Welcome to Unpacking Peanuts. The podcast where three cartoonists take an in-depth look at the greatest comic strip of all time, Peanuts by Charles M. Schulz.
Hey, everybody. Welcome back to the show. It's Unpacking Peanuts, and today we're looking at 1993. I'll be your host for the proceedings. My name is Jimmy Gownley. I'm also a cartoonist. I did things like Amelia Rule's Seven Good Reasons Not to Grow Up and The Dumbest Idea Ever. And you could read my new comic, Tanner Rocks, over on gvillecomics.substack.com, and you could do it for free. Joining me as always are my pals, co-hosts, and fellow cartoonists.
He's a playwright and a composer, both for the band Complicated People, as well as for this very podcast. He's the co-creator of the original comic book prize guide, the original editor for Amelia Rule's, and the creator of such great strips as Strange Attractors, A Gathering of Spells, and Tangled River. It's Michael Cohen.
Say hey.
He's the executive producer and writer of Mystery Science Theater 3000, a former vice president of Archie Comics, and the creator of the Instagram sensation, Sweetest Beasts, it's Harold Buchholz.
Hi.
If everything's running smoothly, you know our producer and engineer, Liz Sumner, is here. Hey, Liz.
Greetings.
All right, guys, we are here in 1993. Do we have any prelude?
I've noticed a certain amount of streakiness this year.
Oh, yeah?
That's always something interesting to talk about because, I mean, everyone's familiar with writer's block. People don't seem to talk about artist's block or cartoonist's block, but it happens for everyone. Songwriter's block. Yeah, I was pretty much settled in on that. Well, okay, Schulz is not going to come up with much this year.
I didn't have very many picks for part one, and for the beginning of part two, I was going, okay, it's clearly past the point where he's going to come up with great stuff. Then in August, all of a sudden, I was picking a whole bunch of strips. You can't explain this, he probably couldn't explain this, but I have a feeling, I don't know if it's inspiration or what, but these things just come in waves. I think in August, he just had a lot of good ideas.
That's interesting. Yeah, I was going through this. I wonder how much of it is me in the circumstances that I'm reading a block of peanuts, at any given point. Is it me or is it Schulz? It's probably a good mixture of both. Yeah, I was having a little difficulty in the first four months of this year. Then I enjoyed this chunk of May through August more. I'm in the same boat as you, Michael. That was my take on it. Jimmy, did you notice anything different just in this little snatch of time?
Well, there's one thing that one tiny strip, and I actually don't even think we picked it to talk about, but I think it might be a clue as to what might be going on in Schulz's life. He mentions Barney, the Purple Dinosaur show. To me, that means you're hanging out with a very little kid. I don't think Charles Schulz had Barney on his mind for really any reason, but I bet if he had a little grand child around, that might be where Barney comes from.
I remember my mom babysat for my cousin around this time. I remember coming home from college, and Barney was a staple every single day. It was just every kid's whole world. I wonder if this is where we're starting to see more of that grandchild influence. Because you also see reruns suddenly become refined in one day. I don't know. Yeah.
It looks like reruns making his big play now. Yeah.
He's starting to show up and be the rerun that we're going to know for the rest of the run.
Yeah.
That's interesting. Yeah. There was also one strip with Snoopy as the doctor. Whenever I see that, I'm wondering, has he been in the hospital again? Spending some days for some tests.
Spending the doctor more to get older, for sure.
Right. Yeah. Sometimes, there might be a couple of strips that were dailies, that were single panels, like right in a row. I'm wondering, was he up against something for just a little brief period of time?
Well, one thing I did notice is he's totally open on the format now.
Yeah.
For a couple of years, he was doing three, and now it's like everything, one, two, three, four, five, six, whatever fits. Yeah. Which I think is great, and I don't know why people didn't do that earlier.
Yeah. Of course, he was stuck with what was sold back in 1950 and didn't bother to try to change it.
Yeah. But he had a lot of clout at some point. He could have probably-
Certainly, I would think by the 60s.
He seemed really reticent about that because he knew he was going to inconvenience newspapers that were running them vertically. I'm wondering, it's probably at some point, maybe there was that discussion and he said, how many papers really would be inconvenienced if I didn't do four panels equal-sized? Is anyone still running me vertically? They probably would have known that because they had to provide those strips. Maybe the syndicate even suggested, hey, you want to end this rule?
I don't know.
Well, the other thing I just wanted to say to Michael's point about streakyness, even if I'm right and he is spending more time with a grandchild and stuff, and that's what's sending his mind in certain directions, it doesn't mean it's going to translate into good comics. That part always will, I guess, remain a mystery why suddenly they're just better. I don't know.
Yeah. But we've all experienced it. We know what it's like to feel like stuff is just flowing and you can't put it down fast enough, and then there are the other moments where it's like, I've got to use some sort of a technique to get to a joke, which I don't really think is a joke, but it's going to fulfill the day. Yeah.
I mean, hardly anybody knows what it's like to do a daily strip, especially for this many years. But basically, I'm sure there's plenty of days where you don't have anything and you go to do something and you're not happy with it, and you hope people just don't notice it.
Right. I remember as a kid, I remember thinking, I only have to draw one strip a day and that's my career. Wow, that sounds amazing. Then when you actually go through the process, and I definitely did that with Sweetest Beasts for a good chunk. I was doing it five days a week. Yeah, once you're in it, you realize that it's like, it was a Newman on Seinfeld and the mail never stops.
The mail never stops.
It just keeps coming and coming. It's like that deadline is always there for the comic strip artists.
Yeah. All right. Well, with that said, how about we get to the strips? Sure. If you guys want to follow along with us, the way you can do that, you go over to our website, unpackingpeanuts.com and you can sign up for the great Peanuts reread. That will get you one email a month that lets you know what we're going to be covering on upcoming episodes. Then you can go over to gocomics.com and follow along with us just by typing in the date and it'll be all free for you.
So you guys do that and we can get started. March 27th, it's a six panel daily strip and this is wild because Lucy's out in the outfield and something in her pocket is going off. We see the cartoon sign of noisier agitation and it turns out, holy cow, she has a cellular phone.
What?
Mind-blowing with a little antenna out and everything. Lucy says into the phone, hello? Oh, hi, how are you? She continues, oh, nothing, just playing in this stupid ball game. Yeah, right field. She continues, she did? She wore the pink one again? You can't believe it. She and then in the next panel, she's interrupted by getting bonked in the head by a fly ball and she drops the phone but then picks it up in the final panel and says, sorry, we were cut off.
Welcome to the future.
That is wild.
Yeah, 1993 and we got cell phones in Peanuts.
I don't know if they come in again, but it seems like there's this kind of thing Schulz might feel is worth making fun of.
So early compared to when kids would actually have cell phones though.
Yeah, well, when you're a multimillionaire, maybe it's going to enter your life a hair earlier.
Yeah, yeah.
When did you guys get your first phones?
2003 for when the girls were going to be born, so I could be available.
I don't remember. I do remember we used to travel to London once a year, and we were trying to figure out because I had a business, and I was trying to keep the business going because I was it. You can't just walk away for 10 days or whatever. To Diane Chagrin, I had to have a phone, and occasionally be talking to people in the States from London. But that was later for sure because I didn't even start that business, I think until 1996 or 2007, so I probably wouldn't have had one until 2000.
But I remember that was a Motorola brick. It was huge, not easy to travel with or put in your pocket.
Well, going back to panel one, there's two things. First of all, he created a funny little scratchy thing to signify a phone ringing.
True.
First I went, what is that, like bugs or something? I've never seen that before.
I mean, it's the cicadas have come out.
And I think she's got that phone in her hand.
Oh, it's just, yeah, maybe it is.
Yeah.
You know, I actually picked this strip because it struck me at the time I read it, that it looked about as rough as any peanut strip I'd ever seen in terms of the drawing. Like panel four of Lucy talking on the phone. And everything just looks so shaky and wonky. And that really struck me at the time I read it. You know, looking back on it again, it doesn't stand out quite as much to me. But like look at her mid in the last panel.
It's just this crumpled mess, which is funny given that, you know, she's a little disheveled after having been hit on the head with the ball. But the line just seems particularly, I don't know if I shouldn't say out of control, but it's, you know, at least the wavering is there. And there are some kind of strange choices of where the eyes are placed in relationship to the hat and all of that stuff. Yeah, I guess.
I don't really see it as much as I would have seen it probably the first time through. The third time through this, I'm barely even noticing that stuff.
That's a good sign.
I could see it now that you grow out to my attention in the hat, but I wouldn't notice anything wonky about the face or...
Oh, really? Yeah. Even the first panel of Lucy, the way he chooses to show Lucy looking down, it's like parts are looking down and other parts aren't, or, you know, are tilted down. And so it just seems like a mixture of two angles. Interesting.
March 30th. Oh, it's a big panoramic panel. And actually, we've talked about this one before. We see a panorama of one, two, three, four, five, six, seven Charlie Browns dancing in jubilation up to Sally, who's standing on the doorstep of his house. And he, Charlie Brown, he's yelling, I hit a home run in the ninth inning and we won. I was the hero. To which Sally says, you?
Good old Sally. Got to stop this thing. Stop this happy nonsense.
Now Liz, could you go in the Peanuts time machine and get us Duncan, who picked this one way back? I certainly could. Excellent.
It's time for the Peanuts time machine.
So joining us today, we have Duncan Watson. Duncan was a voice actor from 1975 to 1977, playing the voice of Charlie Brown in Be My Valentine, Charlie Brown. You're a good sport, Charlie Brown, my personal favorite of this era. And the first feature length Peanuts movie, Race for Your Life, Charlie Brown. All right, why'd you pick that one?
Well, because I mean, isn't that, you know, like, you know, there's always somebody out there who's willing to cut you off of the knees and bring you back down to earth. And I think that's not a bad thing all the time, but sometimes we need to be able to celebrate our wins.
Yes.
Amen to that. 100%.
Yeah, that's something I always have to remember is to, yeah, if someone's, if someone's celebrating, celebrate with them, right? Join in. Yes.
Exactly. And spoiler alerts for people as we read these in the future. If you want your Peanuts happy ending, that's the strip to stop with. Because there's a twist to this in the next year. But in this moment, it is fantastic to see Charlie Brown just so happy. And how about those little drawings? Every one of those drawings of Charlie Brown, I think is adorable. And this is well into his career. He's at 40 years into the strip at this point.
Yeah, he's got his moves down. I mean, don't we all have our happy dance?
Yeah, my favorite is either the third one where he's doing the little kick, or possibly the next to last one where he's just spinning on his head.
More often than not, the person that you get to see expressing unbridled joy is Snoopy, with his new Snoopy dance.
And it's not that often you get to see Charlie Brown really, truly, genuinely happy.
And it's a moment to celebrate.
Yeah, he's earned that in the strip, right? That makes it all the more powerful when it actually happens.
Yeah, and by the way, think about this. If this strip is run in 1958, it kind of ruins the strip, right? Because it's, you know, we don't know this at the time, but we have, you know, 30 some years to go yet, 40 some years ago. But having it happen in the 90s, early 1990, it is a joy. It's exciting.
It's a thrill.
And you know, you feel it because you've suffered along with Charlie Brown, all those defeats. It's great to see that.
Sally's reaction is totally normal. I mean, she's like, you?
Right. That can't be right. It turns out a little bit of a walk in the drawing as well. That first baseball bit we see between Charlie Brown's two and three. Just, I'm not used to seeing that level of, of shake. Yeah. But it's also, I don't know, this is such a jubilant moment.
Well, I mean, look at how shaky the word balloon is, which is working too, because he's yelling.
Oh my gosh, yeah.
But it's really, really rough. I think probably if this was an idea he had years ago, he would have built up the drama of the moment more. Don't you think rather than just kind of going into this, we don't see it, we don't see the homerun.
Right. And this is an interesting segment because I'm guessing we've got some more of this storyline, but he has big gaps in what this is all about over a period of months, which I thought was kind of fascinating. It was almost like he said, oh, I can revisit this or maybe all along. He always seemed to claim he didn't have, he didn't think too far ahead, right? When he's writing this stuff. Right.
You know, he just and that's why some of the segments we used to think or used to say in stories like Daily Stories, he didn't always seem to hit the landing because he claimed that he didn't. Well, it's like in people who know about animation, there's the concept of pose to pose animation where you draw the extremes of a character, and then you fill in the in between drawings to get from those important poses.
Then there's straight ahead animation where you are literally just going forward and you don't exactly know where the in-betweens are going to fall, and there's strengths and weaknesses to both approaches. But he seemed like a straight ahead writer where he would just often not know where he was going to go. And then you could have a flash of brilliance and nail the landing or sometimes you just kind of peter out. Yeah.
April 2nd. So Charlie Brown is running after the kid who he hit the home run after. It's a little girl with long disheveled hair. And he yells, Hey kid, wait a minute. I don't know your name. She turns around and says, Roy Hobbs was my great-grandfather. When you hit that home run yesterday, you ruined my life. And Charlie Brown is back inside with Sally, who's watching TV in the beanbag chair. And he says, I just met the great-granddaughter of Roy Hobbs.
And Sally says, I never know what you're talking about.
Well, me and Sally, we were really confused.
Well, you should listen to Unpacking Peanuts because we covered Roy Hobbs.
We did?
Yeah. He is the lead character in the movie in Book the Natural.
He's a fictional character. I started to figure out it was a movie character, but not till months after this. No, I thought, I was a baseball fanatic, but there's 30 years of baseball where I don't know a lot of players. I was just assuming everybody knows him but me. I did not realize it was a movie character.
Yeah, played by Robert Redford.
He's a baseball character in a movie.
And I would guess that maybe 5% or less of the people reading this strip would know that Roy Hobbs is the name of the character in The Natural.
Right, right.
It's not that well known. So, Schulz is maybe expecting that we're not going to know what's going on.
Yeah, it's very weird. I mean, more people would have known it in 1993, I think, than remember it now, but you know.
Yeah, but even that was like what, nine years after the movie, something like that.
Yeah, that's a long time.
Which man?
It doesn't get around to explaining it till like August.
Yeah.
It's crazy. Yeah. He really takes his time to unfold this one and make some reveals that are huge. And I thought that was pretty interesting. And again, was that just one of those deals where he realized, oh, there's more I can do with this or possibly Bill Melendez was like, hey, that was great. How are you going to end this?
I did end it.
No, I want to animate this. What are we going to do?
April 6th, it's the middle of a baseball game and Schroeder is decked out in his catcher gear and he walks out to the mound and he greets Charlie Brown with this, things fall apart, the center cannot hold. Then he walks back behind the plate, leaving Charlie Brown in the mound to ponder. When catchers get hit with too many foul balls, they get a little weird.
Schulz doesn't do this kind of thing much, but he did a lot in the 50s where, I mean, these kids clearly knew their literature and were able to quote obscure, well, not even obscure, but famous poems.
Yeah. Yeah, this does feel a bit like a throwback. It's nice to see Schroeder's still back there, still thinking about high art. This is by William Butler Yeats, right?
Wow, yeah.
Yeah, Schroeder's remaining high brow. Talk about rough. Look at his hat in that first panel. It's like-
Oh my gosh. Yeah.
Multiple lines outlining.
He drew it twice. How weird is that?
Yeah.
And look how wide Schroeder's head is. Yeah.
Yeah.
That's crazy.
Yeah. What's really crazy is that, unless you're doing it with a microscope, just in the newspaper, it just works. It just blows right past you.
Right.
April 19th. Lydia and Linus are in class, and Linus is contemplating his test or whatever, and Lydia says to him, Did you fall in love the first time you saw me? To which Linus replies, No, you didn't impress me that much. And Lydia says, How about now? How do you feel now when you look at me? Linus turns and says, Well, when I twist around like this, it sort of hurts my neck. To which Lydia with a giant notebook over her head says, Hold still, I'm going to hit you with my notebook.
Yeah, he's getting to her, isn't he?
Yeah, this is the first time we've seen Lydia lose her composure like that.
No, I think Lydia's contract says she has to appear once a year. I don't understand. She never gets more action than that.
She got a haircut.
Is it a little shorter? Yeah, it is a little shorter. She's still one of the great character designs, even though we 99.9% of the time see her in this exact pose, in this exact position, it still looks great.
And he deserves to get hit with a notebook.
No, that's a good line, a good way to deal with it.
Yes, she has a good way to deal with it.
No, he has a good way to deal with it. She thought she had him trapped.
So, do you think this is her, like, putting herself out there, for lack of a better word?
No, she's forcing him into it as an impossible situation.
Because if he answered yes, she would just give a put down maybe.
Well, either he's going to insult her or he's going to lie.
Or both, which looks like he did here. Because we think we know he was pretty much smitten from the first time we saw him and Lydia. There was something going on that he was interested in about her. So, yeah, I don't think he's being entirely forthcoming here with Lydia. Which is, she is putting herself out there. She's making herself a little bit vulnerable.
Yeah.
And he's making her pay for it.
She's asking for it.
Yeah. I mean, she's putting herself out there by putting it on him.
On him. Yeah, right.
Well, and also she could have worded it differently to protect herself a little bit. Did you fall in love the first time you saw me? Wow. That's quite a question.
Or maybe she's used to that. Maybe they are little boys just dropping over dead at the side of Lydia.
That could be. She's got her pick. But he's the first one maybe to give her the run around here.
May 6th. Snoopy and Rerun in his new Rerun outfit, official outfit of overalls are sitting and they're playing cards. Snoopy, of course, has a box of cookies with him because that's Snoopy's thing these days. Snoopy's thinking, I've got the numbers figured out, but who are these people with the funny clothes and what game are we playing anyway? Rerun thinks to himself, I've got the numbers figured out, but who are these people with the funny clothes and what game are we playing anyway?
Well, this is definitely that strange relationship between Snoopy and Rerun. This is maybe the second time we've had any sense that they are somehow on the same wavelength. Here, they're literally thinking the same thing.
I really expected Rerun's thoughts to be the opposite. That's really beautifully designed.
Yeah, it really is. This actually fulfills Norm MacDonald's idea of the perfect joke. The comedian Norm MacDonald who said, the perfect joke is when the setup and the punchline are the exact same. Yeah, it really is good. It tells you something about the characters. I like Snoopy's cookies. Then that takes us to May 7th, and it's a panoramic panel again of Snoopy and Rerun playing cards. But this time, they've just kicked the cards all over the place, and there's a million of them.
And they're dancing around like nuts in it. And there is a caption. And the caption says, First time card players, Snoopy and Rerun, quickly discover that the game is more fun when played with a double deck.
Never been a caption before. I don't know if there's ever going to be a caption after, but this is...
There are captions after, yes.
Oh, really? We had a little bit before. Well, certainly like when he was in Africa or whatever, they had that one with that waterfall. Oh, yeah. Yeah, this is a new thing.
It's so weird because it's just not peanuts. But how else would he handle this?
Right, because he's having to... It seems like he did that when we just... This is the day before the one we just read with them playing the cards. Then if I were Schulz, I'd be like, everyone's going to think this is Linus. So how do you just have Snoopy and Linus, or Snoopy and Rerun having this fun game and tell us that it's Rerun, unless you make a caption that says he's Rerun. That seemed to be the reason for it.
Well, he's got the different outfit on now, and he is just starting to figure out that he needs to change his hair somewhat. But it's not there yet.
Yeah, so you need a cue. And again, these two are simpatico, both having a blast dancing among the Shower of Cards, which is really cool. I like this. I've seen very little of the Snoopy Rerun stuff that we're going to be seeing for the next seven years, but there is really something special to me about these two, having something in common that they just kind of privately share. And I think that's really cool.
Yeah, I agree. Absolutely. May 12th, the Beagle Scouts are out for a hike. Snoopy is leading them and Snoopy thinks, right up ahead, you're going to see the famous Balancing Rock. Snoopy continues, Balancing Rock has been perched on this cliff for 10 million years and, and then the third panel, we see Snoopy is totally shocked and in the last panel, he says, I guess we should have come yesterday. When did the Man of the Mountain collapse?
That's exactly what I was thinking.
Yeah, me too. Yeah, we remember that because we were in New Hampshire.
It was probably like 2008, something like that.
It was an election event when we saw it on, I think it was one of your General Clark events.
Oh, then 2004?
Yeah. Well, I remember being at a Clark event and-
People announced it?
It was on the TV.
Okay. That was 2004.
For those of you who don't know, there was a famous outcropping of rock in New Hampshire that looked like the profile of an old man. It's what's on the back of the New Hampshire State Quarter, actually. Yeah, it collapsed just like this. The other thing, this just made me laugh, that third panel.
Snoopy's hat flying.
Yeah.
The old surprise hat gag.
A day late.
I love someone's hat flying off in surprise. That's one of the wonderful great things of American comic strip history, is the flying hat when you're surprised.
It would be great to just get a gig doing like a really gritty dark superhero just for a couple of issues, right?
I would love that.
Like Thomas and Martha Wayne walk into the alley, and Thomas' hat flies. That would be amazing, wouldn't it?
Yeah, or when Spider-Man makes one of his pithy quotes and Dr. Octopus' feet could fall backward.
Right, yes. All eight of them, right?
Right. Oh, it'd be so fun.
May 24th, Snoopy and Linus are hanging out sitting on the bench outside. Snoopy is in his world famous lawyer getup. So Linus says to Snoopy, okay, let's say the president has appointed you to the Supreme Court. Now, you're facing the Senate Judiciary Committee and Senator Biden asks you a tough question. How will you respond? So Snoopy replies, woof. Then Linus says, I think you're in.
Wow, Senator Biden gets a call out there.
The reason I picked this, this is the only time someone was meant, a future president was mentioned in the strip before they were president. I mean, it would, I mean, it's so rare that he would ever mention any politician in any, or any kind of political process.
So it was pretty wild to see that. Yeah. So who was the 1993 addition to the bench?
Boy, I don't know. That's post Clarence Thomas, right?
I've got to check here. I don't know. Let's see. Ruth Bader Ginsburg is August 10th, 1993.
This is what it's talking about then, huh?
Wow.
Wow. So Snoopy lost out to RBG. Well, you know.
Yeah. And he meant, Sandra Day O'Connor gets a call out as well in this segment.
Yeah. Yes. Yeah. Is she cute, right?
Snoopy. Good heavens.
This type of Zip-a-Tone work baffles me.
Yeah. It's very, talk about streaky.
Yeah. Yeah. It really looks more like that duo shade stuff that you would.
Yeah. And we know he loved Buzz Sawyer. He said that was in Captain Easy and all that stuff. So, I'm wondering if he's remembering that look and he's kind of trying to recreate it with what he's got.
Yeah. I do think Buzz Sawyer looked...
Either that or it's in the junk drawer. All the Zip-a-Tone shreds. Yeah. It's crazy. It's waste not want not.
June 4th. One of the most troubling peanut strips ever. Charlie Brown and Peppermint Patty are on either sides of a tree. Peppermint Patty says to Charlie Brown, You know what I think, Chuck? I think you get better grades if you're cute. Then she turns to him and says, I'll bet my teacher would have given me all A's if I looked like this. And she makes the whites of her eyes appear along with some eyelashes in something that will give you nightmares.
This is what I see when I have night paralysis. And then Charlie Brown says to her, I liked you fine the other way. And Peppermint Patty, who looks a little bit shaken by what just occurred, says, thank you, Chuck. Then she rubs her eyes and says, boy, that hurts your eyes.
I mean, this is being a cartoon character in a comic strip. You can change your eyes to be different.
Boy, it shows how fragile the art of cartooning is. Peppermint Patty, I think, is one of the cutest, most adorable little characters ever. But, boy, you give her those eyes and she is a creature from the depths of nightmare.
Yeah, I'm trying to think of a... Does this remind you of any particular character?
In Peanuts?
The way she does her eyes? No, just in general, like that she's somehow evoking some cutesy cartoon character.
Not to me, no. Did you have one?
It looks like Dolleyes, you know, that's definitely...
Oh yeah, very much like Dolleyes.
Tammy Faye Baker, yes.
Yeah, it's gotta be Tammy Faye.
Oh, Tammy Faye Baker. Yeah, I could kind of see that. Yeah, I don't know. It's... What's most funny, we just referred to that whole Sandra Day O'Connor. Snoopy wants to know if she's cute. And here she's saying, if you're cute, you get L.A.s. So, I don't know. Cuteness is on the brain. There's a theme going through this.
There's some truth to it.
Well, all the teachers are women, though, as far as I can tell in this trip.
That's true. We don't have a male teacher.
Yeah, after fourth grade, that changes.
Right, right. Yeah, yeah. That's true. That's true, Liz, June 23rd.
OK, we're back on the baseball field. And someone who looks just like T-Bowl is the catcher. And the little girl pitcher says, that round headed kid is up next, isn't he? And the catcher says, so what? He was just lucky the last time we played. And he turns to the little girl and says, you are Roy Hobbs' great granddaughter, aren't you? Well, show him who you are. Then he gets back behind the plate and yells, throw it in here, Roy Anne. Charlie Rounds says, Roy Anne.
Boy, this went by me because I was reading this as Roxanne the whole time.
Oh, that's funny. I could see why that you-
That's like me reading it as Oliver instead of Olivier for years. Well, she's Roy Anne.
Yeah, this is, and I don't know if surreal is the right word for this, but going back to that Peppermint Patty one as well, where the only way you could have done that joke really is if you were a cartoonist and these were cartoon characters and you're also now living in this world where a fictional character is entering the fictional world of peanuts and it's like he's bringing out the artifice a little bit this season and kind of putting it for the forefront, hey, these are cartoon characters or hey, these are fictional characters or that or think about these things, which I think is really interesting.
Oh yeah. Well, now another way to look at it from Royanne's point of view though, she's a kid that grew up with a stupid name and then she saw the natural and decided, though this is her backstory, to explain it.
She's the unnatural.
Yeah, and she didn't realize he was fictional.
Yeah, I don't think he's playing around with fictional characters in a fictional story because it's like, I mean, there's rules in these worlds. Like Archie can't be reading an Archie comic. So he lives in a world where there never were Archie comics.
Right. Although who knows?
Except Fantastic Four, actually, you did read Fantastic Four comic.
Drawn by Stan and Jack, no less, right?
Yeah.
Yeah. Right. Yeah. Well, I think, as I recall, there might have been references to the other worlds. There was like Wilbur and Suzie competing Archie comics for years. And I think they actually kind of that was what they would be reading, which is really clever. They're promoting their other comics.
That is cute.
But when you say you don't you don't think he's he's doing that here, you don't think that he's in invoking that concept of the artificiality or of what he's doing because he's obviously doing things that are impossible all the time. Yeah.
Well, I mean, we just had Snoopy, you know, with the Supreme Court. So this is wild and compared. Now, Jimmy's right. I think she got stuck with a weird name and came up with a backstory that explains.
Well, it's not that weird that they've created a character named Rayann in my so-called life. And she was one of the all-time great television characters.
She was.
But that's, yeah, I guess it's the same.
It is the same, yeah.
Well, and at the beginning of this, she introduces herself as the daughter of a fictional character and just lets it sit there. So for those, like we were saying, the percentage of people who knew that Roy Hobbs was a fictional character, Schulz let that sit there for a while. He seems to be very free with this right now. And I kind of like that he's even more than usual. He's floating into that surreality in new ways. And it's crazy.
But that's the thing about Schulz and Peanuts is you, you just absorb it and move on, right? You don't think about it. But I think it's part of what makes it so, the strip so magical is you are really going to flights of fancy that require it to be a fictional world. This is not a suburban neighborhood that you'd be walking into.
But I think that's part of the genius of Schulz is that he gets you to absorb things, rules that he set up that are so huge as flights of fancy, and yet they feel so grounded. Yeah.
Let's take a little break right now. We'll get some water and a snack, and we'll come back on the other side.
All righty.
Cool.
Hi, everyone. We all love listening to Jimmy describe what's going on in a peanut strip. But comics are actually a visual medium. You can see them anytime you want at gocomics.com, or in your very own copy of the complete Peanuts available from Fana Graphics. Plus, if you sign up for our monthly newsletter, you'll know in advance which strips we're talking about each week. Learn more about the great Peanuts reread at unpackingpeanuts.com.
And we're back. Hey, Liz, I'm hanging out in the mailbox. Do you got anything?
We don't this time. Everybody must be busy with their New Year's resolutions. What do you have?
I got a couple of things from the good old hotline. We heard from two super listeners. We heard from super listener Shaleigh Robson, who she was finishing up on part two of 1991. And she writes, and I feel like I saw Peppermint Patty's graduation somewhere before. And then she points out that the first thing that came to mind was when Peppermint Patty graduated from the Ace Obedience School. And she wanted to tell us that that was actually adapted.
It was adapted in a Charlie Brown celebration in 1982, in which it was the fifth story among ten other stories. And she said she's glad she's almost cut up on the episodes, and I'll be getting a nice hot cocoa to warm my Canadian soul. Be a big fan of Shaleigh's. So thank you, Shaleigh. Yeah, we're going to have to check out the animation. Michael, I think if you're going to break your embargo on animation.
You should watch the Ace Obedience School.
Yeah, your least favorite thing, adapting Peanuts, adapting your least favorite story.
Oh my God, yeah.
What a treat.
And we also heard from super listener Captain Billy, who says, hey, Captain Billy here, who was also the mysterious caller 440 from a couple of weeks ago. There you go. And he says, thank you for reading my extension cord joke. I made Liz laugh and my short-term life goal is to make Liz laugh.
Oh, I love you Captain Billy.
I calm down Captain Billy. Seems to me that the strip is more laugh out loud funny since it's been in a while. Maybe it's your excellent readings. Oh, maybe that's it. I don't think it is. I think it's the strip. Keep it up. Love you. Love the show. Back at you Captain Billy.
Thank you.
Thank you. That's all we got this week. If you want to get in touch with us for any reason, if you want to just say something nice, or you want to ask us a question or anything like that, you can give us a call on our hotline, which is 717-219-4162, or you could also use it like our last two listeners did, just to leave a text message. You can also, of course, email us. We're unpackingpeanuts at gmail.com, and then a bunch of social media stuff. I'll give you at the end of the show.
So remember, I worry when I don't hear from you, so right in. How about we get back to the strips?
Sure.
Sure.
But first, I have a question for everyone. Okay. How would you cast Catcher in the Rye with Peanuts characters?
Okay. That's a good question. So first off, Charlie Brown could be Holden and his-
No, but he can't be Holden because he's not Holden. I mean, Linus is, I think, as close as we can get to Holden.
Oh, I don't know. I think he's smart, but I think, I don't know.
I mean, Sally obviously is the little sister.
Yeah. Who plays the hooker?
The hooker would have to be Violet.
I think this analogy might break that.
Oh, Lydia, of course.
Oh, Lydia. I do think there is connection between Salinger and Schulz.
Well, here's what made me think of it. Good old Charlie Brown, first punchline, got you saying good old everything, right?
Right. Yes, of course.
Then Holden says old everything. Yeah.
Old Sackley and stuff. Yeah, he does.
No. Every time it refers to any person, it's with old.
Yeah.
I thought, and Jimmy's a fan, so I wonder if this is all fitting together somehow.
There is some super universe. That's true. That is true. Well, you know, they both saw some stuff in the war I think they didn't want to see. Yeah.
I mean, it's roughly the same period.
Yeah, I can definitely see connections. And I'm telling you, the Glass Van Pelt connection, that is the real Salinger connection somehow.
Listeners, tell us.
Yeah, I was just going to say, listeners, if you're going to cast the Peanuts characters, or in any classic literature, who would go take the ring to Mordor? That's a question. All right. By that line, you have to give the ring to him.
Yeah, really. Yeah, of course.
Obviously.
But then whose son?
Oh, the loyal friend whose loyal is...
Charlie Brown. Charlie Brown.
Definitely.
Yeah. Snoopy'd be Gollum. If the ring was a cookie. All right. June 27th. It's a Sunday. And Charlie Brown is sitting there in a little symbolic panel. And in one hand, he holds a baseball bat. And the other hand, he holds a quill pen, which it took me a while to figure out what that was.
Right? I couldn't tell what it was.
I thought it was the phone. Lucy's phone.
I thought it was a bunch of string for his kite.
I thought it was string for the kite at first until I read the rest of the strip.
Yeah.
So anyway, but it's definitely a quill. And Charlie Brown then is out on the pitcher's mound and he yells, OK, team, we're up to bat. And then as they walk off the field over to the bench, Linus is talking to Charlie Brown. He says, so I've been wondering. And then sitting on the bench, Linus continues, which is more important? Which is the greater accomplishment? Which would you rather do? Write War and Peace like Leo Tolstoy? Or hit 61 home runs like Roger Maris?
And as he's saying this, Charlie Brown is walking up to the plate to take his turn at bat. And of course, Charlie Brown strikes out, strike three. And then Charlie Brown sits down on the bench next to Linus and says, I probably won't write War and Peace either.
I did like this. The whole thing with Roger Maris was super traumatic to all baseball fans. I mean, by this time, 93, he's probably been forgotten. Or did he still have the record?
He still had the record for a few years, because it's not until like 97, 98, the steroid era.
OK.
It's broken.
All right. But at the time, people were really upset by this. It was all wrong. I mean, if baseball was a story, this is not how you tell it.
Right.
It should have been Mickey Mantle. And, you know, I hated the Yankees, but I was still upset because it should have been Mickey Mantle.
So is that just because of their general career? Why do you say?
No, because you had this, the All-American boy, the good guy, Mickey Mantle, who was, you know, the slugger. And then this guy came out of nowhere, who had a funny nose and didn't have any much personality. You know, Mickey Mantle was, you know, the All-American boy. He was the guy who should have done it. You know, outside of Willie Mays, of course.
So it just wasn't the right story.
Yeah, and so nobody liked Roger Maris. And so they came up with all kinds of excuses, like, okay.
There were more games.
Babe Ruth was only 154 games, and Maris, there was an expansion year, so it was 162 games. And plus, you know, he never did it again. That was a fluke. Yeah. So everybody was just angry at him. I think his life was destroyed by doing that.
I don't know if his life was destroyed, but yeah. But yeah, no, I mean, the famous asterisk next to his name, to take some of it away from him.
Yeah, he was nobody's favorite baseball player. Right.
So Roger Maris never was a spokesperson for coffee machines or anything.
He probably cashed in, but I can't think of anyone who would have had Roger Maris posters on the wall.
Well, and the other thing is like the game had changed so much. I mean, when when Babe Ruth hit 60 home runs, I think the next team, like the second plate had like 16, like the entire rest of the next best team.
Wow.
So it was so overwhelmingly dominant that, you know, people didn't want to see that go away.
I think it was a race because I think Mantle ended up with like 58 or 59. I might be wrong, but it was a big race. Who was going to break the record?
Well, when Maris' record was broken in the 90s, you know, who bought those baseballs? A famous cartoonist.
Yeah, it's probably the Spawn guy.
It's Todd McFarland, that is correct. Oh, wow. As he stood in front of a giant banner with Spawn on it, holding his baseball that he spent a million or $2 million on saying he is not a wealthy man. I remember that very clearly.
Wow, and he probably got a million or $2 million worth of advertising for Spawn out of it. So, not a bad move, Todd.
I don't think they're worth anything now because of all the steroids bust after that, you know? I mean, I guess there were something, but. June 30th. So, back at the storyline that happened before, because the Sundays obviously do not interact with the Dailies. So, we're now back at the storyline where Charlie Brown is at the plate facing Roy Anne. And now we see, we take it up in the middle of the game. Charlie Brown has hit the ball and he is running around the bases.
And we see Linus watching with Snoopy and Linus is calling the play for us. And he says, Charlie Brown is rounding first. He's rounding second. He's rounding third. But then plot twist as Linus yells, but Roy Hobbs' great-granddaughter has the ball. She's blocking the plate. And we see just that, a cliffhanger here on a peanut strip. Charlie Brown headed for home and Roy Anne clearly blocking the plate.
Well, the way he draws his hands in that last panel is just, it's the dorkiest thing. This is no athlete here.
No, it looks like he's doing the chicken dance.
But it's how they always run.
It is. It is. Drawing little kids running is fun. I always like to especially draw Reggie so it looked like that he could possibly be accidentally kicking himself in the butt.
Yeah, and then this kind of cliffhanger, he's never done that before.
Yeah. And then, well, he has, but very, very, very, very rarely.
Break these down into like one second intervals.
Yeah, I was thinking of something that's coming up, actually. So spoilers for that. And then that continues to July 1st. Linus is still watching the play and he yells, slide, Charlie Brown, slide. And then we have a large, almost full panorama of Charlie Brown sliding in the home and sending Royanne flying, including knocking her shoes off. And she drops the ball and he is, in fact, safe. He hits an inside the park homerun to defeat Royanne again.
But he's not touching the base.
I am assuming he slid over top of it if you watch the motion.
Yeah, the motion lines show that, yeah.
And some crazy Zip-A-Tone.
Yeah, crazy Zip-A-Tone. And do you want to talk about Ruff? Check out Home Plate.
Wow.
It's a handkerchief.
Yeah, it's a handkerchief or a New York Post. I'm not sure what that is.
It could have been. I mean, you'd have like a rag at second there or whatever. You would never have the real bases to play with.
Yeah. Well, Royanne's glove is also pretty crazy. Yeah. But that Zip-A-Tone, I've never seen anybody use Zip-A-Tone like this. It's pretty masterful. It definitely gives you the sense that there's just dust everywhere. It's pretty wild. Yeah.
Yep. Now, we will find more out about Royanne in a little bit because the Royanne storyline keeps coming in and dipping out. But now, we're here on July 9th, which Charlie Brown going off to camp with Sister Sally. They both have big rucksacks packed up and they're ready to go. But Sally says to Charlie Brown as they're leaving the house, I'm not sure I want to go to camp. Then Charlie Brown says, well, you better make up your mind. The bus leaves in five minutes.
To which Sally says, I'll be there in six minutes.
Yeah, I'm with you, Sally.
Sally's very funny still.
And she had a haircut too.
She really did have a haircut.
Wow.
Yeah. She got those wings trimmed.
Like little canaries or barracuits.
Yeah.
So Sally's not going to camp. July 18th. It's a Sunday. Snoopy is atop the doghouse and he's wide-eyed with just insomnia. And he hops off the doghouse, goes to Charlie Brown's house and kicks on the door. Charlie Brown hears this and then goes out to comfort his dog. And he says, are you upset little friend? Have you been lying awake worrying? Well, don't worry. I'm here. Then he gives Snoopy a hug and says, I'm here to give you reassurance. Everything is all right.
The floodwaters will recede, the famine will end, the sun will shine tomorrow. And he's holding Snoopy's face in his hands while he does this. Then he carries Snoopy with a big hug and says, and I will always be here to take care of you. Be reassured as Snoopy walks off to his doghouse. But then Charlie Brown is in bed and he says, who reassures the reassurer?
When did Watchmen come out?
1986, yeah.
Is there any chance in the world Schulz was aware of Watchmen?
Well, he could be aware of who watches the Watchmen without being aware of.
Oh, was that a, an actually a saying before?
Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's, it's from, it's from, it's originally in Latin. I don't remember what it's originally from. And then it was quoted in the Tower Commission report. So I mean, there's a potential that he, it could be in his mind. Ninety-three is a little late, but.
To me, this is one of the classic strips of the 1990s.
Oh yeah.
This one is, has a lot of, a lot of weight to it. You see some really amazing drawings here of Snoopy.
Yeah.
When he's, he's come wide-eyed, minus the eyelashes that Peppermint Patty had when she tried to look really cute. But he looks genuinely, genuinely worried. And that wavy line just kind of, he looks like he's almost shaking, just the way it's drawn. And then when he's kicking the door, we see a couple of feet in the door kick, because we see the action in that, which looks really interesting.
And then you have a very clean drawing of Charlie Brown with a black background behind him, when everything else looks so rough. And then these drawings of Charlie Brown with this fretting Snoopy, the little sweat marks flying off behind, as he's reaching out to Snoopy. This is just so, there's just one kind of one remarkable drawing after another. And then when he's hugging Snoopy. And I just think the expressions are amazing. This is something we don't see often in the strip, but we do see it.
And then when he's holding Snoopy's head and Snoopy's looking straight into his eyes, like soaking in what he's saying on the bottom tier left panel. And then he's, like you said, he's hugging him. Charlie Brown in his pajamas, kneeling, holding Snoopy tight. And Snoopy's still looking disheveled and concerned. This is just a little masterpiece of cartooning from 1993. And certainly the ending is just about as weighty as the rest of the strip. So I think this is pretty amazing.
It's good strip.
Yeah, definitely one of the best for this decade, for sure. My favorite drawing is the first one on the bottom tier with him holding Snoopy's head and his hands like that, his face. It's just so sweet and so cute.
Yeah.
And Snoopy's kind of larger than you would expect him to normally be. His head seems a little bit bigger in relationship to Charlie Brown than normal, which somehow accentuates the emotion.
July 29th, Sally and Charlie Brown, they're out at the park and they're going to shoot some hoops. And Sally has the ball and Charlie Brown says, OK, shoot, which Sally does, getting it not even higher than her own nose. And then Sally turns and says to Charlie Brown, he doesn't say nice try.
This is great. I mean, not talking about streakiness. So we picked two in a row, which I think are super classic, Peanuts strips. And I'm believing, well, you tell me about the timeline here. There was a time when teachers felt they had to start pump up the kids, the self-image.
Yeah.
And started kind of rewarding, like bad, mediocre behavior, mediocre. Didn't happen in my day, that's for sure.
Yeah. My wife Diane used to do dance competitions where she was like running, running sound or spotlight or whatever. And just like the number of ribbons flying and that thing, like everybody had a ribbon. And even if you participated, you had a ribbon. And so you would see ribbons like strewn around the theater. The kids just like, this is not really, this is nothing I want to take home and put anywhere because it basically says you failed this color.
So would this be around that time period when that started?
Yeah, definitely. He's on to something here, yeah, absolutely.
Well, I was a basketball coach, not quite this year, at 95, I guess, is when I started basketball coaching. And I ran a tough ship. You didn't get compliments unless you really, really deserved them.
Really? And that no pushback from parents or kids? That's just-
Oh, I'm only kidding. No, I was the same as everybody else. Oh, good job. I coached very little kids. There was very little basketball going on. I was babysitter.
Lots of running to and fro.
August 10th, Snoopy and Woodstock are sitting out in the sun, leaning up against a rock and Woodstock looks upset about something.
Or his phone's ringing.
Or his phone is ringing.
Yeah, really, what's with the little scratchy words?
Yeah, it's the same thing. And Snoopy says to him, the sun is in your eyes? Well, put on some sunglasses or wear a hat or sit under an umbrella. And Snoopy looks to see what Woodstock chooses. And he comes back with a hat, sunglasses, and umbrella. And Snoopy says, or do all three.
Every now and then he kneels this great little image of Woodstock.
Oh, man, we've been a while.
Yeah, that is a great, I mean, that could be something you could have on a T-shirt.
That first drawing of Woodstock in the first panel almost looks like it was drawn by someone trying to draw us Woodstock. It wasn't Schultz.
You think so?
Yeah, it looks like he's got a little nose almost. And then it goes into a, like a chin line. It just looks a little different to me. Just a hair with big, again, Woodstock is, Woodstock, we say this so often, it's just a few lines.
Yeah.
You know, something's just slightly different and you're going to notice it because there's so little there.
This is Maximum Chonky Snoopy. He has put away a few cookies at this point.
Oh, that's his foot. I was wondering what was on his lap in the panel too?
Oh, yeah, that's his foot.
Yeah. And then panel one, it looks like he's got a kind of a belly that's rising from his rib cage there, his little paws folded over it.
August 18th, Royanne is back and now she and Charlie Brown are having a little heart to heart over a couple of ice creams at the soda fountain. And Royanne says to Charlie Brown, I have to tell you something Charles, but first I want to know if you like me. And Charlie Brown says, well, sure I like you Royanne, but I don't really know you. I mean, our team played your team a couple of times. And Charlie Brown says, and of course I hit those two home runs.
And then Royanne says to him, that's what I have to confess Charles, I could have struck you out if I had wanted to.
Sending his spoon flying instead of a hat.
So poor Charlie Brown is not even allowed to enjoy his two home runs against his opponent, Royanne. And this continues for a while. We're here on the 20th. Charlie Brown is lying forlorn underneath a tree and Royanne is there with him. He says to her, why did you tell me you let me hit those home runs? I liked being a hero. And then Royanne says, I'm Roy Hobbs' great granddaughter. I have a reputation. To which Charlie Brown says, Roy Hobbs was a fictional character. And Royanne says, what?
Your hat flying?
Didn't you know that? And then Royanne leans up against the tree, says, my life is ruined. And then Charlie Brown says, when your life has been ruined, you should lie under a tree all afternoon.
Truth.
So this, I think, points to my theory. She had a weird name. She saw the movie The Natural, thought it was based on a tree story, came up with the story that she was the great granddaughter of Roy Hobbs and now found out that eventually everyone's going to find out that it's not true because they'll find out Roy Hobbs is not a real person.
Well, and now I will say if all of this is true and she is being less than honest, if Charlie Brown were not Charlie Brown, he would question whether she could have struck him out if he wanted to. And that's a wonderful thing I love about Charlie Brown is that he usually just takes people with their face value, right? Right. And so when someone says, I lied to you about this, but they said, I didn't lie to you about this, he's like, OK.
Let me, right. Let me ask you guys then, this. Do you think she is telling the truth that she could have struck him out? Or do you think she's lying to?
Well, if I could see her mouth or her eyes, I'd have a better idea if she'd tell the truth.
You know, I instantly went to thinking that Royanne could be, could be lying.
Yeah.
And so that was interesting to me because, you know, if you, if you lie about one thing, that's the danger of lying is that, you know, you can't, even when you're being sincere, you can't always know if the other person is sincere or not. And that, that can really undermine you in ways you don't want to be undermined. Right? Yeah.
Of course, it is also always possible that she could strike him out because we know Charlie Brown is a terrible bass pop player. So, but that's neat. That's it. I like that whole sequence with Royanne. I thought that was real fun.
Which that means Royanne could also have not tagged him. Right?
Oh yeah, true. Yeah, right. Yeah.
I mean, how did Royanne get the ball and get to home plate in that? There's a lot of questions.
Yeah. Well, I guess it could have been hit to the outfield and then, you know, he, because if I, not to brag, I did hit an inside the park home run once. It's going to be a close play usually.
Yeah.
But, you know, this one wasn't quite so close, at least not the way it's being played by played by Linus. You know, you sense that Royanne's been there a bit.
Yeah.
Yeah, that's true.
Absolutely.
August 21st, Charlie Brown and Linus are hanging out at the good old thinking wall, and Linus says, she asked you to go out for a chocolate sundae. Charlie Brown, who just looks upset about the whole thing, says, uh-huh. And then she confessed that she had let me hit those home runs. I was crushed. I was humiliated. And then she let me pay for the chocolate sundaes.
Well, this is also interesting. Apparently, the part that Charlie Brown tells Linus about is what we've just heard. Apparently, he's left out the part that she likes him. Right. You know, Charlie Brown's track record in the last years of Peanuts, he's the one that everyone seems to be interested in.
Every girl is in love with Charlie Brown.
It's fascinating. Yeah. Who knew?
Peppermint Patty, Marcy, Peggy Jean, Roy Anne.
Yeah. He's got quite a track record here. There's something about this version of Charlie Brown that is getting the ladies interested.
August 23rd. All right. We're out of Roy Anne World, and now it's Marcy and Peppermint Patty sitting under a tree. Marcy says, horses are relatively easy to train. Mules are easier to train than donkeys. It takes patience to train a donkey. A mule is one half donkey and one half horse, to which Peppermint Patty replies, don't always feel it's necessary to make conversation, Marcy. Oh, that's just a really good line, very, very funny.
I invite you to think about what this tree would look like though.
I would love that. That's a great crawling under and leaning against tree. It's so low.
I wonder if it's maybe it's actually like a fir tree and we're just seeing the bottom of it, you know, and then we're seeing branches all the way up.
But yeah, coniferous trees are lower than deciduous trees.
You don't always feel it's necessary to make conversation.
I'm sorry, Liz. August 29th. It's a Sunday. We have a symbolic panel of the painting Nighthawks, all with little birds like Woodstock, which is just awesome, just amazing. And then we see Snoopy outside painting in plain air. He's got a little Monet hat on and Woodstock is posing for him. And then we see Snoopy has done a perfect portrait of Woodstock.
And then Woodstock takes it home and looks at it in his nest, contemplates it for a while, then brings it back, and he has a couple notes for Snoopy on the painting. And Snoopy, unlike me, takes those notes, and then Woodstock brings the painting back to his nest, and we see that Snoopy has added a smile to Woodstock's face.
Well, if you look at panel two, the smile should have been there.
You're right. It is missing something.
Well, it looks like Woodstock is not the perfect model because the second version of Woodstock looks a little different with the closed eyes of Dignity.
Yeah. I like that Snoopy doesn't draw wings for him. He draws hands.
With the little stick hands. Those are great. And that Edward Hopper diner drawing is just the best. I mean, what a fun thing to think of once you've thought of this gag. What do I put in this upper panel?
It almost makes all of the symbolic panels worth it just to get to this one. Yes, it's so cute. Oh my gosh.
And I picked this strip. This is adorable, but it also expresses personality in the characters. It's all wordless. This is one of my favorite wordless peanut strips, I think, of all time. It's just so nicely done and it's so based on who these characters are. There's so many cool little drawings in here of Woodstock. I love Woodstock contemplating the painting with his tiny little wings, not even being able to touch the paper because they're so short and his beak is longer than his wings.
He's like his nose is right, the little beak is right on top of this piece of art that Snoopy has created. I like the tree in the second tier on far right. Classic Schulz tree probably boiled down to its essence more than usual, but really confidently drawn where he's making fast strokes, and so you don't see what we've been seeing so much with the shake like you see in the clouds above him in the top tier.
And then seeing Woodstock admiring the drawing with, and Snoopy's smile that he puts on Woodstock is very goofy.
It is really goofy.
It's just, it's a great strip. I'm so glad to see a classic strip like this in 1993 as I'm entering into this unknown world of strips I had never seen before. I'm really enjoying some of these.
Well, all hail Streakiness. It is a thing. And we got some good, some Streaks of Glory here. That sounds terrible. Streaks of Glory. You know, you gotta know when to quit. And I think that will wrap up this episode here at Streaks of Glory. If you guys want to keep this conversation going, there's a couple of ways it can do it. The first thing I'd love for you to do is go over to our website, unpackingpeanuts.com, sign up for the great Peanuts Reread.
That will get you that one email a month, letting you know what we're up to. If you want to ask us a question or just shoot us an email, make a comment. We're unpackingpeanuts at gmail.com. And you can follow us on social media. We are at Unpack Peanuts on Instagram and threads and at Unpacking Peanuts on Facebook, Blue Sky and YouTube. All right. Well, with all that said, we're going to be back next week with more strips from the Streaktastic Year of 1993.
So until then, for Michael, Harold and Liz, this is Jimmy saying, be of good cheer.
Yes, be of good cheer.
Unpacking Peanuts is copyrighted by Jimmy Gownley, Michael Cohen, Harold Buchholz and Liz Sumner. Produced and edited by Liz Sumner. Music by Michael Cohen. Additional voiceover by Aziza Shukralla Clark. For more from the show, follow Unpack Peanuts on Instagram and threads. Unpacking Peanuts on Facebook, Blue Sky, and YouTube. For more about Jimmy, Michael and Harold, visit unpackingpeanuts.com. Have a wonderful day and thanks for listening.
How are you going to end this? Like what?