satirical
Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming or e ...
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 ...
by
cartoonist
A cartoonist is a visual artist who specializes in both drawing and writing cartoons (individual images) or comics (sequential images). Cartoonists differ from comics writers or comic book illustrators in that they produce both the literary and ...
and political commentator
Ruben Bolling
Ruben Bolling (born c. 1963 in New Jersey) is a pseudonym for Ken Fisher, an American cartoonist, the author of '' Tom the Dancing Bug'' and ''Super-Fun-Pak Comix''. His work started out apolitical, instead featuring absurdist humor, parodying co ...
that covers mostly US current events from a liberal point of view. Tom the Dancing Bug won the 2002, 2003, 2007, 2008,Gardner, Alan Ruben Bolling Wins Best Cartoon Award from AAN The Daily Cartoonist (June 10, 2008) and 2009Xerexes, Xavier Onward Into the Webcomics Breach Comix Talk (July 1, 2009) Association of Alternative Newsweeklies Awards for Best Cartoon. The strip was awarded the 2010
Sigma Delta Chi Award
The Sigma Delta Chi Awards are presented annually by the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) (formerly Sigma Delta Chi) for excellence in journalism. The SPJ states the purpose of the award is to promote "the free flow of information vital ...
for editorial cartooning by the
Society of Professional Journalists
The Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ), formerly known as Sigma Delta Chi, is the oldest organization representing journalists in the United States. It was established on April 17, 1909, at DePauw University,2009 SPJ Annual Report, letter ...
and best cartoon in the 2018 Robert F. Kennedy Book & Journalism Awards.FULL LIST: 2018 Robert F. Kennedy Book & Journalism Award Winners (May 3, 2018) His work on the strip won Bolling the 2017
Herblock Prize
The Herblock Prize for editorial cartooning is an annual $15,000 after-tax cash prize, and a sterling silver Tiffany trophy.
and the 2021 Berryman Award for Editorial Cartoons,Ruben Bolling wins 2021 Berryman Cartoonist Award (November 1, 2021)Winning Editorial Cartoonist Accepts Berryman Award (May 10, 2022) and he was a finalist in the Editorial Cartooning category for the 2019 and 2021
Pulitzer Prize
The Pulitzer Prize () is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had ma ...
.
Publication history
As Bolling recounted in an interview:
The strip appears in mainstream and alternative weekly newspapers, as well as on the
Boing Boing
''Boing Boing'' is a website, first established as a zine in 1988, later becoming a group blog. Common topics and themes include technology, futurism, science fiction, gadgets, intellectual property, Disney, and left-wing politics. It twice w ...
website. At its peak, it was syndicated in print in over 100 newspapers. It ran on
Salon.com
''Salon'' is an American politically progressive/liberal news and opinion website created in 1995. It publishes articles on U.S. politics, culture, and current events.
Content and coverage
''Salon'' covers a variety of topics, including re ...
from 1995 until March 18, 2010.
In 2012, Bolling launched a subscription service, the Inner Hive, which he credits with keeping the comic going amid declines in print newspapers.
After the September 11 attacks in 2001, and especially with the election of
Donald Trump
Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.
Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of P ...
as president in 2016, ''Tom the Dancing Bugs focus became more overtly political. When accepting the Clifford K. & James T. Berryman Award for Editorial Cartoons on May 4, 2022, Bolling said, "When it started, it was just about apolitical. It was usually about a prehistoric ape-man, or an idiotic time traveler, or something even sillier. The comic strip got more political, more often, as it went along, certainly taking a turn after 9/11. But it was at the rise of Trump in 2016 that I just about handed the comic strip to what I saw as the most important political phenomenon of my lifetime."
Bolling also explained his approach to satire, pre- and post-Trump, at the same dinner:
Recurring characters and segments
''Tom The Dancing Bug'' has no real narrative continuity. The title itself is a
dada
Dada () or Dadaism was an art movement of the European avant-garde in the early 20th century, with early centres in Zürich, Switzerland, at the Cabaret Voltaire (Zurich), Cabaret Voltaire (in 1916). New York Dada began c. 1915, and after 192 ...
ist non-sequitur, as there is no character called "Tom The Dancing Bug" ever seen or referred to in the strip.
Some individual strips are one-shot "stand-alone" presentations, but certain recurring features within the strip are seen regularly on a rotating basis. One of the most popular recurring segments, "Super-Fun-Pak Comix", appears roughly once every month or two, and is dealt with in a separate entry, below. Other features currently seen on a fairly frequent basis include:
*God-Man: The Superhero With Omnipotent Powers!: Placed in normal superhero situations, God-Man fights villains like
Nietzsche
Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (; or ; 15 October 1844 – 25 August 1900) was a German philosopher, prose poet, cultural critic, philologist, and composer whose work has exerted a profound influence on contemporary philosophy. He began his ca ...
-lad, Dr.
Moral Relativism
Moral relativism or ethical relativism (often reformulated as relativist ethics or relativist morality) is used to describe several philosophical positions concerned with the differences in moral judgments across different peoples and cultures. ...
and
Blasphemy
Blasphemy is a speech crime and religious crime usually defined as an utterance that shows contempt, disrespects or insults a deity, an object considered sacred or something considered inviolable. Some religions regard blasphemy as a religio ...
Boy. God-Man's "mundane identity" (when he does not want to attract suspicion) is Milton Baxter. God-Man occasionally solves problems by re-creating the universe and organizing the atoms so that the problem is prevented in the first place. Bolling, speaking in an interview about readers who take offense to the God-Man strips, said "God-Man isn't actually God. He is a straw man that I'm using to make fun of some people's very simplistic views about religion and philosophy." Billy Billings is "God-Man's Pal", a parody of
Jimmy Olsen
Jimmy Olsen is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. Olsen is most often portrayed as a young photojournalist working for the ''Daily Planet''. He is close friends with Lois Lane and Clark Kent, and has ...
.
*Lucky Ducky: The Poor Little Duck Who's Rich In Luck, is a recurring segment purportedly presented by Wall Street Journal Comix. Lucky Ducky first appeared in 2002, after ''
The Wall Street Journal
''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
'' editorialized against
progressive tax
A progressive tax is a tax in which the tax rate increases as the taxable amount increases.Sommerfeld, Ray M., Silvia A. Madeo, Kenneth E. Anderson, Betty R. Jackson (1992), ''Concepts of Taxation'', Dryden Press: Fort Worth, TX The term ''progre ...
policies, calling
poor
Poverty is the state of having few material possessions or little
workers " lucky duckies" because they have a smaller federal income tax burden. In his appearances in Bolling's strip, Lucky Ducky is an anthropomorphic duck who despite being homeless, destitute, and working in a crummy job always manages to enrage his nemesis, the very wealthy Hollingsworth Hound. Hollingsworth (who usually has a much more prominent role in this segment than the title character) views any source of joy, comfort or financial support in Lucky's life to be coming at the expense of the very rich, like himself. As an example, when Lucky is severely injured, and the emergency room accepts him as an indigent patient, Hollingsworth is apoplectic with rage at the "lucky" break the nearly comatose Lucky has received. Typically, the strip will end with an exploited, jailed, and/or near-death and hospitalized Lucky saying "Gotcha!" to an enraged Hollingsworth. Hollingsworth Hound has also occasionally been seen in solo adventures.
*Donald and John: A Boy President and his Imaginary Publicist features six year old president Donald Trump, who is seen conferring with his imaginary publicist John Barron (an imaginary character Trump created and used in real life). The drawing style, lettering, and general tone of the piece is a clear tribute to ''
Calvin and Hobbes
''Calvin and Hobbes'' is a daily American comic strip created by cartoonist Bill Watterson that was Print syndication, syndicated from November 18, 1985, to December 31, 1995. Commonly cited as "the last great newspaper comic", ''Calvin and Hobb ...
''.
*Q-Nuts casts some of the characters from 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 strip as
QAnon
QAnon ( , ) is an American political conspiracy theory and political movement. It originated in the American far-right political sphere in 2017. QAnon centers on fabricated claims made by an anonymous individual or individuals known as "Q". ...
adherents.
*Louis Maltby is an introverted kid with a major guilt complex. He's featured in segments "Games Louis Plays", which describe how Louis looks at the world, and "The Education of Louis", which show his confusion at the world around him. Louis is used to make social commentary by displaying how school and society treats him, and may be semi-autobiographical. He also sometimes appears in other segments when a kid is needed, and has on at least one occasion appeared in a superhero parody in the guise of his alter-ego, 'The Passive-Aggressor'.
*News of the Times parodies current events, in a fashion somewhat reminiscent of ''
The March of Time
''The March of Time'' is an American newsreel series sponsored by Time Inc. and shown in movie theaters from 1935 to 1951. It was based on a radio news series broadcast from 1931 to 1945. The "voice" of both series was Westbrook Van Voorhis. P ...
'' newsreels.
*Judge Scalia was an extremist version of the
U.S. Supreme Court
The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...
justice
Antonin Scalia
Antonin Gregory Scalia (; March 11, 1936 – February 13, 2016) was an American jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1986 until his death in 2016. He was described as the intellectua ...
, used to criticize Justice Scalia's Supreme Court opinions and overall judicial philosophy.
*Did You Know? points out "Fun Facts" in all sorts of things, poking fun at statistic-and-tidbit-obsessed society. The
cult of celebrity
''Famous for being famous'' is a term for someone who attains celebrity status for no clearly identifiable reason (as opposed to fame based on achievement, skill, or talent) and appears to generate their own fame, or someone who achieves fame thro ...
is also a frequent target, with subversive trivia such as ''
Nicole Kidman
Nicole Mary Kidman (born 20 June 1967) is an American and Australian actress and producer. Known for her work across various film and television productions from several genres, she has consistently ranked among the world's highest-paid act ...
had to work as a waitress before she became famous, and not a single person asked her for her autograph'' and claiming that the
Universe
The universe is all of space and time and their contents, including planets, stars, galaxies, and all other forms of matter and energy. The Big Bang theory is the prevailing cosmological description of the development of the universe. A ...
has never been nominated for an
Oscar
Oscar, OSCAR, or The Oscar may refer to:
People
* Oscar (given name), an Irish- and English-language name also used in other languages; the article includes the names Oskar, Oskari, Oszkár, Óscar, and other forms.
* Oscar (Irish mythology), ...
.
*Chagrin Falls is a recurring feature about the Smythes, a typical Middle American family.
*Bob is the extremely average male. He sits at home drinking beer and watching scrambled porn on TV on the weekends, and tries to avoid doing chores and other household duties. During the week, he works (or more often daydreams) in the cubicle by the elevator.
*Harvey Richards Esq., Lawyer for Children is about a lawyer who works for children by using the standard children's tricks for getting out of things or getting people to do things ("My fingers were crossed!" "I called no crossies!"). The point is that lawyers act an awful lot like young children. The character has been optioned for a feature film by New Line Cinema, to be co-produced by Universal Press Syndicate's AMUSE division.
*Brain in a Beaker is a disembodied brain that believes it is in a real body.
*Charley is an
australopithecine
Australopithecina or Hominina is a subtribe in the tribe Hominini. The members of the subtribe are generally ''Australopithecus'' (cladistically including the genera ''Homo'', ''Paranthropus'', and ''Kenyanthropus''), and it typically includes ...
—a less-developed
hominid
The Hominidae (), whose members are known as the great apes or hominids (), are a taxonomic family of primates that includes eight extant species in four genera: '' Pongo'' (the Bornean, Sumatran and Tapanuli orangutan); ''Gorilla'' (the eas ...
from the
pliocene
The Pliocene ( ; also Pleiocene) is the epoch in the geologic time scale that extends from 5.333 million to 2.58soft drink
A soft drink (see § Terminology for other names) is a drink that usually contains water (often carbonated), a sweetener, and a natural and/or artificial flavoring. The sweetener may be a sugar, high-fructose corn syrup, fruit juice, a sug ...
s. He appears to be a satire of
Curious George
Curious George is a fictional monkey who is the title character of a series of popular children's picture books written by Margret and H. A. Rey. Various media, including films and TV shows, have been based upon the original book series.
Geor ...
.
*Billy Dare, Boy Adventurer parodies the clichés used in boy adventurer stories. Billy is very similar in appearance to '' Tintin'', the famous Belgian comics adventurer.
*Sam Roland, the Detective Who Dies is a
Sam Spade
Sam Spade is a fictional character and the protagonist of Dashiell Hammett's 1930 novel '' The Maltese Falcon''. Spade also appeared in four lesser-known short stories by Hammett.
''The Maltese Falcon'', first published as a serial in the pulp ...
-esque noirish private detective, except that ''he'' always dies.
*James K. Poult, a
Mallard Fillmore
''Mallard Fillmore'' is a comic strip written and illustrated by Bruce Tinsley until 2019 and Loren Fishman since 2020. It has been syndicated by King Features Syndicate since June 6, 1994. The strip follows the exploits of its title charact ...
parody, is an "unbiased media chicken" with multiple conservative media outlets. He was seen briefly as a supporting character in a Hollingsworth Hound story in 2013, but has not had a "starring" role in any strip for several years.
*The Outer Reaches of Plot Twists parodies
The Twilight Zone
''The Twilight Zone'' is an American media franchise based on the anthology television series created by Rod Serling. The episodes are in various genres, including fantasy, science fiction, absurdism, dystopian fiction, suspense, horror, sup ...
and Outer Limits, showing stories that use multiple plot twists to the point that suspension of disbelief is difficult to achieve.
*Larry Dodson is an "average joe" type character whom the art world has called "the most important artist of the 21st century."
*Nate the Neoconservative is a
neoconservative
Neoconservatism is a political movement that began in the United States during the 1960s among liberal hawks who became disenchanted with the increasingly pacifist foreign policy of the Democratic Party and with the growing New Left and count ...
who refuses to admit his mistakes.
*The Impossible Squad is a military squad of stereotypical 'tough guys', all sergeants that list 'explosives' as their expertise except for one member (whose specialty is usually extremely different from his squadmates). They consider explosives to be the only way to complete any mission. However, the 'different' member will always suggest another solution based on his skills but his idea is usually shot down by the rest of the team (probably because it doesn't involve the direct use of explosives).
*Hollywood Tales are stories that depict Hollywood celebrities, featuring realistic (but static) likeness of their faces, in humorous situations.
*The Ghost of James Caan is a character introduced in a Hollywood Tales story concerning actor
Zac Efron
Zachary David Alexander Efron (; born October 18, 1987) is an American actor. He began acting professionally in the early 2000s and rose to prominence in the late 2000s for his leading role as Troy Bolton in the ''High School Musical'' tril ...
. He is supposed to be the disembodied spirit of actor
James Caan
James Edmund Caan ( ; March 26, 1940 – July 6, 2022) was an American actor. He came to prominence playing Sonny Corleone in ''The Godfather'' (1972) – a performance which earned him Academy Award and Golden Globe nominations for Best Suppo ...
, despite the fact that Caan is (as of the time of his ghost's introduction) still very much alive. This is also true within the comic, causing confusion to the other characters that appear alongside him. The Ghost of James Caan now makes occasional appearances in "Super-Fun-Pak Comix", below.
Super-Fun-Pak Comix
A recurring feature, Super Fun-Pak Comix consists of four to six smaller strips, grouped together. These collections of smaller comic strips poke fun at the typical conventions and clichés of modern comic strips. For example, they commonly make fun of stereotypical ''
New Yorker
New Yorker or ''variant'' primarily refers to:
* A resident of the State of New York
** Demographics of New York (state)
* A resident of New York City
** List of people from New York City
* ''The New Yorker'', a magazine founded in 1925
* ''The Ne ...
'' cartoon settings, such as two people sitting across a desk or a husband and wife at home reading the paper. Individual comics can also be based around peculiar or bizarre concepts, like 'Funny Only to Six-year-olds' or 'Comic Designed to Fit Vertical Spaces'. Many Fun-Pak strips are one-offs, but there are also numerous recurring strips, and occasionally, some Fun-Pak space is taken up by a fake ad for unlikely products. As well, some recurring long-form Tom The Dancing Bug comics occasionally make Fun-Pak appearances in a shorter format, and a few recurring Fun-Pak characters (Percival Dunwoody, Dinkle) have made appearances in a long-form strip.
Super-Fun-Pak Comix also appears as a daily strip on gocomix.com.
Currently recurring mini-strips (not always seen in every Fun-Pak) include:
*Percival Dunwoody, Idiot Time Traveller from 1909 is in awe of the modern age, although he is also amazed by things that existed well before 1909, including lightbulbs, dogs and hands. However, he is aware of his own idiocy. Later strips have revealed him to be unfamiliar with the mechanics of time travel and causality (for example, believing that accidentally interfering with someone in the future could prevent his own birth).
*Dinkle, The UnLovable Loser is a parody of such characters as
Ziggy
Ziggy is a masculine given name, often a diminutive form (hypocorism) of Zigmunt and other names. It is also a nickname. Notable people with the name include:
Nickname or hypocorism
* Ezekiel Ansah (born 1989), National Football League pla ...
or The Born Loser, with the catch being that his status as a loser is completely justified because he is truly un-lovable; he is narcisstic and typically exhibits obnoxious attitudes, such as
anti-Semitism
Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism.
Antis ...
, and
sociopathic
Psychopathy, sometimes considered synonymous with sociopathy, is characterized by persistent antisocial behavior, impaired empathy and remorse, and bold, disinhibited, and egotistical traits. Different conceptions of psychopathy have been ...
behaviour, ruthlessly exploiting everyone he encounters.
*Marital Mirth is a parody of
The Lockhorns
''The Lockhorns'' is a United States single-panel cartoon created September 9, 1968 by Bill Hoest and distributed by King Features Syndicate to 500 newspapers in 23 countries. It is continued today by Bunny Hoest and John Reiner.
Characters an ...
. The strip concerns a middle-aged married couple in an extremely unhappy relationship, and is supposedly drawn by bitter (fictional) cartoonist Rex Feinstein.
*Doug is an anthropomorphic cartoon creature who is too generically drawn to be any particular type of animal. He is not of high intelligence and has few real talents. The ''How to Draw Doug'' scripts make fun of Doug's rather pathetic life.
*Darthfield reimagines the cartoon character of
Garfield
''Garfield'' is an American comic strip created by Jim Davis (cartoonist), Jim Davis. Originally published locally as ''Jon'' in 1976, then in nationwide Print syndication, syndication from 1978 as ''Garfield'', it chronicles the life of the t ...
the cat as
Darth Vader
Darth Vader is a fictional character in the ''Star Wars'' franchise. The character is the central antagonist of the original trilogy and, as Anakin Skywalker, is one of the main protagonists in the prequel trilogy. ''Star Wars'' creator George ...
, such as with the ability to use the Force to strangle people.
*Phil Collins is a comic strip about, unsurprisingly,
Phil Collins
Philip David Charles Collins (born 30 January 1951) is an English singer, musician, songwriter, record producer and actor. He was the drummer and lead singer of the rock band Genesis and also has a career as a solo performer. Between 1982 an ...
. In recent Fun-Pak strips, he has been teamed up with The Ghost of James Caan.
*Science Facts for the Immature presents a scientific fact which is either a double entendre or is followed by a punchline based on bodily humor. Variations of this mini-strip have included Science Facts for the Depressed and Science Facts for the Internet-Addled.
*Various Superhero comics, featuring superheroes with names and traits that parody superheroes in general. Examples include 'Talk-Up-His-Secret-Identity Man' and 'Garish-Skintight-Lycra-Outfit Man'.
*Hillbilly Bill, of The Hills is a parody of
Barney Google and Snuffy Smith
''Barney Google and Snuffy Smith'', originally ''Take Barney Google, F'rinstance'', is an American comic strip created by cartoonist Billy DeBeck. Since its debut on June 17, 1919, the strip has gained a large international readership, appeari ...
.
*Classix Comix/Comix Playhouse is an extremely shortened comic form of famous plays and novels. This is apparently a reference to
Classics Illustrated
''Classics Illustrated'' is an American comic book/magazine series featuring adaptations of literary classics such as ''Les Misérables'', ''Moby-Dick'', ''Hamlet'', and ''The Iliad''. Created by Albert Kanter, the series began publication in 1 ...
, a series that provided classic books in shortened comic form.
*Comics for the Elderly (formerly "Hey, Old People! Comics!") shows old people giving ornery advice to young people and the young people quickly accepting it.
*Uncle Cap'n is an old lazy pirate who swears and makes you do his work for him through supposed 'puzzles' and 'fun' (but usually illegal) activities. He is a parody of Cappy Dick.
*Selfish Gene is about a boy named Gene who only acts in ways that are beneficial to him under the framework of
sociobiology
Sociobiology is a field of biology that aims to examine and explain social behavior in terms of evolution. It draws from disciplines including psychology, ethology, anthropology, evolution, zoology, archaeology, and population genetics. Within t ...
. This is a reference to
Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins (born 26 March 1941) is a British evolutionary biologist and author. He is an emeritus fellow of New College, Oxford and was Professor for Public Understanding of Science in the University of Oxford from 1995 to 2008. An ath ...
' ''The Selfish Gene''.
*Chaos Butterfly parodies the butterfly effect. Each strip features a butterfly in Brazil flapping its wings and indirectly causing something unpleasant to happen to a man in Chicago some time later.
*Killjoy was Here features Killjoy, a man who ruins any attempt at a funny dialogue by spouting out depressing facts on global issues such as poverty.
*The Epic/Brutal Report is a two-panel comic based on the good news/bad news gag. The first panel has a teenager relaying the 'good news' to his friends, who then exclaim 'Epic!'. In the second panel, he will tell them the 'bad news', to which his friends exclaim 'Brutal!'. The 'bad news' is always extremely disproportional and/or outlandish relative to the 'good news'.
*Comics Appropriating and Abusing Intellectual Property Newly Lapsed Into the Public Domain is a vertical strip that has run in the first Super Fun Pak Comix installment of each year since 2019, when works resumed lapsing into the public domain in the United States. Each parodies one of more of the works that entered the public domain of January 1st of that year, initially through fart jokes. 2022's installment was instead a complete Billy Dare strip, featuring
the Hardy Boys
The Hardy Boys, brothers Frank and Joe Hardy, are fictional characters who appear in several mystery series for children and teens. The series revolves around teenagers who are amateur sleuths, solving cases that stumped their adult counterp ...
.
After
September 11, 2001
The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commerc ...
, Bolling used the Super Fun Pak Comix format to acknowledge the events — the punchline to each one of the comics was "Terrorists destroyed the World Trade Center, killing thousands".
Books
Several book-form collections have been published:
* 1992: ''Tom the Dancing Bug'' (
HarperPerennial
Harper Perennial is a paperback imprint of the publishing house HarperCollins Publishers.
Overview
Harper Perennial has divisions located in New York, London, Toronto, and Sydney. The imprint is descended from the Perennial Library imprint found ...
)
* 1997: ''All I Ever Needed to Know I Learned From My Golf-Playing Cats'' (
NBM Publishing
Nantier Beall Minoustchine Publishing Inc. (or NBM Publishing) is an American graphic novel publisher. Founded by Terry Nantier in 1976 as Flying Buttress Publications, NBM is one of the oldest graphic novel publishers in North America. The comp ...
)
* 2004: ''Thrilling Tom the Dancing Bug Stories'' (
Andrews McMeel Publishing
Andrews McMeel Publishing, LLC (formerly Andrews, McMeel and Parker (1975–1986) and Andrews and McMeel (1986–1997)) is a company that publishes books, calendars, and related toys. It is a part of Andrews McMeel Universal (which comprises AM ...
, oversized treasury)
* 2020: ''The Super-Fun-Pak Comix Reader'' (Clover Press)
* 2022: ''Tom the Dancing Bug: Without The Bad Ones'' (Clover Press)
In 2020, Bolling began publishing a series containing the complete set of ''Tom the Dancing Bug'' comic strips. The first volume, ''Into the Trumpverse'', collected strips from 2016-2019. Bolling then began adding volumes in reverse chronological order, dubbing ''Into the Trumpverse'' as Volume 7. Thus far, volumes 6 and 5 have been published.
* 2020: ''Tom the Dancing Bug Presents: Into the Trumpverse'' (Clover Press) , collecting 2016-2019
* 2021: ''Tom the Dancing Bug Awakens'' (Clover Press) , collecting 2012-2015
* 2022: ''Tom the Dancing Bug: Eat the Poor'' (Clover Press) , collecting 2007-2011