The 'Shroom:Issue 157/Palette Swap: Difference between revisions

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So, about current events… uh, well, hospital equipment has been going missing. No one knows where it’s been going, and the security cameras aren’t picking anything up. Just vanishing. It should be fine, it’s a big hospital and we don’t get many patients, but still. Maybe I should get Detective Pikachu on this…

===== Isabelle =====

Written by: {{User|winstein}}

In the newspaper that we normally order, ''Pickles'' was added relatively later, and together with another comic strip ''Zits'', replaced a couple of comic strips, and to this day, this newspaper still publishes these comics. I was taken to how well it's drawn. It has grown on me and I am sure on a lot of folks as well, given how it's still published. Despite its popularity, I got the sense that it's not popular enough to have a full collection reprint, which is a real shame as this is a treasure of a comic strip. A comic strip about old people may not have been all that relatable since a lot of the time, young folks are a preferred subject to cover. Even then, this comic strip about old people still manage to be enjoyable even to those outside the age group because the content of the comic is simple to read and find meaning in.

The title of the comic strip is funny because it uses a food name, akin to Peanuts, but it does serve a purpose: ''Pickles'' is the surname shared between Earl and Opal, the comic's elderly couple. The association is intentional, as confirmed by the author himself, given how he enjoyed the revered comic strip by the late Charles Schulz. Despite the fact that the main characters have the ''Pickles'' designation, they are not related to one of the Rugrats' families in the slightest. Instead Brian Crane picked up the name ''Pickles'' from one of the (American) football players in a game he watched on television<ref name="ref1">[https://www.masslive.com/living/2014/03/meet_cartoonist_brian_cranes_popular_pickles_family_in_the_republican.html Cartoonist Brian Crane's popular 'Pickles' family joins The Republican - masslive.com]</ref>. Interestingly, ''Rugrats'' had a newspaper comic strip, and ran for a somewhat admirable five years<ref>[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rugrats_(comic_strip) ''Rugrats'' (comic strip) - Wikipedia]</ref>. In addition, the Pickles household have a garden of zucchinis, which they usually give to their neighbours due to surplus, much to their displeasure<ref>[https://www.gocomics.com/pickles/2007/09/22 Pickles by Brian Crane for September 22, 2007 - GoComics]</ref>.

Earl is the eccentric yet grouchy husband, and being a retired person means he has a lot of free time to irritate his wife Opal. He is, in my opinion, the biggest source of humour of this comic. Opal is basically a housewife who is not taking any of Earl's sassiness, although she had her bumbling moments. Despite being in their 70's and married for at least 50 years, they still have their disagreements every now and then. If the two of them are a comedic duo, Earl would be the wise guy and Opal would be the straight "man". Alongside the old couple are their pets Roscoe and Muffin, who are basically a typical cat and dog. Basically, Roscoe is the dog who is quite optimistic but is not the brightest bulb, while Muffin the cat is more surly and has a superiority complex. Their daughter Sylvia and her family lives near the elderly couple, and are in fact neighbours. Sylvia is a then-divorced mother who is well aware of her parents' eccentricities and tried not to take after them. Nelson is Sylvia's daughter and he regularly visits his grandparents, and his impressionable mind meant that he would take Earl's off-kilter words of "wisdom" at face value.

Dan was introduced a bit later into the comic, who eventually married Sylvia. He is a wildlife photographer who was basically introduced to appease the editor's suggestion of doing some dating strips involving Sylvia in his own way<ref>[https://www.deseret.com/2011/2/22/20385034/a-cartoon-family-popular-pickles-captures-humanity-of-humans A cartoon family: Popular 'Pickles' captures humanity of humans - Deseret News]</ref>, but he probably didn't want to move the focus away from the main attraction: the titular couple. Other characters include Clyde, Earl's friend who he meets regularly in the park; Emily, Opal's senior friend who is young-at-heart; and Pearl, who is Opal's sister and is mostly critical of Earl since he chose to marry Opal as opposed to her. Amusingly, in recent years, a character called Leon, Earl's brother, was introduced and he's heavily based on the author himself, being a cartoonist that would justify Earl and Opal's frustrations with being the primary subjects for his comic strip.

The author went on record to say that he took inspiration from his in-laws<ref>[https://www.dailycartoonist.com/index.php/2012/02/14/brian-cranes-pickles-now-in-800-papers/ Brian Crane’s “Pickles” now in 800 papers - The Daily Cartoonist]</ref>, whose elderly antics gave him a lot of material for his work. Amusingly, he found that he himself became similar to Earl as he grew older, and he even joked that in hindsight, he would have made Earl more handsome. After all, some of the best inspirations come from real life, and it's no different for a great number of comic strips. For example, Cathy Guisewite took inspiration from her life as a single woman to produce material for her comic strip named after her<ref>[https://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/16/business/media/16cathy.html Swimsuit Season’s Over. For Good. - The New York Times]</ref>, and Scott Adam's focus on office humour in Dilbert is from his time working at Pacific Bell<ref>[https://hbr.org/2013/10/how-dilbert-practically-wrote-itself How “Dilbert” Practically Wrote Itself - Harvard Business Review]</ref>. Not to mention how many political cartoons are practically reliant on real-life events to write itself. The author even converts the contributions from fans into sequential art, although it does have its disadvantages, such as unknowingly stealing somebody's idea because of a non-disclosing contributor, since Brian Crane doesn't really use Twitter. I previously lamented that ''Pickles'' collections never collected every comic strip, but this is one scenario where omitting a comic strip from a collection is completely justified and understandable.

What is very pleasing about this comic is the overall simplicity and optimism that makes it a very pleasant comic to read and to see. The art style is quite simple but effective, since it portrays enough details that gives it a pleasing look. The characters are easy to understand, with the main characters Earl and Opal have enough differences that they bounce off each other quite nicely, giving their misadventures a sense of humour. One might even say that they make for enjoyable neighbours. Perhaps the main thing I really like about this comic is how good-natured and innocent it is. It should be noted that Brian Crane himself does not participate in the common vices (alcohol consumption, smoking, cursing), and this is reflected in his characters<ref name="ref1"/>, and I find it enlightening since it felt rare to know a work which don't rely on swearing or alcohol for humour. Trivia: The characters also have a Mormon background, much like the author himself.

The source of humour from old people is not necessarily rare, but ''Pickles'' made it very enjoyable without being overly offensive to the age group that is made fun of. One's mileage may vary, but I personally found the material in ''Pickles'' to be quite enjoyable even after 30 years (since 2nd April 1990). It helps that Brian Crane himself is basically a senior as the years gone by, since he can be a living example of what to make fun of. The author mentioned the challenges associated with a comic strip, where there is a requirement to come up with new material daily for years and years, but the appreciation from readers who loved and grew attached to the characters made it all the more worthwhile, which gives newspaper comics a good name<ref name="ref1"/>. You know that a comic strip is relatable when readers joked that they were spied on for ideas for this comic strip, since that implies that they see themselves in the characters.

Brian Crane, the creator of this comic strip, had an ambition of becoming a comic strip artist from young, citing Al Capp's <i>Li'l Abner</i>, Walt Kelly's ''Pogo'' and Charles Schulz' ''Peanuts'' as his primary inspirations<ref name="ref2">[https://magazine.byu.edu/article/the-art-of-making-pickles/ The Art of Making Pickles - Brigham Young University]</ref><ref>[https://www.coolcartooning.com/The_Inkblot-inkblot-issue-6.html The Inkblot, Issue #006 -- Getting Pickled—An Interview with Brian Crane - CoolCartooning.com]</ref>. Although he felt that such an ambition seemed impossible, life found a way into his lifelong dream when he felt that his path to being an artist was confirmed, citing an anecdote where his fifth grade's friend reacted strongly with laughter on his drawing. From there, he worked his way through his profession of drawing, eventually leading him back to the comic strip when he not only felt disillusioned by working on ads that weren't aligned with his beliefs, but felt that he had a knack for funny ideas from doing greeting cards. Although the odds were stacked against him, thanks in part to the unlikeliness in being picked up for syndication, he decided to take the chance. His topic of choice is about old people, as he was reminded of his grandparents. His work was rejected by a number of prospective syndicates, but with the support of his wife, he eventually found an interested party in The Washington Post Writers Group for his comic strip about old people. Needless to say, he was overjoyed. Initially he had to draw the comic strip part-time and kept his day job, but as more and more newspapers picked up his comic strip, he could afford to draw his comic strip full-time and gradually made it his full-time job, fully working from home in the process<ref name="ref2"/>. From there, his success was followed by more greatness, including getting to meet his inspiration Charles Schulz, gaining accolades from his peers and winning a Reuben award at the National Cartoonists Society. One of the things that I find inspirational about all of this is how the author remains humble all the way through his journey, and he appears to still employ this attitude.

On some days, our newspaper didn't print, meaning that the comic strip of that day won't be printed. If we're lucky we might get one ahead of schedule but ''Pickles'' is not exactly a priority. As that was also a time when I cut out the comic strips for collecting, I needed to find the missing content. That was when I searched online for content, which opened me up to a new variety of comic strips I didn't know exist, quite a number of which I eventually considered favourites. We won't be delving into some of these comic strips for a while, but if the time comes, we'll get to it.

Overall, I love ''Pickles'' and I am pleased that new content keeps coming, even if the author reused older strips on a few occasions. When a work that focuses on a certain demographic manages to be enjoyable to those outside of it, that is a mark of a great work, and one could say that it achieved a timeless quality. It's also amazing that even after 30 years the comic is still enjoyable and I thank the angels who guided Brian Crane for making a comic strip that he never dreamed of doing, because the entire thing enriched the lives of millions (at least, it looked like it did).

Normally, I don't divulge on the next comic (which might change), but I felt that I could do this, mainly because I considered ''Pickles'' and ''Zits'' as comics that I took a liking to at the same time. So without further ado, my next topic will be about Zits, which is an effort between Jim Borgman and Jerry Scott. Amusingly, Jeremy from that comic made a cameo in ''Pickles''.

''Pickles'' can be read from GoComics, which has an archive dating back to 2003, meaning the complete collection is currently unavailable: https://www.gocomics.com/pickles