#293; In which Tragedy strikes

Item #1 - Come visit me in San Francisco this weekend at the APE convention!

Item #2 - If you live near Boulder/Fort Collins, Colorado, find yourself a copy of this month's Illiterate Magazine -- there's a swell interview with me near the back.

Item #3 - Johnny Hart, the creator of B.C., died about two weeks ago. I didn't mention it at the time, but what nobody seemed to notice is that Brant Parker -- his collaborator on The Wizard of Id -- also died, last week. Both Id (which has been helmed by Parker's son since 1997) and B.C. will continue to run in papers; in the latter case we will soon be treated to that magic synergy that occurs when lame gag writers combine with "a database of imagery from past years of the strip."

Reducing any hand-drawn comic strip to a mindless cut-and-paste job is bad in itself, but especially when the mind behind the strip was so distinctive. Not that I always agreed with B.C. or even particularly enjoyed it -- in fact I wouldn't miss it at all if it disappeared -- but to think that the strip can just seamlessly continue is insulting both to the original artist and to the other creators who're denied a shot at the paper because of it.

And, of course, if the strip is so independent of the personal vision of a singular creator that it CAN continue seamlessly even without his hand at the wheel, well, that's all the more reason that it shouldn't.