Wizard of Id by Parker and Hart for December 21, 2015

Which coffee cup?

Think this is a poorly articulated comment on the Starbucks seasonal cup

BEST way to improve a coffee cup is to make it a Starbucks coffee cup….

Put a Star of David on yours, I’ll put a cross on mine. We’ll split our earnings when they give four times as much to me, just to spite you. Nobody can teach the Goldberg brothers anything about marketing. (yes, it’s an old joke).

Are we still in Id?

Sigh.

Whomever is coming up with the gags isn’t doing a good job. Artwork can change; gags can change; but if you don’t have a good gag or a good execution of the the gag, your comic is going to fall flat.

Sunday’s is a better example than today’s. The fir tree reaching Jack and the Beanstalk’s giant’s castle does nothing for the punch line in the last frame, and the punch line wasn’t even very good. Ending it with an angry giant yelling “WIZARD!” or a bird bringing a restraining order from the giant wouldn’t have been great but would have been better. Really, Sunday’s gag would have worked much better as drawing the weekly as one frame, having the cartoon sideways, with an angry giant climbing down the fir tree and the Wizard’s wife saying “You had to use your growth formula.”

Today’s fail by putting the “message” first. There’s no problem with message in cartoons, but the gag should come first, with the message second. Today’s gag fails by assuming the reader can recognize the cups as Starbuck’s – hard to do in B&W – and still remembers the “controvery.” The latter doesn’t work well not only because it’s not current, but because it wasn’t much of a “controversy” to begin with. Not only that, but given the price of Starbuck’s coffee, it raises the question of what two beggars are doing with the cups in their hand.

If the cartoonist must do this gag, it would be better tas a multi-frame cartoon, with the two in the background complaining about the cups not having anything to do with Christmas (reminding the reader of the “controversy,” with the lead up for a punch line of them complaining about a lack of Christmas spirit – as they walk by two sad, dismayed beggers with empty, outstretched hands.

Really, this is basic stuff. It’s hard to do well for comic after comic, but if you’re doing to do a daily, you’re going to have to either step up to this level or get another gag writer.

Keep it simple. Keep it snappy. Read the classics Wizard of Ids for instruction.

I completely ignore the organized beggars outside of store exits such as “salvation” army etc. Little of the loot they haul in goes to help anybody and they are trying to brainwash people with that false story of an imaginary sky fairy. I give to NPR, PBS, and a few people I know who need, it from my limited funds.

I am sorry, but December 13, 2015 was the last day I enjoyed the Wizard of Id. Ever since the cartoonist changed to Mason Mastroianni from Jeff Parker, the quality of the art and the writing has been dismal.

I can only hope for something better, but we may have come to the end of an era.

This strip is indeed bad. Not funny at all. Especially after all that unnecessary spiel about those red Starbucks cups that are complete non-offensive. Getting offended over those simple innocent cups is stupid.

I can’t tell if this is a poorly done rip off of Bound and Gagged or Frank and Earnest.

He should fill that coffee cup with HOT, very HOT coffee, and throw it back at her!!!

looks like you got hacked.

Gibbs working undercover.

Huh?

Isn’t that tomorrow?

Wizard of Weird

I was amused by it. Honestly, if you don’t like it then quit reading the comic. Things change.

I was really thrown in that I first saw the comic only in black and white so the cup was not red and I did not get it at all. Then when I saw it on line in color it made sense because of all the SB hoopla on their holiday cup. The woman in the panel looks out of place for Id

HUH?

I originally wanted to comment on the strange little character in the lower right hand corner who seemed to be listening to the two beggars through a cup. But after one poster decided that hot coffee should be thrown on someone, I’ve decided I don’t care enough about that question to return to this site today. I hope women haters and other haters find someplace other than GoComics to launch their abuse in future.

Whelp looks like whoever’s drawing this is still here so I’m out. Maybe I’ll check back in a few weeks and see if it’s gotten funny again. I understand that a different artist would have a different style but if you can’t even keep the characters in-character and can’t even keep the same sort of gags going then go make your own comic and name it something else. It would be better to end this strip entirely than for it to lose it’s heart and soul like this.

I thought it was a wonderful comment on the red coffee cup “situation” (or “ridiculous situation”)