"...Or For Worse."

[sirspamdalot]

Lynn Johnston's comic strip will be retired next year. Or, to be precise, Lynn is retiring, but I read a rumor that the strip is set to continue "in one form or another." Might it go into re-runs, a la "Peanuts"? Or will it be ghosted by others, like that growing multitude of strips whose creators abandoned them to lesser hands decades ago

Comments

[cattifer]

Lord, that sounds creepy...
Sad to hear she's giving it up, though. I was mostly addicted to that strip at one point in time, the way I imagine most housewives grow addicted to soap operas.

[echolocator]

Hey, if Gasoline Alley can do it...

But personally I'm hoping it ends. I really don't want to see it passed down. Look at how much more depressing & disconnected from reality The Family Circus has become since Jeffy's taken over. The Comics Curmudgeon thinks Jeffy's drinking-- and if he is, who can blame him? What a rum gig to inherit.

'For Better or For Worse': the strip & the cartoonist both deserve a nice, quiet retirement. Eternal syndication a la 'Nancy' would be the worst fate imaginable for a work as human as Lynn Johnston's.

[sirspamdalot]

Ahh, Jeffy. Glen Keane's less talented and more famous little brother.

My dark fantasies notwithstanding, I doubt Johnston will be mercenary enough to allow the strip to continue without her. More likely she'll follow the lead of other respected 'toonists -- Larson, Watterson, and Breathed -- who took their creations with them into retirement.

I just hope they won't re-run her strips. Let interested readers seek that stuff out in book form, and give newbies a chance in the limelight!

[sirspamdalot]

sweet CHRIStmas! I just learned that Jeff Keane is a real person who actually draws 'Family Circus'!

My remark above assumed you were making a joking reference to those strips where one of the 'Family Circus' kids supposedly fills in for his 'dad.' (E.g.: http://www.azfoodbanks.org/images/family_circus.jpg )

But I guess my remark still stands.

[quirkybird]

Neil Gaiman once said something about the indignity of knowing that when news spreads of his eventual demise, the internet will be inundated with nine kajillion drawings of Death walking off with a shaggy-haired guy in a black leather jacket and sunglasses.

[sirspamdalot]

Ha ha ha!