Jimmy: Hey, everybody. Welcome back to the show. It's unpacking Peanuts, and we're here in 1989, checking out the best, the worst, the all of Charles Schulz's work here on Unpacking Peanuts. I'm Jimmy Gownley. I'm your host for the proceedings.
Jimmy: I'm also a cartoonist. I did things like Amelia Rules, seven good reasons not to grow up, the Dumbest Idea ever. And you could read my new comic, Tanner rocks, for free on Substack at gvillecomics dot substack.com.
And joining me, as always, are my pals, co hosts, and fellow cartoonists. He's a playwright and a composer, both for the band complicated people, as well as for this very podcast. He's the co creator of the original comic Book Price Guide, the original editor for Amelia Rules, and the creator of such great strips, his strange attractors, a gathering of spells and tangled River. Michael Cohen,
Michael: say hey.
Jimmy: And he's the executive producer and writer of Mystery Science Theater 3000, a former vice president of Archie comics, and the current creator of the Instagram sensation sweetest Beasts, Harold Buchholz.
Harold: Who? Me?
Jimmy: Yeah, you. So, we are here in 1989, wrapping up another decade. It seems hard to believe that, we've been at it long enough that we could get this far out. First off, thank all of you guys out there for listening this long, and thank you, for following along with us, and, to my pals, co hosts, fellow cartoonists, and producer Liz, thanks for sticking it out, on this journey with me. This has been a lot of fun so far.
Liz: Yes.
Michael: Yeah.
Harold: Yeah.
Jimmy: Harold, I have a feeling you have something that you're going to tell us about what Schulz was up to in 1989. I don't know why I have that feeling. I just have it.
Harold: Well, I do have something that I hope will be of interest to our listeners and to you guys. As, I'd mentioned before, I've been looking at editor and publisher magazine, which was for editors and publishers of newspapers, including the buyers of syndicated comic strips. It was a weekly publication. I subscribed to it when I was in college, and I was going back kind of chronologically with where we are in the strips to kind of see what's going on in the syndicated comic strip world. We've been looking at polls from newspaper readers. You know, how is Peanuts doing? But this particular one that jumped out at me I thought was fascinating. I love reading things in the past where people predict the future. It says a lot about their present that we kind of forget about. And it's interesting to see how do we look at the future, and how close do we often get, and what biases do we have that sometimes maybe get us down the wrong paths?
So this is from a column that was called Shop Talk at 30. This is from August 5, 1989. And it's called a look at the future of syndicated comics by a guy named David Seidman, who's been active in comics for years. He worked at, Los Angeles Times syndicate. I think he helped develop like, Foxtrot and Dilbert, and he was an editor and wrote Disney comics. He's just done a lot of things in the comics field over the years. And here are some things that he was saying that he thought might be happening in the future with syndicated comics.
So, number one, he was saying the computer, he, says it's going to cut back a cartoonist drudge work and will do what assistants traditionally do, rule borders, cut pattern screens, fill in blacks, letter dialog and captions, and store and retrieve reference material. Some software and peripherals can correct perspective, shrink or enlarge elements of a drawing, turn and move objects within a composition, or copy photographs. Goodbye light box and tracing paper. I think he pretty much nails that, right?
Jimmy: Yes. That's crazy.
Harold: And he says, this is interesting. As the computer assumes these chores, young cartoonists will find it harder to get an entry level job as cartoonist assistants.
Jimmy: Yep.
Harold: Well, yeah, that's not the first thing I think of going back, is like, oh, people just lost a job. And isn't interesting that people almost never think of the jobs that go away with technology. And certainly young people don't look back on things and say, oh, I wish that cartoonist assistant job still was great.
Jimmy: I want to be a letterer.
Harold: I guess a few would say, I wish I could be apprenticed under Jimmy Gownley.
Jimmy: But, yeah.
Harold: it says when cartoonists finish drawing their comics, they will transfer them onto a computer screen. That is, if they have not done the drawing on the screen in the first place. Once the art is on screen, they will transmit it to their syndicate over the phone wires or by satellite. Okay, pretty close. The syndicate will then send the work to newspapers by the same method. That is true, too. Used to be they'd have to mail these things out, you know, weeks in advance. So he said, he predicted that lead time would shrink as well, you know, like Doonesbury had to be done weeks in advance. Bloom county. And I don't know if that's true, but I bet it is true. There's certainly nothing holding them back from being much, much tighter, just like delivering a, you know, like a editorial cartoon. Why not be able to send your daily strip in a little bit later? Because everything's electronic. There's no mail or anything.
He's also talking about, over the past few decades, comic size has been shrinking consistently. We've talked about that a lot. The newspapers were making the strip smaller and smaller. He says it will probably never get bigger. Space is tight in papers. He was right about that, too. So you can kiss the dramatic continuity strip goodbye, which was already on its way out. That's true. You couldn't tell a story with Steve Canyon or whatever because the space was so small, you couldn't move a story forward. he said the readers will change. They will, grow older, and that's also true. so his prediction based on that is there was the rise of liberated women in the twenties, with Tilly the toiler and Ellie Sanders and Winnie Winkle as the baby boom brought us Peanuts. Dennis the Menace, Miss Peach. he was saying that there would be strips for older readers, often featuring older characters like crankshafts, the first one that comes to mind for me. So I thought that was interesting.
And then he says, one innovation that could actually widen the range of comic subjects and styles is video text, or any other method of sending newspaper material electronically. Video text comics will be free of a newspaper's tight grid, giving cartoonists some room for experiments, but not a lot. Most of the first video text comics will be conventional newspaper comics, rather than anything created expressly for video text, because they had got a, built in readership, and they're cheap. It says these comics will set the format. And as any editor can tell you, it is hard to establish a new comics format once one has been set. Boy, that is true.
Jimmy: Yeah, this guy's a wizard of, yeah.
Harold: Scott McCloud, who wrote Understanding Comics. We've talked about him a lot. He was so into, like, the infinite scrolling comic. Think of all the things you can do with comics, and it just took years and years and years for anybody to actually figure something out that people wanted to read that was not in the standard format. And still the standard format is just by far the most common. it's so strange how technology allows something to happen, but we don't necessarily want the full range of what that can be, right? Then he starts talking about syndicates having other ways to sell comics. Merchandising will get bigger as new tech creates new products. How about Calvin and Hobbs poster on your wall? And an animated hologram?
Jimmy: My dream come true, Will.
Harold: United features syndicate licensed genetic engineers to create real life Snoopies.
Jimmy: No, let's not do that one. Let's skip that one.
Harold: You'll see syndicomics characters in new cartoons, not reprints created for other media, such as, well, book publishing, graphic novels. Syndicates that belong to multimedia conglomerates will get a head start in expanding into such projects. The one thing he's getting wrong is syndicates, because he's writing for people who are syndicate people, right? And he's saying, oh, think the future is going to be bright, buddy? Don't worry. I think he probably knew better, but he had to say that stuff to get this published.
So, last thing I'm going to share, it says here is the scene in the studio of a 21st century cartoonist. The cartoonist sits hunched over his table. he's designing an interactive video cassette based on, their comic strip, which deals with a middle aged couple and their teenage kids. Her, editor calls about the last batch of art that she transmitted to the syndicate. One of the gags is a pun. And the editor says, come on, that's not going to play in Beijing. The cartoonist jots a note redo Thursday gag, no puns. So with the international nature of it, he was also saying that was going to happen. And then he says, when she is satisfied with the cartoon, she slides it onto her art scanner. The machine puts a copy of the art on her computer's monitor. With a few fast keystrokes, the cartoonist lays in pattern screens, fills in blacks letters, the word balloons, types in the copyright notice, and transmits the art to her syndicate. So, pretty good David Seidman to be able to see where things went. I think he was pretty correct. And this is the world that Schulz is in. He's going to see the introduction of the Internet in about six years, really kind of to the general public, and all of this stuff is going to be right on the tail end of his career.
Jimmy: Well, that's really interesting, Harold, and, thank you, as always, for doing all that research. I think, you know, it's hard to really put in perspective what a 50 year career is and the amount of changes that go on, in 50 years. And that was a, that was a really eventful 50 years, you know, it was, yeah. Almost no television around, to the Internet is a big leap.
Harold: Well, he kind of threaded the needle, too, to have a 50 year career in comics. You can't have lived too much younger or too much later. Yeah, this was a window where something was consistent enough for 50 years that Schulz could do what Schulz did and make it a whole and make it feel like it's all of a piece.
Jimmy: well, that is fantastic. so what do you say, guys, with that prelude? We, hit the strips here in 1989.
Michael: Sure.
Liz: Let's do it.
Jimmy: All right. So if you characters want to follow along, there's a couple ways you can do it. First thing you got to do is go over to unpackingpanuts.com, sign up for the great Peanuts reread. That will give you an email once a month from us letting you know what strips we're going to be covering in upcoming episodes. And, then if you want, if you want to read them all for free, they're available on gocomics.com. Andrews McMeel, the wonderful syndicate and publisher of Peanuts, allows them to be up there for free. So you could read all of these along with us. It won't cost you a penny unless you happen to have a little coin in your pocket and you want to want to get fancy, you could buy those fan graphics books or the Andrews McMeel decades books, and that's how you could follow along with us.
So, with all that being said, here we go,
January 10. It's a single panel daily, and we have a whole crew of people sitting, on the benches in the schoolyard, eating their lunches. And Linus is reading the newspaper. Cause he's an informed young lad. And he reads. Listen to this. There's going to be an ugly dog contest, to which Violet, in pigtails, no less, says, ugly dog. And then Lucy, looking at Snoopy, who is, all shaken up and looking a little worse for wear, Lucy says, I think I've already found the winner.
Jimmy: Now, the reason I wanted to talk about this is the pig tails.
Michael: Well, describe Snoopy's, expression, if I. Very puzzling.
Jimmy: Snoopy. It looked like he has a hangover. He's holding his head, his tongues out, his eyes are crossed, and his ears are wrinkled and sticking out at right angles.
Michael: Okay, I can't really read that expression.
Harold: It's odd.
Michael: It does. Look, he's a little nauseous. And what's he reacting to? I mean, Lucy just insulted him.
Harold: When I read it, I thought he was actually trying to look like the ugly dog and be the winner. But now when I'm looking at it, I'm thinking maybe that's not what Schulz was going for. Maybe he. There's. With no explanations. He's not feeling well. But that seems like a very odd choice, you know?
Jimmy: Yeah, it's. It's really strange. I think, Yeah, I think Snoopy has a hangover.
Harold: No, I feel like too many root beers with Bill Mauldin.
Jimmy: Yeah, I did. Exactly. No, I think for Schulz, it's like, at this point, I mean, this is. It feels to me like this is fatigue setting in. Like, Ah, well, I'm not going to do a whole other strip explaining why Snoopy, he's just going to be making a face. I don't think it particularly works as a strip, but what I. The reason I picked it was because. Why, 40 years later, Violet there in her original hairstyle.
Michael: Yeah. Very puzzling because we, haven't seen her in years .
Liz: and it's not necessary. She doesn't have to repeat the ugly dog. It would work without it.
Michael: Yeah, well, also, it's not necessary. But the fact that if he was thinking in terms of balancing, he has his big black waste can in the middle and he's got Lucy on the right. So you'd think that if he was doing a spotting blacks thing, he'd want somebody on the left with black hair. just to balance out the panel. So Violet, you know, one of the few characters with black hair, and Lucy are both on the right. So it's just a weird choice why he would pick her and make her look like she looked back in 1952.
Harold: Although Lucy's still in her classic dress. and saddle shoes and the little bow in the back and the collar.
Michael: It's confusing.
Jimmy: Yeah. The Sally's updated and those two are classic. He might have just been feeling nostalgic. It's cool to see Violet. It's cool to see the original.
Harold: Maybe she was in an animated special. He was thinking about her. Who knows? I will say the spotted blacks on the trash can, I find those incredibly distracting because they look like pen strokes to me. And whenever that happens, I get pulled out of the artwork and I see somebody drawing something rather than it representing whatever it's supposed to represent.
Jimmy: That's funny. Cause I love that. I think that looks cool. And I like. I remember the first time that ever happened that Klaus Janssen, who was an inker for-- the first time it ever happened! The first time I ever noticed that Klaus Janssen, who was an inker for marvel in the seventies and eighties, and then for DC as well, had a really kind of scratchy in some ways, kind of ugly finishing, style. But he used a lot of techniques where you could see the tools. And I, the first time I noticed, like, oh, my God, that's a sharpie. And he just, like, scraped it across this guy's. And it looks like a sleeve. I was blown away.
Harold: Really.
Jimmy: I thought. I think that, yeah, I think that's.
Harold: Like, Jack Kirby back in the, like, the early mid fifties. He was doing like, boys ranch and that sort of stuff. That is, I mean, he, and later, as he, as he goes later, he just has these elemental brushstrokes that aren't hiding that they're brushstrokes. They're just, and I can't, I can't read you. I can't look at it. It's just.
Michael: Sorry. That's not, his inking.
Harold: So he didn't do boys ranch.
Jimmy: He didn't ink it
Michael: No, but he never, he rarely inked. It was Joe Simon.
Harold: Simon did that?
Jimmy: Yeah.
Harold: Oh, I'm surprised. Okay, well, yeah.
Jimmy: And Simon's inking is that puddly. I think it's muddled, you know, compared to, like, Kirby's later inkers, like Joe Sinnott and stuff like that.
Harold: Interesting. But I wonder if they were kind of following in the style of Simon, since Simon and Kirby were partners so much.
Michael: Yeah. But Simon was definitely inking and, co writing.
Harold: Okay.
Jimmy: Yeah.
Harold: it's interesting. I wonder. So are there any inkers that, that fought against that, even when Kirby was doing those really kind of bold images?
Michael: The whole school?
Harold: No, I mean, like, school of very clean inkers, inking Kirby stuff, like in the seventies?
Jimmy: Well, I had, the example I can think of is in 1976, there's a, it's actually, you can get it. Well, it's kind of expensive to find it, but it's called Captain America's bicentennial battles. Actually, you can get it in reprint, but it was those big nine by twelve comics they used to put out in the seventies. And, this was for the bicentennial. And Barry Windsor Smith inks a bunch of pages of Jack Kirby. And it's in his period where. Yeah, where he's like, all very elaborate, like, you know, pre raphaelite Barry Windsor Smith inking over Kirby. And, It looks weird. It looks weird. I'll send a photo to Liz and we could put it up on the obscurity page because it really shows the difference between what one person inking an artist looks like versus another one. It can totally change the vibe of the piece.
Michael: And apparently, Kirby did not care.
Harold: Really.
Michael: He turned the work in and probably never saw it again.
Jimmy: Right.
January 15, it's a Sunday, and Snoopy's out in a good old frozen pond. And he's having a fine time. He just hops out there on the ice and starts, skating around on his paws like he is wont to do. And Lucy's also skating. She watches this for a little bit, but then she says to Snoopy, and she's sort of annoyed by this, that's not skating. That's sliding. And then she continues ranting at Snoopy. You don't have any skates on. You're just sliding on your feet. That's not skating. Skating is when you have skates on. You're not skating at all. You're just sliding. And with this, an upset Snoopy walks away saying, how could I have been so stupid? And then he sits on a bench off the side of the ice and says, I thought I was having fun.
Michael: Now, why would Snoopy care what Lucy thinks about what he's doing?
Harold: Good question.
Michael: I mean, she's one of these nitpicky people who's gonna complain about every little thing. Just ignore her.
Harold: An earlier Snoopy probably would, right?
Jimmy: Yeah, absolutely. Would have, you know, given her a kiss or something on the nose and say, sorry, sweetie.
Harold: You know, you have some, some snappy comeback, but every once in a while.
Jimmy: Snoopy has that where someone hits him with the truth that he has to go and contemplate for a while.
Harold: And this, actually, I think, because that's where he is. When you see that little image of him sitting alone on a bench with this kind of forlorn look on his face, it's like, oh, poor Snoopy. But on reflection, seeing this strip again, for us, talking about it, my main concern is because Schulz has the, kind of an uneven line for these vertical lines that represent ice. It kind of looks like the ice is steaming and melting away. So I'm getting nervous for Lucy and Snoopy here.
Jimmy: They're going to end up.
Harold: I think it's interesting that Schulz, it really works well for me that he has ruled panels that are straight lines, and then he will not use a ruler for the insides where the characters live. So they do seem to have this life of their own that separates themselves from the panel borders. And that's visually, really appealing to me. I like that he does that.
Jimmy: Yeah, that's really interesting. I never thought about it that way, but that's really cool.
Liz: Do we have anything to say about Snoopy Watch?
Jimmy: Michael.
Liz: he looks different to me.
Jimmy: In this one, I think he looks different to me on that second tier, first panel.
Michael: Yeah. Yeah. It almost looks like Jim Woodring. panel three there. No, I mean, he's already. He does look like more like a stuffed animal, I think, these days.
Harold: I love how his little nose in the third to last panel drops down further than where it normally would be. While he's looking down, it's like the nose is looking as well. That's really cute.
Jimmy: Yes.
Harold: And also, the second to last panel, the nose is lower than normal, which suggests maybe a little depression or deflation, which is amazing cartooning, that you. You move things that shouldn't be moved because emotionally, somehow they feel right.
Jimmy: Yeah. And you can get in your own head about stuff like that. I can't do that because of this. And it's always the wrong attitude to get in your own head about it. You got to follow Schulz's advice, and just if it feels right and looks right, it is right.
Harold: It's very freeing. And even in that last panel, the nose and the eyes are super close to each other, more so I think the nose should be further off to the left. And that somehow adds to the little forlorn look, like the eyes of her kind of coming together, looking. Looking at nothing in particular, you know, kind of a nearsighted kind of look. He's a genius.
Jimmy: He certainly is.
January 16. Lucy, Charlie Brown, and Snoopy are all sitting on the couch looking at a photo album. And Charlie Brown says, see, it's a photograph of all the puppies. Snoopy and Spike are right there in front. Lucy says, but who's that in the back row? And Snoopy, very excited, says, Olaf. That's Olaf. And Lucy says to Charlie Brown, he's the one we should invite to the ugly dog contest. And Snoopy, pondering this, says, ugly Olaf. That's what they used to call him.
Michael: These are pretty cruel.
Jimmy: Yeah. So poor Olaf here has been, slighted his whole life, it seems.
Harold: Poor fella.
Jimmy: I love Olaf. I'm excited that we're about to see Olaf. And, the reason I picked that one is basically because I wanted to set it up for this next one here, man.
Harold: But before we go, I mean, there is, ah, an odd visual under the Zipatone on the couch in the second panel. There's no shading in the first panel other than the Zipatone, behind Charlie Brown, Lucy and Snoopy all sitting together.
Jimmy: I know what it is.
Harold: And it looks like stuff that didn't get erased.
Jimmy: That's what it is. Yes.
Harold: And he laid it over. And you can't erase your shavings that got caught under there or whatever. Yeah. And there it is, you know.
Jimmy: Yeah. You can see it right between Snoopy and Lucy, very clearly. A line of, you know, eight dots or whatever. And then there's two between Charlie Brown and Lucy as well. Yep. That Zipatone was unforgiving.
Harold: I can attest to that.
January 26. Speaking, of genius. Here we go. We finally see good old Olaf, and who is entered, in fact, in the ugly dog contest. And in this instance, we see him on top of Snoopy's doghouse. And, they're reminiscing. And Olaf think, talks to Snoopy. Remember when we were puppies at the Daisy hill puppy farm? I can't believe I've grown up to win an ugly dog contest. Then in panel two, Olaf, hurls himself head first off the doghouse, calmly thinking, I think I'll hurt myself, to which Snoopy replies Olaf in his shock. Then the last panel, we see Olaf just, perched on top of his head. He is upside down. He's landed on his head. And Snoopy's looking down off the doghouse at him. And Olaf says, not to worry. I've done this before.
Harold: Wow.
Jimmy: this is one of my top four or five favorite Peanuts strips.
Michael: Really?
Jimmy: I don't know why, but I remember that where I was standing in my friend Mark's house reading it, at his kitchen table. I remember the day, and I burst out laughing at panel two. I think that is just the funniest. The funniest thing. That this dog has just decided to basically end himself, but in the most daily newspaper friendly way.
Harold: Well, this this is a disturbing strip. You can still certainly read it that way. I mean, and Schulz, yeah, he's basically. He's won an ugly dog contest. So the world has labeled him ugly, officially. And then, like you say, he just in the least amount of effort possible. That's in exactly the same pose. His little arms are now up as he's. His head is heading downward. Yes, but it's like it was just a picture of him standing. If you flipped it over on the grass. nothing has changed, including his hat. But he's like, I think I'll hurt myself. It's like, oh, that's. I mean, to say it that way is really, really raw. It's raw.
Michael: You think the editors interfered? You think he cut killed myself?
Jimmy: I think he self censored himself. But I'm sure that was the original thought, that's how I.
Harold: The third panel kind of suggests he was thinking of hurt because he says, not to worry. I've done this before. But the disturbing thing is, don't worry, I've done this before. I've hurt myself before. I'm like, oh, my gosh, Olaf, we just met.
Jimmy: Yeah, Olaf has deep issues.
Harold: This is like, yeah, I mean, I thought Spike was sad. Olaf, Oh, my gosh.
Jimmy: Well, someone wrote in a while ago and said something about how, Spike, is like Snoopy's shadow. And it's what he would be if he didn't have the gang, you know? And here, well, I mean, here's another dog that's overweight. You know, Snoopy's obsessed with eating. he's depressed. There might be a way to look at these Snoopy, siblings almost as Snoopy surrogates. You know, like, alternate
Harold: the marvel What If is now the Snoopy What If.
Jimmy: Yeah. There but for the grace of the great Pumpkin go I kind of thing, you know. Yeah, but I don't know. That drawing that, like, you described it with the least amount of effort possible. I think I'll hurt myself. I don't know why. It just made me laugh. It could be me.
Harold: But I'm. Dude, I'm glad he has the hat. It seems like it's a good cushion.
Jimmy: Oh, absolutely. It's an approachable hat, and it serves as a safety device.
Harold: I will have to see if I can find that approachable hat for myself. I won't throw myself off of doghouse.
Jimmy: Yeah, don't do that.
January 30, Snoopy's out in the snow, and he's carrying a hockey stick. And he says, I hate playing hockey on Woodstock's home ice. And we go to Woodstock's home ice, which is just a birdbath. And Snoopy says at other rinks, they play the national anthem before the game. And then in the last panel, we see them doing a little dance. And Snoopy, with it really annoyed look on his face, explains here we have to do the hokey pokey.
Liz: That's what it's all about.
Jimmy: That is what it's all about.
Michael: Now, wait a minute. What is. Well, somebody will know. what is the origin of this song? Was it a, was it a hit song?
Jimmy: The hokey pokey? Was it a hit?
Michael: Well, I mean, did it come out as a 45?
Harold: Well, I remember on American Bandstand, they said it had a good beat and you could dance to it.
Michael: What's its origin? Somebody did. Somebody somebody had to have written this song.
Jimmy: The hokey pokey, as it is known in the United States and Canada, or hokey cokey, as it is known in the United Kingdom, Ireland, and some parts of Australia and the Caribbean, is a participation dance with a distinctive accompanying tune. It originates in a british folk dance.
Michael: Somebody's, like, collecting royalties every time somebody does this.
Jimmy: I don't think so. No. No. Because it started in Scotland in 1842. So I don't think anyone's collecting royalties on the hokey pokey.
Harold: But it probably was the first dance craze ever.
Jimmy: Nah ah.
Michael: Or the hocus pocus, as the Latin, the roman version of it.
Jimmy: People just disappeared at the end of it.
Harold: That's what it's all about, is what makes that song.
February 5. Charlie Brown's on the phone. Really? That's terrible. They probably should get a dog. And he walks out while he's saying this. And then he relates, whatever he has heard on the phone to Snoopy. I don't suppose you heard the latest. The house next to us was broken into last night. Charlie Brown continues. They say the best thing for keeping away intruders is a dog who barks and has big fangs. Then he says to Snoopy, let's see your fangs. To which Snoopy flashes a very charming little grin. Charlie Brown walks away saying, maybe we can get a bazooka. To which Snoopy replies, woof.
Jimmy: Now, they already have at least two machine guns at the brown household, so I think the browns, have got it covered home safety wise.
Harold: Oh, it's nice that he has a little inscription. To happy birthday, Meredith, in the last panel up the side of the panel.
Jimmy: Saying, oh, that's so nice.
Liz: And it was your 17th birthday, too, isn't it?
Jimmy: That was my 17th birthday. Yeah, that's right. What I was doing February 5, 1979 or 1989. I don't remember. It must have been a great one.
February 8. Charlie Brown is hanging out in, the beanbag chair watching tv. And, the tv is reporting some news, it seems. And he says thousands of people paraded happily through the streets. But economists predict the cleanup will be costly. Then the next panel. Skies were sunny today, but economists warn that this could cause an increase in the price of sunglasses. And then the third panel, which sends Charlie Brown into his feet up in the air pose, is. Although audiences across the country love the film, economists are saying it will probably lose money.
Jimmy: This is a great one, because first off, economists ruin everything. But this is like, I remember, 1989. This was the year of the Batman movie the Tim Burton Michael Keaton Batman movie, which would come out in just a few months after this and all of the stories after it, you know, around Christmas time and after it had conquered the box office and it had all this merchandise and there were. The VHS were coming out for Christmas, it was. Of course, it still will not make money with famous Hollywood accounting. Well, that's when it got famous, really.
Harold: It's probably happened before, but this is one time when a Peanuts character doesn't talk in a strip. With talking to. That's got to be kind of rare, right? It's all just his reaction with the old classic feet up in the air response. but I don't remember. There's probably one or two, but I don't remember a strip where you. There's dialogue, but it's not one of the characters.
Jimmy: Yeah, there might be another, tv strip at some point that would do that. That's definitely a window for him to do something like that.
Michael: Sally generally throws insults at the tv.
Jimmy: Yeah, that's right. She would usually make a comment.
February 13, Charlie Brown's in a drugstore, it looks like, and he says, yes, ma'am, I'd like to buy a box of Valentine candy for a girl who doesn't know I exist. He continues, no, ma'am, nothing too expensive. I'll never have the nerve to give it to her anyway.
Jimmy: Now that's some classic Charlie Brown consistency going all the way back. Yeah, he has. It's interesting. He has the red haired girl in the strip, and then he makes her move away. Then she kind of comes back without any fanfare. And now we're just assuming, I guess this is still the little red haired girl, but there's no indication of it.
Harold: Right. At least in this one, we find out the next strip that it is.
Jimmy: Yeah, he plays fast and loose with her being part of the neighborhood, it seems like.
Harold: Right? Yeah. Well, and maybe, maybe there's seven little red haired girls. Maybe, you know, he just likes little red haired girls and he just hops from affection to affection. This is a weird observation. It's probably not worth much at all. But I'm interested that Charlie Brown's text, the first line just slowly drops from the top panel border in each successive panel.
Jimmy: Oh, yeah.
Harold: And so the last one looks like it's sunk into the bottom of the board balloon where he's kind of depressed. Yeah. I don't know if that's a thing or not, but I noticed that and it somehow psychologically seemed to help his.
Jimmy: Statement that it really does.
Jimmy: Whether he meant that or not, he might have felt it, you know, just as the artist doing it. Boy, when you stare at these things too long, like looking at ma'am with that apostrophe, it just looks like some sort of alien stitial. It barely looks like a word anymore.
Michael: and I was trying to think of, Did he put enough detail into that dollar bill he's got in his hand?
Jimmy: He's got some jangly black on the dollar bill.
Harold: He has a packet of goomy worms he's trying to buy a card with.
Liz: Goomy?
Jimmy: What? Goomy. Where did you get.
Harold: You don't. Goomi bears. Goomy worms.
Jimmy: gummy.
Liz: It's got a double m.
Jimmy: I'm losing my mind.
Harold: It's German.
Jimmy: It's gummy bear.
Harold: It's goomy.
SFX: Gummy bear.
Jimmy: Oh, my.
Harold: I was introduced to goomy bears. they came from Germany, and my aunt lives in Germany.
Michael: doubling down on goomy.
Jimmy: I understand that it might be correct, but no one else is calling them the Boston Keltics. It's a gummy bear.
Harold: Well, I am.
Jimmy: Okay, well, we'll go see the Keltics and have some goomy bears. It'll be fun.
Harold: All right.
Liz: Would there be any reason to have a fourth panel on this strip?
Harold: What would you see there, Liz?
Liz: No, I don't. I just think it's. It's one where it's perfect with three.
Jimmy: Yeah.
Michael: I'm so used to it now, I don't even notice.
Jimmy: It's. Yeah, that seems crazy. It seems like that should have had such an impact, and it doesn't. After having us read, you know, 16,000, 15,000, whatever it is of it, of these things, but it really doesn't. He mastered it pretty quickly. Except for those one panels. They're hard. they don't always work, I think.
March 9, Pigpen is at the psychiatry booth, and Lucy says to him, here's sort of a suggestion, Pigpen. Maybe you could start by trying to go for just 1 hour without getting dirty. What would happen if you tried that? To which pigpen replies, do you have any Idea how painful a migraine can be?
Michael: No.
Jimmy: I do. Migraines are bad, so if pigpen.
Michael: I never had one.
Jimmy: Oh, really? Oh, God. Well, good. I hope you never do. They can last for days. You know, you get the aura where you can't even look at a light. Oh, it's terrible. So if this is the reason why Pigpen, is filthy, I don't blame him.
Michael: I think it's a little odd that he brings pigpen back for a couple of strips, considering he's two of what are now considered, like, major characters. Hardly appear this year at all. Rerun has one. And Franklin has two or appears in two.
Jimmy: It's-- the Rerun thing is really surprising to me as someone who's read the nineties stuff like we are now. How, many years are we into having Rerun? Like, 15-16 years. And he has runs where it seems like he's making a stab at doing something with him, but then he just, fades away again. And when you see him come back so strong in the nineties, it has to be tied to, I think, Schulz having kids in his life again as grandkids, because, well, when you see it's a. He becomes the center of the whole strip.
Michael: Yeah. I'm curious to see it, but it hasn't happened yet.
Jimmy: Nope.
Harold: It's interesting.
Michael: Now, I wonder if there's any, If Schulz ever said anything about how he chooses which characters to do in a particular strip. I mean, does the gag come first, or does he go, well, I haven't used Lucy enough this year.
Harold: He seemed to suggest that he would start with character. Right. I mean, I've seen things where you talked about the keyboard. Each character is a key on the keyboard, and if you have a good set of characters, it gives you the full range of melody. and that sketching method that we've all seen.
Harold: It just seems like he's starting. He has to start with a specific character. Right. If he's doing the sketch, with them in mind, which leads to the gag.
Jimmy: And then I think, Michael, you're probably right. in, the part of him going, I haven't put in pigpen in a while. Like, I can imagine that being the impetus. And then he sits down with the sketch pad and just starts doodling pigpen and sees what happens to.
Harold: I was looking at this second panel of close up of Lucy in her psychiatric booth and how tortured that vertical line is going down to the.
Michael: And her sleeves there.
Harold: Yeah. There's 16 different individual marks of tremor going down the side of one of those, those posts in her psychiatric booth. It's so weird that you can see, again, talking about process, and when you can see process in the art, how that can sometimes pull me out of it. that's been my concern going into, particularly into the nineties, that I'm going to be having a hard time actually seeing Schulz's. What he's doing with the characters, because I'm going to be seeing the line. I hope that's not the case. I'm generally being sucked into the art. It's usually when we're talking about it and looking at it a second time that that really kind of pops on at me.
Jimmy: So let me ask you a question about this. Let's, does this, is this a cartooning specific thing, or does this extend to, like, fine art? Like, let's say you're looking at a painting where, like a van Gogh versus a renaissance painting where you don't see any of the brushstrokes. You're more attracted to, say, the renaissance, where you don't see the brush strokes.
Harold: I'll just say if I'm looking at a van Gogh, I'm highly aware of the process. And so the overall experience of what the artist was depicting. It's almost like, some people have, like, this perfect pitch thing where they can hear two octaves at the same time. When someone's hitting a note just perfectly, that's like, and it's really cool, but at the same time, it's distracting because it's this strange phenomenon in your ear. So when I look at a van Gogh, it's like, brushstrokes. Starry night brushstrokes. Starry night brush. It's like I'm hopping back and forth, and it's not necessarily a pleasant experience. I mean, I don't really get into Van Gogh stuff that I don't. Maybe that's why. I don't know. But, yeah, a Rembrandt. I can just dive into these, these characters and the shades and stuff, and it's just a hole to me versus me seeing the pieces. And I generally like to see the whole and experience the whole and get pulled into it.
Jimmy: Yeah, it's interesting. Yeah, I feel like I'm the opposite. I had a professor in college, who was also my advisor, this guy Leonard Ragazzais, who was, actually a great artist too. And, I remember him talking about Vermeer once, and he said, you cannot see a brush stroke at all. Vermeer. That's why Vermeer is a saint. And then, we were talking about van Gogh, and he goes, you can see every brush stroke. That is why Van Gogh is a saint.
Harold: I guess you can have it both ways then, I guess.
Jimmy: Yeah, well, he could anyway. R I P. Leonard Ragazzais.
Harold: It'd be interesting to ask the listeners, does this ever, is this ever an issue for you guys, when you can see the pieces that go into a piece of art, is that a cool thing? Do you like to see that? I love to look at, like, a comic strip original piece of artwork where I see the. You know, I'm looking at it really close to see how he did it, but to experience it, I don't like. I don't like it because, I never get the full experience of the thing without it kind of being tainted by distraction. But to look at a Charles Schulz original, that's amazing. You know, see the little pencil lines and this and that all around it.
Jimmy: Yeah. Because you're studying it and taking it in, like, fine art more than reading it. Michael, where do you stand on this? Are you pro seeing the hand of the cartoonist or anti,
Michael: I like technique. I like seeing mastery. And so I will always go for somebody who can do, like, super clean detail and. Yeah. So probably not so much with the brush stroke stuff.
Jimmy: Mm
Michael: I like things that really, really look finished.
Jimmy: Right. All right. I am on my own in this. What about you, Liz? We can make it two to two.
Liz: No, I was thinking about it in terms of film, and noticing when the camera work makes me jump out and say, oh, that's camera work, rather than being involved in the story.
Harold: Yeah, totally. With you on that.
Jimmy: you have to be such a master.
Harold: Yeah.
Jimmy: I think there's a couple moments in Quentin Tarantino movies where it's. The camera moves, either stays where it is, where people move away from it, or, the camera moves to a different position. And it's really interesting because you are so aware in that minute that it's Tarantino showing you something. And I think if you're a fan and this is the kind of thing that happens, you're okay with it. You're like, oh, it feels like a meta thing. I think if you just go into it as a movie, you might be distracted by it because you're not prepared for that sort of interference from the director.
Anyway, okay, guys, so listen, we got another pigpen strip coming up right now, but we're gonna take a break because, you know, we just need to get, some. Some hydration and, get some energy for the other half of this show. So we'll, be back on the other side. Catch you then.
VO: Hi, everyone. We love it when you write or call to tell us how much you enjoy the show. But don't just tell us. Tell your friends. Tell complete strangers. Share your appreciation. In a review, it doesn't have to be on Apple podcasts, 60% of you listen on other apps. Some of those apps have review sections. Think of all the poor Peanuts fans out there who haven't found us yet. There are review instructions on our website@unpackingpeanuts.com. spreadtheword. Thank you for your support. And now let's hear what some of you have to say.
Jimmy: And we're back. So, Liz, I'm hanging out here in the mailbox. Do we got anything?
Liz: We do. We do. A friend of the show, Tim Young, writes again. And he says, from my point of view, Jimmy saw Star wars practically the moment it came out. When he was twelve, his family lived in a small town in southern Iowa with exactly one movie screen. And that theater held over Smokey and the Bandit for what seemed like months. We didn't get to see Star Wars till November.
Jimmy: So disappointing. Yeah. But, I do remember Star Wars being held over for a long time, too. And then I also remember the one that was either concurrent with Star Wars or right before or right after that. They never got rid of was Saturday Night Fever in my local that was there forever.
Liz: Then Christopher Oulette, I hope I'm pronouncing that right-- Oulette-- writes on Facebook, he says, in all the previous episodes, when you talked about Nancy, I thought you were talking about Cathy. I was shocked that it was written by a man and people were still fans. I don't read Nancy, but knowing what strip we're talking about makes it all much more sensible.
Jimmy: Does that help? Listen, I don't know if this is too late, but this is not about the legume. This is actually about the common strip Peanuts. So if there was any confusion there. That's funny. Yeah, I mean, I guess a lot of people, you know, Nancy might not register at all, anymore.
Liz: And then, we have a new listener who seems to be bingeing things on YouTube, because we got a bunch of comments from ice cream hero 2375 1st he writes, or she says, I occasionally get emergency tests when I watch tv because we talked about that.
Harold: Oh, so it's still going.
Liz: And, at one point, we talked about the, animation in the eighties going downhill. And ice cream hero says, I don't know about that. Gem is amazing. It's such a fun show. So are you familiar with the animated series Gem?
Jimmy: I think that that, statement is truly outrageous.
Harold: Gem and the holograms? Yeah. I'm not terribly familiar with it, but my take on it, I was definitely into animation. I was considering becoming an animator in the seventies and eighties. And what I noticed was, yeah, the animation seventies is really, I think, a consistently rough decade for animation. there's definitely exceptions to that. But the thing I noticed, like, on the Saturday morning level was, the Smurfs in the early eighties, when that came out, it was just a little bit better.
Jimmy: Uh-huh.
Harold: And then everybody seemed to kind of raise their game a little bit, every year. And the animation was getting more and more solid. I think a lot of young people who had grown up on, like, the Warner brothers cartoons and the Disney stuff, they got pulled into animation. And I think from the bottom up, in a way, we lost all these master artists and a bunch of young people came in who were just really, really into, why aren't they as good as they used to be? Let's make them what they like, what I like, what I remember, and quite, a renaissance. And then to me, like, the watershed moment was like, 1988 when, like, who framed Roger Rabbit and Little Mermaid came out and then we were off to the races again.
Jimmy: Yeah. The other thing on tv animation that I thought made a, that was kind of a demarcation point was Duck tales. You know, DuckTales was just a better syndicated.
Harold: Yeah, animaniacs, the Steven Spielberg, Warner Bros. Stuff. Yeah. That just was head and shoulders above what had been before. Yeah.
Liz: And ice cream hero continues with, today's episode on September 3. I think “you do” is the funnier punchline, a pause before you do could be pretty funny because Lucy actually had to think about what Charlie Brown said.
Harold: Right? Yeah, I agree. That that's, that does make a funny punchline. Yeah. Well, thanks, ice cream hero. Yeah, that's cool.
Jimmy: Yeah, just a panel of silent reflection always can, make that next panel really hit harder. You can't overuse it. But speaking of overusing it, boy, I was realizing I was doing one facial expression in Tanner Rocks constantly. And I had to go back in and go like, what is wrong with you? And I had to, like, digitally erase a bunch of eyeballs. It looks fine now, people. You won't know, but wow.
Liz: And Sverina also writes on YouTube from episode the 1962 part two. So she or he writes, I, too, begged and bargained for a deferment when told I would have to start kindergarten. just one more good year. I pleaded. I knew it was the beginning of the end.
Jimmy: She was wise, they are wise. I was, excited to go to kindergarten. I couldn't wait. And I can't. I remember, like, week two going, oh, no, I thought it would be. I thought it'd be great.
Harold: I thought that was a step up from nursery school personally, but that's just me.
Jimmy: We did not have nursery school in Girardville.
Liz: That's it for comments and mail. Do, you have anything on the hotline?
Jimmy: Got two things from the hotline. We heard from Todd Webb again. he wrote because he forgot to say some stuff while he was on. He left a message for us and, we'll play it right here.
Todd: Hey, guys, it's Todd Webb. we had such a fun chat the other day that something slipped right through my brain that I had wanted to bring up. While we were talking about that 1980 819 89 era of Peanuts. One of the things I noticed when I was reading, specifically in 1989, was there was a couple of strips that struck me as, Calvin and Hobbes ish. in particular, there was one in February, February 6, 1989, where the kids were sledding in a toboggan and they flew off the cliffs and tumbled through the air, much like the famous Calvin and Hobbs routine. and, had a casual conversation while they were doing it, which is what made me think of Calvin and Hobbes. there was also a bunch of strips of them leaning against tree trunks. And there's a strip in, November, I believe it's the 19th, a Sunday strip of, 1989, where Peppermint Patty is making a series of silly faces, which looks just like one of the more famous Calvin and Hobbes strips, which I didn't check the date on that Calvin strip, which I probably should have, but, I'll let you guys do that. But anyway, my question, and thing I wanted to point out was, it's so obvious, throughout the years where Schulz influenced other newspaper strips and they did Peanuts esque things. but it's a rare instance when that seems to boomerang back the other direction. And it seems like 1989, Calvin and Hobbes has been around for a few years, definitely climbing up the popularity charts. And, it seems like Schulz was trying to put his own spin on some of the things that Watterson was trying with, the king in his comic, which is wildly different than the Peanuts kingdom, but still, share some of the same common strip DNA of, you know, kids view of the world. So I just thought that would be something fun to, discuss amongst yourselves since I'm not there right now. And that's all I got for you. Be of good cheer.
Harold: Yeah, yeah, definitely, definitely. Them going down the hill in some vehicle is something that Skippy did, and then. And then Watterson did. I mean, Percy Crosby Skippy from the thirties. Well, there you go.
Jimmy: Oh, a bunch of kids in some sort of vehicle heading down a hill out of control, which is very reminiscent of my childhood. I had a go kart that looks exactly like. If you've ever read Amelia, it looks exactly like Reggie's amazing, mobile, and it did not have brakes, and it did not have a steering wheel.
Liz: Well, you called out Watterson in one of our very first episodes, saying that he stole it from Schulz. something where I think Snoopy was sliding off of the doghouse.
Jimmy: Oh, really? I remember saying that it was the snowmen, sculptures that were. But I don't know. But yes. So thank you, Todd. Always good to hear from Todd. And then we heard from somebody.
Myster caller: Hey, everybody. this is going to be a mysterious caller. I'd rather not reveal my identity. Just a long time listener. First, time caller. I was just thinking about, what Jimmy, screwed up there with the Pulitzer Prize winners. And I think I know what the problem was. I think in his mind, he was outraged about the fact that Trudeau won a Pulitzer before Pfeiffer. But then, in the heat of the moment, I think he transferred his unnecessary outrage to Breathed winning before Trudeau. But you really can't tell with that guy because he's nuts. Anyway, keep up the good work. I'll keep listening. Be of good cheer. The masked caller.
Harold: Well, be of good cheer masked caller.
Jimmy: You know, first off, I think that makes a lot of sense. You're obviously a, very bright person, and I have to say, I think, you sound kind of hot. I'm assuming this is a very handsome man,. So thank you for writing. Yeah.
Liz: And a little concerned about righteousness, I think.
Jimmy: All right, so that's the mailbox, huh?
Harold: Huh?
Liz: That's it. All right, thanks, everybody.
Jimmy: Yeah. We always love hearing from you. You can write to us at, ah, unpackingpeanuts@gmail.com, leave a message there on YouTube, or follow us on our socials, which I will give you at the end of the episode. But right now, let's go back to the strips.
Pigpen's still hanging out at the psychiatrist, booth here on March 10, and he says, do you think you're going to be able to help me? And Lucy replies, I don't know, Pigpen. When I look at you, all I see is dirt and dust. You don't need a psychiatrist. You need an archaeologist.
Jimmy: It's a bit of a callback.
Michael: That's a good punchline.
Jimmy: Yeah, he did one something like this, right? in the Christmas special, at least, and I'm sure was from one of the strips about how he carries the dust of ancient civilizations on him.
Harold: Classic.
Jimmy: For a character who has only one joke, he is iconic worldwide.
Harold: Pretty amazing.
March 14, it's a baseball game. Schroeder is out at the mound. Given Charlie Brown the signals, and he says, one finger will mean a fastball and two fingers a curve. Charlie Brown says, what about three fingers? Schroeder, walking back to the plate, says, three fingers will mean, let him hit it, and we'll all go home. And then Charlie Brown says, I'd be crazy to ask about four fingers.
Jimmy: this is not good strategy. After all these thousands of baseball game, letting them hit the ball will not make you go home earlier.
Harold: So they did not have sandlot rules of once you have x number of runs.
Jimmy: Ten runs, that's a long time. And you still have to play five innings.
Harold: Well, what if these were nine runs down? Would this. Would that be true for shorter if they'd already given us a nine runs?
Jimmy: That's true if we're in the middle. But why? No, it has to be for the game, because why would he be giving the signals now? That could be why they're nine runs down.
Harold: Yeah. He's like, you know, maybe we should have a chat.
Jimmy: To sum up, there's deep problems with this baseball team.
March 19. One, of them, there symbolic panels. We have a kite, with Charlie Brown's head upside down on it. And then in the next panel, we see him and Sally working on the kite. And he says to her, hold it just like that. Thank you. And then as he's setting up his kite, she says to him, I don't understand you. Why do you keep trying to fly these kites when you always get them tangled around a tree? It always happens. Sometimes you don't even get out of our yard. Charlie Brown's ignoring all this, and he walks outside, or he walks towards the door anyway. And Sally yells out after him, wouldn't it be funny if you didn't even make it out the front door? And then we see in the last panel that is what happened. Charlie Brown says, very funny. And we see his kite got tangled in the coat rack in the foyer.
Harold: That's a gorgeous last panel.
Jimmy: Yeah.
Harold: Really?
Liz: And it's sometimes called a coat tree.
Harold: Yeah. Right?
Michael: Yeah.
Jimmy: Yeah.
Harold: Look at that.
Jimmy: Even better.
Harold: But that front door. I don't remember seeing that front door at the, at the house. I don't even know how they open it. That's. You have to kind of jump and have arms in your head to get out the front door. I'm not as worried about the coat rack as I am Charlie Brown being able to get outside, but I just love that art. That is so pretty.
Jimmy: Yeah, it looks really good.
Harold: Now. Schulz is doing something in the last two or three years. I'm not a huge fan of it. The pupil that has the line through it, cutting off the top part of it. So it looks like your eye is half open. We see it in the second panel in the symbol I passed next to the symbolic one with Charlie Brown as he's saying, hold the kite, Sally. And then you see it in the final panel as well. Just the line, line through the pupils, which is to kind of show that you're, I don't know, you can mean you're, you're a little haughty. It could mean you're nonplussed. It could mean you're not.
Jimmy: Because he, on the one hand, in the second panel, it's like he's just professionally putting his kite together.
Harold: Ah.
Jimmy: So it's, it's a very subtle thing to try to capture with one dot of ink. Interesting. Oh, you know, one thing I was thinking that you were talking recently, a few episodes ago, Harold, about, You don't like it when the line is across and it shows them being like disaffected throughout. Like, you talked about tumbleweed like that. And I think what it is, is I think it's a great look, but it's only. But it's salt. It's a seasoning and you know what I mean? And when you have salt soup, it's not good. Nobody wants. You want it, you have to use it.
Harold: Yeah. And I, I guess it became a thing particularly, I think, in the eighties for, Schulz would use it, this kind of thing often for a character who's a jerk, who just shows up like tibbled or whatever and just being a really jerky person and then taking the air of Garfield. The half open eye is the whole strip. And it's kind of this dull cynicism that's supposed to be cool. And I'm like, yeah, no thanks.
Jimmy: Yeah, it's the whole strip that's the issue. you don't have all those notes on the keyboard if you're, if every one of them is minor.
Harold: Yeah, yeah, it's. Yeah. It's just like, I don't know. It's like asking you to go along with something that's maybe not the best. That's kind of the weird feeling it has to me sometimes.
March 26. It's a Sunday, and Charlie Brown is reading a book, in his easy chair. And he says to himself, I bet he's still sleeping. And then we see him go out to the doghouse, and in the second tier, the strip starts off. Charlie Brown says, don't you think it's about time you got up? And we see Snoopy, tucked in very snugly in a sleeping bag on top of his doghouse. And he says to himself, it was cold last night. I thought I was going to freeze to death. Well, I'm not going to be the only one who's getting up, he says. And then, having extricated himself from the sleeping bag, he yells, okay, everybody out. And we see a ton of little birds, the Beagle scouts and maybe a few of their friends come tumbling out of Snoopy's sleeping bag.
Jimmy: I just love that last panel. I love the Idea of Snoopy having a sleepover with all the little birds in his, in his sleeping bag. I think it's really cute.
Harold: Yeah.
Liz: Do the birds have something? What is that dark area on the birds? I'm looking on go comics, and it's not real clear.
Jimmy: That's their feet. It's just blurry because of go comics.
Harold: I mean, yeah, you got wing, foot, foot, wing.
Jimmy: Oh, okay.
Harold: And they're all, like, next to each other. They look like a little, little accordion.
March 27. Oh. Linus is sitting, enjoying the day, and, across his path comes the good old world famous lawyer. And, Linus quotes, the lawyer is evermore the leader in society. Snoopy hears this and thinks to himself, I like that. I don't understand it, but I like it.
Harold: So we've had the lawyer ones popping up every so often for the last years. And I'm guessing that Schulz not only having had to go through legal things simply because, well, when you're a multimillionaire, it seems like people wind up in court for various reasons. And I don't think he's an exception. But Snoopy, it just seems like he has this book of quotations, and every once in a while he'll just pull it out and start to go through things to find a gag or whatever. But I did look this one up. I was just like, okay, what exactly is this quote? And it's, it's from, 1895 Law. Yale Law Journal.
Jimmy: Oh, I thought it was 1896. Okay, all right.
Harold: Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's a common misnomer. Misconception, I guess, but, yeah. So I, think it was the supreme, court justice at the time. That was the beginning of his Yale Law journal article. And then we see it again on the 14 April, there's a he who cannot dance puts blame on the floor is another quote. So I'm guessing Schulz has some quotation books, and that's a hindu or african proverb, depending on who you're asking. So, yeah, I think what better way to get the juices flowing than to crack out the old quote book and see if you can get a good script.
Jimmy: It's great to have a character for, like, Linus who can just do it, and it seems like, yeah, it's a reasonable. Linus could know that off the top of his head.
Harold: Yeah. Right, right.
Liz: What kind of a hat is that?
Michael: It's a lawyer hat.
Jimmy: it's official lawyer hat.
Harold: It's a lawyer in hat. It's an approachable lawyer in hat.
Jimmy: Do you think? I don't think that. I don't think a bowler is approachable. I think it's supposed to be a bowler.
Liz: The brim is too big for a bowler.
Harold: Okay, so it's like Pharrell wearing a lawyer hat.
Jimmy: It's a pharrell lawyer hat.
Liz: Harold, don't choose that one.
Jimmy: Yeah, that's not a good one.
Harold: No. Okay. I'll refrain.
March 28. Lucy and Linus are on the, couch, and they're watching some tv, and Lucy says to Linus, do you think people ever really change? To which Linus says, sure. I feel I've changed a lot this past year. To which Lucy replies, I meant for the better.
Michael: she gets some zingers off this year.
Jimmy: She does. I think this works well as a two panel strap.
Liz: Yeah.
Harold: So you don't think it would be better if Linus's response in her response to him were separated by a panel?
Jimmy: That doesn't bother me. I think it actually, gives the zinger extra punch because it's so fast.
Liz: Yep.
Harold: Okay.
Jimmy: But I think. But if it was three panels, it would work fine as well.
Jimmy: Pretty fancy looking couch there.
Harold: Yeah. Stipitone does wonders to your house.
Liz: Not an Ektorp, because it has that mound in the middle.
Jimmy: Yes.
Harold: The Ektorp. Yes.
March 29. Peppermint Patty is playing Charlie Brown's team in a baseball game, and Marcie is behind the plate for Peppermint Patty's team. So she says to Pepper and Patty, I'm your new catcher, sir. And she's all decked out in her gear. Pepper and Patty says, you look good, Marcie. To which Marcie says, are we going to have any omens? Pepper and Patty says, signs, Marcie. Marcie says, whatever.
Michael: He uses that punchline a lot? too. that's always good for a laugh.
Jimmy: I think baseball signs should be called omens. I like it. And then, oh, this is some exciting stuff going on. This is going to be real grist for the mill in terms of Marcie's psychology.
So on March 31, Marcie walks up to the mound with Peppermint Patty on it, and she says to her, let's give Charles the old bean ball right now, sir. Which, if you're not a baseball fan, means plunking him in the head. Peppermint Patty says, Marcie, I can't believe you. Then Marcie walks back to the, plate and says, it's the new morality, sir. Win at all costs. Then she sits up behind the plate with Charlie Brown at the plate, ready to bat, and says to him, I'm very fond of you, Charles, but stay loose.
Harold: Wow. Yeah. That is a revelation about Marcie. She's all about the proper etiquette when you're at the tiny tots concerts, but when it comes to sports, she's pretty loose with sports. She's like, I don't like this stuff. Anything goes.
Jimmy: I'm very fond of you, but we're going to bean you now. that's our last strip for this episode, though, so that means that we are going to end on a cliffhanger. Does Charlie Brown get beaned? Does Marcie go to jail for, manslaughter? You're gonna have to find out.
So I hope you will come back next week. Until then, if you want to keep the conversation going, there are several different ways you could do it. The first thing you could do is you could go hop over there to unpackingpeanuts.com and you sign up for the Great Peanuts reread. That will give you, one email a month, a little newsletter that lets you know what we're going to be talking about on this here show. Also, if you want to keep in touch with us on social media, we are unpackpeanuts on Instagram and Threads and unpackingpanuts on Facebook, Bluesky, and YouTube. And we love to hear from you, because when I don't hear, I worry. But that's it for this week, so come back next week with more of 1989. It'll be just as much fun. From Michael, Harold, and Liz this is Jimmy saying be of good cheer.
MH&L: Yes, be of good cheer.
VO: Unpacking Peanuts is copyright Jimmy Gownley, Michael Cohen and Harold Buchholz produced and edited by Liz Sumner Music by Michael Cohen additional voiceover by Aziza Shukralla Clark. For more from the show, follow unpack Peanuts on Instagram and threads unpacking Peanuts on Facebook, blue sky, and YouTube. For more about Jimmy, Michael, and Haroldh, visit unpackingepanuts.com. have a wonderful day and thanks for listening.
Harold: Wing, foot, foot, wing.