Peanuts

Two in the LA Times, one from elsewhere today:
Zits by Jerry Scott and Jim Borgman
Peanuts by Charles M Schulz
Stone Soup by Jan Eliot (Thanks to mjolnir_babe)

(Does anyone know where to find the 1990s Peanuts reprints online? Snoopy.com, Washingtonpost.com and Houstonchronicle.com all display the earlier reprints)

With Stone Soup, it looks like we have a wholly original setting for a joke--women shopping. It's an un-picked orchard of hilarity, just waiting to be harvested.

If Charles Schulz didn't invent the silent penultimate panel, he certainly perfected it. The SPP has likely become such a cliche in part because of Schulz's influence.

As you may have gathered, I love Peanuts and a few late-career SPPs won't change that. I have trouble sometimes explaining why Peanuts is so great. For me the brilliance is so apparent that, like the music of the Beatles, or the short stories of Raymond Carver, it needs no justification. If you don't understand why Peanuts is the greatest comic strip ever, you are either a) not paying attention or b) have no soul.

Elsewhere, Bucky Cat says "booger," again.