Understanding Snoopy #3 - It’s Kind of Magical

Jimmy: Hey, everybody. Welcome back to the show. It's Unpacking Peanuts and we are smack dab in the middle of our new season, Understanding Snoopy. And guess what? I'm going to be your host for the proceedings. My name is Jimmy Gownley. I'm also a cartoonist. I did things like Amelia Rules, 7 Good Reasons not to grow up, and the dumbest idea ever. And guess what? You can read all my new comics over on substack-- gvilcomics.substack.com. Joining me as always, are my pals, co hosts and fellow cartoonists. 

He's a playwright and a composer, both for the band Complicated People, as well as for this very podcast. He's the co creator of the original comic book price guide, the original editor of Amelia Rules, and the creator of such great strips as Strange Attractors, A Gathering of Spells and Tangled River. It's Michael Cohen.

Liz & Michael: Say hey.

Harold: Michael Cohen in stereo.

Michael: We didn't plan that.

Jimmy: And he's the executive something. He's executive producer and writer of Mystery Science Theater 3000, a former vice president of Archie Comics and the creator of the Instagram sensation Sweetest Beasts. It's good old Harold Buchholz.

Harold: Say, hey.

Jimmy: And, making sure everything goes smoothly and keeping us out of trouble is our producer, editor and current troublemaker, Liz Sumner. 

[sfx: cricket]

Jimmy: Unbelievable.

Harold: Was that a cricket?

Jimmy: So we are talking about Snoopy. And, I'm, before we get started, I want to say what, what do you think about, going back? Has it changed, your perspective? Because, you know, the strips we're looking at now, we've seen our whole lives, we've seen millions of times. Has reading the entire strip changed your perspective on the strips that, that you were more familiar with? Harold, why don't you go first.

Harold: Boy, I don't know that it's changed the perspective on the ones. I already knew that. That's a hard one even to gauge.

Jimmy: Right. Yeah.

Harold: I'm just grateful to have experienced the whole thing together and not only read them, but then discussed them with you guys. I mean that it just, it's such a well rounded experience of someone's life work that I never would have done before on my own. as much as I love Peanuts, I don't think I didn't have all the Peanuts books and all that. So, to have done that was amazing. And then to re, what do you to re. Experience? The things that I deeply felt so much when I read them as a kid, was really very special. That's all I could say. And then, you know, just reading it all and discovering the new stuff is exciting, but I don't know how much it shifted my views of the things that I, Because my memory from when I read it when I was seven is the memory. I think there's nothing going to dull that or change that, I guess.

Jimmy: Michael, how about you?

Michael: Well, my theory is that, sometime around 1969, Snoopy was killed in a car crash.

Liz: No.

Michael: They found a duplicate. And so there's actually two Snoopies.

Harold: Oh my gosh.

Jimmy: No, hang on. We need to publicize this theory immediately.

Michael: If you read them backwards,there's clues. My answer is no. to Jimmy reading these again, this is the Snoopy I know. And I was never quite comfortable with what he turned out to be. He sold out.

Jimmy: He sold out. For me I think what it's done is that it forced me to articulate things I liked about the strip that I never had to articulate before.

Jimmy: You know, so I think when you go back, it's like, oh, he's doing that thing again. You know, like the static panels or the iconic poses. Like none of those things. I was never talking around, you know, we'd never. How about those iconic Snoopy poses? You know?

Harold: Right, yeah. That's not what you're thinking about on your own. But when you're with some other cartoonists and you have an audience, then all of a sudden you're really trying to, to dig deep and see what is it that's affecting us in this strip. Why are we talking about this strip for years? You know, there's something really, really deep there. And I certainly did approach the reread from that cartoonist perspective. It seemed to be what was unique about our podcast. And as a cartoonist who's continuing to cartoon, of course I'm interested in understanding. I think Paige Braddock was saying this. You know, you're trying to crack the code. You know, slip me the answer. Why is this the greatest comic strip of all time? And, you know, constantly looking for the things of. Why is this so delightful? Why is this so universal? Yeah, and that's, I think, a really worthwhile thing to pursue when you are so deeply moved by somebody else's art and you see other people moved by. It's like you want to know, as an artist, why is that?

Jimmy: Absolutely. And Michael, now let me ask you this. all right, so you solidify, you know, that this is the. This is your prime Snoopy era. This is the thing you like the most. Having now seen, though, the whole thing, can you tell us what it is that makes this particular era that we're looking at today so special to you?

Michael: I think he was a much funnier character. He became kind of philosophical as he aged, and it was more about his observations of the world. But at this point, he was a real force, A life force. And plus, it's just incredibly funny. Some of these are just hysterical and because, you know, it makes sense. He was younger, he was active, he was goofier. And for me, these were, I mean, the rare comic strip that was incredibly funny and made you think, too.

Jimmy: Yeah. The other thing that I did recognize through our re read is what you just said about Snoopy aging. He's the character that I feel really ages the most, because at the end, you know, we've talked about it, it was old man Snoopy in a lot of ways, you know, which is amazing, because Garfield remains immaculately consistent. even funny animal characters that have more range, like Opus or whatever, didn't experience a life-- like Andrew, You know, who wrote the book?

Jimmy: Our guest, Andrew Farago, was able to do a life story book about this character. I don't think you could do that with many other comic strip characters at all.

Harold: Yeah, I mean, there's no Gasoline Alley version of an animal strip where the character ages that I know of.

Jimmy: Well, For Better Or For Worse, I guess you could kind of say, but, you know.

Harold: Yeah, yeah, Farley, that's a good example.

Jimmy: Of a dog, but that's utterly real.

Harold: Yeah.

Jimmy: Well, we have, more strips to get to today to try to, you know, figure out the absolute mystery of Snoopy at the center of the strip and that we're also gonna answer some mail and, hang out and have a good time. Hey, maybe there's another segment. Who knows? Maybe there's a mystery segment coming up.

Harold: All, Right.

Jimmy: So. But before we get to reading those strips, if you want to follow along with us, there's a couple things you need to do. Why don't you go over to unpackingpeanuts.com and sign up for our newsletter. You only get one a month, but it'll give you a heads up about what we're going to be covering as we move forward. It's even more important now, now that we're outside the reread, and we could go willy nilly wherever we want. It's madness. So you're going to need. You're gonna need that newsletter to let you know. Hey, if you want to get in touch with us or anything like that, why don't you give us an email? We're unpackingpeanutsmail.com or you can even call our hotline, which has been gathering dust lately since the rewrite's over. 717-219-4162. So, with all that said, how about we hit the strips?

Liz: Yes.

May 1, 1963. Linus and Snoopy are, outside. Linus is holding a stick, and he says to Snoopy, some dogs are fun to play with. Some dogs chase sticks when you throw them. And he throws the stick, and Snoopy watches it sail over his head. And then Linus says, some dogs chase sticks and then bring them back, to. Which Snoopy replies, some dogs are pretty dumb.

Michael: Linus was asking for it.

Harold: Yeah. Yeah. That setup was a little too perfect for Snoopy.

Jimmy: It reminds me of another one he did like that where. I guess it's Charlie Brown, where it's. Is he talking about a. You know, I, the human will give you the.

Michael: Yeah, yeah.

Jimmy: And then Snoopy says, I, the dog. Thank you for this opportunity, but forget it.

Michael: Yeah, the straight man's gotta set up the joke.

Harold: Yeah, I like the looking at panels one and three of Snoopy. It's like in the first panel, he's been stretched out, and you've taken him on his forehead and his snout and kind of bent both ways down.

Jimmy: Yeah, he's just.

Harold: He looks different. It's. It's almost like visually, Snoopy is. I, wouldn't know. If you say it's kind of this deadpan, taken aback by what Linus is saying. It's really subtle. And then he's kind of recoiled back into his regular position for the third panel, like it's no longer surprising him or whatever.

Jimmy: So I tried to apply some Schulz thinking to some recent cartooning of mine. It was. So I do this comic strip called Arrowheads for the Boy Scouts. It's for their Cub Scout magazine. It's a magazine, actually, that used to be Boys Life, but now it's called Scout Life because, you know, 21st century, and it's integrated now. But anyway, I thought I was up against a deadline, struggling, and I realized, oh, you know, Schulz would not use backgrounds. Okay. This is a Sunday style strip. But Schulz has had plenty of Sunday style strips where there's no backgrounds. Right. And my strip was about a kid sitting at a laptop typing an email. It's like, well, I'll just do it as simply as Schulz did. And it looked awful. It just looked awful. I don't even know, like, it's. You don't even understand you. I don't even understand the levels of sophistication and just the compositions, the consistency of the characters, the placement of the characters within the panel until you try it yourself. And it's just like, well, I only have two little elements in each of these panels, and if you're not.

Harold: So what did you do?

Jimmy: Well, I submitted it and vowed to do better next time. I mean that, you know, it's a commercial gig. There's nothing else you can do, right?

Harold: Yeah. You're on a deadline and.

Jimmy: Yeah. 

August 11, 1963. It's a beautiful Sunday, and Snoopy is out in a field, and he comes across a little bunny who's clearly his friend. He greets him and the bun, he leans up against them and they're just enjoying the day together. And then as Snoopy and the bunny, they're walking along and Snoopy says, this way, little friend of mine. It's good to have a friend, he says as he climbs atop the doghouse, lying in his classic pose. And then the bunny lies on top of Snoopy's belly. And then the next panel, we see three other little bunnies hopping, probably looking for their friend. And sure enough, they find him, Snoopy and him atop the doghouse, having a little nap. Snoopy notices the bunnies down there looking so sad because they have not gotten up on the doghouse. And then in the last panel, all of the bunnies are piled up on top of Snoopy's stomach. And Snoopy says, although I can see where having too many friends could be hard on the stomach.

Michael: I have a question, Harold. When were you born?

Harold: 1966. 

Michael: Oh, I thought maybe he knew that somewhere in the world there was somebody who wanted to read this strip someday.

Jimmy: That's what I mean by doing it directly for you. Right? You wrote it just for you.

Michael: This is definitely a Harold strip.

Harold: Yes, it is the epitome.

Jimmy: And you can see a version where instead of Woodstock, we got bunnies.

Jimmy: For the Beagle Scouts and stuff.

Harold: Yeah, no, I do love this. That's what I love about cartooning. He just captures these moments with a few strokes of a pen.

Michael: I don't know, it just seems like when it's a cartoon thing, when you have groups of, little animals that they all act exactly the same.

Jimmy: Yeah.

Michael: Yeah.

Jimmy: I wonder if that comes from animation.

Liz: Sheep.

Michael: Well, yeah, because they're duplicating them.

Jimmy: Yeah. Yeah.

Harold: I love that Schulz can capture joy and contentment with just a few lines, and that's a rare thing. You just don't see it. And he manages to pull it off in ways that don't feel kitschy. Right. And I appreciate that. Not that there's anything particularly wrong with kitsch. I think it gets a bad rap.

Liz: But, it's better than twee.

Harold: Yeah. And even twee, I think twee gets a little bit of a hard time as well. But there is a depth to this, which I think is what makes me love it so much. There's something to it that feels like it's not just fantasy. It's not just someone's wishful thinking. It's hard to put into words, but it's actually, a legitimate, event that happened. That was a beautiful thing. And it's fun to be able to peek in and watch this little world with Snoopy and the Bunnies. So.

Jimmy: Yeah. Well, you know, I think when people say things like kitsch, twee, sentimentality, any of these. It doesn't matter-- even violence or what. when people say these things are not good, I don't understand what they're saying, like, sentimentality is not good in art. Well, that's like. Is. That's like saying to me, like, cinnamon is not good in baking.

Harold: Yeah, well. Right. Yeah.

Jimmy: I mean, it depends on what context, how much you use, where you use. It's all.

Harold: Yeah.

Jimmy: Every part of.

Harold: And everybody has different, you know, different things that they're. They're drawn to based on who they are. And. And I feel. I do feel bad for people who enjoy things like this, who. Who get looked down on. I mean, this, is. We'll get into all sorts of controversy or whatever, but, I mean, if somebody loves precious moments. Figures. And it inspires them, and I'm all for that, you know, I want them to enjoy whatever it is that gives them joy, you know?

Jimmy: Sure. Now, Michael, you said, I know we have to move on because we have other ships to get to, but when we were having some technical difficulties, you were talking about, the fact that the Bunnies all operate in unison. We were just talking about.

Michael: Exactly, yeah. Which is. You'll see that a lot in cartoons, just because it saves the animator trouble.

Jimmy: Yeah. And that's what we're thinking. Do you think, Harold, that idea sort of comes from animation that he'd do the bunnies the same way.

Harold: It's interesting. I mean, I don't think so. My wife took a course with Danny Simon, the brother of Neil Simon, a comedy writing course. And one of the things in sketch writing was he said, there's never a they. You know, if you have multiple characters, they should all have their own personalities. In this case, I think the joke is that all three of these little bunnies want the same thing, and it's going to cause trouble for Snoopy. You're all four of them. Right. So in this case, I think it works. I mean, they're all. All of enough of one accord that they're all going to want to be on top of his stomach, and he's got to deal with it. Right. So it totally works in the humor. And so I think sometimes there is a day, sometimes there is a unified group of people who are beings that want something at the same time. And it's okay to kind of show them all together. To show them in little threes with their ears up and their ears down is pretty adorable. And it sells the joke really well.

Jimmy: Absolutely. 

February 12, 1965. We're in the middle of a sequence here where Snoopy has, lost his one true love. So he's been eating his feelings, as we all want to do now and again. So he's, porked up a little bit. So a very rotund Snoopy is at the dog dish, and he's thinking to himself, I must have been crazy to have fallen in love. And he kind of waddles away and says, I thought I could forget her by eating, but I can't. And he sits down. He's just on his big fat butt next to his doghouse and thinks, I'll never forget her as long as I live. What a life. You try for a little happiness and what do you get? And then, looking like he swallowed a beach ball, he tries to lie on the doghouse and he finishes with a few memories and a fat stomach.

Michael: Yeah. He takes after his brother.

Jimmy: Yeah, yeah. Very Olaf.

Harold: I love how he's perfect perched on the. On his back and his head's not even touching. There's so much back fat for Snoopy that he just can't quite. It's a little bowling ball, could.

Jimmy: Tip him like a teeter totter. I think the first one. The head's weird looking in that first panel, I think. I don't know, maybe because of the way it attaches to the body, the new pudgy body or something. I Just think it looks really, really.

Harold: The eye in that.

Jimmy: Or maybe it's just the placement of the eye.

Harold: Yeah, yeah. It's like further down the head looking down in the dog dish.

Jimmy: Yeah, yeah.

Harold: Well, Charlie Brown is certainly an enabler here. I guess he's filling up the dog dish for poor Snoopy.

Jimmy: Charlie Brown would be an enabler, you know what I mean? I could see he would be too wishy washy to put his foot down.

Harold: And say he can't until older Charlie Brown, when Sally comes along then he seems to sometimes have a little bit of a spine, what's good for her. But. Yeah, yeah.

Jimmy: And I think this brings us to another fun thing about Snoopy. And if, you know, we're trying to unpack him, and understand him, one of the things is he can do. They do a lot of things. Schulz does a lot of things with cartooning with Snoopy that you can't do with the human character so much. I think this would seem really. Well, I mean he did it with Sally, he had her gain weight, but it's a lot dicier to be goof, especially like a kid or anything like that. But it gives him a lot more freedom to be able to do these kind of things because Snoopy's like part dog and like part like middle aged guy anyway. So it's not, you know.

Harold: Yeah, it's interesting he made the choice when Snoopy is the bowling ball stomach and back on the fourth panel on top of the doghouse that he opts not to draw the tail. So it's just that round outline and you don't have that little tail protrusion to kind of take away from the humor of the visual.

Jimmy: Oh yeah, that would have been disastrous because what would it look?

Harold: It would have looked.

Jimmy: Oh yeah, it would have been really disastrous. All right, moving along. 

June 28, 1965. This is another sequence. This is where Charlie Brown has decided that if his baseball team would just grit their teeth and bear down, they would start winning some games. And, it has been panning out in this game, this game so far anyway. And Charlie Brown is the man journey talking to Snoopy, who's up next? And he says, all right, Snoopy, this is the last of the 9th. We need one run to tie up the game. I want you to go up there with teeth gritting, determination and get on base. Let's see you grit your teeth. Snoopy does. And Charlie Brown says, that's fine, keep gritting your teeth and you'll get a hit. And Snoopy goes up with his teeth gritted wildly thinking, I feel like a fool.

Harold: Great cartooning.

Jimmy: Now another thing he does with the cartooning, when we see Snoopy being a dog chasing rabbits or whatever, we see the rounded canine looking teeth. But now that he's gritting his teeth, you know, as a baseball player. They're human looking teeth.

Michael: No, these last two, it's like the sight gag. It's just laugh out loud, funny.

Harold: I don't think I've ever seen. I think that what makes it work for me. I don't know if you guys think this is usually when you grit your teeth for whatever reason, your eyes look kind of angry. But since Snoopy's doing it on command, he's got his little laid back eye with the grit. And I think that's what makes me laugh and laugh because he's, he's not into it. He's just, he's just following the rules here.

Jimmy: Right, right. Yeah, Just the pure psychic of, it. I mean, really, really good cartooning. And I also like how Charlie Brown has his fist there. Like, yeah, that's fine. Keep gritting your teeth. 

January 5, 1966. Snoopy is atop the doghouse with one of his bird friends. A proto Woodstock, but definitely not Woodstock. Stuck. And the bird is chirping away. And Snoopy says, this guy bores me to death. He's always talking about all the worms he's caught because he gets up so early in the morning. Birds just chirping away. And then Snoopy just boop. Kicks the bird off the side, of his doghouse. And then lays down and thinks to himself, score one for the worms.

Michael: I wanted to emphasize that the birds were a big part of the strip before Woodstock came along.

Jimmy: Yes. And it's interesting, you know, with the ones you chose today, that we see the group of bunnies that seem like the proto Beagle scouts. And then we see this bird, which is like a proto Woodstock. And it feels like he's trying to get them to get, like he likes so much of that bunny thing, but it's not quite clicking for whatever reason. And the birds are good, but that's not quite the design. And it has to just be this slow refining process till he gets it to what it needs to be.

Liz: But he gets the chirping,

Jimmy: he's got the chirping.

Michael: But I think he decided a small. You need a tiny bird to make these.

Jimmy: Yeah, that is a great point.

Harold: Panel three is a classic. If I were drawing this, I would not think to have this massive amount of white space around the bird. And Snoopy. And Snoopy is like hovering over the doghouse about six inches off of it as he kicks the bird. And visually that is just so funny. And I don't think I would have thought to do something like that. And I love that he still has that. Just the two little lines that depict the edge of the doghouse down in the lower right corner attached to the border panel. And everything else is just floating in white space. It's great.

Jimmy: Yeah.

Liz: And the sound effect is just the right size.

Jimmy: and the facial expressions are great. Like, okay, if I was going to do this exact one, the bird would have had his eyes bugging out of his head. It would have been some, sort of strange grimacey face. I would have drawn it funny. Or my idea, of what a funny. Yeah. You know, whereas that's not a funny expression on the bird. It's the context that makes it.

Harold: It's like he's making choices, like, talking about the grit. And without. Without the angry, eye here, you've got the bird flying off. Now birds fly, so you can't feel too bad. I don't know how much it hurts for a Snoopy's paw and his little bird butt, but the fact that the. And that the birds have hair. They have tufts of hair on the top of their heads, you know, that they look like hair versus feathers. But, you know, if I had drawn it, I would have had the. The hair going backward as if the air, the, you know, air was catching it. It's just going straight forward. So everything looks incredibly stiff on the bird. And that, to me, is funny. It's like this is like a little shermy drawing a Bird or something with that little hair going forward. So it's not like. It's not about the. The intensity of the pain or the velocity of being kicked. It's just the fact that he's being kicked and he's experiencing it, but he's. He's just. He's stiffly taking it, I think, is what makes it funny here. And again, a choice that is not an obvious one. But it's so funny.

Jimmy: Yeah, no, it's not. It's not. Yeah, it's that stoic nature of it, it.

Harold: That.

Jimmy: That makes it so funny, along with just the pure--

Harold: And look at the difference between Snoopy's collar in the second panel and the fourth panel. I mean, his little tiny neck when he's sitting versus his three times fatter neck when he's lying on the doghouse.

Jimmy: Although have you ever gotten a picture of yourself when you're lying down? I sort of understand what Snoopy is going through.

Jimmy: And I always feel like personally insulted. It's like I didn't have that much to eat. Even today, like it's on a day. 

Harold: It's all today. Yeah. Not my life choices the previous 40 years.

Jimmy: Yeah. Now my. Yeah. 

May 8th, 1967, Snoopy's standing on the street corner passing out some handbills and Linus just walks right by, doesn't even notice. So Snoopy again boots him. And then in the third panel, a very annoyed looking Snoopy hands Linus the flyer and then Linus reads it and it's. This is be kind to animals.

Michael: I think later Snoopy would not go around kicking people.

Jimmy: Yeah.

Michael: He was an angry dog.

Harold: I mean, you pick Michael. You picked like five sight gags in a row here with visuals with Snoopy. These were great.

Jimmy: Well, you know, I mean, if we're trying to understand it, I think one thing that we could chalk up to it is great sight gags. And the design all the time, regardless of how it's changing, always seems to work and always seems to fit the time. You know, like I can't imagine 1955, Snoopy in 1995, and I can't imagine it the reverse. You know, it would, just, just wouldn't work. But this is so funny. I love that third. The look on Snoopy's face in the third panel and he's handing the piece.

Harold: Of paper compared to the first panel where he doesn't even choose to give him any eyebrows. He's just this motionless leaflet passer on. Just so many great choices that are not obvious. I think that's why it's funny, because it's surprise, right? It's the element of surprise. There's something in the drawing that's like, oh, it just catches you off guard.

Jimmy: Yeah. All right, I'll tell you what, why don't we take a break now and then we'll come back. We're going to check the mailbox and then we'll finish up these strips and, and you know, like that. Do whatever else we do on the show.

Harold: All right.

Jimmy: I'll be right back.

BREAK

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Jimmy: All right, we are back. Now, guys, how do you feel about our chances of trying a timed Encyclopedia Britannica Peanuts quiz? Think we can do it? There's only 10 questions.

Harold: Oh, my.

Liz: Okay.

Michael: All right, all right, I'm game.

Jimmy: Here we go. 

Harold: We’re doomed. 

Jimmy: Okay, so what I'm gonna do is here on Britannica.com they have a timed, little Peanuts trivia question quiz. I have not read it yet. I have not taken it yet. It's multiple choice. So we're going to see as a group how we can do.

Harold: Why must I be put through such agony?

Jimmy: Well, it might be expert level. It might be ridiculously simple. So anyway. Okay. All right, so here we go in five. four, three, two, oh, one. What kind of dog is Snoopy?

Liz: Beagle. Boom.

Jimmy: one. Right.

Harold: Hooray. Oh, we got.

Jimmy: That was two hundred and fifty points. Because we got that.

Liz: Come on.

Michael: The clock's running.

Jimmy: The clock is. Well, no, it pauses between. So we're good. Here we go. Next. What character always carries a blanket?

Harold: Linus.

Liz: Linus.

Jimmy: Okay, all right. Maybe I should have checked these cards, these questions ahead of time.

Michael: Come on.

Jimmy: All right, here we go. Next one. In what year did first Peanuts comic strip run?

Harold: 1950.

Jimmy: Oh, dear. Yeah. All right, here we go. Next one. Next one. What is Charlie Brown's sister's name?

Liz: Sally.

Harold: Sally.

Jimmy: This is not a difficult quiz. Which of the following is not the name of one of Snoopy's siblings? Spike, Andy Bell, or Frank?

ML&H: Frank.

Jimmy: When did Woodstock first appear in the comic strip? Oh, 1967. 1986. 1950 or 1951?

Michael: 67.

Harold: 67.

Liz: No.

Harold: I just. Okay, we have to put in a formal complaint.

Michael: The unnamed bird. It was with.

Jimmy: No, no. We just ran out of time because I didn't hit the button. Right. Which character is obsessed with the great Pumpkin? Linus.

Harold: That would be Linus.

Jimmy: Which character plays the piano?

Harold: That'd be Schroeder.

Jimmy: And the final one is about which of the following holidays was there a Peanuts television special? Valentine's Day, Christmas, Halloween, or all of the above?

Harold: All of the above.

Jimmy: We did it, guys.

Michael: Well, I think we should cut that segment.

Jimmy: We got 2560 points.

Harold: That's not shabby.

Jimmy: So, that's amazing. So if you want to play along, you Can't. It's over. All right, so I am hanging out in the mailbox, though. Liz, do I got anything?

Liz: We do. let me see. We heard from super listener John Merullo, who says several times in the first Snoopy episode, old Snoop is referred to as the greatest comic strip character of all time. But we have already determined in many earlier episodes that the greatest character in Western literature is Linus. If the American comic strip is to be considered part of Western literature, then we have a contradiction.

Harold: Nope, we're doomed.

Liz: Is Snoopy then the greatest comic strip character other than Linus, or is Snoopy only the greatest character in a graphic sense? I believe people change.

Michael: I believe I said that Linus is the most complicated.

Harold: Complicated, complex. That's my memory. Yeah, but John, maybe you can find some, spots where we said otherwise. But that's my memory.

Michael: I think he was my favorite character during this period. But yeah, over the course of this strip, he kind of fades out, so.

Harold: yeah, that is true. So we're going to stick with Snoopy despite our apparent contradiction there.

Michael: Sure.

Jimmy: We contain multitudes, as, well, Whitman says.

Harold: the Sampler.

Jimmy: Yes. that is what. Embarrassingly, that's what I had to think of to get to the name Whitman. So that pause is me. The name of the candy is Whitman Sampler.

Harold: And the secret is stay away from the cherry cordials. Leave that for some reason.

Liz: and the Jordan almonds.

Harold: Yeah. Anything with orange in it. That's not. Yeah. All right.

Liz: Paul Hebert writes, I really enjoyed the first Snoopy cast, and I'm looking forward to being along for the ride. As you look at Schulz's work from new angles and with the insights that came out of the great reread, I'm curious about two things. How are you going to deal with Woodstock in this arc of episodes? It's hard to talk about Snoopy without Woodstock. Same with Peppermint Patty and Marcie. The sidekicks help define the more attention grabbing character. I'm hoping for a Woodstock standalone series, of course. But I do hope you talk a bit about how Woodstock and the Beagle Scouts help define Snoopy.

Jimmy: Well, yeah, I'll be picking the strips for the next episode and I'll keep that in mind. And, we're all Woodstock fans here, so I think that's a good idea.

Harold: Well, you could totally do an understanding Woodstock. Woodstock's also a pretty complex character, Schulz. That way, you know, there's aspects of Woodstock that I think surprise throughout the years. You could totally do a. Ah, Woodstock Understanding Woodstock by itself.

Jimmy: I think you could do Peppermint Patty. You could do Marcie. I think you could do Sally. Certainly Linus.

Liz: We're going to be doing this for a long time.

Jimmy: Yeah, Linus and Lucy together would be a good one.

Harold: Oh, and I want to ask John, Merullo, who was asking about our stance on Snoopy, and Linus, if he agrees, with either of those two, or if he has another greatest comic strip character or greatest character of all time, because I'd be interested to know his thoughts.

Liz: All righty. And we heard from Andy Hudson, who writes, I'm very late to the party but enjoying the podcast nonetheless. I discovered your podcast in December of 2023. This was a couple of months after my first visit to the Charles Schulz Museum in Santa Rosa. As a lifelong Peanuts fan, the museum was fascinating, and it only made me want to learn more about the strip and the cartoonist who created it. So I found some books about Schulz, as well as your podcast episode about the original Peanuts Christmas special. Since then, I've been tuning in during my drives to work, but as these are only 7 minute drives, I don't get very far into an episode before it's time to pause the show. I also enjoy listening when I am drawing or painting in my tiny studio space. I never feel lonely when I'm working in my studio, but I always enjoy having you all to keep me company when I'm there.

Jimmy: Aw.

Harold: well, thank you. And here's to traffic jams. we've got a few more minutes together.

Jimmy: Thank you. well, congratulations on having such a short commute. That's fantastic.

Harold: Yeah, that's great.

Jimmy: yeah, I love hearing the people listen to us while they're sitting making their own art. That is just the most rewarding and flattering thing. I think you could hear that someone wants to hang out with us while they're being creative, so thank you.

Liz: Oh, he adds a P.S. that last week I was back in Santa Rosa and visited the museum. They have a great new exhibit all about the paperback Peanuts books, which I'm pretty sure I've heard you discuss. I thought of you all while I was there, and he sent us a picture. So I'll post that on social media.

Jimmy: Oh, nice.

Harold: Thank you.

Jimmy: Oh, Benjamin Clark continuing to crush it at the museum.

Harold: Yeah, I want to get out there. I want to see these things.

Liz: Oh, it'd be fun to be there.

Jimmy: Yeah, we got to make that happen.

Liz: Yes. And finally, Jason Bullitt took the Buzzfeed quiz and like most of the rest of us, he is also a Marcie.

Jimmy: What is going on? I think someone's promoting, some special.

Harold: Of a certain sort, and they were waiting. Little thumb on the scale. I don't know.

Jimmy: Definitely.

Liz: Well, that's it for the mail, but I do want to hear from some of our listeners in South Korea because we have been consistently charting really high in South Korea. So please get in touch with us.

Harold: Yeah. Thank you for listening.

Jimmy: Absolutely. And, yeah, maybe you get in touch with us and we'll tell you some stories about Harold's adventures in South Korea, getting the Amelia Rules graphic novels printed.

Harold: That was.

Jimmy: I would wait up till, like, 3-4 in the morning so Harold could call me and give me the day's update. So it was great.

Liz: What do you mean, wait up till 3, 3 or 4 in the morning?

Jimmy: I was already up. You're right. you're right. I. Busted. I'm never asleep at 3 in the morning.

Liz: Anything in the hotline?

Jimmy: Nothing. The hotline's dead.

Liz: Sad.

Jimmy: No, nothing in the hotline. I'm feeling. Personally, I am feeling lonely. I sit here. It's red, it's under glass like that, Batman one. And it just sits there, and no one's been calling.

Harold: Make our cold line a hotline, somebody.

Jimmy: Exactly. 717-219-4162. You can call or you can text, and of course, you can also always email us unpackingpeanismail.com and follow us on social media. But I'll give you that litany at the end. All right, what do you say we get back to these last four strips?

Liz: Let's do it.

Harold: Yeah.

July 14, 1967. Snoopy and Linus are outside, and Linus is holding a stick. Then he says to Snoopy, do you see this stick? And he rears back like he's gonna throw it. And he says, I, the human being, will throw the stick, and you, the dog, will retrieve it. And then Linus throws the stick over Snoopy's head. And then Snoopy calmly closes his eyes and says, I, The dog could not be less interested.

Michael: Yeah, very similar to the other strip. I didn't,

Harold: You must love these, Michael.

Michael: Well, I didn't. If it was a repeat. I knew it was a repeat. I would have cut one of them.

Harold: But, yeah, there is something about. You just set up something that just is slightly. I don't know. You just set it up. This is what the character's doing, and then the other character undermines it. It's just it's just such classic setup.

Jimmy: Yeah. Again, Linus, here, we get to see them together. The most complex and the greatest character.

Michael: Yay.

Jimmy: Boom. yeah.

Harold: And greatest stick ever drawn.

Jimmy: Great stick. Now, could you imagine if, in that second panel, if Woodstock was in the panel with Snoopy, like, when. Just to get the idea of scale. It would be so tiny. There is something about. Something very pleasing about small drawings. Yeah. You know.

Harold: Yeah. I get to draw in the books that I sell, you know, when I go to events, and I just have a little corner I had. See, Jimmy is smart. He's designed his first page. Sometimes for him to draw in a space. I didn't do that. So I've got this little corner in the upper right. And so I'm drawing this little lion who's probably less than an inch tall. But it's so. It's just. It's so satisfying to draw it and then show it to people, and they're like, oh, I got my own little, little tiny cartoon sketch.

Liz: I like your pairings, Jimmy. I really. I love reading your books and finding out what they're. What to drink with them.

Jimmy: Yeah. What beverage and what snack or what song to listen to while you're listening. Or reading my comic.

Harold: Yeah. Your books have all the accoutrements. Yeah.

Jimmy: But, you know, anytime I do anything like that, now I have to do it. Now it becomes a chore.

Liz: Yep.

Jimmy: I will tell you what has driven me crazy for three years of this podcast that absolutely no one, probably not even you three, care about at all. But it drove me nuts. I write the little descriptions that no one reads about what each episode is, and each one ends with plus and then some little thing. Adding that plus for the last 80 episodes has driven me. I ended it at the finale of the reread.

Harold: Oh, wow.

Jimmy: And I felt so freed. It's the same way with the pairings in the comic. It's like, oh, I have to think of these again.

Harold: Well, I must say, those are clever. Whenever I was building out the newsletter, getting to read those, it was like reliving highlights of, the thing we recorded together. So thank. Thank you for that.

Jimmy: My favorite thing is finding one thing one of you guys said and pulling it out as the title.

Harold: That's the hard thing to find. One thing that you guys said that was of interest.

Jimmy: No, no, that's not what you meant.

Liz: I wonder if anybody listens to those things I put on after the credits.

Jimmy: The tag at the end of the credits. I always do.

Liz: Most people turn things off at the credits.

Harold: Yeah. For those of you who've never gotten to the end, Liz has recently been popping in a certain.

Liz: I've been doing it for 185 episodes.

Harold: Well, that's recent.

Jimmy: In the Peanuts world.

Harold: 75 years. Yeah, those are fun. You know, you never know which thing might be, a callback. But you know, on Mystery Science Theater, I really loved that they would pick one. One little two second shot or one second shot from the. From the movie at the end after you. So you'd have to stick all the way through the credits. So for those of you who've never experienced Liz's stingers, you gotta.

Jimmy: Some of them are really good.

Harold: Follow all the way through.

March 14, 1968. This is another sequence in which Charlie Brown has elevated Snoopy to the role of manager on the ball team. And Lucy, has just found this out. So she yells at Charlie Brown, manager. That stupid beagle is going to be our new manager. Nothing doing. I'll. And then, of course, Snoopy boots her in the butt again. Michael was feeling violent when he picked these.

Harold: He loves a good boot, I guess.

Michael: I think it's hilarious to kick someone in the butt.

Jimmy: And then in the last panel, Snoopy says, we baseball managers don't stand for any back talk.

Michael: Wow, I'm redundant.

Harold: Three boots with a little tongue sticking out for Lucy.

Jimmy: Oh, my God. The tongue is what puts it over the top.

Harold: Yeah. And the arms raised. I mean, it's such a. It's so classic. There's no point of contact. You just see again, they're just floating in white space. I love it. He's so good at this.

Jimmy: Yeah. And you know what? Like you said, like, you don't know how like hard it is with Snoopy's paw hitting or whatever. And what it is, is the way he gives. It's more of a surprise.

Harold: Yeah.

Jimmy: You know what I mean? Like, I can't believe the dog just kicked. You know that kind of feeling either whether it's the bird reacting or Lucy.

Harold: Yeah. And those little weird rounded stars for pain that he does. The Dating Game stars.

Jimmy: I love Lucy's giant mouth too.

Harold: Yeah, right. Yeah. I guess the rounded stars, that, that means it was a dull pain.

Jimmy: Yeah, dull pain.

Michael: Yeah.

Jimmy: Yeah. 

February 10, 1969. Snoopy is playing hockey. He's actually the goalie and he's saying, here's the world famous hockey goalie guarding the net. And then Linus comes up, making a play on the goal. And Snoopy just launches at him, swinging the, the hockey stick above his Head screaming, Ugh. And Linus, of course, drops his stick in sheer terror. And then Snoopy calmly stands and says, nobody scores.

Harold: Yep. 60s. The violent Snoopy was, was the highlight of the 60s.

Jimmy: I'll tell you what, I love the little detail that he has the tape on the hockey stick. That's like a. It's interesting. I mean, there was definitely hockey in Peanuts, but Schulz loved it so much, I'm surprised there wasn't.

Harold: More,

Jimmy: Of it in the strip.

Liz: And he's got dog teeth.

Jimmy: He's got the dog teeth again.

Harold: Yeah, those are great. A little rounded. They're all of a piece. Right. There's no connector to the top of the gums. That's great.

Jimmy: So good. I love his winter landscapes too.

Harold: Yeah, those bleak little trees in the upper corner of. Panel two.

Jimmy: Yeah. 

November 16, 1969. It's a Sunday, and Snoopy, the world famous writer, is atop the doghouse and he's getting set to type away. And on tier two, he starts. It was a dark and stormy night. Suddenly a shot rang out. The door slammed, the maid screamed. Suddenly a pirate ship appeared in the horizon. While millions of people were starving, the king lived in luxury. Meanwhile, on a small farm in Kansas, a boy was growing up. And Snoopy silently reviews his writing and then writes part two. And then in the last line, he says, in part two, I tie all of this together.

Harold: Cheesy grin.

Michael: Now, this is what he does a lot later years where the punchline is, he's talking to the reader.

Harold: Uh-huh. Yeah. And there's something, I don't know. How do you guys feel about this? When Snoopy looks at you, breaks the fourth wall, is there like this little electric moment for you reading it? It's like, oh my gosh, he's addressing me.

Jimmy: Yes, absolutely. No, he. It caught. It brings you in. And this is something worth thinking about. I don't have an answer for this. Theoretically, breaking the fourth wall should destroy the reality of the strip.

Jimmy: Right. Because it's acknowledging a reader.

Harold: Right.

Jimmy: And if you do it wrong, it does.

Harold: Yeah.

Jimmy: But if you do it right, it invites the reader in as if he's a co conspirator.

Harold: Yes. I mean, you did this in Amelia Rules all the time. She was. I mean, from the get go, Amelia is addressing the audience. And I think it's an incredibly powerful thing. the connection that you feel to the characters is, I think, a lot more personal when they're confiding in you. Yeah, I understand why some People don't consider it appropriate for a style role.

Michael: It's very blatant in that one. But I looked at one before. He is not addressing the audience in the hockey one. He's thinking to himself.

Harold: yes, yes. And that's funny, too, because you could read it, you'd have to go out of your way to read it, that we're in on it with him.

Michael: But if in the last panel he was smiling, big, toothy smile, it wouldn't be as funny looking at the. Yeah.

Jimmy: Why?

Harold: Why wouldn't it?

Jimmy: Wouldn't be. But why?

Michael: Well, I don't know, but it seems to me this. He picked up on this and used it a lot.

Harold: Yeah, yeah.

Michael: yeah. In later years, but I don't remember him using it very much before that.

Harold: Yeah. When I was doing-- I keep bringing up Sweetest Beasts. But, you know, he's influenced me in so many ways, particularly since we started recording this stuff, because, you know, we're steeped in Peanuts. And I. I made it a very conscious decision that in my mind, when I'm drawing these little characters, they are. They are cartoon characters. It's not a lion. It's not, a real life lamb. These guys are cartoon characters in their world, and they're living their life, and they're fine being cartoon characters. But because they're cartoon characters in my world, they have an audience, and we are the audience. And every once in a while, they'll turn to us and address us. And again, I've been referring to Mystery Science Theater, but the same deal. It's like, you know, the little puppet shows, a Romper Room or whatever. If you grew up where the-- or Mr. Rogers, you know, they address you directly, and it's. It is super powerful. It's a connection. Mystery Science Theater, the sketches, the characters are basically pointing toward the camera, and either they're talking to the mad scientists that are forcing them to watch these bad movies, or they're talking to us and we. Again, we're in on it. And I love that. And I hear from people all the time with Mystery Science Theater that their bond to those characters is way greater than if they had done everything identical in the show, except we were looking through a world where they never break the fourth wall. And I think it's absolutely the right decision for that show. I think it's absolutely the right decision for Schulz. He. He's. He knows how to maximize experience. When you read the strip, he's just a master at it. He. I think he was Constantly studying and trying to see how he could have an impact. And like Michael said, you know, he. He broke. He broke through to something that was in his arsenal of humor and, and connection. And he, he used it then on, you know.

Jimmy: You know, okay, let's. If, let's just. Before we wrap this up, let's try to pinpoint this a little bit. So if we compare the nobody scores where he's thinking to himself, and in part two, I tie this together where he's talking to us, the difference could possibly be we see. Do some Snoopy, do something, you know, notable exciting on the hockey, ice. Right. And then he says the nobody scores is just to him. So in that we're. We're seeing something true about Snoopy. He wasn't doing that to perform for us. He feels that nobody scores. That's true. Where in this one, he's actually kind of. In the, in the writing one, he hasn't done anything successfully yet. Right. So he's looking at us like, almost like, don't worry, I'll tie all this together in the last one.

Harold: Yeah, it's,

Jimmy: So that's also a way of seeing inside him, but in a way that would maybe be impossible without him talking directly to us. Because if he was saying that to himself, that makes no sense, right?

Harold: Well, yeah, I mean, the hockey one, you've got those classic little slanted eyes of. What do you call that? You know, it's this. What's the adjective to describe Snoop?

Liz: indifference?

Michael: No, it's more than that.

Jimmy: It's.

Harold: It's almost like pride or it's like 

Michael: hubris. 

Harold: Almost hubris. Yeah. I think there's. I think that's. Yeah, there's something in it where he's, he's, he's. He's self content, proud of himself. He has a high opinion of himself. And the best way to do that are those two little slanted lines and, and then, you know, if the eyes are closed, how does he look at us? You know, you can't have both.

Liz: But in the other one, he's writing for an audience so he could speak to the audience.

Jimmy: Yep.

Harold: Yeah, that. That's interesting. Yeah, he's here. He is something that's supposed to be shared with others, and it is being shared with, us. And that's the kind of, the magic of. It's like, oh, man, you know, he knows we're here.

Jimmy: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Harold: That's, that's kind of magical, you know, and, and we don't do it a lot. But I, yeah, I definitely chose to do that a lot in. And I find it incredibly satisfying to every once in a while, let the characters. I mean, because the character's looking at me too, right? While I'm drawing it.

Jimmy: Yes.

Harold: And I'm feeling it. You know, it's one of these little moments where all of a sudden I've been tinkering with these characters and they're down in their little world, and then, you know, your, your pen's drawing it, and then all of a sudden they look back up at you and like, hey, yeah, I see you. There's something really special.

Jimmy: Well, as long as we're talking about our own work. Boy, my, my new book, I'm serializing in the Real Dark Night. There's not a fourth wall. There's not a third wall. There's no walls at all. Like each. The writer is talking to the characters, the characters talk back out to the readers. And yet I want to try to keep it so it's not just a surface level formal joke that you're still involved with these characters lives and if something bad happens, you worry about them.

Harold: What is the effect of that by erasing those boundaries? What do you think the, effect of experiencing the art is? Why did you choose it for this particular story? That's about dealing with depression and how you struggle with it.

Jimmy: It was the best way to make someone feel empathy, by making it actually, ultimately it feel almost like about themselves.

Harold: You see, I, think empathy is a great, a great way to put it. This. How, does this not create empathy in connection? It's the most obvious way, I guess, to do it. I mean, it can ask. And Schulz is so, so, so good at loving his characters and not judging his characters. He lets the characters judge one another and judge themselves. He occasionally will do it if he's got a throwaway character that comes into their world and is being mean. And it's so jarring when he does it like Thibault or whatever, but generally, he's loving the characters. He's not judging the characters. And then they're sometimes addressing us and seeking sympathy from us or a laugh with us. And I think that's what makes beloved characters in art, or at least that's one way to do it. It's incredibly powerful.

Jimmy: Yeah, I think you're right. Well, you know what? We could go on for another five hours. And we will, but just not today. But if you want to, get in touch with us, remember unpackingpeanuts@gmail.com and 717-219-4162. And if you do leave a text message on the hotline, make sure you identify yourself. So if you want to follow us on social media, you can follow us at unpackpeanuts on Instagram and threads and unpackingpeanuts on Facebook, Blue sky and YouTube. And, you know, remember, when I don't hear from you, I worry. So we'll be back in a couple weeks with more Snoopy. Until then, for Michael, Harold and Liz. This is Jimmy saying, be of good cheer. Yes, yes, yes.

MH&L: Yes, Be of good cheer.

Liz: Unpacking Peanuts is copyright Jimmy Gownley, Michael Cohen, Harold Buchholz and Liz Sumner. Produced and edited by Liz Sumner. Music by Michael Cohen. Additional voiceover by Aziza Shukralla Clark. For more from the show, follow Unpack Peanuts on Instagram and Threads Unpacking Peanuts on Facebook, Blue sky and YouTube. For more about Jimmy, Michael and Harold, visit unpackingpeanuts.com have a wonderful day and thanks for listening.

MH&L: Frank.