Fear the Future, by Arthur Tebbel – Pop Art #165

January 31, 2012 Arthur Tebbel 0 Comments

Dear Art,

You wouldn’t suspect this from my reclusive profile but I know a lot about the things you look at on the Internet.  I know you saw the drawing making the rounds that looks like a postscript to my popular comic strip Calvin and Hobbes.  I don’t know why people insist on keeping that stuff alive even though it’s been gone for so long.  Can’t they find another comic strip to love?  Should I feel flattered or insulted by these attempts?

-Bill Watterson

 

Bill,

First off I’d like to say that I love your work.  Really, it’s one of the four works from my childhood that I credit with forming my take on humor (along with, in no particular order, The Simpsons, NewsRadio and The Muppets) so I’m not entirely unbiased on the subject.  Alternatively maybe I’m completely perfect to comment on this subject; I’m a big fan of your work and it was abruptly ripped from my life when I was 11.

People should stop ripping off your work.  This piece is clearly that.  There’s another famous one out there where Calvin gets on some Ritalin type drug and stops seeing Hobbes.  It’s persistently mention on the web as being the “last strip” to the point where I saw someone claim they remembered seeing it in print.  It’s really a shame because it’s a lazy photoshop with the same image of Calvin used over and over again.  It serves in stark contrast to the actual last strip that was a beautiful Sunday strip full of life and character.  I’m not going to talk about the plethora of knock-off merchandising out there except to say that I saw a sticker this weekend of Calvin peeing on the Nissan logo and I was just utterly perplexed that anyone hated Nissan that much.  I mean maybe your characters are the only way this poor person could express himself after the board of directors of Nissan hunted his family for sport.

Your strip has been gone for just over 16 years.  When I looked that up to write this I was actually stunned.  It feels like an old wound.  I know how lame that sounds.  It spoke to a lot of people in a really profound way and then it was suddenly gone.  I understand people’s need to create stuff that lets them feel more connected to what you did.  I understand less when they feel the need to pass that stuff of as your work.  I hardly understand it at all when they pass it off as your work expressing the exact same lesson Toy Story 3 did last year.  A lot of people saw that movie.

Most importantly I can’t believe you actually care.  You walked away 16 years ago. I have to assume with enough money to work anonymously for the rest of your life.  You live in Cleveland, a fact I know because I bought a book about someone trying to find you.  You inspired this fanatical loyalty that you seem content not to return to your audience.  I’m not going to tell you you owe it to anyone to do anything more with your life for that audience but maybe if they wildly overreach in their misguided expressions of that love you should just let it be.