The cartoon blog of Andertoons cartoonist Mark Anderson. He discusses his cartoons, cartooning, comics and, oddly enough, LEGO.
…my arch-nemeses would be:
The Crybaby
Powers – Deafening whine
Weakness – Unable to look forward
Battle Cry – “There’s used to be so many great markets…”
The Know-It-All
Powers – Giant inflatable head
Weakness – Krypto-new-idea
Battle Cry – “I’ve been in this business 40 years…”
The Inquirer
Powers – Assumes competition wants to help
Weakness – Unable to dial phone and/or use Google
Battle Cry – “Who’s the editor there and what does it pay?”
Welcome to yet another edition of…
CARTOONS THAT DIDN’T WORK
I’d actually already earmarked this cartoon for the blog when my college roommate emailed me asking what the deal was with it, thereby confirming my suspicions.
OK, the joke here is that they’re outside. No one gets the speaking character’s joke because it’s an “inside joke” and they’re all outdoors.
Ta-daa!!!
This one’s a real heartbreaker too because I spent a lot of time on the art. Four guys sitting around a campfire at night in the woods? Yeesh! I must have gone through at least two different gray markers just shading the damn thing.
Sometimes I’m OK with a weird or obtuse reference and I know a lot of people aren’t going to understand the humor, but this one seemed so simple at the time… Damn my feeble brain!
Anyway, there it is. Much to my chagrin, there’s more to come down the road…
I ran across this letter to the editor concerning an editorial cartoon:
As a Kellogg-Muncy Bakery employee I was disturbed to see the tasteless editorial cartoon in Sundays edition of the Sun-Gazette. To insinuate that Tony the Tiger would eat a child is despicable and exhibits poor judgement on the part of the cartoonist.
The so-called artist of this cartoon has the ability to change the channel or turn off the television if this repetition is too much for him to bear. This commercial depicts children having a good time and eating a nutritious breakfast. It is mind boggling that with everything else going on in the world that Tony the Tiger would be chosen by the cartoonist to deface and degrade.
Kellogg’s generously supports the Little League organization as well as many other organizations in the community, as well as the United Way, and not to mention worldwide support of our troops.
Kellogg’s employs 250 + people from the surrounding communities who take pride in where they work and what they do. I cannot speak for all of the employees but those that I have discussed this editorial with were outraged. You’ve made a mockery of everyone involved with Little League.
Oh man, there’s a ton of great stuff in this one!
I submit that Tony would indeed eat a child given the chance. I’m sure that, like me, you’ve heard urban legends of commercial out-takes where Tony’s handlers had to quickly sedate him to save some defenseless child from the tiger’s frosting-induced blood lust.
I do, however, agree with the writer and suggest that this Tiger/baseball bashing has indeed gone too far! And in that vein I’d like to suggest that we rename the Detroit Tigers the Detroit Lemmings to avoid any misrepresentations of ferocity.


Recently a cartoonist bulletin board discussion resurfaced about Scott Kurtz and his plan to give PVP away to newspapers.
When this thing first reared its ugly head a few months ago, I was one of the cartoonists concerned (OK, kinda pissed) about the ramifications of this sort of thing.
My position was this — PVP is a good strip and editors should be paying a good rate for it. I thought Scott was selling (or, more accurately, not selling) himself and the industry short.
Well, some time later, it doesn’t look like this thing has really taken off and some cartoonists are about waist deep in their own schadenfreude. So why aren’t I?
I recently took a beating on the same board for my new free daily cartoon feature. I was accused of destroying markets, incomes, the industry as a whole…
I thought (and think) it’s a good idea, and I’m going to continue trying it out. And I have to assume Scott thought/thinks the same thing for his plan. In fact, I think the “next big cartooning thing” is still out there waiting for some plucky cartoonist to cast aside convention and try something outrageous.
So get to the point you say?
Hey, Scott — sorry, man. I was wrong. Thanks for giving it a shot. Hope your next thing works out for ya.
I ran across this and was so proud!
Apparently the newest Webster’s will bring back “wedgie” thanks to my constant efforts:
“Wedgie had been left out of previous updates because it used to be confined to the parlance of high school. But Agnes said it started showing up in comic strips and editorial cartoons, indicating a new, wider usage.”