Binkley's Anxiety Closet

[suzene.insanejournal.com]

Title: Bloom County: Toons for Our Times
Creator: Berkeley Breathed
Availability: Out of Print, but IDW's working on it

I was flipping through some of my old Bloom County collections tonight, and thought I'd upload one of my favorite running gags: Micheal Binkley's Anxiety Closet.

Comments

[cmdr_zoom.insanejournal.com]

why no, I don't miss the Cold War (and the slim but ever-present possibility of nuclear annihilation on any given day) at all.

[shanejayell.insanejournal.com]

LOL.

I still have all the original collections. Including the record.

[divi_d.insanejournal.com]

XD cute.

4th strip would have to be my favorite... even if it is a tad predictable XD.

[jlroberson.insanejournal.com]

"Ignite my toes, Romeo." Snort.

The thing that a lot of people forget about BLOOM COUNTY is that it was just about the only strip--and I'm including DOONESBURY(the one time it did, it had to make this big huge weeklong deal out of it)--that made any reference to sex or anything related whatsoever, regardless of the somewhat childish ways Breathed("snugglebunnies") had to phrase it for his venue. I'd call it a groundbreaker if anyone had followed him. Breathed really seems a bit of a one-off in that respect.

[icon_uk.insanejournal.com]

Didn't "For Better or For Worse" stray into this territory, and also was the first to deal with a character being gay?

[psychop_rex.insanejournal.com]

Ah, Bloom County. You never will find another comic strip that is simultaneously so dated and so uniquely hilarious. Half the time I'm laughing hysterically, and I have no idea just what I'm laughing AT, because the joke involves some obscure celebrity that was big for about five minutes in 1985. The fact that it is still one of my all-time favorite strips is a testament to how good it is regardless.

[jlroberson.insanejournal.com]

I mean sex itself. I don't think they ever showed the character kissing a boyfriend in FBOW, did they?

[icon_uk.insanejournal.com]

I don't think so, it was considering daring enough in the US for a comic strip character to actually say he was gay in the first place.

Lynne Johnson discusses the storyline here (http://www.fborfw.com/features/lawrence/). Some interesting comments, if (as in much of FBoFW) it comes across in a slightly... cloying earnest manner.

[arilou_skiff.insanejournal.com]

Huh, might be so in the US...

I mean, we have Nemi and Rocky, and such...

[artnouveauho.livejournal.com (from insanejournal.com)]

Bloom County was the single best thing about the 80s. Damn, but I miss that snorklewacker.

[halloweenjack.insanejournal.com]

Nemi is an exception to a lot of rules. It's the only comic strip that I have in hardcover (two volumes).

[halloweenjack.insanejournal.com]

My favorite Snorklewacker cartoon is the one about Nastassia Kinski and cheesecake.

[yotsuba123.insanejournal.com]

I so identified with Binkley back in the day, anxiety closet and all. And now that I'm older...yeah.

The one with the knight hopping out and offering him a grand adventure, and Bink declining because he had a report on snails due the next morning...I was so right there with him.

"Someday, you'll say 'you never went for the gusto'. "

[foxhack.insanejournal.com]

You say that as if nuclear annihilation wasn't a possibility anymore.

[lonewolf23k.insanejournal.com]

Yeah, Russia's still got nukes. But more worrysome is that North Korea is getting itself some nukes, and if we don't watch out, so will Iran.

[suzene.insanejournal.com]

One of the most interesting things about reading Breathed's side-notes in the new edition is getting a sense for how much he was (completely unintentionally) getting away with on the comics page that no one else had ever tried.

[foxhack.insanejournal.com]

I'm not talking about any country. Countries ain't stupid.

I'm talking about all those tiny little terrorist cells that are out there. JACK BAUER WAS RIGHT, I TELL YOU!

[cmdr_zoom.insanejournal.com]

Yes, but the odds of my little college town being a target are much, much lower than when Russia had a couple of kilotons to spare for every American citizen. I grew up under the shadow of a war that would kill off most animal life above rats and cockroaches in the entire northern hemisphere.

[dejadrew.insanejournal.com]

Oh god no, not Natassja Kinski with a big slice of cheesecake! ANYTHING BUT THAT! (sob)