All Things Cartoon - with Steve Kanaras

The first cartoon strip I remember enjoying as a kid was Beetle Bailey. I still love it to this day, but I am not sure what made me pick up the dollar collection from the pharmacy and beg my mother to buy it for me. It probably could have been Hagar or Broom Hilda or Peanuts, but it was Beetle Bailey. I couldn't have been more than five or six years old.

I was fortunate in that my brother was a year older than me, so I got exposed to reading and other activities like soccer simultaneously even though I was younger. So I learned to read when I was four, and so could comfortably read the comics by five or six. Not that I understood the jokes mind you, though it wasn't difficult to make sense of Sarge pummeling Beetle for being lazy.

In addition to cartoons on television, Beetle was my introduction to the printed comics. And I've been hooked since. Most of the strips from that cheap early collection linger in my memory, and I instantly recognize them when I see reprints.

Amazing the way the brain works, and the kind of impression left by some pieces of art over others. I've read thousands of comic strips, books, graphic novels since then, most quickly forgotten except the ones that resonated. And the ones that resonated were almost all featuring a certain web-slinger named Peter Parker, a Thunder God with a mighty hammer, and a six year old existential brat with a pet tiger.

For whatever reason, the way my brain is wired, comics made much more of an impression on me than TV or video games or even I am ashamed to admit regular books. I am a voracious reader, and have watched my fair share of television and films and played more video games than is useful, but none have affected me, or stayed in the memory bank with such recall as the comics.

Brain scientists probably have a better idea (or, really, from what I've read about brain science, maybe they don't) why this would be the case, but I don't think I am unique. Newspapers have used cartoons for over a century both as a vehicle for selling copies, because who doesn't like a good laugh or a great serial adventure or drama,and also as a powerful editorial weapon. A good political cartoon can say with a couple of metaphorical pictures what a good columnist might struggle over a typewriter for days to say, probably more imperfectly.

In my estimation, the exaggeration of emotion that the best cartoons capture are the key to their power. A cartoon smile is a hundred normal smiles, and angry cartoon harnesses the power of the atom. I think they resonate because they make us laugh, but also make us feel on a level unattainable by realism. There is a good deal lost in the translation from a three dimensional world of five senses when it is distilled to a two dimensional world of media and entertainment.

The hyper-exaggeration helps bridge that gap. I am blessed to have an artist to collaborate with who understands the essence of exaggeration. Matt Ryan has been drawing cartoons for as long as I have known him, and I know for much longer than that. You see the fruits of our work together here each week in the A La Cartoon feature.

And though there are many aspects of his work that are of exceptional quality and craft, pay particular attention to the facial expressions (warning: they are not always human characters, but he can even make a cell phone look like it's nervous). It is in these renderings of emotion, at least for my money, that we unravel what makes cartoons so special and powerful for us.

So please enjoy the weekly strip, and support any cartoonist you can, even if it just means viewing their work online and in print and enjoying this beautiful art-form that speaks to us with such passion.

Until next time!

Steve Kanaras