''Pickles'' is a daily and Sunday

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 ...

Brian Crane Brian Crane is an American cartoonist who created ''Pickles'', a comic strip featuring a retired couple, Earl and Opal Pickles, their family, and their family pets, Muffin (cat) and Roscoe (dog). Crane was born in Twin Falls, Idaho, but was raise ...

focusing on a retired couple in their seventies, Earl and Opal Pickles. ''Pickles'' has been published since April 2, 1990.

Publication

As of 2016, ''Pickles'' was syndicated in close to 1,000 newspapers worldwide.Dwyer, Ed
"CULTURE: The Funny Papers: Newspapers may be in trouble, but the comic strip is alive and well — and flourishing online,"
''Saturday Evening Post'' (November 7, 2016).

Story and characters

Inspired by Crane's

in-laws ''In-Laws'' is an American sitcom television series created by Mark Reisman, that aired on NBC from September 24, 2002 to January 14, 2003. The series starred Bonnie Somerville, Jean Smart, Elon Gold, and Dennis Farina. Plot The protagonist has ...

, the strip describes their efforts to enjoy retirement, which instead proves quite imperfect for both. Earl Pickles is bald and has a bushy white mustache; he also wears glasses and suspenders. He is described as "a couch potato, curmudgeon and all around geezer-in-residence." Opal Pickles also wears glasses and is often seen wearing purple polka-dotted dresses and white sneakers. She is " a devoted wife, mother, grandmother, Red Hat Lady and cat servant." When sitting, she is usually seen with her pet cat, Muffin, in her lap (on some occasions, Muffin tends to lie on Earl's lap to his disdain). Both characters were drawn with their eye pupils visible through their glasses during the strip's early years, but their glasses were later whitened so that they are opaque to readers. The cast includes their dog, Roscoe; their cat, Muffin; their 6-year-old grandson, Nelson Wolfe; Nelson's parentstheir daughter, Sylvia, and her husband, Dan, a

wildlife photographer Wildlife photography is a genre of photography concerned with documenting various forms of wildlife in their natural habitat. As well as requiring photography skills, wildlife photographers may need field craft, field craft skills. For example ...

; Clyde, Earl's friend; and Pearl, Opal's sister, who dated Earl many years ago. Roscoe and Muffin are depicted with thought balloons (like

Snoopy Snoopy is an anthropomorphic beagle in the comic strip ''Peanuts'' by Charles M. Schulz. He can also be found in all of the ''Peanuts'' films and television specials. Since his debut on October 4, 1950, Snoopy has become one of the most recog ...

Garfield ''Garfield'' is an American comic strip created by Jim Davis. Originally published locally as ''Jon'' in 1976, then in nationwide syndication from 1978 as ''Garfield'', it chronicles the life of the title character Garfield the cat, his human ...

) to express their personal views whenever they observe the daily routines of their humans or other incidents. In the foreword to one of Crane's ''Pickles'' books,

Charles Schulz Charles Monroe "Sparky" Schulz (; November 26, 1922 – February 12, 2000) was an American cartoonist and the creator of the comic strip ''Peanuts'', featuring what are probably his two best-known characters, Charlie Brown and Snoopy. He is wid ...

, creator of the ''

Peanuts ''Peanuts'' is a print syndication, syndicated daily strip, daily and Sunday strip, Sunday American comic strip written and illustrated by Charles M. Schulz. The strip's original run extended from 1950 to 2000, continuing in reruns afterward. ' ...

'' comic, stated, "I think it would be very comforting to have Earl and Opal for neighbors."

Awards and honors

*In 2001, ''Pickles'' was named best newspaper comic strip of the year by the

National Cartoonists Society The National Cartoonists Society (NCS) is an organization of professional cartoonists in the United States. It presents the National Cartoonists Society Awards. The Society was born in 1946 when groups of cartoonists got together to entertain the ...

. *In 2013, Brian Crane shared the

Reuben Award The National Cartoonists Society (NCS) is an organization of professional cartoonists in the United States. It presents the National Cartoonists Society Awards. The Society was born in 1946 when groups of cartoonists got together to entertain the ...

with

Rick Kirkman Rick Kirkman (born 1953) is a cartoonist and co-creator of the comic strip ''Baby Blues''. He received the National Cartoonist Society Newspaper Comic Strip Award in 1995, and the Reuben Award in 2012 for his work on the strip. He also served as co ...

Bibliography

The strips have been collected in book form in ''Pickles'' (1998), ''Pickles, Too: The Older I Get, The Better I Was'' (1999), ''Still Pickled After All These Years'' (2002), ''Let's Get Pickled!'' (2006), ''How Come I Always Get Blamed for the Things I Do?'' (2010), and ''Oh Sure! Blame it on the Dog!'' (2013). A 25th anniversary retrospective, ''25 Years of Pickles'', was released by Baobab Press in 2015.

References

External links

''Pickles''
comic strip at

GoComics GoComics is a website launched in 2005 by the digital entertainment provider Uclick. It was originally created as a distribution portal for comic strips on mobile phones, but in 2006, the site was redesigned and expanded to include online strips ...

.com
''Pickles''
comic strip at Arcamax.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Pickles American comic strips 1990 comics debuts Comics about married people Fictional families Gag-a-day comics Works about old age