Sometimes pop culture phenomena can make the transition to the newspaper comcs page, sometimes they can't ... but mostly they can't. The problem is that the fan bases for Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Rugrats, Masters of the Universe, and so on, though large, are not really so very large to form a substantial bloc of potential newspaper readers. While some newspaper feature editors inevitably get snookered into the hokum that if they run strip X they'll suddenly experience a measurable bump in subscriptions, that rarely if ever actually happens.
Problem two is that in the midst of a pop culture phenomenon, the creative personnel involved in driving that engine tend to be stretched so thin that a newspaper strip gets the dregs of that creative juice. There is just not so much money to be made with a newspaper strip that a corporate property like Pokémon can expend limited resources on it. They are way too busy catering to their fan base in ways that are the real cash cows -- toys, books, movies, etc.
Problem three is that the creative team on these newspaper features is faced with a practically unsolvable dilemma -- you can please the fan base, or you can try to appeal to the general newspaper readership. 99% of newspaper readers know exactly nothing about Pokémon, but if you try to pull them in by explaining the concept over and over, or ignore the mechanics of Pokémon and just do gags about weird little creatures, you will catch holy hell from the fans. There are few things that fans hate more than having the object of their affection diluted and made palatable to the non-fans.
So where does the Pokémon newspaper strip fall into the pitfalls described above? Well, not knowing anything about Pokémon, I wouldn't presume to guess (your opinions are more than welcome). But what I do know is that the Sunday and daily strip came and went so fast it practically left skid marks in the few newspapers that tried carrying it. The strip debuted on September 10 2000, and bowed out on March 30 2001*, just a little over six months. The feature was credited to Gerard Jones (writer) and Ashura Benimaru (art).
* Sources: Viz Communications press release, reprint book "Pikachu Meets The Press". A Pokémon fan site claims the strip ran for a year, but have found no evidence of a longer existence.
Today is also Nintendo's anniversary, having formed on this day 133 years ago (!!!) as a playing card company. Is that why you ran this strip today? (Also, everyone knows you can't capture a Pokémon that already belongs to another trainer!)
ReplyDeleteMerely a happy coincidence. Beyond the Christmas strip every year, I'm hopeless at observing anniversaries, holidays, special events on the blog. --Allan
ReplyDeleteI think that Rugrats lent itself very well to the newspaper funnies. One didn’t have to watch Rugrats to get the comic strip. And with the long history of comics about children, it fit in well. Lasted 5 years from mid-98 to mid-03.
ReplyDeleteI remember the "Rugrats" comic strip well. It ran in my local paper (Memphis Commercial Appeal), probably to the end.
ReplyDeleteIt's still in reruns in very few papers, believe it or not. I was surprised when I saw it back in 2018 or 2019 while on a trip.
@Brubaker Yeah, you can view it at the Creators website. They also published a near-complete collection of the strips 3 years ago. There were about 8 different artists, some terrible, some really good.
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