Comments on: Paiging Frazz

By: Claude

Claude — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 02:25:31 +0000

Perhaps it’s just a Sunday tribute to Juneteenth.

By: yellojkt

yellojkt — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 11:52:11 +0000

The Washington Post moved Frazz to the Kidz Page in perhaps the most tone deaf comics move ever.

By: Usual John

Usual John — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 04:46:14 +0000

I generally find Frazz pretty funny, and the last collection showed how funny it can be. Mallett is consciously setting a good example. That can get tiresome, but I think most of the time he makes it work.

Kids do have the intelligence shown in Frazz, but they don’t have that level of experience or, usually, vocabulary. In the strip shown, presumably someone (probably Frazz) has been telling the kids about Satchel Paige and his favorite sayings. The kid mentioning Aristotle and Bertrand Russell is the smart kid, Caulfield. So, not all that unrealistic.

By: Lessa

Lessa — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 04:01:37 +0000

Frazz is carried in the Kalamazoo Gazette also. Jef Mallett is a local boy, he lives in Lansing, and grew up in the Big Rapids area.

In considering the intellegence of this strip, remember that every year at Halloween, the readers have to figure out which literary character Caulfield is portraying. I find Frazz much more enjoyable than some others that have bee around for years.

By: turquoise cow

turquoise cow — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 00:15:57 +0000

the Star-Ledger of Newark, New Jersey publishes Frazz. Generally I like it, but sometimes the kids are rather wordy and intelligent, which makes me wonder if real kids are this wordy and intelligent. I’m not around kids enough to know if they’re capable of that (though the idea is that Frazz is a good influence on them), and I don’t recall my classmates ever being quite so well-spoken. Then again, none of my classmates in elementary school were geniuses.

By: Blinky The Wonder WOmbat

Blinky The Wonder WOmbat — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 19:44:55 +0000

Wordsprite-

Satchel Paige passed away in 1982, so that shoots down your theory.

Or perhpas Mallet was saving it for when Satchel the Pooch passes away.

By: John DiFool

John DiFool — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 18:27:32 +0000

Yeah, its constant lampshading and such can get tiresome, and its rare that I LOL at it (like I often do with Zits, for example, c.f. the kissing thread last week).

Satchel would be on my very short list of pitchers to draft first (in one of those all-time sim leagues or such).

By: The Ploughman

The Ploughman — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 18:12:28 +0000

I should leave it alone, but when C&H comes up, WordSprite, I just got to keep talking!

My paper doesn’t get Frazz, though I’ve seen enough in other papers and online (including this site) to get a general sense of the premise and characters. One thing that’s bothered me about the strips I’ve seen is that it seems to wear its intelligence on its sleeve - like the guy who works in the fact that he’s doesn’t watch television into every conversation or quotes an obscure philosopher and then waits for you to ask who they’re talking about. In contrast, I always loved how C&H (often) had a more literary level, but was always, to me, more about the characters and the situation presented in the strip than the references. The children’s dialog here illustrates this to me - what they say is as intelligent as something Calvin might intend, but the actual words ring hollow in the mouths of children.

And nobody’s talking about boogers. That’s missing too.

By: WordSprite

WordSprite — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 17:31:52 +0000

Jef Mallet probably had the comic ready to go for when Satchel Paige does pass on, then had no other ideas for that Sunday strip, and just decided to use it then. (Don’t all bloggers or other writers do that? Have a little arsenal just in case?)
Yes, the kids DO always talk this way in Frazz and that’s one reason I love it- the other being that it is sort of like having Calvin and Hobbes back again.
Also, at least one paper carries it- the Chicago Tribune: it’s one of their better choices.

By: Kevin Andresen

Kevin Andresen — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 17:25:04 +0000

Does ANY paper publish Frazz? Or, as has been postulated here, is it too intelligent for resistant America? [… that also shuns educational video games (save Dora).]

The Ploughman - These kids are pretty hip, possibly because Frazz has engaged them in their studies for years. I don’t remember ever thinking about discussing school reading with my class mates; it seems that could have changed my whole life. In high school, it might have energized my failed efforts to read “Great Expectations” and “Moby Dick”, two of the books from English class.