Word: blooms
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...repeating Dan Quayle jokes every week to beat us so senseless that we begin to see his deep, hidden artistic motive. He may yet prove that there is humor in bad humor. If that is his aim, he is repudiating most of his last two years of "Bloom County," and he must be a very disenchanted cartoonist indeed...
...Outland" does not even integrate humor and surrealism as well as G.B. Trudeau's "Doonesbury." Breathed's "Bloom County," though funny in its commentary on 1980s culture, was basically "Doonesbury" with funny animals. By the looks of "Outland," Breathed is still playing in Trudeau's shadow. If you want artistic adventurism in the comic pages, look to Trudeau's talking cigarette or his personification of Old Man History. Or look to Zippy the Pinhead. Or look to Life In Hell. Or even to Calvin and Hobbes...
...idea. I would be more amenable to Breathed's intellectualism if he put any care into his drawing. After all, he has a whole week to form a really powerful set images. But "Outland" looks as sketchy and hurried as the worst weeks of "Bloom County." It certainly doesn't measure up to the artistry of "Calvin and Hobbes" in one of its Sunday Spaceman Spiff strips...
BREATHED promised us a lot with this strip. He said he was burned out on "Bloom County," but he has shown no signs of revival in "Outland." It is hard to believe he has made an honest attempt at a new artistic direction. Trudeau and Gary Larson took sabbaticals to save themselves from burnout, but they did not reject their characters. Breathed did. Anyone who owns an Opus T-shirt should feel betrayed...
...best, "Outland" is a very poor parlor trip. At worst, it's "Bloom County" on crack...