"Calvin and Hobbes" Creator Bill Watterson Looks Back With No Regrets

With fifteen years separating us from the last appearance of "Calvin and Hobbes" on the comic pages, reclusive artist Bill Watterson gave a rare interview reminiscing about his legacy. "The only part I understand is what went into the creation of the strip. What readers take away from it is up to them. Once the strip is published, readers bring their own experiences to it, and the work takes on a life of its own. Everyone responds differently to different parts. I just tried to write honestly, and I tried to make this little world fun to look at, so people would take the time to read it. That was the full extent of my concern. You mix a bunch of ingredients, and once in a great while, chemistry happens. I can't explain why the strip caught on the way it did, and I don't think I could ever duplicate it. A lot of things have to go right all at once."

Comments

Best comics

[sopssa]

If you think about it, it is actually quite hard to say what makes a good comic. Humor plays some role, but it isn't so straightforward either. Calvin and Hobbes was definitely my favorite comic as a kid. I did read Donald Duck too (obviously, as everyone did), but apart from that I can't remember any other as good comic. And I went to library solely to read Calvin and Hobbes. I didn't like the alien parts, but otherwise it was great fun.

RSS programs today make it really nice to read comics too. I am reading Cyanide & Happiness, Pearls Before Swine, a few local comics and xkcd. I actually have some others in my rss program, but a lot of times I skip them because they're not that up to quality and not that funny.

Now a days I like Pearls Before Swine for its good humor and references to other comics, culture and politics. The random appearances of Stephan Pastis himself and being self-satiric also make it great. I remember there being some reference to Calvin and Hobbes sometimes too.

Re:Best comics

[Em Emalb]

The thing about C&H, to me, was that Watterson didn't dumb down his comic. It was just a story about a boy, his tiger, and the adventures they'd have growing up. It had wonderful imagination, wonderful commentary on life, and was more amusing than funny, IMO.

Greatest comic of all time, IMO....ranked 1A with Farside being 1B.

Re:Best comics

[Scrameustache]

To me, Calvin and Hobbes looked like the poster child of a comic that yearned to be on the web. If you read any of his books, he often had long and bitter fights with the publisher about the format of his comics. How much space he could use, if he had to have the “Throwaway frame” and so forth. I wish a comic like this had come along maybe 10 years later so it could take full advantage of the web, instead of being smothered by the oppressive newspaper guideline .

Look at what Lucas made when he had to contend with other people's input, and look at what he made once he got absolute, unsupervised creative control.

It helps to have an editor to keep you grounded.

Re:Best comics

[goldaryn]

*prepares to get modded down into the infernal depths of hell* Far Side wasn't in the same /league/ as Calvin and Hobbes. I know that they were one frame and no continuity, but they were also miles off in terms of writing, observation, illustration and funniness. It's like comparing a one-liner to a poem, perhaps it's even unfair to compare. But IMHO, if they were Slashdot posts and I had 4 mod points, Far Side would be Interesting but Overrated. C&H would be Insightful and Funny

Re:Best comics

[Red Flayer]

If you think about it, it is actually quite hard to say what makes a good comic. Humor plays some role, but it isn't so straightforward either.

It's very easy to say what makes a good comic. Basically, it's all of the positive slashdot moderation categories, except for underrated.

Funny? Check. Insightful? Check. Informative? Check (though to a lesser extent).

Plus characters that people can identify with. My dad loved Calvin & Hobbes because he identified with the Dad (and now that I have kids, I do too). I identified with Calvin. My sister identified with Suzie. My mom never read comics, but I'd bet that she'd identify with Calvin's mom... I swear there were times when she said stuff that I recall reading in a speech bubble above Calvin's Mom's head.

But, since this is turning into a tribute thread... Let me just say that Calvin's dad's explanations of science are a wonderful model for how to stimulate original thought in kids. I too, have told my kid that the sun rises in the morning because hot things rise, and sets in the evening as it cools.

Re:Best comics

[fahrbot-bot]

It's very unusual for a first-grader to use words like "arboreal" and "ichthyoid". ... Calvin's rambunctiousness would be considered abnormal...

In reality, Calvin would probably classified as At-Risk/Underachieving Gifted.
[My wife was a Gifted Education teacher.]

Re:Best comics

[Anonymous Coward]

That's a very different comparison, actually.
It wasn't the content that he fought. Watterson actually ended up fairly free to do what he wanted in the end and it showed for it. It was the constraints of the medium, the publishers have this set of boxes, and the artist was supposed to fill just those boxes. And to top it off, the comic has to be designed in such a way that certain boxes can be removed (the throwaway boxes).
The example with George Lucas (who I presume you're talking about) would be more accurate if George Lucas had decided to say "screw the 4:3, 'made to fit to tv' crap. I want my film shown in 16:9 in its original high resolution, no cropping the sides off and no letterboxing." Watterson risked losing some market to hold to his artist vision.

Re:Best comics

[LandDolphin]

You compare Far Side to a one liner and C&H to a poem based upon the 1 frame vs. 3 frames (And I assume continuity). It is worth noting that telling a story in 1 frame or line versus 3 frames or a whole poem is much more difficult.

Re:Best comics

[MightyMartian]

I don't even like comparing them. It's like comparing Monty Python and Don Rickles. Both are extraordinarily funny, but the humor comes from places so different that saying one is better than the other doesn't even make sense.

The Far Side was as Pythonesque as a comic ever got. It was absurdest and surreal, meant to tickle with bizarre juxtapositions. I still remember the first Far Side comic I saw, of the truck smashed into a single palm tree in the middle of a desert. It was so bizarre, so absurd that I laughed out loud.

C&H was utterly different, a more human comic script that found its humor in this wonderful world that Waterson created. While I don't think any childhood was quite like it, I don't think I've ever experienced anything that invoked childhood with the kind of purity of that comic book.

Re:Best comics

[GabriellaKat]

It's very unusual for a first-grader to use words like "arboreal" and "ichthyoid". ... Calvin's rambunctiousness would be considered abnormal...

In reality, Calvin would probably classified as At-Risk/Underachieving Gifted. [My wife was a Gifted Education teacher.]

Sadly, he would more then likely be called some form of ADD/Autism (living in his own world, shunning clothes at times, etc). ADD/ADHD & Autism are siblings after all. I'll never forget the strip where "the pills must be working" and Hobbes just becomes a stuffed toy.

Re:Best comics

[bonch]

While I agree with what Calvin's personality represented, I do think a lot of people overanalyze the comic today to try to convince everyone of its greatness. Calvin used words like "arboreal" not to shun the status quo and illustrate the richness of experience but because it's funny for a kid in a comic strip to use words like that. The Peanuts kids also spoke in a way that was above their age level for the same reason.

Bill Watterson seems kind of mystified and amused at the enduring popularity of the strip and how people have latched onto it.

Re:Best comics

[tubegeek]

That color/b&W strip was my all-time favorite - especially when Dad reminds Calvin that many artists are insane. A classic.

Good for him

[Foggiano]

I'm glad he was able to create something that he is pleased with and has brought happiness and pleasure to those around him. May we all be so fortunate.

regrets?

[Bodero]

No regrets? That's like asking Bill Gates if he regrets dropping out of Harvard and becoming a billionaire. Yeah, I'm sure he regrets it daily.

Re:regrets?

[eldavojohn]

No regrets? That's like asking Bill Gates if he regrets dropping out of Harvard and becoming a billionaire. Yeah, I'm sure he regrets it daily.

The regret in question would be the one where you regretted quitting early. Because Watterson quit early. It's a very short 'interview' but to all artists and people in general out there who start something very good, take note:

Readers became friends with your characters, so understandably, they grieved -- and are still grieving -- when the strip ended. What would you like to tell them?

This isn't as hard to understand as people try to make it. By the end of 10 years, I'd said pretty much everything I had come there to say.

It's always better to leave the party early. If I had rolled along with the strip's popularity and repeated myself for another five, 10 or 20 years, the people now "grieving" for "Calvin and Hobbes" would be wishing me dead and cursing newspapers for running tedious, ancient strips like mine instead of acquiring fresher, livelier talent. And I'd be agreeing with them.

I think some of the reason "Calvin and Hobbes" still finds an audience today is because I chose not to run the wheels off it.

I've never regretted stopping when I did.

As someone suffering to find anything even remotely watchable on American TV, I wish more people would adopt this kind of attitude.

Re:regrets?

[fm6]

That bit about leaving the party early resonates with me. A very long time ago, I couldn't look at a Peanuts strip without laughing. Then after a decade or so, I couldn't look at it without grimacing.

Still, I do miss that young sociopath and his tiger.

Another brave thing Watterson did: no licenses for animated cartoons, coffee cups, etc. He said he couldn't stand the idea of some voice actor doing Hobbes. Neither could I, but I'm not sure I could have walked away from the millions of dollars those licenses would have paid.

Re:regrets?

[mctk]

So incredibly true. Compare the two versions of "The Office." In the UK, they told their story, had some laughs, but when it ran its course, they stopped. I wanted more. I still want more. I'll just have to wait a few years then watch the episodes again. In the US, however, the program is floundering to find weekly topics. And it shows. Once Jim and Pam hooked up, the main tension, the binding thread was gone. Look at "Heroes". Intriguing first season, great climactic moment. But it just...keeps...going. Look at "Lost". I followed the first season closely, but after a while, you start to think that the writers are sitting around going, "Now what can we do this week, without really changing much. After all, we still have 10 more hours of programming to fill." Does anybody even watch The Simpson's anymore?

Re:regrets?

[MightyMartian]

North American media tends to drive things into the ground (not that others don't to, the last season of Monty Python's Flying Circus, sans Cleese, apart from a few moments, was clearly beyond its prime).

I remember the same thing happened to MASH. I look back at the original few seasons when McLean Stevenson and Wayne Rogers were still there, and they constitute some incredibly funny moments in TV history. Once they were gone and Alda exerted more control as the "Star", the tendency to be overly maudlin and topical ruined the goon show quality.

Peanuts certainly went past its prime. It's heyday in the late 1960s and into the late 1970s certainly constitutes probably the greatest comic strip there ever was (and I've yet to see a cartoonist that doesn't think Charles M. Schulz was the best the medium ever produced). But clearly the concept had run out of gas by the 1980s, and like anything taken too far, it began to be a terrible caricature of its former self. The whole strip turned into a cliche. If Schulz had walked away in 1980, he would have the left the strip at the top of its game. I don't think it was, in his case, for want of money, with TV and even movies, and the wide syndication, he was probably the best-paid writer in comic strip history. I think it was that he just couldn't leave it behind.

Watterson left C&H in a place where its perfection was never compromised. I've reread my collection a dozen times, at it all seems so perfect. Nothing is stale or reused. It's now art for the ages.

Wise words

[Anonymous Coward]

It's always better to leave the party early. If I had rolled along with the strip's popularity and repeated myself for another five, 10 or 20 years, the people now "grieving" for "Calvin and Hobbes" would be wishing me dead and cursing newspapers for running tedious, ancient strips like mine instead of acquiring fresher, livelier talent. And I'd be agreeing with them.

I wish someone had mentioned that to Matt Groening.

Re:Wise words

[elrous0]

Groening was always overrated. If you listen to the Simpsons commentary tracks, you figure out pretty quickly that he had little to do with the success of the show, or its quality. All he talks about is the quality of the animation. It's quite clear he has little appreciation for the writing (which is what truly made The Simpsons so great). Someone will be talking on a track about how clever a bit of satire there was in this scene, and Groening will interrupt with "Hey look at how cool that flower looks!" Going back and looking at "Life in Hell" and his other early works, it's clear he was never a fraction as creative as the Simpsons writers (probably why he only wrote one episode--one of the more mediocre ones at that). Either he or one of the other co-creators was smart enough to hire Harvard Lampoon grads and other smart writers in the early days of the show, but after that he basically contributed nothing. It was always a paycheck for him (and maybe an ego boost, since many people assume he's the actual show-runner and creative force--which he never was). So you can't really fault him for milking it. He doesn't realize how mundane the show has become because he never really appreciated what made it great in the first place.

Re:Wise words

[sopssa]

I actually started liking Simpsons again after season 20 began, it felt like it went back to roots and the humor was back there. I earlier stopped watching around season 14. Now I do not know Groening comes in to play with this, but Simpsons has definitely picked up again.

But I wouldn't say Groening didn't contribute much to the show. Even if the other writers did have a lot to do in it, he must have played some role. Remember that Futurama is great too and he was vocal against Fox when it got cancelled.

Re:Wise words

[roystgnr]

Futurama is not great. No-one (other than nerds) thinks it is funny.

A joke isn't any less funny just because someone who doesn't understand the language won't laugh at it.

Re:Yeah, he did it right, beginning to end.

[DoofusOfDeath]

It's just a darn shame that the end couldn't have been thirty or forty years further out.

Consider Garfield and Peanuts. After a while, they just don't have anything new to say.

Scientific Progress ...

[gurps_npc]

... definitely goes Boink.

As an amatuer author, I understand some of where he is coming from. Stories have a beginning, middle and end. The end generally signifies the part where writing about it any more would be boring. Which little girl truly wants to hear about how Snow White had to change dirty diapers for her children? Or who really wants to hear about how Wendy and the lost buys grows old while Peter Pan is all alone with tinkerbell?

Yes, sequels are instant money makers, because we all want to read/see MORE from a good writer, but the truth is if you have said all you had to say, then there is no more.

It's kind of like going to the Grand Canyon and tring to dig it deeper with a shovel. Yeah, it's 'more', but it's not the same thing, and quite frankly, the quality of workmanship goes down.

Re:Sorry Bill

[ShadowRangerRIT]

And that means you can't appreciate any other comic? A bit limiting don't you think?

Thats it? That was the Interview?

[WarlockD]

Meh. Seriously, no questions on "What are you doing now?" "Have any new projects?" "Are thee any comics you are looking at now a days?"

All these questions are just rehashed from previous side remarks he has stated. He has always been a recluse so why is he doing an interview now?

These things drive me up the wall. Fine, its a puff piece because you don't want to scare the guy off, but I am truly interested in what he has done in all that time.

Disappointing interview

[Hatta]

Those last couple questions were really wasted. Why not ask him what he's been doing for the past 15 years? Does he ever think about doing another strip, or any sort of art again?

You know, he could do one strip a week, any subject he wanted, any format he wanted, post it on the web (editors? who needs them?) and it would be huge. He'd have complete creative control. Would that sound appealing to Watterson? Or would that cut too much into his golf time? We'll never know because this journalist squandered this opportunity.

Re:Disappointing interview

[Wyatt Earp]

Did the journalist squander the opportunity or did Watterson only answer what he wanted to answer?

Reading about the guy, its obvious he wants his life to be private, so the interview is just those questions and answers Watterson wants to give.

Not the journalist's fault.

some others should take note

[Anonymous Coward]

"It's always better to leave the party early. If I had rolled along with the strip's popularity and repeated myself for another five, 10 or 20 years, the people now "grieving" for "Calvin and Hobbes" would be wishing me dead and cursing newspapers for running tedious, ancient strips like mine instead of acquiring fresher, livelier talent. And I'd be agreeing with them."

Hear that, Crapfield and Family Crapcircus?!?

Re:some others should take note

[eln]

While I agree with you where Garfield is concerned, you're sorely mistaken as far as Family Circus: That strip was never any good.

Re:some others should take note

[DerekLyons]

You forgot the real Living Dead of the comics pages - Blondie. Eighty years of recycling the same material over, and over, and over...

A True Artist

[Foobar of Borg]

He left Calvin & Hobbes while it was still good and he had something meaningful to say. He didn't do what a lot of people do and drag it out so he could suck out every last possible penny. He left a meaningful corpus of work that we can all appreciate.

Re:Yeah, he did it right, beginning to end.

[Dahamma]

Are you kidding? Garfield is more brilliantly insightful than ever. You just have to know how to read it.

http://garfieldminusgarfield.net/

Re:Bill looks like Calvin's Dad

[Hatta]

Calvin's dad looks like Watterson's dad, which would explain the resemblance. Watterson himself looks much more like Uncle Max.

The Far Side and the "Geek Cred"

[Jonathan]

I think a major reason for the Far Side's popularity among science and engineering types is that Larson used science as the basis for many of his strips. Because of this, even when the joke wasn't that good, people in the relevant field would tape them up on lab doors, just because they were amused that anyone would make a comic about their field. Perhaps xkcd is the modern equivalent (although THe Far Side seemed to focus more on the biological sciences, as Larson had a zoology background, and xkcd is more physics/math)

Re:One of a very short list

[ColdWetDog]

I don't count Gary Larson in the same field - he was quirky and brilliant, but there's no continuity in his works - there's 5,000 individual gags, but no heart, nobody there we care about

I take it that you are not of the biological sciences persuasion. The Far Side's protagonist was nature her/it self. That was the underlying thread between his many dis separate jokes and themes. I'd put him right up there with the others you mention.

YMMV, of course.

Re:Thats it? That was the Interview?

[Culture20]

but I am truly interested in what he has done in all that time.

Just guessing, but: Fishing, watching his (grand)children grow up, changing the oil in his truck. My bet is he's reclusive because he doesn't want to bore us with the details. If C&H is any indication, he's a guy that enjoys *life*, not attention.

Re:Yeah, he did it right, beginning to end.

[Anonymous Coward]

Holy crap! Today's comic (Feb 01) on that site is classic. I almost snorted water out of my nose.

Re:One of a very short list

[khallow]

I don't count Gary Larson in the same field - he was quirky and brilliant, but there's no continuity in his works - there's 5,000 individual gags, but no heart, nobody there we care about.

Continuity? Why should we want continuity? No heart? We disagree. If you wanted a comic strip with no heart, then just take a gander at Doonesbury. I have no idea why Garry Trudeau bothered with continuity. It's just a political cartoon (like Oliphant) in comic strip format with some extraneous soap opera about people I simply can't care about (technically, so was Bloom County, but that worked). Peanuts provided a better experience (especially, the early years when the strip was actually being creative).

Or how about Bill Griffith with Zippy the Pinhead? He was very sparing in his use of the continuity crutch, yet he somehow managed to come up with likable characters that we can care about.