Thursday, November 07, 2013

The Stinking by Darby Conley


The Stinking is the sixth "treasury-sized" -- the album-sized softback with three dailies or one Sunday per page, re-collecting the strips that previously appeared in two smaller books -- collection of Conley's Get Fuzzy comic strip, including about three years of strips.

I reviewed the fifth such treasury, Treasury of the Lost Litter Box, about three years ago, and I find that I don't have much more to say about this next book now. It's still the same kind of strip it was then, with the same strengths (well-defined cast, a willingness to be obscure in pursuit of a good joke, long sequences that mutate and proliferate) and weaknesses (narrow premise and occasionally claustrophobic setting).

And I still think that if you like strip cartoons, you need to buy strip cartoon books somewhat regularly, so your revenue stream helps them continue to exist. (Whether you think the best mechanism for that is the fine publishing house of Andrews & McMeel and some corporate book purveyor is a more loaded question; there are definitely other mechanisms to push money towards comics creators these days -- but the point is to find one you like and use it, semi-regularly, to keep the things you enjoy going.)

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