Bloom County: Loose Tails (1983)

The first and, arguably, best collection of Bloom County. My dad got all excited at finding this in a thrift store years ago and I immediately fell in love with it too.

I've since found most of the subsequent collections of this strip but also Outland and Opus, and while he maintained his charm and wit, it kind of lost direction and became more about stupid shit Opus was doing at the moment to the detriment of the rest of the characters. I'm sorry, but Opus is simply not a Hobbes who can carry a strip near-single-handed.

Please, check out this silly little book, it has some pretty good political humor but that was never really what the strip was about, funny doesn't need any elevation thank-you-very-much. ( )

It feels a bit silly to write a review for Bloom County, a strip from oh-so-long-ago that has ended oh-so-long ago. But for me, Bloom County was the epitome of a great comic strip. Humor, lessons, silliness, relaxation, and simple joy of life. From Opus, I learned to walk up to the Lost and Found and say, “I’ve lost my marbles.” because of Opus, I had sat in the dandelion patch to collect my thoughts. http://fromoffshore.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/bloom-county-dandelion-break1.jp...
(Now, it’s just a weed; damn this growing up thing.) Bloom County was the only comic strip included in the UC Berkeley paper when I went there, also oh-so-long ago. It was my daily pressure relief. This particular book is the best collection – free of Bill the Cat, which is so overrated. Should I admit that I still have an Opus stuffed animal? ( )

Loved this strip, particularly in its early days before "Bill the Cat". For the cartoon genre, a classic in my book. ( )

This was one of my favorite strips in its time, and at the time I thought that this was secretly created by G.B. Trudeau of "Doonesbury". This was about the time of his hiatus, the style was reminiscent of "Doonesbury", and the author's name seemed impossible to be real - I mean really, "Berkely Breathed"? But this is a truly fine strip, funny and fanciful, with one of my favorite characters in the comics (Opus the Penguin - in fact, I named our darts team "Penguin Lust" in his honor). Always interesting, usually clever, often hilarious, and with fine artwork to boot, this strip was just short of greatness. But just barely. ( )

The first Bloom County collection suffers a bit when it comes to the drawings, and the characters have not yet found their ultimate form. It's still a good laugh. ( )