You might not know it, since he ended Calvin & Hobbes 15 years ago and has all but dropped out of sight. I picture him as a Howard Hughes figure, unable to shake his fist at the world anymore because he hasn’t trimmed his nails since the Clinton administration. But he can still use his fingers to type, apparently, because he just gave an e-mail interview to the Cleveland Plain Dealer.
Here he is answering the #1 question on most fans’ minds: Why’d you quit?
This isn’t as hard to understand as people try to make it. By the end of 10 years, I’d said pretty much everything I had come there to say.
It’s always better to leave the party early. If I had rolled along with the strip’s popularity and repeated myself for another five, 10 or 20 years, the people now “grieving” for “Calvin and Hobbes” would be wishing me dead and cursing newspapers for running tedious, ancient strips like mine instead of acquiring fresher, livelier talent. And I’d be agreeing with them.
I think some of the reason “Calvin and Hobbes” still finds an audience today is because I chose not to run the wheels off it.
I’ve never regretted stopping when I did.
Gruff, but honest. I might be bitter and reclusive too, if every other car on the road had a sticker depicting my famous cartoon character urinating on stuff.
Watterson also has good answers about his “stardom” and the fate of the newspaper industry. I miss that guy, but if he doesn’t want to be “the dude who does Calvin & Hobbes” anymore, fine by me. It’s really sad when a beloved cartoonist tries to return to his most famous creation and falls flat on his face.
(thx editor & publisher lol)
Here’s a bit more for those who would want to read it.
http://www.andrewsmcmeel.com/calvinandhobbes/interview.html
However much I miss Calvin & Hobbes, Watterson did the right thing. Just like Larson did with The Far Side. It would have been much sadder to see such a great cartoon devolve into B.C. or Haggar the Horrible.
Peanuts anyone?
I registered just so I could call your swipe at Peanuts what it is: sacrilege.
I love Peanuts. But, really, when was the last time it was funny?
…and I’ll agree to disagree with you over BC.
BC still takes a few relevant shots at some deserving targets, and there aren’t too many strips that don’t apologize for their Christian faith. BC takes a stand there also.
Now: If you put Peanuts (blaspheme!) on a list then you can’t stop there.
Family Circus, anyone?
It’s too bad that there are so many Calvin urinating stickers. I seem to remember an idiot trying to put a joint into the kid’s mouth, as well.
It was a good strip — Calvin’s parents seemed like good folks.
Somebody yelled, “Hey, Dilbert!” the other day, which reminded me that Dilbert is a good cartoon. Crankshaft is good, too. Good old Crankshaft.
I never understood Calvin and Hobbs. But I never let it bother me because I had already gone through the I-don’t-get-Saturday-Night-Live-but-have-to-fake-it-so-I’m-not-ostracized-in-high-school bull crap.
I graduated from high school. Some people never do.
I am very confuse — Gibbsy is show me the minor comic strip Calvin Hobbes, and this is make no sense. http://calvinwithouthobbes.tumblr.com/
But he’s happy about the “Calvin peeing on liberals” sticker, right?
Point well-made with Bloom County. In the 80’s it was great, and I still have several of the anthologies from those days. I still giggle about a “Billy and the Boingers” sticker that I snuck in to some other folk’s college photos. Although Breathed’s art continued to become quite impressive, there were too many “Shut Up and Sing,” strips. Maybe I just got older.
I am now seeing the second wave of children in our home ‘discovering’ my Calvin & Hobbes books from back in the day. That is a strong testament to Watterson’s art, that in the days of 24-hour cartoon channels and endless exposure to the Spongebobs being offered children are still enjoying Calvin’s imagination.
Garry Trudeau has an outstanding talent, but his ideological lecturing turned me away long ago.
The same with Pirarro’s “Bizarro.” Great talent, but wasted on extreme leftist elitism.
My favorite these days: “Pearls Before Swine” http://stephanpastis.wordpress.com/
and “Zits” http://www.arcamax.com/zits
Garry Trudeau jumped the shark awhile ago. The great skewer of presidents from Nixon to GW Bush suddenly can’t find anything to rip Obama about. After one year, he still hasn’t goofed on The One. He hasn’t even created an icon for Obama.
I like Bizzarro and Zits and Carlos & Janis and that’s about it.
I do miss Calvin & Hobbes.
I like Arlo & Janis also. (damn auto-type)
I like “Pearls Before Swine” and I really used to like “Get Fuzzy” when it was just a psycho cat and a sweet dumb dog, now it has become too politically motivated. The psycho cat is now a Republican, of course.
Bloom County was really funny for a while. The characters Bill the Cat and Opus were money. Who can forget Opus in rock star mode singing “Every leg you break, every cake you bake, every leaf you rake…” And then, Um Opus, Sting would like a word with you. Too funny.
I miss Calvin and Hobbes, too, but I absolutely HATE peeing Calvin decals…
Here ya go, fallon:
Billy and the Boingers (the artists formerly known as Deathtongue)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgQng5SMd68
Opus played ‘heavy metal’ (a tuba) and Bill the Cat would boing his tongue.
Good times.