That’s one hting that’s very VERY different about that series. Unlike “Family Circus” or “Peanuts”, the characters in FBOFW actually age in real time. To say “we grew up with them” is actually a lot more accurate than many other characters in literature, TV or film.
I can say “I remember when Elizabeth was in diapers…” And “Michael” is only a little bit younger than me. So some of his story lines have been actually relevent to me once in awhile when I was growing up.
If you’ve read the series for years, it’s hard not to have a vested interest in the characters. It’s a weird phenomenon.
Negative criticism can be just as valid as positive criticism. In the history of newspaper comics as a medium, FBOFW is a major name. It’s been running for almost thirty years, and Johnson’s commitment to continuity and a realistic time frame is extremely rare, if not completely unique. Anyone interested in comics as an artform ought to spend some time studying it, even if they don’t care for it. Shaenon Garrity, the author of the previously linked essay, is a professional comic artist and historian. Even if she hadn’t prefaced her essay with an explanation of why FBOFW is personally important to her, it’s still entirely valid for her to examine a major work in her field of study and evaluate its merits, or lack thereof.
Also, Lynn seems to believe in a kind of psychological feng shui. If someone is rich in physical beauty, that means they’re deficient in integrity. Anthony is the least attractive of Liz’s suitors, so clearly he’s balanced by his overwhelming strength of character. Likewise, Julia is OMG overweight*, so she must have a great big heart, the same way slender Therese was regarded as anemic both physically and in personality.
*IRL, of course, the twenty or so pounds Julia has on Liz would more likely make her more appealing in contrast. She would look healthy compared to the stick with hair. Not every guy wants a gal who looks like a stiff breeze would blow her away.
Plus Johnston is taking the strip out of its current timestream within a few months and - IIRC - going to a mix of flashbacks and some new progress in plots. Thus people who have been following the series are trying to figure out in what state she’s going to “leave” the strip’s plot before this change happens.
I’m not questioning the value or validity of such criticism - I’m interested in the motivation for it, which is obviously much more widespread than among “professional comics historians” (though they may be the most eloquent examples). My point merely being that it seems, to one unfamiliar to the comic in question, odd that so many people have such an evident passion for a comic for which (apparently) nothing good can now be said.
The explainations offered - that the comic was once good and has degenerated - makes sense, but it is I’d say part of a phenominon I’d call for lack of a better term ‘negative fandom’ - as someone remarked above, you can see the same thing happening with The Simpsons: namely, a series which has existed for a very long time seems to have (if you will) “trapped” a goodly number of fans who are seemingly compelled to continue to follow it, out of nostalgia or for other reasons, though they know it now sucks and they hate everything about it (even more so because it was once good).
Sorry. I was in a hurry, so gave a thumbnail description of King’s definition of a Michael Man.
The Michael Man’s ‘niceness’ is pretended. Having no other attractions (real kindness, much personality, sense of humor, or – yes – looks or sex appeal) to make himself interesting to her, he uses that pretended niceness to wiggle into his targetted woman’s life. Most women do value niceness, and they don’t want to stomp on a nice guy, however boring he is. And so he weasels in.
Another of the Michael Man’s weapons is to display his “niceness” liberally to her family and friends. When the woman starts trying to offload him, her support system starts in with “but, he’s so nice.” After a while, the woman starts to question herself – Michael is “so nice,” what’s wrong with her that she doesn’t want him? In every respect, Anthony is the classic Michael Man.
These men do exist, and most every woman has encountered one. The bad thing is, when asked what was wrong with him, she can only respond, “…he was just too nice…” And, of course, this leads to responses like yours, RikWriter.
Hope I explained that a bit better – I’m on my way out of town for 10 days, so I probably won’t be back before this thread is off the boards. Have fun without me!
That sums up the strip quite nicely.