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Bloom County Babylon: Five Years
of Basic Naughtiness is unique in the line of
published BC books (BC as in Bloom County, not BC as
in...BC). It's a super-deluxe 224-page edition that
collects Breathed's personal favorite strips from all
books previously, and it also includes some previously
unreprinted stuff from the lost years of 1980 and 1981
when the strip barely resembled what it became. But at the same time it serves as the official
collection of 1985 Bloom County strips--the second half
of the book is taken up by them. This took me by
surprise. There's nothing on or within the book to point
this out--one has to find out on their own, which was an
ignorant decision given the way the market works. As
cartoon consumers, we've been taught for years that a
heavier, more expensive book is always only reprinting
what has been printed before in a less expensive volume.
I didn't find out this was a legitimate collection until
years later.
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It also didn't help that this was the one my
mother wouldn't let me purchase, because of the word
"naughtiness" on the cover. (Well, what was she
supposed to think? Who IS that woman?)
This is a sequel to Steve's previous "New Year's
Hangover" from one year ago. The referenced cucumber
appeared in that strip.
The below strip was reprinted, but nobody who owns
"Babylon" got to see the Banana actually spit things
out.
EDIT POLICE: The book has Oliver saying "Not exactly"
in Panel 3. The 'puter's sensitivity isn't discussed.
This one's missing from the
"We're cancelling your childhood, Binkley" series:
The Gene Simmons ad for the
Banana Junior 6000 contains one additional line: "Say NO to
spandex and chrome. Say YES to silicon."
The "Olive Loaf
Vigilante" sequence, in the book, is missing its resolution
strip.
The first strip below was
reprinted; the next few were not. From this point, a full month
was cut.
There may be an extra strip in
this sequence that's missing. The Sunday strip after this was
another "Bill ate it" IOU.
My paper runs something called
"The Brilliant Mind of Edison Lee." To be honest,
Oliver kicks that brainiac's behind six ways 'til Thursday.
NEXT:
OPUS DATES CYNDI LAUPER (you heard me)