Ray C., the so-called “rabbit test” itself didn’t kill the rabbit - but in order to get the results, it had to be dissected. Mice and frogs were also used.
On an old episode of MASH, Hawkeye and BJ used one of Radar’s rabbits when Margaret needed a pregnancy test, but they surgically removed the necessary organs (the ovaries?) to get the results, and sewed her up nicely afterwards. (The rabbit, I mean, not Margaret.)
“Dilbert” creator and cartoonist Scott Addams frankly admits, when he realised Dilbert needed a pet dog to bounce ideas and points of view off, to having stolen the concept from Charley Brown and Snoopy.
Addams says in one of his books that turning Charley Brown and Snoopy into the rather more cynical Dilbert and Dogbert had to be done carefully and with thought, so that it looked like creative invention on his part, and not like outright theft of another artist’s copyright character.
But he quite helpfully prodiced a series of cartoons demonstrating how Snoopy mutated into selfish arch-cynic Dogbert, (and for that matter how Charley Brown’s zig-zag sweater is replicated in Dilbert’s tie).
When you’ve been shown where to look, it’s very very obvious.
I’ve just seen what I suspect is a similar sort of borrowing and adaptation happening in CLV.
PLease accept, Jennifer, I like and admire what you do and I want to carry on contributing to these comments pages for a while yet!
So I’m not accusing you of theft of intellectual property (although Scott Addams cheerfully owns up to it, I think it’s in “The Dilbert Principle”, if not that it’ll be in “The Joy of Work”). There may be subtler and unconscious influnces operating here!
But I’ve just noticed. Monsieur Smokey.
Did you as a child ever go to see Disney’s version of “Winnie The Pooh”? Loathe him or avoid him for his saccharine, Disney’s cartoons do tend to stick and linger in the mind, especially of an imaginative sensitive kid. (As I’m sure you were, like the young Mona)
I’m seeing in M.Smokey a strong association to the cynical and dolorous donkey Eeyore. It’s in the ears and the nose, mainly, and Smokey fulfils the same function to Mona as Eeyore does to Winnie!
..AgProv,while this strip does have it’s share of Disney flavor..i.e. Donna could easily pass for a Disney Princess..that is part of it’s appeal.Smokey may -or may not-even barrow from Winnie & co.,but to say (by saying that Scott Adams cheerfuly admits to theft of intellectual property,you ARE basically accusing Ms.Babcock of said crime) she is a thief is foolish…on the other hand..Batman is a blatant ripoff of Sherlock Holmes..
Well, I realised what I was inadvertently implying halfway through posting and tried not to make it sound so horrible… the “unconscious borrowing” of a motif half-remembered from a long-ago Disney movie sounds a hell of a lot better!
An author I love (Lindsey Davis) did a similar thing - she pointed to characters and scenes in other authors’ work that have influenced her own, and described her adaptation of their ideas as “tribute plagiarism”, ie reworking and adapting somebody else’s original character to such an extent it classifies as something new and original - as Dogbert certainly does - whilst leaving ample clues as to provenance and lineage. I don’t think there’s anything shaming or suspect about this at all if it’s done with enough thought and care and “added value”, as well as a love and respect for the character and tradition you’re drawing from…
after all, Winnie the Pooh’s “Eeyore” also became, through a couple of intervening stages, Marvin the Paranoid Android in “The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”, which is also a really original reworking. Douglas Adams was also cheerfully upfront about borrowing the character, although he maintains a fellow comedy scriptwriter for the BBC who was nicknamed “Eeyore” was the necessary intermediate stage…
A.A. Milne’s original books about the Hundred Acre Wood and its denizens , which came before the Disney cartoons, were based on the stuffed toys owned by a little boy called Christopher and the games he would play with them.
Childhood stuffed toy, develops through the power of a child’s love a life and personality all of its own and is still there as that child grows to adulthood… I’d still maintain a recognisable Eeyore is in M. Smokey! And (even if consciously borrowed) no shame attaches - the recreation makes the character type new and original and entertaining, so I hope i’ve caused no offence, Jenn? I hope not.
While Addams’ Dogbert is in a recognisable line of descent from Snoopy, something new and different has been added to make the character work on entirely a different level which acts to forgive the original “theft” . (For that matter, Garfield the cat is just about recognisable as a descendent of the original Krazy Cat of the 1890’s newspapers - the point is that every new cartoonist borrows from the ideas of the ones who went before, while creating something great and original of their own, as CLV undoubtedly is).
And creative ideas may happen simultaneously and independently, , half the world apart, to one or more different people.
Look up “Dennis the Menace” on Wikipedia for an example of this phenomena in action. It surprises Americans, And Scots.
Indulge this strange European who is captivated by Mona and Donna. Who or what is Joe Doty?
Truth be told, the author has a stuffed bunny named Smokey that she still talks to and sleeps with on a regular basis. That is the true inspiration behind Monsieur Smokey.
Ah, what should I know, i’m the token eccentric Brit (with a working fluency in French, not that I’m boasting) who was drawn here by the promise of revisiting the world’s second-greatest newspaper cartoon strip featuring a penguin. (That’s Berke Breathed’s “Bloom County”, btw. The best cartoon strip ever, featuring a penguin, is Steve Bell’s “If….” which still runs today in the London “Guardian”. Another of those “Dennis the Menace” situations, btw, where two cartoonists half a world apart both had the same idea at about the same time- “let’s put a penguin in it. That’s so off the wall nobody’s ever going to imitate it.”)
I stayed to discover…. Andy Capp is big in the USA? I thought that strip was so uniquely ethnically English that it wouldn’t travel well, but here it is in all its shabby glory - Andy Capp from the English North-East. Here’s a conundrum. Andy appears daily in British newspaper the “Daily Mirror”. In the cartoon he is often seen studying the racing form in the Daily Mirror. Here’s a question. What does Andy Capp see, when he turns to the comics page in the Daily Mirror, where we in this world see “Andy Capp”?
(Or for that matter the spin-off series featuring his grand-daughter Mandy Capp - almost as funny, though done by a different artist)
As one who has been stepfather to teenage girls and has come out the other aside relatively sane, I saw the humour in “PreTeena” straight away. bleeep Bells, I could write a sequel.
And then the sublime. I discovered CLV. Most wonderful and makes me feel nostalgic for a vanished and mis-spent youth. Please… keep them coming and don’t ake inelegantly written deconstructions to heart!
Miyuki-san, I read and understand and ask your forgiveness for reading more into the situation than it possibly merits. I hope my meanderings amused rather than offended! {bows low in tribute to one of greater skill than his}
margueritem about 14 years ago
Smokey’s out for what he can get.
ladywolf17 about 14 years ago
The look on Mona’s face says it all.
GRRRRR!!!!!!!!Sisyphos about 14 years ago
Mona doesn’t yet want to face the truth as presented to her by her alter ego, M. Smokey….
runar about 14 years ago
My cats tell me that cuddles are the most important thing in the world.
Tantor about 14 years ago
Try Xanax
The missing M. Smokey about 14 years ago
… and besides, three’s a crowd.
Ray_C about 14 years ago
Wasn’t there once a pregnancy test that involved the death of a rabbit? Just askin’.
lewisbower about 14 years ago
In panel 3, is that the Mona we all know and love?
Plods with ...™ about 14 years ago
does she strangle the bunny often?
Thomas R. Williams about 14 years ago
Better a bun in the bed that one in the oven.
runar about 14 years ago
Ray C., the so-called “rabbit test” itself didn’t kill the rabbit - but in order to get the results, it had to be dissected. Mice and frogs were also used.
fritzoid Premium Member about 14 years ago
On an old episode of MASH, Hawkeye and BJ used one of Radar’s rabbits when Margaret needed a pregnancy test, but they surgically removed the necessary organs (the ovaries?) to get the results, and sewed her up nicely afterwards. (The rabbit, I mean, not Margaret.)
AgProv about 14 years ago
I’ve worked something else out here.
“Dilbert” creator and cartoonist Scott Addams frankly admits, when he realised Dilbert needed a pet dog to bounce ideas and points of view off, to having stolen the concept from Charley Brown and Snoopy.
Addams says in one of his books that turning Charley Brown and Snoopy into the rather more cynical Dilbert and Dogbert had to be done carefully and with thought, so that it looked like creative invention on his part, and not like outright theft of another artist’s copyright character.
But he quite helpfully prodiced a series of cartoons demonstrating how Snoopy mutated into selfish arch-cynic Dogbert, (and for that matter how Charley Brown’s zig-zag sweater is replicated in Dilbert’s tie).
When you’ve been shown where to look, it’s very very obvious.
I’ve just seen what I suspect is a similar sort of borrowing and adaptation happening in CLV.
PLease accept, Jennifer, I like and admire what you do and I want to carry on contributing to these comments pages for a while yet!
So I’m not accusing you of theft of intellectual property (although Scott Addams cheerfully owns up to it, I think it’s in “The Dilbert Principle”, if not that it’ll be in “The Joy of Work”). There may be subtler and unconscious influnces operating here!
But I’ve just noticed. Monsieur Smokey.
Did you as a child ever go to see Disney’s version of “Winnie The Pooh”? Loathe him or avoid him for his saccharine, Disney’s cartoons do tend to stick and linger in the mind, especially of an imaginative sensitive kid. (As I’m sure you were, like the young Mona)
I’m seeing in M.Smokey a strong association to the cynical and dolorous donkey Eeyore. It’s in the ears and the nose, mainly, and Smokey fulfils the same function to Mona as Eeyore does to Winnie!
rainman5353 about 14 years ago
Congratulations to AgProv, our “Joe Doty Award” winner for today!
Plods with ...™ about 14 years ago
Nope…
3hourtour Premium Member about 14 years ago
..AgProv,while this strip does have it’s share of Disney flavor..i.e. Donna could easily pass for a Disney Princess..that is part of it’s appeal.Smokey may -or may not-even barrow from Winnie & co.,but to say (by saying that Scott Adams cheerfuly admits to theft of intellectual property,you ARE basically accusing Ms.Babcock of said crime) she is a thief is foolish…on the other hand..Batman is a blatant ripoff of Sherlock Holmes..
AgProv about 14 years ago
Well, I realised what I was inadvertently implying halfway through posting and tried not to make it sound so horrible… the “unconscious borrowing” of a motif half-remembered from a long-ago Disney movie sounds a hell of a lot better!
An author I love (Lindsey Davis) did a similar thing - she pointed to characters and scenes in other authors’ work that have influenced her own, and described her adaptation of their ideas as “tribute plagiarism”, ie reworking and adapting somebody else’s original character to such an extent it classifies as something new and original - as Dogbert certainly does - whilst leaving ample clues as to provenance and lineage. I don’t think there’s anything shaming or suspect about this at all if it’s done with enough thought and care and “added value”, as well as a love and respect for the character and tradition you’re drawing from…
after all, Winnie the Pooh’s “Eeyore” also became, through a couple of intervening stages, Marvin the Paranoid Android in “The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”, which is also a really original reworking. Douglas Adams was also cheerfully upfront about borrowing the character, although he maintains a fellow comedy scriptwriter for the BBC who was nicknamed “Eeyore” was the necessary intermediate stage…
A.A. Milne’s original books about the Hundred Acre Wood and its denizens , which came before the Disney cartoons, were based on the stuffed toys owned by a little boy called Christopher and the games he would play with them.
Childhood stuffed toy, develops through the power of a child’s love a life and personality all of its own and is still there as that child grows to adulthood… I’d still maintain a recognisable Eeyore is in M. Smokey! And (even if consciously borrowed) no shame attaches - the recreation makes the character type new and original and entertaining, so I hope i’ve caused no offence, Jenn? I hope not.
While Addams’ Dogbert is in a recognisable line of descent from Snoopy, something new and different has been added to make the character work on entirely a different level which acts to forgive the original “theft” . (For that matter, Garfield the cat is just about recognisable as a descendent of the original Krazy Cat of the 1890’s newspapers - the point is that every new cartoonist borrows from the ideas of the ones who went before, while creating something great and original of their own, as CLV undoubtedly is).
And creative ideas may happen simultaneously and independently, , half the world apart, to one or more different people.
Look up “Dennis the Menace” on Wikipedia for an example of this phenomena in action. It surprises Americans, And Scots.
Indulge this strange European who is captivated by Mona and Donna. Who or what is Joe Doty?
runar about 14 years ago
Never forget the following maxim: ”Bad poets imitate; good poets steal”.
If you can’t trust T.S.Eliot, who can you trust?
runar about 14 years ago
You could also consider Monsieur Smokey a lecherous Hobbes to Mona’s chronically depressed Calvin.
pschearer Premium Member about 14 years ago
AgProv said “Who or what is Joe Doty?”
Oh, you lucky, lucky man or woman!!
The missing M. Smokey about 14 years ago
Please. I am not lecherous. I just adore women.
…especially in bed.
runar about 14 years ago
M Smokey, I consider lecherousness a virtue, not a vice.
Jen Babcock creator about 14 years ago
Truth be told, the author has a stuffed bunny named Smokey that she still talks to and sleeps with on a regular basis. That is the true inspiration behind Monsieur Smokey.
AgProv about 14 years ago
Ah, what should I know, i’m the token eccentric Brit (with a working fluency in French, not that I’m boasting) who was drawn here by the promise of revisiting the world’s second-greatest newspaper cartoon strip featuring a penguin. (That’s Berke Breathed’s “Bloom County”, btw. The best cartoon strip ever, featuring a penguin, is Steve Bell’s “If….” which still runs today in the London “Guardian”. Another of those “Dennis the Menace” situations, btw, where two cartoonists half a world apart both had the same idea at about the same time- “let’s put a penguin in it. That’s so off the wall nobody’s ever going to imitate it.”)
I stayed to discover…. Andy Capp is big in the USA? I thought that strip was so uniquely ethnically English that it wouldn’t travel well, but here it is in all its shabby glory - Andy Capp from the English North-East. Here’s a conundrum. Andy appears daily in British newspaper the “Daily Mirror”. In the cartoon he is often seen studying the racing form in the Daily Mirror. Here’s a question. What does Andy Capp see, when he turns to the comics page in the Daily Mirror, where we in this world see “Andy Capp”?
(Or for that matter the spin-off series featuring his grand-daughter Mandy Capp - almost as funny, though done by a different artist)
As one who has been stepfather to teenage girls and has come out the other aside relatively sane, I saw the humour in “PreTeena” straight away. bleeep Bells, I could write a sequel.
And then the sublime. I discovered CLV. Most wonderful and makes me feel nostalgic for a vanished and mis-spent youth. Please… keep them coming and don’t ake inelegantly written deconstructions to heart!
AgProv about 14 years ago
Bleep Bells? What a prissy filter, as I clearly wrote “Héll’s Bells”… that isn’t even swearing, in English or French!
les clarions d’enfer….
AgProv about 14 years ago
Miyuki-san, I read and understand and ask your forgiveness for reading more into the situation than it possibly merits. I hope my meanderings amused rather than offended! {bows low in tribute to one of greater skill than his}