Put some blame on the newspapers, they've been reducing the space for comics for decades. If you've read any of Breathed's commentary from his Bloom County days, he talks about the pressure to reduce the size of the comic, and he had to make adjustments to the title bars and comics themselves because he never knew if they' d be printed together.
Another Calvin and Hobbes reference. Bill Watterson and a few others were fed up with that as well. I'd be interested to see if Gary Larson's "The Far Side" was influenced by that and if he just adapted to the smaller space or if that was how he always wrote.
I think The Far Side was meant to be a one-panel comic from the start, kind of like The Family Circus dailies were.
But yes, now that you mention it, Watterson fought that as well. I give Watterson credit, he never caved to the merchandising pressure on what was a wildly successful comic strip. Gives Calvin and Hobbes a bit more in the "fond memory" department.
That is something I wasn’t aware of.
One of the things I remember about that commentary is some newspapers print the Sunday as a three-line (as in three lines of panels) format, some print it as two lines, and there's no enforcement as to how you have to do it. Breathed said that the first line, that which usually contained a drawn title had to have an unrelated throwaway joke because he couldn't assume the papers would print it.
I think Watterson talked about similar in his commentaries. I have no idea if newspapers even print Dailies/Sundays anymore, it's probably been 20 years since I've picked up a newspaper beyond looking at the local headline on the Columbus Disgrace because it was on the counter at the gas station.
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