Calvin and Hobbes/Calvins Dad
Calvin and Hobbes, written and illustrated by Bill Watterson, is a comic strip that follows the antics of Calvin, a 6 year old boy, and Hobbes, his tiger. First syndicated in 1985, at its height Calvin and Hobbes was carried by over 2,400 newspapers. To date, almost 23 million copies of 17 Calvin and Hobbes books have been printed. Intellectual and witty, the strip changed the way Americans viewed comic strips.
Calvin is named for a 16th century theologian (John Calvin) who believed in predestination. Hobbes is named after a 17th century philosopher (Thomas Hobbes) who had what Watterson has called "a dim view of human nature." According to Watterson, the source of the two names is intended as a joke for people studying political science, and that not many other people would get it.
From the point of view of everyone but Calvin, Hobbes is a stuffed toy tiger, but when they are alone together, Hobbes comes vividly alive, and he and talk to each other and play together, and Hobbes occasionally playfully attacks Calvin (Watterson has stated that Calvin simply sees Hobbes one way and everyone else sees him a different way — that Hobbes is more about the subjective nature of reality than about dolls miraculously coming to life).
Calvin and Hobbes strips are characterized by sparse but careful draftsmanship, intelligent humor, poignant observations, witty social and political commentary, and well-developed characters that are full of personality. Antecedents to Calvin's fantasy world can be found in Charles Schulz's Peanuts and George Herriman's Krazy Kat, while Watterson's use of comics as political commentary reaches back to Walt Kelly's Pogo.
In the first strip, Calvin meets Hobbes when he catches him with a rope noose baited with a tuna fish sandwich. The last strip appeared on Sunday, December 31, 1995.
Bill Watterson is notable for his insistence that cartoon strips should stand on their own as an art form, and he has resisted the use of 'Calvin and Hobbes' in merchandising of any sort. Watterson strived for a full-page version of his strip (as opposed to the few cells allocated for most strips).
He longed for the artistic freedom alloted classic strips such as Little Nemo and a sample of what could be accomplished with such liberty is given in the opening pages of the Sunday strip compilation The Calvin and Hobbes Lazy Sunday Book. This also might explain why the strip has never been made into an animated series.
Except for the books (see below), all Calvin and Hobbes merchandise, including T-shirts and the ubiquitous stickers for automobile rear windows that depict Calvin urinating on a company's or sports team's name or logo are unauthorized; after threat of a lawsuit, the maker (Custom Vehicle Graphics) of the stickers replaced Calvin with a different boy.
Characters
- Calvin — a 6-year-old with overactive imagination
- Hobbes — Calvin's tiger
- Calvin's Dad — a middle-aged patent lawyer who is usually portrayed as a stereotypical middle class father as his son might see him. When Calvin asks him something he doesn't know the answer to, he often makes up an answer. He also enjoys bike rides and camping trips, which were regularly featured in Watterson's strips, and insists that Calvin's chores, like the camping trips, "build character."
- Calvin's Mom, a stay at home mother who is frequently exasperated by Calvin's antics
- Susie Derkins — Calvin's classmate
- Miss Wormwood — Calvin's teacher
- Rosalyn — Calvin's babysitter, and arch-nemesis
- Moe — the class bully, the only character to "speak" in lower-case letters
- Calvin's Uncle Max — Watterson felt he didn't fit in the universe of Calvin and Hobbes, so his existence was limited to a few strips.
- Doctor 5-40 — Calvin's dubious physician/alien interrogator
Calvin's Alter-Egos
Calvin's hyperactive imagination leads him to imagine himself as other characters with different powers and goals:
- Stupendous Man — a superhero Calvin often turns into in the comfort of his school locker, often while on the run from facing such terrifying prospects as Miss Wormwood and the school principal
- Tracer Bullet — private eye
- Spaceman Spiff — space traveller, fights alien monsters on far-away planets
- Captain Napalm — preceded Stupendous Man, appears only in a few strips
- Dinosaurs — Calvin loves dinosaurs! This, of course, means that Calvin imagines himself as a dinosaur in many of the strips.
- Bugs — Calvin types "help i'm a bug" on his Mom's letter to his grandmother.
G.R.O.S.S.
G.R.O.S.S. is an acronym that stands for Get Rid Of Slimy girlS. G.R.O.S.S. is a club whose main purpose seems to be to exclude girls, mostly Calvin's neighbour Susie. Calvin and Hobbes spend most of their time in the club reworking its rules constitution and arguing about who is its Supreme Dictator-For-Life.
The Transmogrifier
The Transmogrifier is a device designed by Calvin that can transmogrify any object into another object. The Transmogrifier is made of a cardboard box. Calvin makes improvements upon the transmogrifier "technology," turning the box into a duplicator and a time machine. He also produces an improved, portable transmogrifier, incorporated into his water pistol.
Calvin's snowmen
A recurring feature in winter strips is Calvin's snowmen, whose grotesque nature often gets him into trouble. Watterson often uses Calvin's snowmen as a vehicle for Calvin's artistic theories, and to ridicule less-than-rigorous ideas about art.
Calvin's wagon and sled
Calvin and Hobbes often take rides in a wagon or a sled (depending on the season) and talk about philosophy or politics. The conversations are frequently paralleled in the course of the vehicle and the background, and the rides almost always end in a crash. Calvin's wagon has a lot of mileage on it, as it has made the trip to the planet Mars and back.
Calvinball
Calvinball is a game played almost exclusively by Calvin and Hobbes, although the babysitter Rosalyn has played on at least one occasion. All players in a game of Calvinball must wear raccoon-like masks (when asked why, Calvin replies that "no one is allowed to question the masks"). The rules of the game are made up as one goes along, but the one consistent rule is that the rules can never be the same twice. Either player may change any rule at any time, so the only way to break the rules is by using one rule twice. Watterson has stated that the greatest number of questions he receives concern Calvinball and how to play.
Calvin and Hobbes books
- Calvin and Hobbes (1987) — foreword by Garry Trudeau
- Something Under the Bed is Drooling (1988) — foreword by Pat Oliphant
- The Essential Calvin and Hobbes: A Calvin and Hobbes Treasury (1988) — foreword by Charles Schulz
- Yukon Ho! (1989) — the Yukon Song included
- The Calvin and Hobbes Lazy Sunday Book: A Collection of Sunday Calvin and Hobbes Cartoons (1989) — all in color, includes 10-page story "Spaceman Spiff: Interplanetary Explorer Extraordinaire!"
- Weirdos From Another Planet! (1990)
- The Authoritative Calvin and Hobbes: A Calvin and Hobbes Treasury (1990) — compiles Yukon Ho! and Weirdos From Another Planet!, includes a 7-page story in which Calvin becomes an elephant
- The Revenge of the Baby-Sat (1991)
- Scientific Progress Goes "Boink" (1991)
- Attack of the Deranged Mutant Killer Monster Snow Goons (1992) — not reprinted in color elsewhere
- The Indispensable Calvin and Hobbes (1992) — compiles The Revenge of the Baby-Sat and Scientific Progress goes "Boink", includes several illustrated poems
- The Days are Just Packed (1993) — large format, color sundays
- Homicidal Psycho Jungle Cat (1994) — large format, color sundays (Watterson has indicated that this was his favorite book title)
- The Calvin and Hobbes Tenth Anniversary Book (1995) — contains essays by Watterson and commentary on individual strips
- There's Treasure Everywhere (1996) — large format, color Sundays
- It's A Magical World (1996) — large format, color Sundays
- Calvin and Hobbes Sunday Pages 1985-1995 (2001) — large format compilation of sketches for and finished copies of color Sundays (catalogue for an exhibition at the Ohio State University Cartoon Research Library)
Calvin and Hobbes quotes
- "Trifle not with tired tigers."
—There's Treasure Everywhere, (c) 1996 (p.106)
- "It's a magical world, Hobbes, ol' buddy...Let's go exploring!"
—last line of the final Calvin and Hobbes strip
See also: Cartoon characters named after people
External Links
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