Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson for September 01, 2012

Domino’s delivers, and it provides the uniformly bland pizza that most of America thinks is fine dining.

Dad is rolling the eyes in the second panel!

Absolutely!

PS:Love the dog!

I like to hear News from different countries!

Give them time, Calvin, and they’ll find a way. Walmart’s already on the Internet.

As DJ Terry Wogan once rightly said, more tv isn’t necessarily better tv. I think he was right.

Calvin had NO idea. Remember, this was before “reality” tv shows.

Strips like this kind of epitomize everything I didn’t like about Calvin & Hobbes’ second five years as opposed to its first. Saying it “got too preachy” doesn’t quite cut it. It’s more like Watterson had strong views on society (none of which I disagree with, BTW) but lacked a suitable vehicle in his strip with which to express them, so he forced it. Calvin became a vehicle for every societal trend Watterson took issue with, no matter how incongruous. It never felt genuine to me and just came off as contrived.

This strip is one of the worst, in that respect. Here comes Calvin complaining to his dad that the culture isn’t being kept homogenous enough. What? What about Calvin’s personality or history as a character ever suggested that a homogenous culture is by definition a good thing? Nothing, that’s what. This just came totally out of nowhere. What makes it even more of a non-sequitor is that, when Watterson isn’t using him as a mouthpiece on these issues, Calvin is a total non-conformist. Heck, he’s THE non-conformist.

Even as a kid I found the strip contrived when it got into territory like this. It just doesn’t work.

All that aside——WOW is it incredible how prophetic this turned out to be. Watterson, in the 10th anniversary collection, added the footnote below this strip that read “I’m sure they’re working on this.” That was in 1995, when the internet was really just starting to become a cultural force. Wow.

do you know 7-11 convenience store?

I think the upholstry design on Dad’s chair is so funny and indicative of Americans’ need to conform.

I can’t believe I’m writing my comic strip like, right now. I must be crazy………

We don’t have any TV reception in our home (cable or antenna). It has been a GREAT filth free 4 years.

Come on, dad. Calvin needs his Walking Dead fix. >_>

Think that this was written before cable (and its accompanying zillion choices) took over the viewing space. It’s much easier to have uniform national blandness when all you have is three networks and limited choices.

Still, in spite of liking choice, we still sort of take a shine to blandness. It’s not always the structure that counts; but sometimes it’s how people use the structure.

Don’t worry, Calvin. Nowadays, thanks to the internet, all the world can have a homogeneous culture. Now, anyone can live the American Way of Life (especially here in Brazil) and absorb their culture, series, everything from cable tv. The point is: what happens to the individual and local culture of every country, every particular society with its own behaviors, opinions and habits?

Culture in the US is not homogeneous. Even if it were, blandness is better than negative. Much of the contemporary multi-culture involves crime and violence, pornography and general sexual immorality, bad language, cheating, dishonesty …etc., etc., etc., even (Snagglepuss)

Ah, but they do,Cal. It’s called commercials — or hadn’t you noticed.

What do you get with cable? 150 channels with nothing worthwatching instead of five.

Why take a college philosophy course when I can just read Calvin and Hobbes ?

Can you say Calvin’s dad is cheap!

ALMOST made it through without politics being mentioned. And no names were mentioned, nor nomud slung. THAT makes a nice change!

And dad needs a Kindle. That hard copy book is so low tech.

And Amazon.com has shown the way in which people will buy their things and even watch “TV”.

Never noticed before, but are those flowers on dad’s chair? And a ruffled skirt? C’mon, dad – get a mans chair & set a good example for your son!

There’s Pizza Hut. You can get that delivered.

Soooo…….thats why its called the DISH network, a huge helping of blandness , 24/7. LOL

Cable only gives you more pulp, but at least there is the History Channel with new and interesting material. Networks have just exhaused their material. Same old—What happened to TLC and Discovery that used to have new and uplifting material?

Oh Calvin… You do know a lot of things judging by your big words.

But you still don’t seem to understand that NO means NO!

LOL xxx

There are realy many events and music, fine! More than in Internet I would like to come myselfe and see!

And is cable going to do with the growing list of cord cutters?

Bruce Springsteen …

If you can say you don’t have Walmart of McDonald’s in your home Calvin, you should be counting your blessings.

Sure hope I never see a WalMart delivery truck trolling through the neighborhood…competing with the ice cream truck?

Au contraire,,,we have wifi and an antenna digital TV,,,we get about 30 local channels and can stream the internet. Better than cable or satellite; we get to choose what to watch and WHEN to watch it. No more 200 channels but nothing’s on for us!

Sometimes I forget these strips were published years ago when it was fancy to have cable. Now if you dont, you are weird….well unless you have satalite

Some cable TV shows are good, but certain other cable shows are just lame and racy. So, Calvin, you have grasp the concept of how cable TV is.

No they don’t Calvin – we go into theirs instead….

I believe the pattern on Dad’s chair is called “Womble Scribble”…or something like that…

He can call for a pizza without dad knowing.

@JLG Calvin is generally a nonconformist, but tends to make an exception for popular culture and art- witness the umbrage he takes when Hobbes refers to his “collectible figurines” as a “sculpture.” Witness also his faux-religious ceremony offering his brain up to the television.

Calvin’s tendencies are toward chaos more than nonconformity, and the loud, attention-commanding vulgarity of mass entertainment seems to speak to these tendencies. At the very least, Calvin typically rebels against his parents’ views, and Watterson generally portrays Mom and Dad as Emersonian non-conformists, so I think Calvin has to be opposed to that sensibility at least some of the time. True, Calvin also seems to seek out the solitude of nature, but that’s just another kind of chaos- there’s a reason he named his tiger Hobbes.

all these coming from so called small kid!!!