Super Pogo!

While looking for certain archived comic images, there are some things that pop up that are so unusual that you feel compelled to share them with the world and remind them that such things existed back when nobody was paying that much attention.

Superheroes have made a strong comeback in theaters after languishing on the funny pages for ages, but that's only after they distilled away the most essential elements, and removed all the overwrought narratives, the multi-story arcs that demanded intense attention and knowledge of what was going on in other books in the company line, and artwork that was wonky and incomprehensible at best.  (Nowadays, movies have the same creative problems that plagued comics, but that's a lecture for another time, preferably not by me)

The Superhero resurgence may have started with Blade, but the jumpstarter was Tim Burton's Batman, which radically changed the usual audience perception of the cheesy Adam West version, which was still fresh in the majority's mind, years after Frank Miller's Dark Knight take on the character.  That may have been in mind when the briefly revived Pogo strip by Doyle and Sternecky diverged in a brief parody that's just as overwrought with creative narrative bombast as the double-entendre laden monologue that influenced Tracer Bullet.  The first part (in colour) can be seen here:


After this, things get a little trickier to figure out.  Sadly, the text is so faded away in parts that it's practically illegible.  Fortunately, I took a closer look and deducted most of what was written:

Panel 4: Bright Knight Picks a Fight: A fortunate sudden downpour saves our hero from a flaming end, but now he must lock jaws with the big ultimate foe himself!
Panel 5: Caption: Mudgeopolous at Dinnertime
Bright Knight: Alright, at the count of five.  1, 2...
Boy Pogo: Halfa sammich Goofus?
Goofus: Thanks Boy Pogo.  Us Arch Enemies allus travels on our stomachs.
Panel 7: 1989 OGPI! Distributed by the L.A. Times Syndicate!  (Until I found a clearer copy above, I thought the text at the bottom panel read: Must Obey! Receiver by The L.A. Times Syndicate!)

And that's where our adventures end.  If anybody wants to see the rest of the story for themselves, they're free to buy a physical copy of the six issues that supposedly make up this run.

Then, at the other end of the spectrum, we have some promotional material that are quite frankly, some of the most amateurish childish drawings ever done.  And the blotted black and white images of the quality coloured pictures don't help.

You'd think a franchise as large as Little Caesars would've been able to splurge for higher quality.  The left hand side is also take up not just by the title, but also an accompanying stand-alone panel that's just as amateurish as the rest of the comic.

And like the Pogo comic earlier, it ends on a cliffhanger.  Good luck trying to find the conclusion to this thrilling epic, assuming anybody bothered to save a copy for themselves, and weren't embarrassed to keep one for themselves.  (If artist Calvin Crosby is reading this, I apologize for my unflinching criticism)  I'm not even gonna bother transcribing the inane script here, save for the last panel:

Panel 7: This is (sp)Sobt.  She is Caesar Man's Girlfriend.  She hears his request.  BUT WILL SHE SAVE THE DAY?

The Superhero genre has permeated everything from Archie to Garfield (who's more suited as the Caped Avenger than the Liefeldian Pet Force), but not everything deserves to be shoehorned into a specific formula, no matter how much diehard fans insist on saying so.  Further proving that not everything can be improved by simply slapping a spandex outfit over a persona in the vain hopes of attracting a wider audience, is the long-forgotten instance of Cheerios branching out its brand into the unusual field of two Laurel & Hardy types with the tagline of "It's Applelicious!  And Cinnamoncredible!" which never quite caught on, for some reason.


Most of their time is spent bickering over which part of the cereal sprinkles these bad guys are more interested in, the apple or the cinnamon, but it never lasts for long before they decide to whup some baddie's behind.  With minimal effort, mind you - it's not like they have to actually WORK for it.

Despite their potentially limited appeal, the height of their relevance ultimately culminated in a minute-long advertisement staring a very familiar-looking 'gator Kart-Racing Villain.

Save for those annoying sponsors on Sesame Street, today's kids don't even know what Commercials ARE.
Whether this should be lamented or celebrated depends on your fondness for unskippable jingles that   Media Watchdogs have been complaining about merchandise being solely targeted at children for ages.  But at this current rate, TV shows and movies that are naked merchandising adverts for comics, toys & cards are the only likely places for advertised commercial franchises to be seen in the first place.

Bone of Discontent

Jeff Smith's all-ages comic, Bone is a perpetual seller, rising from the ruins of a broken comics market that had increasingly marketed itself to older audiences with very little in regard for younger readers who'd be more interested in alternate literature more suited to their tastes.

And a protagonist named after a reoccurring Don Martin character.

So it was somewhat of a letdown when the serial which was mentioned by the author/artist to run somewhere between 60 to 100 issues to its conclusion, only to finish at a paltry 55 issues instead.  The rigid self-imposed high production values that required further delays between releases of individual issues may have had something to do with it, as well as the need to rush towards an inevitable conclusion.  The Dragonslayer arc had plenty of buildup, which frustrated readers waiting for a payoff, which Jeff Smith rationalized as saying that even events in World War II had certain events play out before they came to fruition.

That would've been fine and all, only after finally getting a good segue into the start of the war at the 27th issue, things started derailing with Rock Jaw, the weakest of the Bone arcs, with a third party character who for all his massive strength and impressive physical presence, wound up not having much influence over the course of events.  You could cut out all the scenes Rock Jaw appeared in, and not lose anything of importance.  A scene that I'm sad never got included was where Grandma Ben got in a fight with Rock Jaw, which would've been worth the price of admission.

Why didn't this make the cut?

The first draft of Bone, Thorn: Tales from the Lantern was somewhat crude, with self-depreciating author inserts and adhering to a rigid 4-panel comic strip layout, but had several side characters that didn't make the final cut.  One of which was Voochko the Russian pig, easily the largest instance of Pogo influence, right down to the constant wordplay.

Okay, this might not be as much of a loss.

Even so, there were divergent pathways the LOTR / Looney Toons mashup could've taken that I'm disappointed weren't explored, especially since in an early interview, Jeff Smith introduced the Cow Race as a one-off joke that led to a wider expansion of the village and its residents.  That was something that Majora's Mask and multiple One Piece arcs handle quite well.

"I never anticipated doing the Cow Race.  I just thought Gradma Ben was a weird old lady, she raised cows, and maybe there was a cow race.  But I was never going to show it, it was just a joke.  But as it went, it just had to happen.  I just had to draw this cow race.  Things like that will hopefully come up all the time. (...)  The reason I did it is because it did move the story along.  I've seen a lot of fantasy stories, Lord of the Rings quest types, and oftentimes, the basic format is: A little group of friends go on a quest to defeat the big enemy.  You never see the world that's in danger.  You never meet the villagers.  Or, the big sorcerer's going to conquer the world, and make everyone his slaves.  But if you don't know who the slaves are going to be, the people that are in danger, it's hard to care.  That's part of the reason I'm using the Cow Race, even though it's just completely stupid hijinx.  It actually has a huge "Move the Story" purpose, in that once this is over with you will have seen a day in the town, you'll have met a lot of the people.  You'll actually have a memory that there is a town, and that there are people there who are in danger."  

After, that, I was expecting to see new potential avenues that would've been explored, and was let down when we were given digressions on old vendettas onto Dragons and old men offering stinky cheese that went nowhere, giving me a feeling of squandered potential.  It's not as if I was expecting seemingly inconsequential events in earlier chapters to suddenly have greater implications and meaning later on, but my fondest Bone memories are from those early funny volumes where the possibilities were unlimited.  And then, those probabilities were dashed with what we were given.

One-off characters like Bone's brief bare-shirted muscular rival at the Cow Race carnival and Ted's bigger brother who was a one-off visual gag, were and never seen or referenced again.  For the most part, that was fine, since they had their parts to play, and those roles were over and done.  As the stage saying goes, "There are no small actors, only small parts".  It was just more difficult to reconcile with the later "important" secondary characters that we felt no emotional lingering for.  Bigger sins were the Bone spin-offs Tall Tails, staring a Bone who's a cross between Popeye and Scrooge McDuck, and Rose, Grandma Ben's backstory, which should've been engaging comic stories in their own right, but hardly proved to be the compulsive re-readable tomes they could've been.

Some of the things that disappointed me (in addition to missing out of using Archie's iconic slap-face disbelief circles) were some theories that never panned out:

Fone Bone was later signified to have some kind of link to the Dreaming that Thorn and The Hooded One were connected to.  This was slightly hinted at in this pivotal scene in Rock Jaw:

Smiley Bone even said "Maybe it's not Moby Dick, maybe it's you!" If it turned out that Fone Bone had the natural ability to make anybody fall asleep just by reciting Moby Dick, that would've made him a massive status effect caster, plunging anybody within hearing distance into a dreamlike state.  Considering that was pretty much the Hooded One's ultimate goal, it's too bad this option never got explored.

Going further with the Hooded One, in the first appearance, I noticed that both T.H.O. and Smiley Bone had a somewhat similar outline.

I thought it would've been somewhat hilarious (in my mind, anyways) if Smiley Bone tried to sneak through enemy territory by disguising himself up in ratty clothing and holding his nose up high while speaking in a nasal tone to any Rat Creatures that'd dare to venture too closely.  Naturally, this plan would fall apart in 5 seconds of anybody paying attention, but it'd be fun to see him try.

I wasn't the only one let down.  I compiled some of the longer commentary from a forum that appropriately enough, had the subject title:

Jeff Smith’s massive BONE

Was anyone else really disappointed by the ending? Twelve years of suspenseful build up and they defeat the main villain by touching a wall? Some mystical hoo ha that Smith came up with in the last third of the work. Surely, he could have come up with something cleverer than that!

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I’m with Allen about the climax.

The PREVIOUS death of Briar, on pages 824-831, was SOOO much better. The hilarious payoff/reveal of Phoney’s balloon, Briar’s pathetic realization that she’d failed (p827-828), the locusts gushing out of her body as she dies, and that eerie shot of her two tied-off halves on pg 831 -- now THAT’S a climax!

When I read that issue and realized the story hadn’t ended yet, I assumed it was because Smith had an even bigger and better climax in store, and was elated by the prospect. But after this lame finale, I’m thinking maybe that other climax was the REAL ending of the original story Smith wrote in college. Maybe he couldn’t wrap up all the loose ends that quickly in the comic book version, so he just kept going and improvised another, weaker death for Briar at the end?

I was also disappointed by Lucius’s death. He’s gone for ages, then he pops in for 2 pages, gets blown over by a small explosion, and while he’s off panel we’re informed he’s dead. Whaa--?

Plus, that whole winter the Bones spend with Thorn before returning to Boneville. What happened there? What transpired between Bone and Thorn that convinced him not to stick around? That pace-killing, months-long wait doesn’t appear to do anything for the story, other than give Smith a chance to work in the Christmas episode and the snowfall scene. Shades of Dave Sim’s procrustean digressions.

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As a general reply to Allan,

Yes, the ending was pretty much a let down. I started collecting bone back in the mid 90s when I was yet another angsty teen into angry-man-with-guns stories. Bone was the first story that got me seeing straight through the art and into the story, and seeing the art and writing both equally defining the characters, story and world. It was almost too much for a young mind to take. It was fantastic.

I went from poor teenager to poor student, spotted issue 21 on Image and delved back in. I collected it up til almost the end of the Dragon slayer story and it stayed that way for a few years. I re-read those issues again and again and leant them to all and sundry. “Trust me! You’ll love this!” About a year ago I had the cash to catch up. Started racing through the TPB’s, first buying Dragon Slayer! And then - Rock Jaw!.. then... umm... and... ghost circles... and... there’s a giant bee... and some Jedi mind tricks people... aaah... something about a crown of horns?... and didn’t they already kill Briar?... more Jedi intrigue... and yesterday I brought Crown of Horns. And a big thing came. And then somebody Knew What They Had To Do. And then one of the greatest characters from the shorter collection for so many years appears, KingDok, and it was like he walked out of the past unannounced. And you remember how good it used to be. And then he dies. And Lucius Down, whose argument with Phoney Bone over the running of the Barrelhaven is the single best piece of characterization/tension/plot climaxing ever, climbs out of a rock, yells something macho, falls over and dies.

I have a few theories on this ending. One, is that Jeff Smith saw The Two Towers and Princess Mononoke and something with the ol’ Mystical Jedi Mind Tricks people in it. He’s been drawing the best 1 page gags and 3 page arguments and 2 page pieces of travel characterization for ten years, and he’s had it up to here with being subtle and ingenious. So before you know it, there’s a wriggling worm (dragon) covered possessed beast, a last stand against overwhelming odds on a battlement, and a sweet Secret Weapon to defeat the hordes with.

The other thought I had was that I’ve been re-reading the first 25 odd issues of bone for roughly six years, and gaining more from them each time. Then in one year I finished the two other thirds of the story and there’s so many characters you have to start dealing with. Of course he can’t flesh them all out - and in many ways there’s a redundancy about some of them. I hated the Rockjaw story (part five) the first time I read it, but even that was pretty cool compared to what else happened. I lost touch more and more with Bone as a world and a group of people. I could tell you my fifteen favourite scenarios from the first part of the trilogy, but the only thing I remember from 5 onward was Fone and Smiley telling Thorn that Phoney raised them back in Boneville - which suddenly made the three Bones relationship clear. And apart from that, everyone Knew What They Had To Do and sort of cruised along and did it. Via droughts and magical limbo lands and Jedi Mind Tricks.And they stopped talking to each other.

I don’t hate Bone at all. It kicks the ass out of many other titles on the shelves. None of them get an essay like this about them from me. It had to end, and it could’ve been extremely tragic. It just seemed like a different story. Though it’s somewhat of a letdown, Jeff Smith’s still a huge influence on my own drawing and (attempts at) comics, and Bone is still the pride of my comics collection.

Nb: This was my first post - apologies, the rest won’t be this long and painful

_______________________________________

Not painful in the least, Matt. Those are some great observations.

Yeah, it’s sad that much of what made the book special kind of deflated after the Dragonslayer sequence. I also kind of got frustrated with the whole Bone/Thorn flirtation. About halfway through, it stopped progressing altogether right through to the end. I kept waiting for at least a kiss. Don’t they even get to smooch? Sheesh.

It really is a testament to the power of the earlier stuff that so many of us kept reading through some pretty well-trod territory. It’s kind of like, when you have static characters, there’s only so many ways you can keep restating the same personality traits. Phoney and Smiley looking for the hidden treasure in the walls of whatever that city was supposed to be sure didn’t open anything new about those characters. We’d already seen that bit three times!

I think I kept holding on for a slam-bang ending, which I figured was going to be a cleverly planned out crescendo he must’ve had in mind for years. Instead, it was the series’ biggest disappointment. Whatta letdown.

_______________________________________

Yeah, I was interested in how he was going to resolve that one. “Bone will be heartbroken if he can’t win her love, but they’re different species, so how could it work?” It was one of the story’s two or three most central conflicts.

But then it was like he realized at some point that “waitaminute -- these two can’t get together! That would be too weird!” So instead of resolving it, he just let it fall by the wayside.

As a Day in June

Classic Pogo comic:

Pogo: What is so rare as a day in June?
Churchy: Well, the 29th of February is plenty rare, but the 57th of November is even rarest.
Pogo: Huh! There isn’t a 57th of November. It hasn’t got one.
Churchy: Well, what could be rarer than that?


















The answer to the scarcity of a nonexistent date would be a golfing comic in FBOFW. We also get to see the early prototype for Michael’s planned facial hair for when he was emulating his Zonker Harris stage while at College. It’s not quite on the same level of Anthony’s pornstache, but it certainly looks better.







Lynn hardly put much stock in sports, even though her kids were regular hockey players in their youth, and was one of the few cartoonists who didn't pump out mediocre filler material of her family going on golfing outings. Here, she betrays that proud heritage with the publication of a single one-panel joke, complete with accompanying commentary strip. It may be a one-shot, but it still feels somewhat disappointing to see her pander to common taste.

















Another side of rarity would be a house full of invisible bugs that was similar to those empty rooms full of ninjas. This drove me nuts as a kid, because I could only find three of the present escapees, and was wondering where all the others had gone to. It didn’t occur to me that they must’ve gone offscreen years later.



















How often do you see animal fecal material talked about in the funny pages? Depends on how much the characters involved own pets, and have to clean up their mess, usually represented by the abundance of stink lines just hovering above the ground below eye level. However, given how much attention Lynn paid on doing toilet jokes during her new-runs phase, this isn’t exactly new territory. It wasn’t new material that absolutely needed to be told to fill in the blanks, which was why FBOFW’s popularity plummeted in its declining years.







Ironically enough, Mike Peters of Mother Goose & Grim fame (who Lynn is good friends with, and likes his sense of humour) once regulated about a certain criticism about Grimmy’s constant habit of drinking out of the toilet. One of his readers complained that she didn’t want Grimmy to do that, because it “might influence her own dogs to drink out of the toilet”.

As long as we’re talking about the filthy nature of bathroom habits, we might as well take a cheap pot shot from behind.



















Tempting as it is to downplay the amount of gardening Elly did as opposed to her housework, there’s a fair number of strips that show her working on her flowers, or being appalled at the damage Farley did while nuzzling up in her flowerbeds. However, all that activity was later shifted over to Lawrence who was in agriculture (i.e., flowers) and was the only applicable job that would fit his “gay” persona.














You know what you don’t see too much of nowadays, next to novels with the words THE END in them? Cereal boxes containing plastic prizes in them.

















Remember the good old days when there would be dozens of animated commercials for sugar cereal? Until concerned parents decried out the possibility that they might choke on the plastic toys (which is why the US can't enjoy Kinder Surprise), that these things aimed at children might cause them to get fat that got them pulled off the air. Given the current war to label sugar as a harmful substance on par with tobacco, they certainly succeeded on that front, but at the cost of entertaining slots between Saturday Morning Cartoons. I never bought any of the stuff they advertised, but always enjoyed seeing the continuing adventures of cereal mascots such as the Honey Nut Bee, Sugar Bear, Toucan Sam, Lucky, the Twik Rabbit, Sonny the Cuckoo Bird, Snap Crackle & Pop, the Cookie Crisps cop/thieves, Tony Tiger, Cap’n Crunch, and the Flintstone’s Pebbles.










This was also the cover for the 1995 Calendar.

Weird Romance: Mary Beth

You wouldn't think of Shoe having much romantic interest, since there's a generally all-male cast, with the exception of Roz the waitress and Shoe's secretary, Muffy Hollandaise. The former is efficient, but harried and unattractive, and the latter's such a minor character who hardly showed up or had much presence, and has been mostly forgotten by now. However, there was a reoccurring theme that was returned to at various intervals at Skyler's school - his infatuation with a certain Mary Beth.


































For most of her appearances, she was often regulated to being an offscreen presence, much like the Red-Haired girl in Peanuts. In addition, she appeared to be much more competent and smarter than the nerdy bird, making her something more of a unconquerable rival than a potential soulmate. No matter what Skyler would do, Mary Beth would do better.












Further confounding the issue are two other Marys who were briefly mentioned and quickly forgotten - Mary Beth Lederman (who was just Mary Beth Malarkey offscreen) and Mary Lou Fencepost who was also a cheerleader, though a more intimidating one. Until I checked their last names, I thought they were the same person, and had undergone a serious weight-loss program.


































Whatever the reason, Jeff MacNelly continued to return to the Mary Beth name, until he felt comfortable with the Malarkey surname. Presumably because it referenced the most famous Pogo caricature of all time.


































Skyler's most frequent encounters with Mary Beth were during Football games, which went as well as you would expect. While the general formula in Sports Manga is "small & cute will always win over big & ugly", that outlook doesn't work out as well in America given Skyler's obvious handicaps. His small size made him an eternal underdog in the face of the oppressive force of the opposing team (and fellow teammates), yet he always somehow wound up in a crucial position in these group sports.


































In another Peanuts parallel, he was regularly the baseball pitcher, with Charlie Brown's equal success rate. One wonders why any team would bother having Skyler there, let alone why he would join in the first place, since intellect is more his forte. I suspect he was being coerced into these things, which thanks to the abolishing of Gym class in schools nowadays, has become something less of an identification issue, and helped increase obesity, which could play a part in Perfessor Cosmo Fishhawk's increased current presence to an aging audience. (How often has Skyler appeared in the current Shoe strips since Jeff MacNelly died?)

















For the most part, Mary Beth Malarkey seems to be totally oblivious to Skyler's affections in her, save for when the little skylark indulges in one of his fantasies. They're not quite as outlandish as Calvin's, and they're more sports-related than usual, but they're certainly no less divided than any dream of a young athlete doing his best to impress the girl. Only problem is, her portrayal is all over the map. She's affectionate in one strip, then totally dismissive in another. This inconsistency may explain why it's not a reciprocal relationship and more of a crush than anything else .












(Minor note - until I started watching Breaking Bad, I had no idea that Skyler was a gender-neutral name)

Pogo Noir

As promised, here’s the second half of the Calvin influence. The previous example might’ve only been used for a few math strips, but this should leave no doubt of where Tracer Bullet originally came from.


































This becomes even more evident when faced with the use of shadows and the narrative wordplay on the first page. Bill Watterson once mentioned that he bought his father a Pogo book with the intention of giving it as a present to his father. Only, when he cracked it open to see the contents, he wound up keeping it, and his father never got the gift. That was probably Pogo's Peek-a-Book, since it has this, and the previous story. In fact, this comes right after Mother Goosery Rinds. Fantagraphics may have gotten the rights to reprinting the newspaper strips, but there’s nothing about Walt’s Kelly’s other stuff. It’s amazing he was able to pump out this extra stuff in addition to his dailies and Sundays.


































With the untimely arrival of a dame arriving through the door (as all noir pulp novels are won’t to do), we’re presented with one of the most rewarding scenes ever - totally black screens. This shortcut allows us to fill our imagination of what seductive form this vision of loveliness could possibly look like. Could it be Miz Mam'selle Hepzibah having suddenly lost her distinctive French accent? Could it be Miz Beaver in a scandalous low-cut outfit?


































No such luck. This is a children’s funny animal book, remember? Even though it has all the distinctive trappings of Noir fiction, Walt Kelly was too much of a prude to admire the female figure. In art sessions, he was known to hold his hat in front of him while sketching nudes.


































Even though the client has all the sex appeal of a jumping bean, our intrepid detective decides to have a little fun with her at his expense.


































Interestingly enough, even though he's named on the title page, he never right out declares his actual name in the comic itself. That's covering all the bases I guess.


































Blacksad this certainly ain’t.


































It’s at this point that the internal monologue goes completely off the rails and into Frank Millar territory. It’s not quite getting a kick out of violence, or the pushing the limits of a failing body, but more into the realm of a ranting hobo. You’re better off ignoring it completely, then going back and rereading it once you reach the end, since it’ll have more relevance then.


































One wonders what a long-term Tracer Bullet story would be like, if the private dick was totally oblivious to the surroundings while on the case.


































Amusingly enough, this isn’t the only private dick alligator around. Well, it might be, depending on how much you discriminate between alligators and crocodiles.

Pogo Math

Back at the beginning of this year, (where does the time go?) I approached the announcement of the release of Fantagraphic’s Pogo collection with great reluctance. I was extremely dubious of them ever releasing Walt Kelly’s work, given how often they’d been pushing back their release date. At the time, I vowed that if they actually followed through on their promise, I would show two Pogo comic shorts that were an obvious influence on Calvin & Hobbes.


































When the launch date came and went, I was mystified when I heard accounts of people being in awe with the impressive package, even though I hadn’t seen the actual product in question. It hadn’t been preordered at my comic shop, so I had no clue whether it’d been delayed through that particular outlet. I didn’t want to post the pages until I saw the book in person.


































It took going to several bookstores until I found it buried somewhere in the humour section of a large bookstore. It was extremely tricky finding it, because the comic selections were all over the map. There was one corner that sold Manga, several shelves further away selling Graphic novels, children’s Manga on the other side of the store, and French BDs smack dab in the middle. The humour section was on another floor, sandwiched between Entertainment and Poetry. If you’re trying to sell a new comic, it’s a better idea to have similar products together in one location, don’t you think?


































Considering the amount of dialogue and detail a typical strip contained, Pogo must’ve been the closest thing to overstimulation a child in the 50s could receive. Pogo is so chock-full of multiple characters and bizarre speech patterns that it’d take a lifetime to sort it all out. And that’s before the political caricatures entered the picture. Of course, it wasn’t without its little problems - all of the animals of Okefenokee swamp are extremely gullible and easy to fool - even the villains. There was a similar plot of Pogo being kidnapped and held hostage by two predators, and somehow bluffing his way out of their clutches - within the time span of months.


































It’s probably easier to appreciate the intricate details of Pogo once you understand the basics. Pogo Possum is the vanilla main character and straight-man. Albert Alligator is the well-meaning oafish blowhard who’s always snacking on Pogo’s wares. When you’ve got the kind of rapport the two have between them, you can better understand their relationship, even if you’re annoyed at how often Albert keeps mooching off Pogo’s groceries. How does the possum get a chance to eat when everybody’s taking his food away? (I’ve just realized that this is another Calvin influence, when Hobbes declared double rations to award the mutiny)


































These are the kind of violent lyrics that tended to be used all the time before Nursery Rhymes and Fairy Tales were watered down in order to appeal more to children and gory-sensitive adults. A study found that some rhymes were more violent than TV shows. What child wouldn’t want to hear about the old lady in a shoe beating her kids, or babies falling from treetops?

The history behind some classic rhymes can be rather disturbing. Some other obscure examples can be found here.

Naturally, Pogo objects to this kind of thing, so he offers some alternatives. This saccharine nonsense is the kind of thing that gives children’s entertainment such a lousy reputation. They sound cute, and that’s all they’ve got going for them.


































This sounds like a variation of those Meow Mix commercials. It'd probably be a big hit with cat enthusiasts. (Albert's probably accidentally swallowed one at some point)


































Patience. We’ll get to the Calvin & Hobbes influence soon enough. For now, enjoy these mangled poems.


































Not much to say about this one here.


































We now get to the the meat of the comic, and why people have fond memories of Pogo in the first place. For all the bumbling around with funny animals and wandering plots, it's the Funetik Aksent that most readers remember. Some still fondly recall the nonsensical lyrics to the Christmas carol, Deck us all with Boston Charlie.


































To everyone who worries about dropped potential plot points, no need to worry about the third wish here - Pogo never bothers getting a chance to make use of its uselessness.


































I like how the question of Bigamy doesn’t even enter the picture. These other reasons are certainly more imaginative. This is also the sort of maddening trick question that shows up all the time in Professor Layton games.


































I like to think there's an extraordinarily long pause between the first and second panels here.


































I told you we’d get to the influence sooner or later. We can clearly see where Hobbes’ mathematical ability comes from.


































Here, we also see how Calvin's Dad invents new rationale to explain his outlandish stories. Or maybe that's an inherent trait of everybody who likes manipulating young developing minds.


































As with all things Pogo, the subject invariably veers away from the original topic, and has to be mentally wrenched back onto track.


































The mathematical answer to the man + 40 wives x 40 cats x 40 kits question, if you didn't know it already, or bothered to look it up, cheater.


































I’m not going to help you with this last one. You can easily work it out yourselves, though that’s a lot of cats there.


































Bonus question - if it takes a mouse to feed a kitten, and two mice to feed a cat, how many mice will it take before the women start screaming their heads off?