G.O. Fizzickle Pogo

by Walt Kelly

Genres: Comics, Humor

Trade Paperback

First published January 1, 1958

About the author

American animator and cartoonist best known for the classic funny animal comic strip, Pogo. He won the National Cartoonists Society's Reuben Award in 1951 for Cartoonist of the Year, and their Silver T-Square Award in 1972, given to persons having "demonstrated outstanding dedication or service to the Society or the profession."

Reviews

[Rick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Late 50s Pogo. Storylines involve Howland Owl trying to get a flea and Hounddog onto the US’s response to Sputnik; Owl and Churchy building a competitor to the Suez Canal in response to the Suez Crisis; and a plot to arm butterflies with dentures. There is also a dispute over who is man’s best friend and is it exclusive? Seems “a person” claims “Dogs is his best friend” and Hounddog agrees with the person’s astute judgment, afterall he preaches,“A dog is faithful, loyal, kind, and brave…his heart is the size of a loaded kiddy car and his brain is alive with the poetry of love.” When informed that said “person” praising dogs is “a bug, a professional flea,” he retracts his endorsement of the flea’s judgment. Funny, sure, but take a second to go back and read that description again. I want “his heart is the size of a loaded kiddy car and his brain is alive with the poetry of love” on my tombstone. Mr. Kelly can write, funny and beautiful.

A frog, mimicking a bat who is trying to pass as a butterfly, lands in Albert’s yawning mouth. He takes stock of what he sees down there, considers the commercial advantages to conducting tours of Albert’s insides, but encounters a monster of sorts so flees in great alarm. It results in efforts to exorcise the demon from Albert, which fail, and then, in a gag Kelly would return to in 1973 or 4, decides to resolve the issue by sending an armed posse in after the demon. Albert protests, “BLAM, my eye! Suppose they misses? Anything else they shoots down there will be MINE…I SURROUNDS the rascal!” When he repeated the gag during the Watergate investigation, Kelly played off the John Dean line about a cancer growing and the swamp critturs seeking to rid Albert of this cancer came to the same conclusion and the same protest punchline.

G. O. Fizzickle Pogo is a delightful grab bag of ridiculousness: puns, satire, slapstick, and just general overall goofiness. Owl wants Albert to go to the moon too so he can be an enforcer, tossing off any unwanted visitors, but Churchy laments the damage this will do to songwriting, an alligator on the moon! “Nothin’ is sacred,” replies Pogo, “they moved Brooklyn to Los Angeles so anything can happen.” Yes, the moving of the Dodgers to LA makes it into Pogo, as does the Beat Generation, and probably some things I missed, bein’ just a tadpole myself in the late 50s. There is even meta-fiction here when Churchy listens to an example of Beat poetry and observes, “I made up stuff like that and BAM they throws me into a comic strip…FER LIFE!” A better life sentence I can’t imagine.

[Jamie McLendon · Rating 5 out of 5]

A clever take on the year that spurned the space race, covering topical stories of the time such as the launch of Sputnik and the Suez Crisis. Plus, the illustrations are top-notch, par usual.