On Sunday, March 4, Garry Trudeau began a storyline that brings together three themes that have been central to Doonesbury for many years: feminism and the political empowerment of women; the challenges facing American soldiers and veterans; and electoral politics. Melissa Wheeler, a former army helicopter mechanic, asks Joanie Caucus for help with her political … Continue reading This Week in Doonesbury: #MeToo Runs for Office.
Look! Rice Paddies!: Doonesbury Goes to War, Part II. Vietnam, 1972
In my last “Long Strange Trip” post, way back in October, I wrote about B.D.’s time in ROTC. Those strips made me reevaluate how I thought about how Garry Trudeau wrote about war. I had remembered GBT’s Vietnam-era strips as being lighthearted and goofy in comparison to the grittier and darker approach that he took … Continue reading Look! Rice Paddies!: Doonesbury Goes to War, Part II. Vietnam, 1972
Comic Review: Stark Plug
Here's my second attempt at writing a comics review; you can read the first, on Tailsteak's Forward, here. If you're a creator of web- or print-based comics and you'd like me to write about your work, drop a line on Twitter (@readdoonesbury) or through my contact page. *** A while back, I received a copy … Continue reading Comic Review: Stark Plug
This Week in Doonesbury: A Missed Opportunity.
On 14 January, Garry Trudeau addressed the single most important social, cultural, and political issue of our time: the movement by women to raise awareness of, and fight back against, systematic sexual abuse by men in a number of fields, including politics, the entertainment industry, the news media, sports, and the tech world. In recent … Continue reading This Week in Doonesbury: A Missed Opportunity.
Comic Review: Tailsteak’s Forward.
Note to readers: While this project is meant to be a comprehensive look at fifty years’ worth of Doonesbury comics, I also want to take the opportunity to write about other comics that grab my attention. Here, then, is my first attempt at reviewing a webcomic, one that I think is well worth checking out. … Continue reading Comic Review: Tailsteak’s Forward.
This Week In Doonesbury: GUILTY, GUILTY, GUILTY!!!
On Sunday, Garry Trudeau published a strip that I’ve seen coming since Donald Trump won the election. But even though I knew this gag was on its way, actually seeing it in print cracked me up. First it’s a great joke. Second, because, by recycling a strip from 44 years ago, Trudeau demonstrated his ability to … Continue reading This Week In Doonesbury: GUILTY, GUILTY, GUILTY!!!
Doonesbury Encounters: Howard Cruse in Heavy Metal, April 1983
Alongside writing about the history of Doonesbury and posts about Trudeau’s ongoing work, I’ll also write about Doonesbury’s appearances in other media, starting with this look at Howard Cruses’s review of a Doonesbury collection that ran in Heavy Metal’s April, 1983 issue. Recently, my rereading of Doonesbury intersected with another long-term comics reading project I’m … Continue reading Doonesbury Encounters: Howard Cruse in Heavy Metal, April 1983
“Violence is as American as Cherry Pie”: Doonesbury Goes to War, Pt. I
When the curtain falls on Doonesbury, the ensuing retrospectives are bound to focus on Garry Trudeau’s chronicling of the War on Terror and its effects on the men and women who were asked to put their lives and their well-being at risk for a fundamentally flawed set of foreign policies. GBT has used the experiences … Continue reading “Violence is as American as Cherry Pie”: Doonesbury Goes to War, Pt. I
This Week in Doonesbury: Mental Health, Health Care, Homelessness and Trump.
(Note to readers: Hi Mom! … I intended to post at least once a week as a way to keep my writing chops up, but the past couple of weeks haven’t been great. I’ve been working on something about how GBT wrote about Vietnam during the first few years of Doonesbury, but it’s really not … Continue reading This Week in Doonesbury: Mental Health, Health Care, Homelessness and Trump.
This Week in Doonesbury: Mental Health in the Age of Trump
I’m not going to write about myself very much in these pages, but I will note here that I read this week’s Doonesbury strip through the lens of my own mental health issues, namely a case of generalized anxiety disorder that I’ve been carrying around for quite a while. Things got really bad earlier this … Continue reading This Week in Doonesbury: Mental Health in the Age of Trump
Reading Doonesbury 