I fully understand that characters in comic strips are just pen-and-ink representations of things going on in an artist’s mind. That they’re not real.
Nevertheless, in seeing the launch of the current “Doonesbury” storyline in which B.D. becomes a man down in Iraq, my first thought was, “Oh God, poor Boopsie, she couldn’t take it, please don’t let him die.” Which shows just how effective Trudeau’s become in investing us in his cast’s fates.
Spoiler to follow regarding B.D…
It’s been reported that B.D. will survive, but will lose a leg. Since he’s been a football star since his inception, this of course will be beyond devastating. Granted, if we can recover the ability to laugh after 9/11, certainly there can be humor again in “Doonesbury” after such a horrific happenstance. But the bottom line is that you have to credit Trudeau’s guts for acknowledging that war is not a laughing matter.
PAD
• 
Can’t say I like seeing this sort of turn of events in what is a humor comic. I fear it will turn into a late-series episode of MASH, with perhaps a little too much pathos and also a sense that Trudeau is doing it to shock more than he ought to. He’s not Joss Whedon, and I think that this could become poor soap opera too quickly.
I give him credit for wanting to try something new and that would shake up the audience, but this is not what I read Doonesbury for.
One more thing on the timing of the announcement/leak: from the coverage, I gather that newspapers get a week’s worth of daily strips at once (since I’m seeing that some papers are concerned about, wait for it, the harsh language that B.D. uses later in the week). So once thousands of newspapers have the info, it’s gonna come out.
According to Newsday:
Creator Garry Trudeau “thought it was time” to look at the plight of the 4,000 wounded service people in Iraq, said Lee Salem, editor of Universal Press Syndicate, which distributes Trudeau’s comic to 1,400 papers, including Newsday.
“I’m simply trying to show what a grievous wound might mean to one soldier’s life. B.D. will go to Germany, and then stateside for recovery and rehabilitation, a journey of healing I’ll try to track in some detail,” Trudeau said.
[Considering how invisible the wounded troops are everyplace else, I for one welcome this.]
Jay Tea,
My wife’s black, I’ve been known to call her or ask her for some “brown sugar” when the mood strikes, if you know what I mean.
IMO, it isn’t a racist statement, at least as used in the comic strip, but one that is supposed to show a. Bush’s penchant for giving nicknames; or b. the “relationship” between Bush and Rice, if you know what I mean, Earl.
Now, if I were an African-American, that last would get me riled up because, come on, she could do better than a married white guy.
Greg
because, come on, she could do better than a married white guy.
Well, Bill Clinton chose Monica.
It could be said that working for the gov’t clouds the decision-making processes a bit. 🙂
I’m glad someone else mentioned “Gasoline Alley.” Jim Scancarelli has had me wondering since February if 105-year-old Walt Wallet is about to die–and had me wondering if it will, instead, be Phyllis (who’s gotta be up there too–she and Walt have been married for 78 years and he’s her second husband!) who passes ever since Skeezix said she could tell him the big secret she’s been keeping “tomorrow.” I think if I were an 83-year-old man and my 104-year-old stepmother told me she had a big secret she’d been keeping since I was an infant, I’d call the wife and tell her I’d be late…
Haven’t seen today’s strip yet, though…I’ll see it in the paper tonight along with “Doonesbury.”
Paul
**Just a little clarification: IIRC, Bud (from JAG) lost a leg in Afghanistan, not Irak.**
Yup. My bad. Brain cramp.
Doonesbury IS a humor strip, but it is also a POLITICAL humor strip. This is as fair game as the divorce of Mike and whatshername, and the revision of Mark. It doesn’t have to be funny every time, since this is obviously going to set up a ton of irony strips.
This has been an incredible week of Doonesbury’s
and it’s only half over. Monday Trudeau nearly
tricks us into thinking BD’s dead, but it’s told
from BD’s point of view, with the black panels as
he drifts into consciousness (or just closes his
eyes. It’s a technique he lifted from my favorite
M*A*S*H episode, but it works, and the B&W gives
it a war movie feel. (I know most daily papers run
it in B&W, but it’s posted at Yahoo in color, and
Monday was in B&W).
Tuesday we have another clever technique. Notice
there’s a conversation between BD & Ray, but Ray’s
not hearing what BD’s saying. Is he just thinking
he’s speaking? Is he mumbling or moaning
incoherantly? Or is he unable to speak?
Wednesday we depart from the first person POV,
unless BD is having an out of body. He seems to be
crying in the first panel, then in the final panel
we seem him on the stretcher with a missing leg.
And I haven’t seen every Doonesbury strip ever,
but is this the first time ever we’ve seen BD
with his helmet off? Hasn’t he always had a
football helmet, cop riot helmet, army helmet on?
And need I point out the obvious phallic
symbolism, the symbolic castration inherent in
the removal of his “helmet” by a field doctor.
So he’s lost a leg, he may be without something
else in that same area and he may be mute. And
his soul may have left his body. At this point
we don’t know and the weeks only half over.
It’s been a long time since a comic strip’s had
me on the edge of my seat waiting for the next
installment like this. It may not be Pulitzer
gold but Trudeau is definitely working the medium
for all it’s worth.
Xero, in what universe does one Republican Senator calling for a draft mean “the Republicans will probably be calling for a re-instatement of the Draft after the elections in November”? Considering that the two bills currently sponsered in the Congress were introduced by Democrats, WHICH WAS MENTIONED IN THE ARTICLE THAT YOU CITED AFTER YOU SAID THAT, by your logic the measure should pass the Senate 100-0, because if ONE Republican in favor implies wide Republican support, then TWO Democrats in favor of it must mean it will be one of Kerry’s campaign planks.
Reading comprehension. It’s a good thing.
I suddenly wonder if BD will ever put his helmet back on.
GASOLINE ALLEY STRIP ALERT!
In today’s (Wednesday’s) installment, Skeezix has just received a middle of the night emergency phone call that something dire has happened at his aunt and uncle’s!
Actual circumstances remain unknown as I type this, since I prefer to read my comics in the newspaper over breakfast.
I am just amazed at this week’s Doonesbury and Get Fuzzy.
Seeing BD yesterday without his helmet was a much bigger blow to me than seeing him without a leg. I like DonBoy’s idea that BD may never put a helmet back on.
Okay, I don’t want to retract my previous praise,
but the Thursday strip was a cheat, unless
“retconning” is yet another comics convention
Trudeau is mining.
On Wednesday BD’s leg was blown off at the upper
mid-thigh level; on Thursday a new character, a
M*A*S*H doctor, is claiming they lost the shin
but saved the knee.
Ok, dude’s still a crip, but what they’re telling
us today ain’t what they showed us yesterday.
So much for Pulitzer Gold.
————————–
And may I ask what’s up with the p*l*t*cs?
Check the map, there’s only one United States Of
America. Whether you voted for the Resident Select
of not, whether you supported Dubya’s little war
or not, it happened. It’s our war now, like it or
not, and when American soldiers come home in a
bag, they’re our boys to bury. Ain’t no us or them
anymore. War is dirty business, nothing unpatriotic
about saying so, it’s just facts of life.
Okay, I don’t want to retract my previous praise,
but the Thursday strip was a cheat, unless
“retconning” is yet another comics convention
Trudeau is mining.
On Wednesday BD’s leg was blown off at the upper
mid-thigh level; on Thursday a new character, a
M*A*S*H doctor, is claiming they lost the shin
but saved the knee.
Ok, dude’s still a crip, but what they’re telling
us today ain’t what they showed us yesterday.
So much for Pulitzer Gold.
————————–
And may I ask what’s up with the p*l*t*cs?
Check the map, there’s only one United States Of
America. Whether you voted for the Resident Select
of not, whether you supported Dubya’s little war
or not, it happened. It’s our war now, like it or
not, and when American soldiers come home in a
bag, they’re our boys to bury. Ain’t no us or them
anymore. War is dirty business, nothing unpatriotic
about saying so, it’s just facts of life.
RE: David Bjorlin’s question
I was in the middle of writing an article for my site and researching multiple links. I paraphrased a one news article and linked to another.
Maybe you should have politely asked me for the real source of my statement, or whether I had posted the wrong link, before making an ášš of yourself?
http://www.e-thepeople.org/article/31188/view
I guess we all visualize humor differently. I see Andy’s point but can’t see someone too lazy to read a book (as restated in that strip) being sharp enough to tell Condi what they want to do to Clarke they can do to her.
Whoa. My favorite Mac personality reads Peter’s column.
I’ve heard Peter sing and sing well; So I won’t chide him on his music tastes.
– Alan
PS If anyone is reading The Baroque Cycle – add to the Metaweb @ http://www.metaweb.com
Randall, was that an attempt at satire, or do you truly not comprehend that, as “Doonesbury” is a comic strip, what you’re seeing in there are drawings, not photographs? The drawing may look to you like the loss was “obviously” mid-thigh, but until the artist tells us clearly exactly where the damage occurred, his drawing may not be exactly to scale, especially under deadline pressure.
**********************
I also hope you were kiddiing about the politics, as that’s what got “Doonesbury” relegated to the editorial page of our local fishwrap in the first place…
On Wednesday BD’s leg was blown off at the upper mid-thigh level; on Thursday a new character, a M*A*S*H doctor, is claiming they lost the shin but saved the knee.
Ok, dude’s still a crip, but what they’re telling
us today ain’t what they showed us yesterday.
After seeing the Thursday strip, I went back to the Wednesday strip and looked at it again. If you believe that BD’s left leg was drawn to look like it was in an elevated position (to minimize the blood flow after having the leg blown off), then the doctor’s right.
I saw yesterday’s strip last night, and wow. It was very powerful. For one thing, it was the first time we’ve seen B.D. without his helmet, and to see him like that, without his leg, he looked so … naked. Not weak, but no longer powerful.
Continuation of the side thread on JAG. Yes, it tends to portray the military in a positive light, but one of the reasons I like it is that it tends to be reasonably realistic in that the military isn’t viewed as one monolithic ‘good guy’. There are very decent people in it, but also some bad apples. Even the hero is known to goof at times. And they don’t shy from showing how politics can screw things up for the people on the front lines.
One of my favourite episodes (and a good example of why this is one of the less than a handful of things I bother with on tv any more) featured a fighter pilot who’s accusing her C.O. of sexism for taking her off flight duty. He contends it has nothing to do with her being a woman and everything with her being a lousy pilot. Enter a congresscritter who’s big on women’s rights and she forces the reinstatement of the pilot to flight duty. End result? The reinstated pilot dies when she lands badly on the carrier, destroying the F-14 she was flying, killing herself and wounding her Radar Officer in the process.
Jay–Are you a black woman? If not…shut up. Any black women here want to comment about whether the “Brown Sugar” comment is racist?
And who’s to day Trudeau didn’t call up cousin George and get approval from Condi?
And Simon, Trudeau is far better then Whedon. Hip references in diaglog do not a genius make.
Andy Ihnatko is here? How cool is that!
Jonathon the Other: “Doonesbury” is a comic
strip, what you’re seeing in there are drawings,
not photographs. Until the artist tells us
clearly exactly where the damage occurred, his
drawing may not be exactly to scale, especially
under deadline pressure.
**********************
Robert Jung:
If you believe that BD’s left leg was
drawn to look like it was in an elevated
position (to minimize the blood flow after
having the leg blown off), then the doctor’s
right.
**********************
The comics medium is a combination of words and
pictures. What the writer tells us does not
supercede what the artist shows us. Especially
when it’s the same person doing both jobs.
“Drawings not to scale?” Even with a fairly
stylized drawing style the difference between
mid-thigh and below knee is a petty sloppy error.
And I think Doonesbury is done pretty well ahead
of deadline, not cranked out at the last minute,
so I wouldn;t worry about deadlines.
———————-
Robert, you may be right. Trudeau doesn’t use
that much foreshortening (think of how rarely you
even see the characters faces straight on.) But
he is trying everything this week, and he doesn’t
do that many birds-eye view panels, either, so
you are right, BD’s leg may have been tilted
upwards, making it look shorter than it was.
———————-
Jon, it’s a series of strips about the horror of
war. Does that automatically make it a criticism
of the administration? When I was a kid we didn’t
care if it was Johnson’s war or Nixon’s war, we
just didn’t want to get drafted and, as Frank
Zappa wrote much later, “shot in the fox hole”
in a stupid and pointless war.
I do believe this is the first time BD has ever appeared bare-headed. I recall that at one point when he’d had to change one helmet for another (possibly when he went to the Gulf War in ’90), he described having the old one removed as an actual surgical procedure.
The more I thought about the idea of “Doonesbury” and “Get Fuzzy” actually crossing over, the less I liked it. “Get Fuzzy’s” world, where every animal is apparently sentient and verbal, wouldn’t mesh very well with “Doonesbury’s” world, where carrying on conversations with your pets is something you need pharmaceutical assistance to achieve.
Paul
“RE: David Bjorlin’s question
I was in the middle of writing an article for my site and researching multiple links. I paraphrased a one news article and linked to another.
Maybe you should have politely asked me for the real source of my statement, or whether I had posted the wrong link, before making an ášš of yourself?”
Two things. One, I didn’t just make an ášš of myself. I made an ášš of myself several years when I accepted my law degree.
Two, read your own citation. Again. There’s still only one Republican quoted as coming out in favor of a draft. One. Three minus two. (Three being the total number of Members of Congress advocating a draft, two being the number of them who are Democrats.) The leap from that to “the Republicans will probably be calling for a re-instatement of the Draft after the elections in November,” which is what you said to begin with, is still ridiculous unless you have secret evidence that the Libertarian presidential candidate is in fact precognitive. In which case we need to ask him who’s going to win the next Super Bowl so I can place my bets now.
To sum up: I may be an ášš, but you’re still wrong.
Getting back to actual “Doonesbury” questions, when did BD become a lieutenant? I thought he was a corporal in Gulf War I, hence the whole “cheating on Boopsie” storyline, which was broken off because the girl was an officer and he was a noncom?
New guy, just been reading through this thread. Have to say, this is one of more civil discussions from left and right that I’ve come across. Way to go people.
I’ve been following Doonesbury since very early on (’73 0r ’74). In spite of Mike Doonesbury’s history (founding Walden Commune, trying to find America), I believe that Mike has identified himself as a Republican (although not as a conservative). I can’t find proof of this, but in 30 years of reading, I’m pretty sure the subtext is there.
1) This may dispel the notion that GBT only speaks directly through his liberal characters.
2) Whadaya think?
Ben
Scavenger:
I’m an American, a legal adultwith opinions and thoughts and the will to express them. If you got issues with that, you got bigger problems than some little comic strip.
There’s an old aphorism among defense lawyers that “if the facts are against you, argue the law. If the law is against you, argue the facts. And if both the facts and the law are against you, attack the prosecutor.”
Jay:
It’s too petty to attack people for not visualizing humor the way I do. I’d be jumping all over “some odd man in Ohio who confuses public opinion as fact” if actions like that made any sense.
Andy’s got a good bead on making the strip work as you understood it
The bloodshed comment is about the war, not any posters.
So I sez: Trudeau doesn’t use that much foreshortening
(think of how rarely you even see the characters
faces straight on.) and of course, just to prove
me wrong, the Friday strip features a full frontal
shot of the new doctor (Who does seem to bear a
remarkable resemblence to M*A*S*H’s Major Charles
Emerson Winchester.)
And in keeping with the weeks theme of pushing the
limits and using every technique at his disposal,
Trudeau has BD skip denial and go straight to
anger upon discovering his missing limb and shout
out an expletive there’s no need to repeat here
(initials S.O.B.), a phrase not generally seen in
the comics section or on the editorial page – and
in double the regular sized dialog lettering.
I think Mike Doonesbury’s political affiliation has changed as he’s gotten older, not exactly an uncommon phenomenon. He certainly seemed identified as a Democrat in the early days, but he’s said he’s now a Republican. I think there was even a series of strips where he discussed it and basically said that as he got older and more affluent, he felt the Republican party was a better fit (I’m really digging through my own memory here, not having the inclination to search ten years’ worth of archived online strips to get the exact explanation).
As for BD’s increase in rank, the fact that he was in the Gulf War and was called up for Iraq over ten years later would seem to indicate that he’s remained in the reserves all this time. Presumably, he’s been meeting the annual service requirements, so it doesn’t seem all that unlikely that he could have gotten promoted to lieutenant since 1991.
Paul
Meanwhile, Rob’s cousin has arrived home in “Get Fuzzy” and it is not BD from Doonesbury.
The crossover possibility would have been nice to see, but “Get Fuzzy” does raze an interesting point:
Despite how anyone may personally feel about the politics and the situation(s) here and abroad, how come it is only the immediate families that are doing the most celebrating when it comes to returning soldiers today?
I’ll be interested to see if we get the Friday strip as written, censored or not at all. My paper still carries “Doonesbury” on the comics page and the last time there was controversial language (the mášŧûrbáŧìøņ Sunday page) we got a reprint instead.
And it’s pretty clear that someone has died over in “Gasoline Alley,” but as of Thursday we still don’t know if it’s Walt or Phyllis…I did some online searching tonight, and y’know I didn’t find word one about this arc? I know “Alley’s” biggest years are long past, but you’d think the syndicate would say something about killing off a major character…
Paul
how come it is only the immediate families that are doing the most celebrating when it comes to returning soldiers today?
Recently, the son of two of my married coworkers returned home from Iraq. They had a homecoming party.
Alot of the situation is, I think, the fact that nobody really knows when these soldiers are coming home. Many of them are being kept longer than the usual year tour of duty (indeed, most of the soldiers themselves don’t know when they are coming home).
I don’t think it’s some sort of media bias, but a reality of the situation – soliders are coming and going all the time.
Why are only the immediate families celebrating when soldiers come home?
Probably for the same reason that nobody’s getting outraged when coffins come home: the returns of both living soldiers and dead ones are being kept under pretty tight wraps.
When someone loses her job for simply releasing pictures proving that yeah, we’re losing people in Iraq, I think it’s safe to say we’ve all fallen down the rabbit hole.
TWL
Agreed Craig and Tim,
It’s a trickle of soldiers coming and going, and it’s on an almost daily basis. It’d take up way too much time on a national news level, but here in the Metro Detroit area, the comings and goings of any Michigan-area soldier(s) usually gets mentioned several times on the news and in the papers…
People will be more interested over all when all our boys come home from the Bush Family’s personal vendetta against Iraq…
Today, Friday, the harsh language.
I admit to some surprise that the Raleigh News and Observer printed the phrase the wounded BD shouts. Raleigh seems like such a stodgy, conservative place that I couldn’t really imagine the editors feeling that it was appropriate for the readership.
However, Doonesbury is printed on the editorial page, not the main comics pages. And the N&O gave us the complete run of Boondocks’ “Condi needs a man” strips, which the Washington Post, which syndicates that strip, didn’t even run.
I look forward to the inevitable howls of protest over the language of today’s strip in future letters to the editor.
“Probably for the same reason that nobody’s getting outraged when coffins come home: the returns of both living soldiers and dead ones are being kept under pretty tight wraps.”
Not from where I’m sitting. Every time the troops come home, there’s a blurb in the TV news about it, with the hugging family members, cheery sound bites, and servicemen greeting the babies they’ve never seen before. In contrast, dead soldiers are merely numbers on the Iraq Body Count Tote Board, briefly mentioned and then forgotten.
But then, this entire war has been whitewashed by the Administration, who feels that any negative publicity will reflect poorly on Bush and hurt his re-election chances in November. Notice the total lack of coverage about servicemen who aren’t killed, but simply maimed or disabled in Iraq…
…like Doonesbury’s B.D., which completes the circle.
Every time the troops come home, there’s a blurb in the TV news about it
Are we talking local or national?
Local attention for troops returning is no suprise; indeed, it should be expected.
But then, this entire war has been whitewashed by the Administration,
Agreed.
While it’s local news for me, we do get coverage of troops returning even outside the local area.
Does anyone remember Nog on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine? He lost a leg as well and had to deal with it. Surprised no one has referenced that here.
Also, the big news here in Arizona is that former Arizona Cardinals player, Pat Tillman, who re-enlisted after 9/11, was killed in Afgahnistan.
Lee Whiteside
SFVT.org Webmaster
Over at Mark Evaniers site http://www.newsfromme.com/
he has a half dozen links to stories about todays
Doonesbury strip. Not coverage of the war story
being told or how well it’s being told, but
coverage of the “bad language”.
If I’m not giving him too much credit here, I
suspect Trudeau may have included the double sized
bold print expletive deliberately as an attention
getting device to draw attention to the strips
topic.
(What to they think an athlete/cop/soldier who
discovers his left leg is gone below the knee is
supposed to say; “Where’s the rest of me?”
Or isn’t the editorial page the place for realism
anymore?)
I’m surprised this still works. It’s the 21st
Century; we can say “heck” and “darn” on TV now
without using “heck” and “darn”. Heck, most
sitcoms can say the B-word without resorting to
“bee-otch”.
Apparently some papers ran it, some dropped it or
replaced it, some removed it from the print paper
but put it on their web site, and at least one
censored it, apparently violating their contract
with the strip’s syndicate. Let’s hope they get
sued.
It’s been one… heck of a week. Monday BD is
wounded, Wednesday we see him sans helmet and
sans foot, Friday the attention getting “naughty
word”. I’m looking forward to after midnight
(when Yahoo posts the next days strips) to see
what Trudeau’s saved for a capper.
And that phone call or e-mail home to Boopsie is
one I’ll be dreading.
I don’t think I’ve been this caught up in a comic
strip since, oh I don’t know. Since Farley died.
Personally, I think the size of the letters just indicates the volume with which BD uttered them.
I also think that’d be pretty much my response, too. “My leg’s gone?? SON OF A BÍTÇH!!!“
I’d probably add some other colorful language that no legit newspaper is prepared to print, though…
You know, a couple of months ago Trudeau had that plot about Boopsie shutting down the football program because of sex at recruiting parties. The Monday strip is Boopsie going out to her mailbox, reading some mail, and then she just has the word (thought?) balloon “Oh God, no.” At that point I wondered — jeez, could Trudeau kill BD? And was I supposed to jump to that conclusion from that strip, or was it all in my head?
Aaaannnd we wind up the week with pain, attempted
bigamy (though that was done as a joke) and a sly
drug reference. Yeah, morphine’s great, isn’t it?
Greatest week of any comic strip in recent memory.
I retract my retraction: Give this guy a Pulitzer.
None of the comments i noticed about BD’s helmet being off (i may have missed one or two, since i was skimming quickly down the list) have made the possibly more-or-less subtle point that someone on the rec.arts.sf.fandom newsgroup has made — up until now, BD’s helmet has always matched his current activity/profession.
By showing BD with no helmet, what (if anything) is Trudeau implying/foreshadowing?
((BTW, Kathleen, i remember your “skinny tie” music days — i was promoting the Ramones and Steeleye Span and Fairport Convention at the time, you may remember…
((Still am, actually.))
Back on “Doonesbury characters who have died, often in current-events-related ways”: I believe a hated ex-boss of Mike’s died in the WTC, saving others — much to Mike’s guilty dismay.
“By showing BD with no helmet, what (if anything)
is Trudeau implying/foreshadowing?”
Well, he was a jock/athlete, a cop and a soldier.
Now he’s going to be a civilian who probably can’t
go back to being any of those things.
I agree that the helmetless, footless BD on the
stretcher was the central money-shot of the entire
week. And I’m sticking with the “symbolic
emasculization” theory.
… or maybe he’ll be a pirate. Sorry.
First BD, then Pat Tillman. A bad week for Footballers.