Read this strip at gocomics.com.
This isn't Linus' first time with the security blanket, but it's the first time it's presented in terms of providing security. It's not called a "security blanket" yet, but it's almost there, it just needs to connect those two nouns with nothing else in-between. This is a term that entered our language largely because of Peanuts, so this is a momentous strip.
I like Lucy's loud "INSANELY happy!!" I can't picture that coming out of Nancy or Sluggo. Here Lucy is generally in favor of Linus' blanket. Her attitude later on wavers between for and against, with their blanket-hating grandmother pushing her against I think. Charlie Brown, contrary to his general opinion later, seems to be against it on principle, but willing to give it a try. Isn't a blanket more than just a swath of material, though?
Linus' expression in the first panel is interesting, an expression that doesn't read easily. The sequence from panels 6-8 are interesting for how unconcerned Charlie Brown and Lucy are about Linus' feelings throughout their conversation; his reactions to them are pretty funny.
It's early in the game for Schulz's depictions of Linus and the blanket, so the facial expression Linus has in the first panel must be his being soothed by the "'outing' flannel".
ReplyDeleteWe're several strips away from Schulz's drawing of the thumb-sucking more familiar to Peanuts readers.
And Lucy seems to be playing with a doll--have we ever seen that before? Maybe it's a voodoo doll...
ReplyDeleteThe thing that most surprised me when I first read this as a kid was the shock of seeing the adult's hands on the counter in the last panel.
ReplyDelete