New Comic "The Ancients" Finds Humor in Aging

When I ask Joe Berger how his comic "The Ancients" began, I hear the flipping of pages over the phone. "In this notebook, I have the exact date where the idea just sort of popped into my head," he says. "Oh, here … it’s the 28th of February, 2023."

"The Ancients," which has been running on Substack and launches on GoComics today, started from an unlikely moment of parental frustration that Berger captured in that very notebook. The cartoonist, who also co-creates "Berger and Wyse" here on GoComics, was butting heads with one of his three grown daughters, an aspiring artist. The tension, he says, "morphed into two old men, kind of different parts of me, I suppose," and the first dialogue of "The Ancients" emerged: "We should take the old ways to our graves. The young pay no heed. They care not for our wisdom."

What began as a dad trying to make sense of his daughter grew into a comic about the timeless generation gap. But Berger is quick to clarify that "The Ancients" isn’t meant as a rant of “kids these days." "I'm not interested in it being a polemic about young people," Berger says. "It's more about the fact that the ancients get things wrong. They're the sort of subject of the satire far more often than the youth themselves."

Berger’s always got a notebook with him, and it’s his go-to source for fresh cartoon ideas. "When I need inspiration, I go flipping through my old notebooks," he says. "Inevitably, there’ll be an idea that’s been sitting there for years, one I’ve brushed past ten times. But on the 11th time, I’ll spot a little kernel."

And the best compliment he could ever receive? "Throughout my career, people have sent me photos of my cartoons that they've stuck to their fridge," he laughs. "That's the perfect place."