Being Jim Davis

Hey, you know whom we've not mentioned on the podcast so far, not even once? Roscoe Conkling, that's who. You would've thought that with all our various digressions that we'd have gotten there by now, but you'd be wrong. You're WRONG, asshole!!Whatever; here's your podcast.Today's strip

13 Apr 201717min

Today we mostly just bitched about Cafepress. It's entirely possible we also mentioned this Garfield strip at some point, but I can't say for certain. To be honest, after doing this podcast for the better part of a year, it's increasingly difficult to feel certain of anything. Except the fact that that was definitely a halfway decent Jared Diamond joke. Obvs.Today's strip

12 Apr 201717min

Guys, I HIGHLY recommend googling 'pig vs cat.' You will not regret doing this. I give 50% odds you'll like it even better than actually listening to anything we say in this episode.Exhibit A Exhibit B Today's strip

11 Apr 201719min

During the Renaissance of Garfield, from roughly August to November of 1979, there were many advances in science, math, philosophy, and art. One of the most monumental advances in Garfield was the development of linear perspective. Linear perspective uses principles of math to realistically portray space and depth in art. Renaissance Jim Davis was largely concerned with drawing realistic scenes, and linear perspective gave him a reliable method to accomplish this realism, which helped make his comic strips all the more captivating!Comics are necessarily a two-dimensional activity because a newspaper has only height and width. Yet the world around us is three-dimensional because real objects have not only height and width but also depth. So, how do we portray three-dimensional objects on a two-dimensional plane? This is a complicated task, but Renaissance Jim Davis used and perfected linear perspective as a means of depicting three-dimensional depth in comics. To achieve this perspective, Davis would pick a vanishing point on the horizon line.Then, Jim Davis would create a receding checkerboard of intersecting lines that would converge and disappear at the vanishing point. When executed properly, linear perspective makes far objects appear small and near objects appear big, just as they do in real life.Perhaps the best way to conceive this is to picture railroad tracks. Imagine that you are standing on railroad tracks, staring at them as they stretch out ahead of you. The two railroad tracks are parallel in real life, but they appear to merge together and disappear at the vanishing point on the horizon. If the train were at the horizon line, it would appear really tiny. If the train were two feet in front of you, the train would appear huge. So, the size of the train differs depending on how far away it is. This sense of dimension is the same thing Renaissance Jim Davis tried to achieve in his comics.Today's strip

10 Apr 201721min

I do not accept the idea that the present over-all programming is aimed accurately at the public taste. The ratings tell us only that some people have their television sets turned on and of that number, so many are tuned to one channel and so many to another. They don't tell us what the public might watch if they were offered half-a-dozen additional choices. A rating, at best, is an indication of how many people saw what you gave them. Unfortunately, it does not reveal the depth of the penetration, or the intensity of reaction, and it never reveals what the acceptance would have been if what you gave them had been better -- if all the forces of art and creativity and daring and imagination had been unleashed. I believe in the people's good sense and good taste, and I am not convinced that the people's taste is as low as some of you assume.Today's strip

9 Apr 201719min

You will see a procession of game shows, formula comedies about totally unbelievable families, blood and thunder, mayhem, violence, sadism, murder, western bad men, western good men, private eyes, gangsters, more violence, and cartoons. And endlessly, commercials -- many screaming, cajoling, and offending. And most of all, boredom. True, you'll see a few things you will enjoy. But they will be very, very few. And if you think I exaggerate, I only ask you to try it.Is there one person in this room who claims that broadcasting can't do better? Well a glance at next season's proposed programming can give us little heart. Of 73 and 1/2 hours of prime evening time, the networks have tentatively scheduled 59 hours of categories of action-adventure, situation comedy, variety, quiz, and movies. Is there one network president in this room who claims he can't do better? Well, is there at least one network president who believes that the other networks can do better? Gentlemen, your trust accounting with your beneficiaries is long overdue. Never have so few owed so much to so many.Why is so much of television so bad? I've heard many answers: demands of your advertisers; competition for ever higher ratings; the need always to attract a mass audience; the high cost of television programs; the insatiable appetite for programming material. These are some of the reasons. Unquestionably, these are tough problems not susceptible to easy answers. But I am not convinced that you have tried hard enough to solve them.Today's strip

8 Apr 201720min

Like everybody, I wear more than one hat. I am the chairman of the FCC. But I am also a television viewer and the husband and father of other television viewers. I have seen a great many television programs that seemed to me eminently worthwhile and I am not talking about the much bemoaned good old days of "Playhouse 90" and "Studio One."I'm talking about this past season. Some were wonderfully entertaining, such as "The Fabulous Fifties," "The Fred Astaire Show," and "The Bing Crosby Special"; some were dramatic and moving, such as Conrad's "Victory" and "Twilight Zone"; some were marvelously informative, such as "The Nation's Future," "CBS Reports," "The Valiant Years." I could list many more -- programs that I am sure everyone here felt enriched his own life and that of his family. When television is good, nothing -- not the theater, not the magazines or newspapers -- nothing is better.But when television is bad, nothing is worse. I invite each of you to sit down in front of your television set when your station goes on the air and stay there, for a day, without a book, without a magazine, without a newspaper, without a profit and loss sheet or a rating book to distract you. Keep your eyes glued to that set until the station signs off. I can assure you that what you will observe is a vast wasteland.Today's strip

7 Apr 201720min

It probably says something that Jon and Chris are clearly more interested in "Steve Hansen of Cincinnati," a nonexistent listener they made up, than in any of this week's Garfield strips.Today's strip

6 Apr 201726min