December 3, 1953: Some light cast on Violet's disdain for Charlie Brown

I suppose this shows us a reason Violet throws Charlie Brown out of her house sometimes; he won't keep quiet during a show.  Of course, it seems that Violet won't herself either.

I'm sure some form of time compression is at work here, but even so, it is difficult for me to see how she could find enough things to tell Charlie Brown not to do that it'd fill up a whole half-hour.

I think Violet's pigtail-look has pretty much vanished entirely by this point.

EDIT: Corrected typo in title

Sunday, November 29, 1953: Charlie Brown should see this

Read this strip at gocomics.com.

Lucy's joy at being the best at jumping rope is wonderful.  Panel 2 is a bit strange for its abstract ground, but it works.  Panel 4 is terrific though, even if, when you look closely at it, Lucy's rope jumping isn't as fluid as it appears at first.  It's really several different, unconnected images of her jumping rope presented together in such a way that it scans as a continuous stream.  It does further the illusion of her skipping rope with a forward motion though, which is important since one jumping rope in place cannot come across other people.

He put so much work into this that I almost feel embarrassed to notice there's a small mistake here in the strip construction.  If you remove the top panels (like some newspapers do) the joke becomes much weaker, since Linus reaching 700 jumps isn't as impressive if we didn't know Lucy was so proud because she hit 600.  The boldface on "SEVEN HUNDRED" loses its relevance.  The strip is still understandable in that Lucy's change in demeanor implies that her brother has surpassed her.  I suppose, in that regard, the knowledge that she had reached 600 is extraneous information?

EDIT: Fixed gocomics link.

November 26 & 30, 1953: Two with Violet

November 26, 1953

 November 30, 1953

Violet was such a sweet little girl at first, wasn't she?  That seems long ago now, but it's been less than three years since then.

In the first strip here we have another case of Charlie Brown being thrown out of Violet's house.  Until now, usually Violet forgets what made her angry before C.B. is evicted or long gone, but not in this case.  In the second strip she takes naked advantage of Charlie Brown's lack of backbone, and doesn't even have the venom to make an evil smile about it.  It's just a business translation for her.  She wants what Charlie Brown has, so it becomes hers.  Wow.

It's difficult to feel sorry for C.B. in that one.  It's not like she threatened him or anything!

Charlie Brown's hat in the first strip is rather stylish. 

November 25, 1953: Wrath of Dog

Read this strip at gocomics.com.

Snoopy only has a limited number of ways of expressing annoyance at this point.  His ears in the last panel are adorable though, in a Mickey Mouse kind of way.

Was it kids' habit back then to eat whole bags of candy at once?  I'm amazed the Peanuts kids didn't all become diabetics.

November 24, 1953: Charlie Brown *still* has a big, round head

Read this strip at gocomics.com.

Maybe I should start categorizing these.  This is a type of joke we've seen several times before, beginning with the beach ball strip.  That began as a kind of comment Schulz made about his art style.  This is Lucy's second time making a joke at the expense of Charlie Brown's head.  The "WHEE!" is new however.

This is a chase strip, but it's not a "turnabout" strip because Charlie Brown has a reaction shot in the penultimate panel.

November 23 & 28, December 31 1953: Sleepy Snoopy

November 23, 1953:

 November 28, 1953:

December 31, 1953:

I'm taking a couple of these out of order to collect some thematically similar strips.  All have to do with a sleeping Snoopy and all have to do with sight gags.

The first strip is another early thought balloon strip, and one that uses the standard tail on the balloon, too!  Schulz seems like he's finally decided to settle on this convention.

In the second strip, is that an indoor bed for Snoopy?  It would seem that would fix him as Charlie Brown's dog, but I don't think we can absolutely say that until a character states it explicitly.

The third strip is one that Schulz would come back to later, and is visually inventive in how it uses the size of the 'Z' to represent the loudness of Snoopy's snoring.  (It's also one of the earliest, though not the first I think, of a large serif 'Z' to represent sleep, which is a very Peanuts convention.)

Sunday, November 22, 1953: Yes, Lucy is still beating Charlie Brown at checkers

Read this comic at gocomics.com.

8,000 games now.  So, Lucy plays because Charlie Brown takes losing personally, eh?  She does make it to an even 10,000.  That day isn't very far off even.

The background grass seen back when Charlie Brown lost 7,000 games is seen here again, this time behind Lucy in the next-to-last panel.

Nice abstract drawing in the lead panel, although it looks like Schulz is cheating Charlie Brown's arm a little.

Looks like a chagrimace in panel 7.

November 21, 1953: The Trepidation of an Engine

Read this strip at gocomics.com.

In those days, comic artists would draw all four panels of a strip, even if nothing much changes between them.  Notice how the scribble of the grass sort of trails off to the bottom-right of the frame.  I think Schulz was going for a stylistic effect there.

November 20, 1953: "Aus Der Tiefe"

Read this strip at gocomics.com.

There are certain personality characteristics that Peanuts characters exhibit.  Here is exhibited one that we might call "mischevious."  Snoopy has it definitely, and Lucy might have some of it.  Charlie Brown used to have to, as we see here, but kind of grows out of it.

Yet another reason to love Peanuts: you have just read a strip about the pronunciation of a German particle.  That's not something you'll typically find in Dennis the Menace.

In panel 2, Charlie Brown is sitting on the far end of Schroeder's toy piano.  That thing must be really heavy to avoid being upended.

November 19, 1953: Third use of "Fuss-budget"

Read this strip at gocomics.com.

Fuss-budget became one of those terms that identified Peanuts, like "good grief!"  It's probably about time to stop calling out every usage, though.