Boes ("Ox Tales") is a Dutch newspaper

gag-a-day A gag-a-day comic strip is the style of writing comic cartoons such that every installment of a strip delivers a complete joke or some other kind of artistic statement. It is opposed to story or continuity strips, which rely on the development of ...

comic strip A comic strip is a sequence of drawings, often cartoons, arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions. Traditionally, throughout the 20th and into the 21st ...

created by Wil Raymakers and Thijs Wilms. It was created in 1980 and spawned a popular

anime is Traditional animation, hand-drawn and computer animation, computer-generated animation originating from Japan. Outside of Japan and in English, ''anime'' refers specifically to animation produced in Japan. However, in Japan and in Japane ...

television series between 1988 and 1991 called ''

Ox Tales ''Ox Tales'', also known as , is an anime television series produced by Telecable Benelux B.V. in association with Saban Entertainment and animated by Telescreen Japan. It was a co-production between Japan and the Netherlands based on a Dutc ...

'' in the English-speaking world. The comic managed to outlive the animated adaptation and still continues to appear as a column strip in several Dutch daily and weekly newspapers.

Concept

"Boes" is a

pantomime Pantomime (; informally panto) is a type of musical comedy stage production designed for family entertainment. It was developed in England and is performed throughout the United Kingdom, Ireland and (to a lesser extent) in other English-speaking ...

comic about an

anthropomorphic Anthropomorphism is the attribution of human traits, emotions, or intentions to non-human entities. It is considered to be an innate tendency of human psychology. Personification is the related attribution of human form and characteristics t ...

ox who walks on

clog Clogs are a type of footwear made in part or completely from wood. Used in many parts of the world, their forms can vary by culture, but often remained unchanged for centuries within a culture. Traditional clogs remain in use as protective f ...

s in a landscape that resembles the farm lands in the Netherlands. He works as a farmer. Many gags center around his comedic interactions with animals. While many gags are child-friendly there are also gags which have more risqué jokes involving sex,

toilet humor Toilet humour, or potty or scatological humour (compare scatology), is a type of off-colour humour dealing with defecation, diarrhea, constipation, urination and flatulence, and to a lesser extent vomiting and other bodily functions. It sees subs ...

and obscene gestures. The series has a few recurring characters who are unnamed in the comics, but received names in the animated series. They are Dolly the tortoise, Shampoo the gorilla and Saffie the dog. While in the English dub for the series they are named Jack, Gaylord and Sammy. Between 1981 and 1982 William-Dickens Productions published two albums with gags. Between 1986 and 1989 14 albums were published in

oblong An oblong is a non-square rectangle. Oblong may also refer to: Places * Oblong, Illinois, a village in the United States * Oblong Township, Crawford County, Illinois, United States * A strip of land on the New York-Connecticut border in the Unit ...

format by Uitgeverij Drukwerk (nrs. 1–10) and

Standaard Uitgeverij Standaard Uitgeverij is a Belgian publisher, and the leading publisher in the Dutch language market of Flanders. History In 1919, the Standaard group was created, mainly consisting of a chain of bookshops (Standaard Boekhandel), a newspaper (''De ...

(nrs. 11–14).

republished four albums with gags between 1989 and 1993 and gave them distinguishable titles: "Ossehaas" (1989), "Kippevel" (1991), "Hamsterwoede" (1992) and "Stierengevecht" (1993). In 1988 three comic book albums were published by

where Boes has longer stories and in which he and other characters talk to one another. These albums were titled: "Een harde noot" ("A hard nut"), "Een nieuw erf" ("A new yard") and "De schaapscheerder" ("The sheep shearer"). In 2011 three new albums with gags were published by Nona Arte.

Animated series

Between 1988 and 1991 the comics series was adapted into an animated TV series, produced by Telecable Benelux B.V., Teleimage Japan Inc. /

Meander Studio A meander is one of a series of regular sinuous curves in the channel of a river or other watercourse. It is produced as a watercourse erodes the sediments of an outer, concave bank (cut bank) and deposits sediments on an inner, convex bank w ...

. A total of 101 episodes were made and broadcast internationally in English, Spanish, Italian, Dutch, Hebrew, Portuguese, French, German, Swedish and Croatian.

Sources

1980 comics debuts Dutch comic strips Dutch comics characters Gag-a-day comics Pantomime comics Male characters in comics Comics adapted into animated series Comics adapted into television series Cattle in literature Fictional farmers Fictional Dutch people Turtles in literature Comics about dogs Comics characters introduced in 1980 {{comic-strip-stub