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March 2, 2010


Comic Strips Pick-Up/Drops Update

* the Denver Post had done its best to link all future polls about the popularity of comic strip to massive purges of same, dropping a whopping 20 strips and adding one after their post recent reader-participative event. The list includes the work of last year's Reuben Award winner, Speed Bump, and the strip of one of this year's Reuben finalists, Cul De Sac. The lone pick-up was Steve Kelley's Dustin, although Scary Gary and Pluggers have been added on Sundays.

The Post was in a unique position of taking on strips when the Rocky Mountain News folded, which not only gave them a ton of strips but ripped the leverage of appearing at the News from the features. The pain will be felt by the strips themselves, particularly the borderline successful strips and modestly successful ones, where placement in a top 20 market and the money that comes with a slot in a bigger newspaper can be a real difference in the pocket of the cartoonist.

As I've mentioned before, I could see anywhere from 10-50 drops of over five features by papers in this calendar year.

* E&P reports that the Omaha World-Leader has returned Hagar and Non Sequitur to its comics pages. The World-Leader was the last paper to announce the kind of major, features-reducing overhaul of the kind the Post just announced. A certain amount of angry reaction is expected and usually built into these kinds of things.
 
posted 6:00 am PST | Permalink
 

 
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