The Complete Peanuts: 1953-1954

Rating:
Summary: "What a blockhead that Charlie Brown is!"
Review: In this 2nd volume of The Complete Peanuts, Charles Schulz refines the 1st 8 characters he introduced in the 1st 2 and 1/2 years of Peanuts. Lucy is a little fussier (she'll be known as crabby later on) and Linus, though still a baby, thinks deep thoughts and is known for sucking his thumb. Charlie Brown is establishing himself as the wishy-washy "loser" (he has his 1st Valentine's Day letdown in this volume). Also, the security blanket is introduced but it's Charlie Brown and Schroeder who endorse it at 1st, not Linus. Lucy admits she has a crush on Schroeder (the 1st in a series of unrequited love affairs). Violet and Patty are more or less reduced to 2nd bananas (they'll later be known mainly to repeat all of Lucy's putdowns to Charlie Brown). They plan a party and decide not to invite either Charlie Brown or Lucy, realizing that "inviting some people isn't as much fun as not inviting people." Schroeder is still a big fan of Beethoven and classical music (he's the catcher for Charlie Brown's team) and pretty much replaces Shermy as Charlie Brown's buddy (Shermy is rarely seen in these cartoons, he's given a crewcut). 2 new characters are introduced but only one of them seems to have "staying power"- Pig Pen and Charlotte Braun. Pig Pen is a lovable slob with soot all over his face and clothes. Charlotte Braun is a loud and obnoxious character, who would later be written out. Charlie Brown's team always loses and Snoopy's imagination runs wild (though he still walks on all fours and we can't read his thoughts that often). The term "blockhead" is introduced here. In fact, Schroeder is one of the 1st to call him that (but not to his face!). Lucy's mother disgraces her by writing The Life and Times of a Fussbudget. The term "Great Scott!" is used often by Charlie Brown (it would later be replaced with "Good Grief!"). In 1 cartoon, Violet and Patty announce they will not play Lucy's games, which makes Lucy quite upset. After a tantrum of kicking and screaming, she agrees "All right, then. Let's play your way." In another cartoon, she kicks around Patty's doll, Violet's stamp collection, Linus' cookies, Charlie Brown's picture puzzle and Schroeder's piano. Later, as she's running away from the angry gang, she complains nobody understands her! She won't let Linus play with her toys but she will let him play with a rubber band. She later takes it away, though: "I didn't mean for you to have THAT much fun with it!" Charlie Brown's pitcher mound is introduced. Linus stands up for the 1st time, but quickly loses his balance when Lucy rewards him with a cookie. In a few cartoons, adults appear in the background (particularly in the golfing cartoons). A lot (but not all) of what wound up in More Peanuts and Good Grief, More Peanuts is featured here. There is also an interesting introduction by news commentator Walter Cronkite.

Rating:
Summary: A Masterwork Continues
Review: In this second volume of the Peanuts collection, we continue to see Schulz's world as it evolved towards what became its glory years (late 1950s to late 1960s). Charlie Brown is still a smart aleck, but gradually his professional victimhood is taking form. Lucy is still sweet and babyish at the beginning of this volume, but by the end she is definitely moving towards her loud mouth, abrasive, loveable self. Snoopy is becoming less doggy and more human (we get to imagine the inside of his doghouse for the first time), and Linus is showing signs of genius even though he can't speak yet. We also see some favorite characters for the first time, noteably Pig Pen, and get to see some failed experiments, such as Charlotte Braun, a loud mouth who moved into the neighborhood for awhile but obviously didn't work out.

I was also interested to see some indirect allusions to the real world of the mid 1950s in these early strips, such as one character's refusing to incriminate himself (he must have been watching the McCarthy hearings on those old TV sets!).

This is a fun volume which presages some of the finest Peanut moments, which we'll be able to see again in coming years, thanks to this series' creators.

Rating:
Summary: Magnificent II
Review: It is such a pleasure to read through these early Peanuts comic strips. There are so many things to discover: the first appearance of Linus, Lucy as a champion golfer, the brief first appearance of the security blanket.

Admittedly, some of the discoveries are real surprises: adults speak, Snoopy verbalizes (albeit in his head) and Charlie Brown does always lose. Still, it is a joy to see how Schultz developed in these early years and began to find his voice.

This series of books is turning into one of the great collections of all time.

Rating:
Summary: These kids were NASTY!!!!
Review: Maybe in its latter days Peanuts became more of a cute kids strip, but in its early days it epitomized childhood cruelty. Sandcastles are cheerfully kicked and smashed to the ground, kids constantly discuss why they hate each other, they manipulate each other for personal gain, they yell, scream, throw things, hit each other, kick other people's possessions and on and on. It's an onslaught of bare raw human nature in the form of little human blobs. Pure Id reigns in this domain.

Lucy comes of age in this volume. Nowhere is this more apparent than on the January 24th, 1954 Sunday page (pg. 167). She kicks everyone's prized possessions across the room while yelling "That's what I think of your 'ol stamp collection!!" and "That's what I think of your ol' stupid marbles!!" The last panel has all of the kids running after her mob-style as she pleads "I'm frustrated and inhibited. And nobody understands me." Another strip has Lucy whacking poor baby Linus on the head. When Charlie Brown pleads "What did you hit him for?" Lucy replies "Because he was there!" (May 24th, 1954, pg. 219). She's pretty nasty throughout to pretty much everyone. But she also has a whimsical side such as when she's counting stars or raindrops.

Charlie Brown's metamorphosis into the loser we all know starts to gain momentum. Early on he could be defiant, obnoxious, loud, or cunning. By the end of the volume he's more depressive and shunned than ever.

Linus is still a baby throughout, but some words emerge, usually in defiance of Lucy's nasty schemes to get him in trouble. The security blanket shows up also for the first time. Even Charlie Brown experiments with it.

Schulz also took some risks in May, 1954. He introduced visible adults into the strip for the first (and probably the last) time. A series of Sunday strips finds Charlie Brown and Lucy playing in a golf tournament. They are surrounded by adults. The juxtaposition of very realistically drawn adults and little abstract circular kids makes for a disorientating visual experience.

Pig-Pen appears for the first time in 1954. He's more of a one-gag character and not as strong as the rest of the crew. The same can be said for Charlotte Braun. She appeared then disappeared forever in late 1954. Her gag? She talks too loud.

And of course Snoopy. There's loads of great Snoopy strips in this volume. Many are purely sight gags, but Snoopy does begin to "talk" around this time. One of the best Snoopy strips is October 11th, 1954 (pg. 279) where Charlie Brown tries to take Snoopy's picture. It's purely visual but a sure sign of things to come.

It's amazing that strips featuring old cathedral televisions and radios, and Brownie-style cameras can still evoke outloud laughter. The humor strikes at many different places, and works on many levels, from the physical to the intellectual and thus appeals to many kinds of people. Something lurks here for almost everyone. Some people could even find parts of the strip depressing. After all, kids get socially shamed, shunned, physically hurt, abused, and abandoned over and over. But depicting the entire cast as cute children somehow turns these situations into comedy. They all seem innocent, but they are anything but. In fact, part of Schulz's contribution was revealing the underside of the cute and innocent. These strips seem to tell us: just because something IS cute doesn't mean that it's incapable of cruelty. He helped expand the possibilities of the cute 'lil cartoon character.

Even though the strip later fell headfirst into rampant commercialism, these early strips reveal an energy and edge unmatched in most mainstream comics (even today, especially today). When the golden age of newspaper comics gets a historical review sometime in the future, Peanuts will likely stand out as the exemplar of the medium.

Lastly, Fantagraphics comes through again as the champion of classic comics. This volume continues the great design and layout of the first volume (though arguably the strips could be bigger and the Sunday strips could be in color). Walter Cronkite introduces and a short Schulz biography closes. Keep them coming.

Rating:
Summary: A classic masterpiece
Review: The Complete Peanuts 1953 To 1954 is the latest in a series of anthologies created to collect the entire Peanuts comic strip series, including daily and Sunday strips. Featuring an introduction by Walter Cronkite - who expresses wistful reminiscence at losing his one and only chance to meet Schulz before his unfortunate passing - The Complete Peanuts 1953 To 1954 continues its early years of the strip by introducing the staple character of Pig Pen to the cast of Charlie Brown, Shermy, Violet, Schroeder, Patty, Lucy, Linus, and Snoopy. Mirthful, whetted, keenly observant of childhood disappointments and cruelties, The Complete Peanuts 1953 To 1954 also offers some key insights into the early days of the strip before it settled into conventions more familiar to later readers. Snoopy still walks on all fours; Linus is too young to talk yet; adults occasionally speak off-panel and can even be seen (from a three-year old's point of view that is). Observe Lucy's amazing golf prodigy talents, and a fascinating strip that may well be genesis of why she torments Charlie Brown every year by yanking away a football before he can kick it - for Charlie Brown himself has mercilessly yelled at her for being personally unable to kick a football further than a few inches! A classic masterpiece, and member of a series that is an absolute must-have for true fans of Schulz's genius.


Rating:
Summary: Another Winner In A Tremendous Series!
Review: The second volume of the proposed 25 volume "Complete Peanuts" set contains all of the Peanuts strips from 1953 and 1954. It continues the exploits of Charlie Brown, Snoopy, Lucy and Schroeder (the latter two have grown up quite a bit since the first volume from 1950 to 1952) as well as Linus, who although still a baby begins to show the intelligence that would be a large part of his personality for the life of the strip. We see Pig-Pen introduced in this volume as well as what many Peanuts fans consider the "lost character", Charlotte Braun. This character, who appeared for about a two-week stretch in late 1954 and was never heard from again had the fussbudget personality that was later assumed by Lucy. Having only seen one strip with Charlotte before getting this book, I have to say that Charlotte was annoying in her short tenure in the strip and Charles Schulz probably knew it was best to cut his ties with the character. But she still is a fascinating part of Peanuts history.

If you get this book, you will notice that the quality of the reproduction of some of the strips are less than average. There is an explanation in the book that many of the early strips were lost from the Schulz collection and that there are not many copies of newspapers around to pull the strips from (their next best option) and that microfilm (where most newspapers are usually kept) is usually not acceptable for reproduction. So for some strips, they used the best they had. Sure, it would be nice to have pristine copies, but at least I'm glad something is there.

All-in-all, it is another masterpiece and I can't wait for the next volume, which will be the strips of 1955 and 1956!

Rating:
Summary: this book makes me happy
Review: this book seems nomal but it makes me happy and smile.


Rating:
Summary: Volume 2 Of A Classic
Review: This is the second volume of "The Complete Peanuts", and although some characters (e.g. Snoopy, Linus) are very different than they are in the newer strips, they are certainly closer to those characters in this collection than they were in the first volume. Snoopy becomes increasingly more eccentric, but he has not yet become a WWI flying ace. Linus occasionally has a blanket, but it is not a permanent part of his character, nor does he even speak yet. Lucy does fall for Schroeder in this collection, and Charlie Brown has his first sad Valentine's Day (although for some reason the description for the third volume indicates that this event occurs within its pages).

For most of this collection, the cast includes only the same 8 characters as existed at the end of the previous collection (Charlie Brown, Patty, Snoopy, Shermy, Violet, Schroeder, Lucy, and Linus). The only addition that lasts is Pig-Pen, who first appears in July of 1954. The other short-time addition is the long forgotten Charlotte Braun, who appears briefly in November of 1954. The most common characters during this period are Charlie Brown and Lucy. Snoopy is the next most common, while Patty becomes less common and is more of a secondary character along with Schroeder and Violet. Linus becomes more common as time passes, while Shermy appears only rarely in 1954.

This is an excellent collection, and it is clear that the editors have worked hard in trying to locate all the old strips. This is definitely worthwhile for all fans of the strip.

Rating:
Summary: Where have you gone, Charlotte Braun?
Review: This second volume in the Complete Peanuts series is even better than the first one. Charles Schulz really started to come into his own by this point. The characters are closer to the Peanuts characters we all came to know and love, although they are all younger at this point. Two new characters were introduced in 1954, they being the legendary Pig Pen and the soon-to-be-forgotten Charlotte Brown. Pig Pen of course is famous for being the dirtiest kid in the world. Charlotte Braun is obscure for being a girl who talks too loud. This is great stuff, and all Peanuts fans should get this book.

Rating:
Summary: THE PEANUTS ADVENTURE CONTINUES
Review: When I was a kid, I must have had at least 30 of the old Fawcett paperbacks with the Charlie Brown comics in them. I can remember going to Montgomery Wards with my mom and she buying me a new one every couple of weeks or so. But little did I ever see of the peanuts figures contained in this, the second volume of the Complete Peanuts, covering 1953 - 1954.

You get over 700 of Charles Schultz' daily and Sunday strips, over half of which have never been re-printed in any previous collection. These peanuts still have yet to take on the familiar look and characteristics that we would come to know in the 1960's. They are more crudely drawn..looking more like toddlers really. They are also louder and rowdier than you remember, often times being downright nasty to the other characters. Quite surprising for me since I've never seen any of these older strips before.

Linus and Snoopy get a bit more strip time than in the first collection and Lucy begins becoming the domineering, bossy sister that we know and love. Pig Pen is introduced along with Charlotte Braun who disappeared just as quickly. Also, interestingly, we see perhaps the only strips (that i know of anyway) where Schultz actually draws adult characters.

The collections looks great too. Very sharp reproductions on strips which haven't seen the light of day in 50 years. An Amazing collection and another must add to your bookshelf.