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Peanuts, January 16, 1954, © Peanuts Worldwide

Rereading the earliest 1950s Peanuts comics, I find it most interesting how bad many of them are. And that's not because the theme of each gag was often drenched in a deep, dark existential dread. That's not a bug, that's a feature of Charles Schulz's world. (For the best exploration of that topic, see: 3eanuts.com.)

No, the problem is a lack of characterization. It clearly took time, years, for Schulz to congeal the personalities of each of the strip's largely interchangeable characters into more realistic, relatable individuals that continue to strike such a chord with modern audiences three quarters of a century later.

Without good characterization, the strip above is just a child who can't stack blocks. That's not particularly funny. But in later years, conscientious and thoughtful Linus trying and failing to build a order out of chaos... that will always be Peanuts.

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To be continued...

 

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