Some terrible news from my good friend Mark Heath – Spot the Frog, a rare laugh in the comics pages anymore, will be ending July 5.
To quote Mark:
This will be six month’s shy of the five year contract. The reason is the usual one: too few client papers, the need to earn money to replace my missing socks. I spoke with United Media and they were sympathetic to my odd sock fetish.
You’ll have to read more to get the sock reference.
It just kills me when good work like this isn’t given its due. Spot is funny, clever, sweet & kind. The papers and syndicate never knew what a gem of a strip they had.
Mark is considering a third book if there’s enough interest. I know I’m interested, and you should be too.
Sign up here. And harangue your papers for not picking it up when they had the chance.
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Shoot, that's sad news indeed. I recently made a similar decision (for nearly similar reasons – except that my needs were for gluten-free food, not socks) to retire from Working Daze. I am sure Mark's considerable talent will not go to waste. It's just a shame that the papers did not see the gem that he was.
So sorry to hear. I always think of the Schulz quote: "Cartooning will break your heart."
OK, it's cold comfort to know that the greats have had their problems too, but there are so many stories like this.
I remember seeing samples of this amazing looking daily strip that John Romita had peddled around with no success in the 1960s. John Romita!!!
Hefner rejected the first batch of cartoons that Jack Cole sent in. If Cole hadn't persisted — there would be no Playboy cartoons as we know it because Cole set the standard. But he got rejected at first.
And then there's POGO. POGO originally ran in one paper, and then, after 2 years, the paper went under. So Walt Kelly went shopping to find a new home for his strip. Here's Kelly himself describing the grueling process of showing the strip to editors in person (a quote I ran in my blog of last week):
"One lady editor insisted that she did not want to buy a duck. Kelly pointed out that it was a possum [s]he had by the tail. The lady said you can't even tell one animal from another, let alone draw one. Another editor offered Kelly a job taking care of his comic book division. A third editor laughed, which only encouraged Kelly. Then he said nobody would understand the strip. 'Try it out on ordinary people,' he roared. 'You'll see.'"
Mark H: I wish you much good luck with your next project. Please don't give up or anything, OK?
Mark,
I'm saddened to hear this piece of news, as well. I loved the original style and look of Spot the Frog. Another great cartoon is disappearing from the newspapers.
Yet another example that 'the good die young'.
I tried to email Mark, but it didn't work…
Good luck, Mark.