Good news for fans of "Bloom County" and "Outland":
quote:NEW YORK -- "Bloom County" creator Berkeley Breathed is returning to newspapers Nov. 23 with "Opus," a weekly comic starring his famous cartoon penguin.
Breathed had hinted he might do a Sunday-only comic again during a speech at the National Cartoonists Society meeting this spring (Syndicate World, June 5).
"Opus" will be in a half-page format at a time when many newspapers run five strips on a Sunday page. But Washington Post Writers Group Editorial Director/General Manager Alan Shearer told E&P Online that most of the 30 or so newspapers WPWG has already approached plan to buy Breathed's comic. "If you ran it before, you're going to want it again," said Shearer.
"Bloom County," which won a Pulitzer Prize in 1987, appeared in nearly 1,300 newspapers via WPWG before ending in 1989. Its successor strip, the Sunday-only "Outland," ran in about 225 papers before ending in 1995.
Ideally, papers would expand their comics sections to make room for the large-format "Opus." But when Bill Watterson's "Calvin and Hobbes" went half page more than a decade ago, a number of newsprint-cost-conscious papers responded by shrinking or dropping some other comics.
Shearer said Breathed has made great artistic use of the half page. "It's absolutely breathtaking," he said.
Newspaper editors are being shown "Opus," but are not alllowed to keep copies of it. "We're trying to keep it off the Internet," explained Shearer. "The one place and the only place to see 'Opus' will be in newspapers. This is a tremendous opportunity to increase circulation."
Shearer said "Opus" will be topical and -- unsurprisingly given the comic's name -- spotlight the penguin even more than "Bloom County" and "Outland" did. The WPWG executive wouldn't say whether or not other "Bloom County" characters besides Opus would appear.
The story about Breathed's Nov. 23 return to newspapers was broken in Tuesday's Washington Post.
Breathed is currently working on a film featuring Opus, and has done a number of children's books since ending "Bloom County."
Source: Editor & Publisher Online
Gotta dig through my old clothes and see if I still have my "Penguin Lust" classic tshirt somewhere.
The first place I saw this was in the Chicago Tribune - I hope that means they intend to carry it!
I'm not a prolific writer here, but I lurk a lot and am utterly at a loss as to how I missed that thread. I could have known about it a week sooner!
Posts: 4344 | Registered: Mar 2003
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posted
Which would just mean you'd have to wait a week longer for the cartoon to begin. C'mon, dude... half full, half full.
Posts: 6213 | Registered: May 2001
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Do you guys really think that a weekly, character driven strip will be able to achieve much momentum? I think that it would probably have to be a daily for it to really catch fire for me. I know that I never really warmed up to Outland, and I think that that was why.
The weekly format works fine for This Modern World or Tom the Dancing Bug, but those are overtly political, topical strips that don't have continuing story lines (although Tom the Dancing Bug does have reoccuring character, such as God Man).
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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I read somewhere that Breathed won't write a daily strip anymore because the panels are too small, and it pisses him off to have to draw such microscopic pics.
In fact, that's why most of the greats quit.
I'll take Breathedy Goodness in whatever package I can. And Noemen, how can you not warm up to this?
Posts: 7600 | Registered: Jan 2001
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Yeah Ralphie, that's a good one. There are a number of good individual Outland strips; it's just that it never really...quickened for me, if you know what I mean. I do agree that I'll take weekly Breathed over no Breathed at all, but I really wish he'd do another daily strip. I can sympathize with his complaints about the small panels; I know that Watterson complained bitterly about that.
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quote:Which would just mean you'd have to wait a week longer for the cartoon to begin. C'mon, dude... half full, half full.
Papa Moose, that's exactly the attitude I adopted last week when I read the last of the three books in George RR Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire. As frustrating as it is to me to have to wait for who knows how long for A Feast For Crows to come out, I know there are lots of people who have been waiting far longer than I.
And, btw, it was reading about the series here at Hatrack that got me reading it in the first place.
Posts: 4344 | Registered: Mar 2003
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quote:sndrake - Yes. You should be very embarrassed that you have a life.
Ralphie, thanks for the thought, but what I actually have - for the most part - is work. My partner and I struggle to have a life - she's in the same work and in the same boat.
And it's no use whining, because we both worked very hard to be in positions to do the types of work we're doing.
We did get to take our first vacation in two years this summer, though. Spent a nice week in Tennessee with friends. No pictures - we seem to have mislaid the camera. Posts: 4344 | Registered: Mar 2003
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And who can forget the classic sequel to "To Kill A Mockingbird" that was filmed in Outland: "Kill Mo' Mockingbird: Boo Radley Loose In The Hood", a collaboration between Oliver Stone and Quentin Tarentino.
<--- gets his daily Breathed fix emailed from Ucomics' digital reprinting of every Bloom County -and then Outland, and THEN The Academia Waltz!- through their My Comics Page service. 6 daily strips one day, a sunday the next, and so forth until every strip has been reprinted - including MANY that were never collected in book form - of which I own all of them, They're only on 1982 now in the digital reprinting, and there's still tons ahead! Joy!
<--- also owns a VHS of A Wish For Wings That Work.
posted
Its always fun to raise topics that have sunken deep into the depths, but its only a few more hours now till Opus makes his grand and exalted return. I'm hoping for a posting on http://www.bloomcounty.com/ at the stroke of midnight, but after all these years I can afford to wait a couple of hours.
Posts: 291 | Registered: Jun 2002
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I know, Noemon. Outland just never managed to hook me, although the content/style wasn't all that different than BC.
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Out of the Gene Pool had a nice little "welcome back" in the last panel of the strip today - not as nice as "Heart of the City," of course. "Heart of the City" isn't carried in the Trib. Hope it didn't get bumped to make room for OPUS.
Posts: 4344 | Registered: Mar 2003
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It was on the lame side, but I'm going to hang in there for a few months to give the Breathed and the bird a chance. It's awful to think that maybe Gary Larson had the right of it.
"regurgitated squid" was worth a smile, anyway. But, yeah, nostalgia won't keep me reading and making a special effort to buy the Sunday Trib.
(Still haven't found my vintage "Penguin Lust" tshirt.)
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