Smithsonian Collection of Newspaper Comics 4pts

The end of chapter five in this collection featured Thimble Theatre by E.C. Seger, which has two main titles: Sappo and Popeye. While the Sappo strips could go together to form a continuous narrative, they can definitely stand alone. Meanwhile, the Popeye comics left the reader wanting more, like the story wasn’t finished yet, so when it was first published they’d have to wait a week to read the next part of the story. Each character in Popeye has a strongly defined and iconic character voice and they all play off of each other to great comedic and dramatic effect. This is especially noticeable in the interactions the namesake has with his sailor pal Ol’ “Salty” Bill Barnacle when they first greet each other with playful violence. The characters in Popeye became so popular this strip even got adapted later into an animated series; Popeye’s famous spinach strength started in the Seger comics of Thimble Theatre. Sappo had a lot of humorous sci-fi elements, like the repeated use of the life-reversing ray made by inventor Professor Wotasnozzle. Interactive cut-out “funny films” also included in Sappo allowed the readers to play as popular characters from the comics in Thimble Theatre by switching out the heads, faces, or panels. Neither title had more than a couple of women characters as men dominated both. Only Mrs. Sappo showed up in Sappo, but the rest of the characters were all men. As far as women go, the Popeye comics mainly had the Sea Hag, but Olive Oyl and Miss Sniddle made a couple of brief appearances too. With women mainly as bystanders, villains, or victims, Thimble Theatre comics showed the ideas of their time.

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