?”
Oliver Wendell Jones (the doctor) and Ronald Ann (the holistic practitioner) fighting over how to treat Opus (Joe Schmoe health care consumer)'s injury:
O.W.J.: “It’s my foot!”
R.A.: “It’s my foot!!”
Opus: “It’s my nose!! My nose!!”
Toward the end of the strip, Opus talks about how big changes make his toes ache. He sits down next to Steve Dallas on the couch:
Steve: “I’m gay.”
(pause)
Opus: “…then you won’t mind massaging my toes.”
Opus takes Bill to a therapy group for cat owners. He goes through a tirade of Bill’s drug habits and affairs with Jean Kirkpatrick and Princess Diana. Distraught, he asks someone else to take over:
(pause)
old lady with cat: “My woogums gets gas.”
Opus: “OH, AMEN TO THAT!!”
A female cockroach accuses Opus of sexual assault and Opus is thrown in prison. Last scene, of Opus tied in chains to the wall of a prison cell:
Opus: “But I was trying to SMOOSH her!!”
Milquetoast: “You lingered.”
A look into the secret lives of dogs. Opus watches his dog admiringly:
Opus: “Dogs always seem to be so deep in thought. I wonder what they’re thinking about?”
Dog (thinking): “Tomorrow I get to poop again!”
Gay Steve and Mark Slackmeyer from Doonesbury elope:
Steve: “Kids?”
Mark: “Why not?”
Kyomara, I notice that all of the examples that you mentioned contain the cast of Bloom County. If you re-read my post, you’ll note that I state that Outland recaptured some of the magic when the Bloom County characters were imported.
But, sadly, not all. Of course, the last couple of years of Bloom County were somewhat more hit-and-miss as well.
