Blink.
I read about 30-odd online comics each day, some syndicated, some not. (Memo to self: time to write a new “comic strips I read” post.) Sometimes one of them falls dark — but rarely two.
Chris Muir’s Day by Day was unabashedly polemical, sort of an anti-Doonesbury, politically — sort of refreshing in a medium where, if political opinion is expressed, it’s 99% of the time on the Left (Mallard Filmore being another, if nearly unreadable, exception). Muir is dropping the strip, though, for one of the worst reasons possible:
To all my readers – Thank you all for reading DBD these last 2 years, and thank you for supporting the strip through your letters and emails. YOU, the readers, made the strip happen, and I will not forget. DBD did receive offers and was well on its way to distribution. However, several family members are now fighting severe cancers and what small time I had for DBD has ended for now.
Yikes. DBD was never in my top ten list — it was too relentlessly political, missing some of the personal notes that has made Doonesbury just bearable over the years — but it had its humorous moments, and was, as noted, a refreshingly different perspective on the (virtual) comics page. I’m sorry to see it go, especially for the author’s reason. Muir leaves open the possibility of returning, and I do hope that happens.
I’ve enjoyed Michael Jantze’s The Norm for a few years now, since we met the man at the SDCC. I liked it enough to buy up all the back collections, as well as a piece of art for Margie. And now, he’s hanging up his hat — maybe. Evidently, straddling the online vs syndication world has been a bear (no matter how things may have sounded back in San Diego), and he’s going to simply retire the strip unless he can make a go of it online-only.
So, if you’ve an interest, you can become a Norm subscriber; if enough folks subscribe, he’ll continue the strip, otherwise, he’ll return the money.
I hope he makes it.