The Indispensable Calvin And Hobbes (Calvin & Hobbes) Summary and Reviews

The Indispensable Calvin And Hobbes (Calvin & Hobbes)
by Bill Watterson

The Indispensable Calvin And Hobbes (Calvin & Hobbes)
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Book Summary Information

Author: Bill Watterson
Edition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 1992-06-01
ISBN: 0836218981
Number of pages: 256
Publisher: Andrews McMeel Publishing
Product features:
  • ISBN13: 9780836218985
  • Condition: New
  • Notes: BRAND NEW FROM PUBLISHER! BUY WITH CONFIDENCE, Over one million books sold! 98% Positive feedback. Compare our books, prices and service to the competition. 100% Satisfaction Guaranteed

Book Reviews of The Indispensable Calvin And Hobbes (Calvin & Hobbes)

Book Review: "Our baby is a rabbit? How come we have a rabbit?!"
Summary: 5 Stars

Despite its now obvious age, "Calvin and Hobbes" has not lost a whit of its appeal. In this third collection, released in late 1992, Calvin watches an old style thick televisions with rabbit ears. Try bolting one of those to the wall. No computers, no cell phones, no video games appear here. Calvin's dad works with pen and paper. Calvin's school looks more out of 1975 than 1992. And of course the ubiquitous wagon. Apart from providing philosophical, intellectual, comedic and visual stimulation, "Calvin and Hobbes" has also become a picture of a lost era. The world simply doesn't look or work this way anymore. Anyone born before 1980 may recognize it. The more recently born may derive a fairy tale or fantasy feeling from the strip. Yet another sign that the world has changed too fast. "Calvin and Hobbes" even seems to shirk at the rapidity of modern life by placing itself inside the world of backyard snow fights and wagon leaps. The setting evokes Peanuts more than MTV. And that's a very very good thing. Our physically and mentally crowded world leaves little room for introspection and philosophizing. Calvin, though of course a child, finds plenty of time for it in the unreal, almost surreal, world he inhabits. Nonetheless, he also suffers from some modern maladies. He wants the world to be the way he wants it to be. Reality remains unwelcome. The brilliant Sunday panels, rife with the best cartoon art of the past few decades, exemplifies this. Here Calvin rides a triceratops out of his school. Perspective goes awry twice, once in a neo-Cubist fashion. He becomes a not so graceful sparrow, a color film negative, an Allosaurus, a Tyrannosaurus, even a Calvinosaurus. His parents become Venusian aliens and try to make waffles out of him. Plus, he defies the very laws of physics itself to avoid homework. Up and down reverse and Calvin droops from the ceiling. Once order gets restored, he begins to grow exponentially until he stands upon the Milky Way. Most brilliantly, he and Susie Derkins morph into a Mary Worth-esque nightmare to play house with a "child rabbit." Such scenes set "Calvin and Hobbes" apart from the rest of the comics page. Though it wasn't afraid to teeter on the edge of sappiness at times, it also wasn't afraid to plunge in the opposite direction either. The tension between the evil Calvin and the good Calvin helped keep the strip fresh for its near decade run. It never degraded nor became stale. Doubtless it never will, regardless of what happens to the now disintegrating newspaper comics genre. History will likely hail this strip as second only to Peanuts and Krazy Kat (and arguably a few others). Luckily, the entire series looks as though it will remain in print for the foreseeable future.

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