I’ve spent some much needed time looking over Frank Young’s blog/shrine to comic book auteur John Stanley, and it got me thinking again about what an underrated talent Stanley was and still is. His intelligent work with child characters predates Peanuts by several years and is far darker and more profound than anything Charles Schulz did with his strip in fifty years. His obscurer handling of animated characters like Woody Woodpecker and Tom Cat are gems well worth discovering, and reprinting, if there’s a market for that sort of compilation. While I’m not crazy about his work in the “teen scene” comics in the 1960s, it still remains some of the most interesting work a comic writer/artist did in his later years.
By no means limit yourself to my few recommendations linked below. Spend endless hours reveling in the goodness that is John Stanley!
Bongo and Bop: “A Breather” (1961): Bill Williams’s art makes both the stories highlighted here worth reading, but the shorter one is a truly brilliant piece of cynic comedy.
Johnny Mole (1944): To reiterate my comment: a big hulky man who abuses a child and pays hush money is overcome with remorse and disgust at his abuse and freespending, all while the kid enjoys it? In 1944?!
Tubby: “The Gourmet” (1948): I consider this Stanley’s greatest story.
The First Little Lulu Comic (1945): These are neat little gems, but they’ve never been reprinted with the original artwork, which Frank’s provided.
“Tom Cat” (1948): This one is just perverted. Read. Now.
“…the pitiful limitations of the Hanna-Barbera animated original”??
Naw.
Thad, thank you for your encouraging words. I love your selection of stories from the site. I wondered why that Tom-in-diapers post had gotten so many hits lately!
I know my opinions about the animated “Tom and Jerry” may be controversial in some quarters, but I’ll stand by them. I’ve never been able to warm to the Hanna-Barbera MGM output. It feels like trying to make friends with a serial killer, while knowing what that person does in their spare time.
I am beginning to think that “The Gourmet” is John Stanley’s single finest short story. He achieves something truly sublime in those six pages.
I’m not always as overwhelmed by John Stanley as I’m supposed to be, but these are interesting.
That Tom Cat story may be the closest thing we’ll ever see to The Story of O for Kids.