Wallace the Brave by Will Henry for November 21, 2021

Dads mostly don’t know what’s going on…Wallace’s dad, bless him, just goes along.

He has that “That’s my boy! I wish I could do that” look on his face.

The way Pop is dressed, he looks like someone from 100 years ago, driving a flivver. Though he could use the goggles, and maybe a scarf.

okay___

Michael Joseph Jackson

Today’s Wallace the Brave is uncharacteristically plain and simple. The end panels are even more so without Wallace in them. That’s curious. I miss all the beautiful pastels that usually decorate the strip.

Wallace is seriously strange. In a good way.

Dad: “I’ve wasted my entire life. Do I remember where the nearest abandoned tractor tire is?”

That pause before both hands are up… Don’t leave your kid hanging, Dad!

Nice sound effects in panel 3.

Aaand, go do it again!

Well that one’s going on the fridge

Maybe he sees something of himself in Wallace

Wallaces dad probably wishes he could try it.

If the father was working on his lobster trap, he’d most likely be on the pier or close to shore? Close one for Wallace!

It’s one of his more safer adventures……

Wallace can always find something to do. I half expected it to be Sterling instead of Wallace.

Interesting how the first and last panel, which don’t show Wallace or the tire, don’t have borders or colour on the ground. This makes the last panel look like “did this just happen?” Very subtle.

Boy fun.. don’t even try to figure it out.. it will only remind you of your own misspent youth when all you had was a stick to play with.

I’ve heard stories of kids doing this sort of thing “back in the day.” Doesn’t surprise me at all that Wallace eventually got the same idea.

I read into this strip a whole bunch of sentimentality on dad’s part. I think he’s watching his son do fun kid stuff, sharing in his childhood with the high five (and really feeling the gravity of that), and having the bittersweet realization that his kid won’t be a kid forever. I think it might be that desaturated simple panel at the end that made my own heart hurt a little bit. I adore it.

I’m sure dad is sad he can’t do that himself.

With most dad’s I would expect them to be thinking, “WTF”. But Wallace’s dad is probably wondering if he can find a tire big enough for him to join.

The changes in dad’s eyes through the panels said it all for me…

ONE MORE TIME! Then a cup of hot cocoa, with two cups of mini marshmallows on top.

No seagull?

Wallace doesn’t get as many visitors or comments as say Luann (150+ 190 comments and 250 likes each day) so we have him all to ourselves for a while. At least until word leaks out. Shhh!

He is your son

Hey, it worked for Jean Finch.

Looks like he’s spitting the leaf out in the final panel.

I had many such moments with my three sons as they were growing up.

This: Understated. Evocative. Sweet. Uplifting. Beautiful.

Contradictions: Familiar / Rare… Simple / Complex

Me: Nuchal shivers. Moistened eyes.

Unpremeditated utterance: Oh. [Glossolalia?]

Laughing out loud all by myself hahHAAHAHA

Hes hust like, wut just happened

where be the seagul

I get the comics on Washington Post’s Sunday edition. Sherman’s Lagoon is one of my favorites, along with Pickles sometimes. But Sally Forth or Judge Parker? Yawn, neither is funny.