If you’d asked me in passing when Mark Tatulli’s Lio debuted, I would have said this past spring. It still has that glossy wrapped-in-celophane feel. Which is why my jaw dropped when I saw his  first book  at Amazon. But a quick google search revealed that Lio made its squishy-yet-silent way into papers last year (while tacitly confirming that my grasp of space and time is increasingly slippery.)

You all must know about Lio, the deranged but loveable kid (you know he’s loveable because he smiles a lot, and you know he’s deranged for the same reason) who sleeps with monsters and laughs at Death. Not because he’s brave. Because Death is funny. I love the strip’s style, the detail Tatulli squiggles in each panel, as if he has all the time in the world,  even though he’s running a second feature. My jaw threatens to unhinge once again when I consider the work this demands.

Lio’s great imagination is matched by his industry. He can knock out a death ray decked in tubes and wires that would have satisfied H.G. Wells. He can built robots and time machines and atomic bombs.

I admire his  work ethic.

I know where he gets it from.

 

This is for Mark Anderson, who comes closer every day to becoming the first cartoonist to assemble a gag cartoon out of Legos.

This is a sunday from last year. As always, I had trouble drawing the chess/checker board. The perspective of  the squares goes amiss from the back row to the front. Thus my clever distraction of blocking your view with Karl’s leg.  

I’m looking forward to this:

 

 

The Aaugh blog offers a review of the advance reader copy, with the warning that readers who stumble over clay feet  should shy from the book (while highly recommending it for everyone else.)  Schulz was apparently dark, petty, and insecure.  The light that radiated from his pen sprang from shadows.  As he strode into history he left a  track of clay.

Which is fine with me. I have clay feet. Most of us do.

Behind the shield of this blog, and my strip, I might seem a fine person.  Mary would agree (I make a point of hypnotizing her while she sleeps), and perhaps a few of my friends. At the same time, there are those who would say with equal authority that I’m dark, petty, insecure. A mini-Schulz. I can’t disagree. I’m good, I’m bad; the typical mix of water and dirt that pans out in mud.

If my percentage of clay doesn’t rise above my ankles, I’m having a good day.

Perhaps it’s the same with you. 

Readers followed Peanuts because Schulz wrote about love, disappointment, hope. He knew the places we’d been and those waiting ahead. If Schulz himself was a mystery,  now’s our chance to step into his shoes, one clay foot at a time. 

 

 

 

 I like the idea that Bat-Hound needs to wear a mask, lest he be recognized in his normal life. via coverbrowser.

Update: Batman  refers to the dog as their new Bat-Hound. Does he mean new, as in, they’ve never had a bat-Hound before, or new, as in, Bat-Hounds are the Red Shirts of comics?

Scott Adams and his spongillion (courtesy of Jon Stewart)  readers have been advising Scott Myers on how to make his comic, Basic Instructions, into a syndicatable feature. Vivisection is always interesting, if you have the stomach for it. But in my opinion,  Myers work is funny, and it’s time to mail it out. Whether he splits the feature down the middle, or into four parts, or one panel a day, is an impending discussion between him and a syndicate.