January 25, 1954: Peanuts in THREE-DEEEE

Read this strip at gocomics.com.

To think the idle joke about a failed gimmick in movie-making from fifty years ago would be absolutely as relevant today as when it was first read.

This is another of those strips where the emerging, vague un-dog-like nature of Snoopy's personality is the source of the humor.  When I read these strips I'm reminded of a Warner Bros. cartoon directed by Chuck Jones, "A Pest in the House," one of the few with a joke that explicitly recognizes how weird is that arbitrary line between its animal characters as animals (things that Elmer Fudd hunts, that sleep in holes, that hope around the woods and float in ponds) and as human-like creatures (that pester hunters, who dress up in women's clothing, that play poker and golf, who hold jobs).

The cartoon in question begins with an announcer speaking: "Once upon a time there was a labor shortage.  It became so bad that employers would hire anybody."  A pause, then, when Daffy Duck zooms on-stage: "Or anything...."

There's another cartoon like that, made later,I think it's People Are Bunny, where Bugs Bunny and Daffy are competing in a radio program's stunt game for a mystery price, where they're racing each other to the studio.  At one point Daffy is flung into the air and left to helplessly fall to painful cartoon injury, and Bugs, looking up from the ground, casually remarks, "I wonder if Daffy will remember that he can fly?"  There is a crashing sound, then he adds, "I guess not."  Later in the same cartoon a similar remark happens regarding swimming.

Sunday, January 24, 1954: Lucy flips out

Lucy goes on a glorious campaign of destruction here.  It's the closest she's yet gotten to her malevolent destiny.

I think maybe part of the reason Schulz drew this one is just so he could draw lots of tiny little things flying around the room.  Anyway, I didn't know Violet had a stamp collection.

The lead panels, as usual, aren't needed to get the joke, although they do explain why Schroeder is involved in the mob.  (Linus is too young for such things.)  Of all the offended chasers, everyone seems to be yelling at Lucy except for Charlie Brown, who is uncharacteristically grim-faced.

January 23, 1953: Snoopy vs. The Yard: The Newspaper

Read this strip at gocomics.com.

Another strip showing the dog getting stymied by some artifact of human civilization.  These are kind of boring I think, except for panel two, which is the closest I think we've gotten to this point to the "classic" look for Snoopy, that is to say the late 50s-to-60s look where Snoopy was long, lean and drawn loosely.

By the way, sorry for being a little slow with posts, shepherding the Kickstarter project has consumed a lot of my time over the past two weeks.

January 22, 1954: One, two, three....

Read this strip at gocomics.com.

Lucy's expression in the first panel may seem silly, but it conceals the seriousness with which she will bring to her task.  Lucy counting stars is a common running gag in the early days of Peanuts.

January 18, 1954:

January 19, 1954:

January 20, 1954:

January 21, 1954:

Let's do a few this time:
January 18: This strip is a callback to December 16, 1953.  Like that earlier strip, Schroeder's legs reveal attention to how they're braced against the fence.  Nowadays it seems weird that a kid would get off of school for his birthday, or that of any random classical composer.  That fence is weird -- it's in both strips.  This must be the edge of Schroeder's yard.  Chagrimace!

Of note for trivia contests: Schroeder's birthday is January 18.

January 19: It would be so easy to derive a political message from this strip.

January 20: This strip is something of a callback to July 2, 1953.  In that strip the kids are saddened by the prospect of being left with a babysitter.  Here, they're gloating at the prospect of the other being left behind.  Gradually, their relationship is evolving.

January 21: I like this one for how the shape of the notes in the last frame fill in the space between the top and the piano.

January 16 & Sunday, January 17, 1954: Trials of a Baby

January 16, 1954:

Sunday, January 17, 1954:

Surprisingly many of Peanuts characters have a special talent, one that overrides the limitations of real life.  Snoopy has many such "powers."  The force of Lucy's anger (later on) is terrifying to behold.  Charlie Brown's ability to lose has already been been demonstrated while playing checkers.  And Linus has a way of making or doing things that doesn't seem quite "right."  Stacking the blocks like he does in the first strip is an example.  He's also great at blowing up balloons halfway, and other unlikely feats of what I'm going to call, for lack of a better term, dexterity.

The second strip is the first time we get something akin to a stream of dialogue from Linus.  Until now his words have been things like "dottie dottie" or loud laughs of derision in the face of Lucy's selfishness, but here are several full sentences.  Noteworthy, however, is that although his words are in speech bubbles so generally are Snoopy's, and neither character has been shown using full sentences to communicate with the other characters.

I like how big kids are represented as running in herds that clean the floor of toys in their wake, like cattle devouring whole fields of grass.

January 13-15, 1954: Snoopy's ears creep me out

January 13, 1954:

January 14, 1954:

January 15, 1954:

Snoopy's ears demonstrate once more how they can be held rigid in place in weird poses at will.  They're almost like additional limbs.  Of course they have their limits: they don't seem capable of supporting much weight, and they don't seem capable of supporting Violet's ire, that killjoy.

The third strip gives us a lot more Snoopy drawings than the standard daily strip.  I love the one at the top-left of the third panel, where you only see his feet peeking into the frame.  But there's a three-quarter "puppet head" view of Snoopy smiling in that one too, which we haven't seen for quite a while.

Charlie Brown is the one giving Snoopy his walk, which points the "owner" needle more firmly towards him again.  But we've still gotten no concrete indication of whose dog Snoopy is.  This may be the first time, however, that Snoopy's relentless enthusiasm has gotten on the kid's nerves, which is an oft-used gag over Peanuts' run.

January 11 & 12, 1954: The Van Pelt kids with blocks

January 11, 1954:

January 12, 1954:

The first one is more an observational strip about human nature than Lucy's personality specifically, although we might conclude that she's been somewhat spoiled by her tremendous winning streak at Checkers against Charlie Brown.  The second is a more typical strip about sisterly concern, but it does give three more of those great serif'd sleeping Zs.

(I should note that, despite what the title of this post might lead you to conclude, Lucy and Linus' last names have not been revealed in the strip yet.  Or if they have, I certainly don't remember it happening.)

Sunday, January 10, 1954: Snoopy and a Baby #1

Read this strip at gocomics.com.

The times when there's a baby on hand for Snoopy to wordlessly react with are relatively short when compared to the length of Peanuts, which is a shame because I think they're among the funniest, most whimsical strips of its run.  Snoopy develops a great double-team act with Sally when she arrives on the scene.

Snoopy's head drawn in profile in panel 5 is archetypal Snoopy.  There is just a hint of the direction the character would be taken in later there.

January 9, 1954: Counting stars gaiden

Read this strip at gocomics.com.

Charlie Brown's exasperation at Lucy counting stars is one of the more iconic strip themes of early Peanuts.  So far by my count we've only seen one Lucy star counting strip, and she more guesses than counts in that one.