I’ve never been a big fan of the Peanuts comic strip, though I was a fan of the older Peanuts movies (The Great Pumpkin, Christmas and so on). I remember hearing about how there was going to be a complete collection of the older strips being collected into a book form and thinking, “…eh”. I actually looked up the first volume and was suprised by the humor and such that they contained. To me, Peanuts was like Family Circus or Marmaduke, strips that had way outlived their funniness and any chance at humor, but these early strips were actually pretty good.
The Seattle Weekly’s article on Fantagraphics, the publisher of these volumes, is interesting. Financially struggling, Fantagraphics was literaly saved by these books. Well known in the indie comic book publishing arena, they’ve been resposible for publishing other more well known books in the past, like Ghost World (made into a movie).
Good read. And check out Peanuts!
