It's deja vu all over again. I feel like I've posted this before, but who cares, he still kicks ass. Berkeley Breathed is a legend in his own time. The man single-handedly made penguins cool, male insecurity rampant, and even entered the term "Ack, thppppt!" into the modern lexicon. Both Bloom County and Outland are classic examples of social commentary in the strips. Decidedly whimsical, Mr. Breathed's strip, set in a fictional world where dandelions are plentiful, immortalized an idealistic and naive penguin with a necktie and symbolized not only the cynicism of a decade (the '80's) but also the optimism people hoped for. His characters were flawed, unreal, and yet real at the same time. It's through these flaws that people could identify with their dreams and frustrations. Although both strips are out of syndication, they live on in my memory, as two of the most surrealy hilarious strips ever.
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