Cartoonist Berkeley Breathed is ending his Opus comic strip after five years. The last strip ran this morning. Breathed says his core readership – the 13 to 30 crowd – no longer reads papers. He also says he doesn’t want to see Opus take on Breathed’s political pessimism.
“Now is the time to get out and leave the sweet little bastard the way people would like to remember him, and how I would like to remember him, before he inevitably gets drawn into my bitterness, which I cannot seem to divorce myself from in cartooning,” Breathed said.
He also thinks the Web spells the end of comic strips, as the reader must explicitly search for the strip to view it. “You are no longer a found delight,” he said. “You are a dedicated delight. And that’s what changes the readership.”
I don’t see why there can’t be a “funny papers” type website to take the place of the paper one, but I’m not aware of one existing.
I fondly remember the 1980s “golden age” of comics: with Shultz’s Peanuts, Marlette’s Kudzu, Watterson’s Calvin and Hobbes, Wilson’s Ziggy, Larson’s Far Side, and Breathed’s Bloom County. What delight they brought this curious teenager! Few, if any, of the current strips resonate with me – including Opus, for that matter. Maybe Breathed is right and the age of the comic strip is coming to an end.Its a shame that my kids might not have that same experience.
MT.Net readers know I’m a fan of cartooning. Maybe its time I did something about it.