Berke Breathed Interview in The Onion

Hobart writes "Berke Breathed, author of Bloom County has granted an interview to Tasha Robinson of the The Onion's AV Club. This is the second interview I've seen in six months (previous interview link) after the six years of silence since the end of Outland. He even calls for volunteers to help with his site! ;)"

The good old days...

Bloom County was the reason I did so well in History class way back when. I remember reading strips about Ed Meese and Caspar Weinberger, and then having to go to the library and find a Time magazine or Newsweek to figure out who they were. I really miss those comic strips. I still pull out those books from time to time, have a couple of beers and stay up laughing until 4 in the morning. The closest thing I've found to replace it is The Boondocks

However, YMMV

Stale?

I don't really understand how he thinks Bloom County is stale now. Reagan and Jean Kirkpatrick may be long gone, but I still find Bloom County strips hilarious. Maybe it's some false modesty on Breathed's part.

Insight behind the dot-com bust...

O: At about this time last year, the Internet freelance marketplace ants.com announced that you'd won a bid to design a mascot for them. Whatever became of that?

BB: I entered as a joke and a bet with my brother-in-law that I could name a price that a dot-com would refuse to pay. The bastards paid.

Interview Fake?

It seems many /.ers have failed to remember that the Onion is a satirical newspaper. This is, like all their other interviews, probably made-up.

Seems they did a pretty good job.

I do rememer reading a funny short on how MSFT plans to patent 1's and 0's, which all mathematics derive from, hence patenting all physical laws like Gravity, etc. Imagine paying MSFT to stay on the earth (sounds a lot like consumer PCs to me).

Irony and humour abound

The only Outland I ever read was in the very last book; I already loved it by the time I got to the end (which were also the last strips, of course). Sensational stuff, of which I shall dig up more one day.

Also, as I have aged (but not by much ;)) it's been nice to notice how I can relate more and more to Calvin and Hobbes; it was funny when I was younger, and now it's funny on a whole new level. I tells ya, that boy's got it sussed.

(And kudos to Bill anyway, for never succumbing to the demands of the the syndicate to license C&H.)

Tux vs. Opus

Tux is definitely the winner in the sheer cuteness department, but I bet Opus could take him in a deathmatch! ;-)

Berke in the Christian Science Monitor

You can find an interview from last February here [csmonitor.com].

i loved bloom county and outlands

I have many, many of the bloom county collections (even the "Billy and the Boingers" official vinyl album.) I really enjoyed those books. However, the interview with Berke is nice...but I would really love to see some interviews of Bill Watterson....anyone know of any recent ones since his retirement?

Interesting Review!

I notice one peculiar thing that perhaps is a slip up on breathds part. He still refers to himself a couple of times in the article as a cartoonist. Or includes himself within the group or cartoonists. It is interesting to note that he is retired yet still includes himself as one of "them" :). I suppose once a cartoonist always a cartoonist.

He totally underrates himself, he got a pulitzer for his cartoon work, which as he pokes fun at was probably not an easy feat by any means.

Jeremy

He's got his priorities in order.

From the interview:

O: Have you decided what you want to be when you grow up?

BB: Dad. The rest is frosting.

More important than your career or your pet peeve -- your family.

Berke Dell and Eyebeam

I was in UT Austin in the early 80s. You've heard of Berke (the magazine he talks about was called UTmost, get it?), and the two other things was this crazy kid making PCs in his dorm room named Dell, and Sam Hurt's Eyebeam. Actually I would say Eyebeam was more popular at UT then Berke- Hank the Hallucination won Student Body President. Check it out- http://www.samhurt.com/index.html

.sig city!

Damn lot of good .siglines in that interview:

If there's a female character in a big furry suit on Barney or Sesame Street, she has long eyelashes and flits and flutters about like some nightmarish caricature from Jerry Falwell's wet dream.

heh

well, dayummm

Opus was named after a Kansas song. If you're too young to know who Kansas was, to hell with you.

"Magnum Opus", live version on _Two For the Show_ amazes.

Anyone else ever have the hots for Quiche Lorraine?

Very cool!

My fantasy is to have Dilbert, Calvin & Hobbes, & Bloom County all running at once.

owww!

Talk about opening old wounds. I'd been able to forget the hole in my morning humor 'til this reminded me of all that great stuff that isn't there anymore.

Now I'm not going to get any sleep as I stay up all night reading the collection of strips.

Thanks, I think...

Outland Strips Online (yes, I'm a whore)

Bloom County Zone [cpoon.com]

Ah yes, the fading days of newspaper comics.

A great read for people interested in newspaper comics is the tenth anniversery collection of Calvin And Hobbes, which is notable for Bill Watterson's informative essays on how the comics work. To sum up:syndicates only accept things geared towards mass consumption because newspaper comics are by and large regarded as an annoyance by the people creating newspapers, which results in reduced sizes, restrictive sunday formats, and other aggravating issues. Watterson practically had newspaper editors at his throat when he and his syndicate asked about being able to actually design his own sunday comic format. When they were finally convinced into doing this, Calvan and Hobbes created some amazing work.

Since then, Breathed, Watterson, and Larson have all retired and the newspaper comics aren't very enjoyable for me today. Occasionally Fox Trot will still be amusing, and of course Dilbert is very witty, but you never get a chance to see anything impressive visually. Maybe the internet will pick up the slack? Sluggy Freelance [sluggy.com] (to pick a random example) has had amazing storylines spanning months, and the artist is free to create whatever kind of strip he wants, without censorship, ridiculous format demands, or any other unnecessary crap. Now, if only being profitable was easier...

Re:Ah yes, the fading days of newspaper comics.

Sluggy has had amazing story lines, and amazing use of space. Start here [sluggy.com] (sorry Pete) and check out the next two days. There is no way this would work in a syndicated format.

Personally, I don't read the comics section of the newspaper any more. Tools like comics.pl [cornell.edu] just make it unnecessary.

Such wit

O: Is the liberal stance of the early strips indicative of your own personal politics?

BB: Liberal, shmiberal. That should be a new word. Shmiberal: one who is assumed liberal, just because he's a professional whiner in the newspaper. If you'll read the subtext for many of those old strips, you'll find the heart of an old-fashioned Libertarian. And I'd be a Libertarian, if they weren't all a bunch of tax-dodging professional whiners.

I love this guy - I hope he makes a comeback.

And thanks for the new sig, Berke.

Untimely Insight

Berke's belief that he is less relevant today could possibly be justified, but I think that comes from his being so ahead of the times. Outland expressed the kind of self-referential humor that we take for granted after shows about nothing and the Simpsons. The denizens of Bloom County were far ahead of their time, and reading the strips today isn't the same as during the supply-side days of Regan. He helped create the ironic, self-immolating humor that we have today.

Female animals

The responses of a talented writer make for a very entertaining interview, whether I agree with the man or not. I thought of one exception to his rule that

Throughout cartoon history, there aren't any--repeat, ANY--primary animal cartoon characters that are females

Namely, Betty Boop, who started out as a dog. But perhaps this example turns back in his favor, as she didn't stay canine for long.

GREAT Interview (and still reading it)

I'm about halfway through it now. Only reason I'm posting now is because I have a problem resisting the temptation to post as fast as I can. :)

But I'm absolutely enthralled by reading this. I'm at work, I should be working, but...I can't. I'm glued to this. Breathed, whether he wants to be or not, is forever an icon of what the 80's were to me...or more appropriately, of what the 80's weren't. They weren't silly, they weren't fun, they weren't lying in the dandelion patch.

If this interview were a slashdot post, I'd post beneath it saying, "Mod this up! +1, Insightful" as some of us are wont to do. :)

It's great to hear from the guy. Now pardon me while I go back and read more... :)

Berke hasn't been watching the cartoons of the 90s

From the interview:

Throughout cartoon history, there aren't any--repeat, ANY--primary animal cartoon characters that are females. If one was female, she was primarily a girlfriend to the main character. Minnie Mouse. Look at kids' TV. If there's a female character in a big furry suit on Barney or Sesame Street, she has long eyelashes and flits and flutters about like some nightmarish caricature from Jerry Falwell's wet dream.

Two words: Dot Warner.

Ahhhhhhhh...

It was a joy to read. It was even better realizing that yes, he still has 'it'. Whatever that is... I really enjoy reading his childrens books to my 2yr old. Fantastic artwork and at some basic level - funny for both of us. :)

No one is serious?

... If nothing is serious anymore, then there's nothing to satirize." - Berke Breathed.

Well, Berke, I must say, I know of someone who still takes himself seriously. His name is Jack Valenti, and he says things like this:

"If we have to file a thousand lawsuits a day, we'll do it." -JV.

There you go, if you start cartooning again, you can pick on him. Personally, I need to go pick dinner out of my beard, and build me a wheelchair to go dandeylion stomping in. It's probably just like building a bicycle, you never forget. By the way, Opus is an idiot, right?

Good luck with everything.

Sincerely,
Sheldon.

obligatory obsucure reference

and I quote: The justice system is a scandal. Mimes and murderers are coddled. Victims are abused. As a vigilante, I can make only one conclusion... ... All judges are mental perverts and communists. Thank you.

Brilliant e-interview

Especially enjoyed his nasty insult of Mr. Oliphant (whose work I'm not aware of) relating to penis size and sneezing. Anyways it's a great read for anyone who is curious.

Is it just me...

Is it just me, or does Breathed come off as a bit of a jerk in that interview?

He started drawing poorly after Penguin Dreams, but he hit bottom by the end. Go back and look at your Happy Trails collection. Remove the booger jokes and the Donald Trump jokes, and you're left with nuthin'.

Tom Cruise?

Did Tom Cruise run over his dog or something?

weird.

Berke Breathed _is_ cool

For a while back in the mid-90's I was at Amaze!nc, which produced the Bloom County screensaver. We would occasionally have Mr. Breathed come by the offices to work on the project. Not only were the screensavers hilarious (we even got sued for the one where Opus shoots down the flying toasters =), but Berke himself was a very nice guy, perfectly willing to take suggestions and laugh out loud with animation interns, just out of college with no corporate power of their own.

-Dug

*sniff* the good ol' days

I miss reading, at various times, Zippy, Bloom County, Doonesbury, the Far Side and Calvin and Hobbes. What the heck happened to Bill Watterson?!

I think I have a new .sig from this one: And I'd be a Libertarian, if they weren't all a bunch of tax-dodging professional whiners.

The Onion

Nothing beats The Onion when it comes to horoscopes, Heres Berkeley's:

Virgo: (Aug. 23--Sept. 22)
It will occur to you that no one in the phone book has a realistic-sounding name. Change them all, if possible.


However mine is better :)
Aries: (March 21--April 19)
If you put too much gasoline on the bandanna over your face, you'll get sick. Not enough and you'll be able to smell the corpses. Strike a balance.

Oliver's "Star Wars" missile defense

Just like Doonesbury. They've been running old Doonesbury cartoons about Reagan and Star Wars. It's hard to tell that they are from 1985.

I remember when Oliver Wendell Jones received a huge grant to develop a space based missile defense system.

His plan was brilliant. Cover the earth with a net made out of dollar bills.

Completely relevant for today. I can't believe Berke thinks his stuff has lost it's meaning.

I also can't believe the American public still puts up with all the money we're wasting on Star Wars.

No man is an island, but some men are peninsulas

Bill Watterson

This got me thinking about my other favorite reclusive former comic strip writer. I looked around and found an interview [reemst.com] (allegedly the only one he ever gave); and a shorter, more recent article [reemst.com]. The second one is kind of sad . . . it's too bad that the fame of the strip brought him so much unhappiness.

Why did we ever bother with Tux?

We should have rallied around Opus. Marketing AND a penguin, rolled into one.
Hell, the strip even has a real hacker/scientist in it. Tell me that you haven't be thinking this.

Race in Bloom County

Brethed says he avoids race but I remember 3 strips that dealt with it directly. One involving a flesh-coloured band-aid, one involving 'flesh' crayons, and a third where the young black kid buys a copy of 'ebony', and the little white kid tries to buy a copy of the ficticious 'ivory' to which the proprieter says something like 'shoo! i run a progressive newstand here!'. Maybe not dealing with it so serious, but to a 12-year-old it seemed like advanced socialogical debate ;)

Banana p.c. junior

The one machine i wished someone would make...

bah

As if "new Onion Wednesday" doesn't DDoS theonion.com and theonionavclub.com enough, you had to announce the story today too. Thanks.

Website.

He even calls for volunteers to help with his site!

Too late [berkebreathed.com], looks like someone already helped him. His site looks terrific IMO.

It's frustrating as a fan...

When a favorite author or artist decides they've had enough and the fan has to find something new to fill the gap. "That's life, deal", doesn't come close to getting a fan past that wall. Larson, DNA, Breathed, Watterson, and many others drop out when they have their fans peak interest and call it "leaving while it's still fresh" or some crap like that. As tough as these people have been on themselves, they are and have been their own worst critics. I don't think I've ever seen a Bloom County strip I didn't like. At least I have the books and can fish them out once every couple years, to read and reminice. It was a great time to be a kid.

Re:A question I must have missed...

bill waterson (sp?) wrote calvin and hobbes. He had had enough, and decided to retire. Dude did that strip for a long-ass time.

better to go out in a flash

Re:Bloom County ? What the fuck is that ?

All I have to say is "THPTF"

Re:I always knew he wasn't a nice guy, but come on

Yeah, yeah, you think Peanuts was funnier than Bloom County. No doubt you think Leave it to Beaver and Ozzie and Harriet were laugh riots too, and think Norman Rockwell was a great artist. I'll take biting sarcasm over stale 1950's nostalgia any day.

NEW GOATSE WARNING FOR ABOVE LINK! DON'T GO CAP'N!

.. and i thought only birds everted their cloacha.

ick.

sorry, Charlie (Brown)

I'm not sure where you got your facts, but it's widely known and accepted that the art in Peanunts was "assisted" by other artists.

And even if that were not so, artists rarely ink their own strips. To say some drawn lines were "made a little shaky by that hand tremor" is nonsense.

Re:I always knew he wasn't a nice guy, but come on

I think you kind of read into that quote incorrectly ---- What Breathed meant was that many cartoonists, including Schulz, were exploited, and never even owned the rights to their own characters. He wasn't saying that Schulz' creativity would have been replaced by the students, but that the syndicates could have basically done whatever they wanted with the characters, including cutting Schulz out of the picture completely.

Re:Here's why

I modded him down because the comment felt less like a genuine expression of opinion toward Mr. Breathed and his work and more like a smart ass pot-shot designed to get the author attention (and the comment about The Onion was merely off-topic).

You're helping to destroy Slashdot. Go read the Jargon File definition of "troll" [tuxedo.org]. Far too many comments are moderated down as trolling just because they express an unpopular opinion, or express an opinion in an unpopular manner. This results in posters being silenced - yes, here, a poster will be silenced if he's moderated down 5 times in 24 hours - when they don't deserve it.

Someone expressing an opinion they truly believe is not, by definition, trolling.

Anyway, meta-moderation will even the score if other don't agree with me.

I hope so, but haven't seen it happen yet. You can bet your sweet bippy that I'll metamoderate that as "unfair" if I get the chance.

Re:I always knew he wasn't a nice guy, but come on

Two points:

• If that's all Breathed was saying, he's simply wrong. Schulz was not above making the terms of his syndicate contract public, and said more than once in interviews that his contract forbade the syndicate from ever hiring anyone else to write or draw Peanuts. Period.
• Breathed said not only that they could do this, but that they may as well have. This was the insult. Anyone who paid the least bit of attention to the last couple years of Peanuts should have noticed that Schulz was back near the top of his game. Mind you, I don't blame anyone for not reading the strip at that point; Schulz had indeed had quite a few dry years there. But such a person should not speak as if he knew what he was talking about.

------

Re:Bloom County ? What the fuck is that ?

Flabdabb -> Follow the links to the "everything2" nodes in the story for definitions.

(In short -- Berke Breathed is a cartoonist who did two comics strips, Bloom County and Outland, that ran from 1980-1995 in US newspapers. It was originally picked up as a replacement for Doonesbury when it was on hiatus. Extremely funny stuff, the origin of "Bill the Cat", "Opus the Penguin", etc ... )

for someone that claims to love humor

you sure don't understand jokes.

fuck you and the patronizing horse you rode in on.
...dave