h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

And so I love it

I'm glad you love it, Munchkin, but it makes perfect sense to me. I shall explain later... (such a tease).

It made me giggle, which is all I ask.
Well giggling and a winning lottery ticket and fanatical loyalty to the pope are all I ask actually, but there is no point in being greedy here.

Do you want to hear something wonderfully spooky? I saw this cartoon JUST after listening to my CD of The Last Goon Show OF All.
Honestly. Truly.

This cartoon reminded me of (amongst other things) something I saw when I was 15. I found in a library a book of Goon Show episodes translated to comic strip form. Enjoying cartoons (as I do) I really tried to give it a chance but after a few pages I had to close the book and walk away. The Goons were such perfect radio material that to see that someone had the gaul to think they could represent it visually... was apalling. Utterly appalling.

Taking this thinking to a particular end,I absolutely love your cartoon spim. If I have mixed up your message I do not apologise but humbly offer this as my interpretation of events.

Ta

Not quite, Wowbagger. You probably failed to consider the awful truth which this cartoon is, in part, a reflection of, and that is that I just don't get the Goons. In my admittedly limited exposure to it I have always been unable to get beyond thinking, 'but they're just talking nonsense in silly voices'. Comedy doesn't work in logical ways so when one finds oneself objecting to it on logical grounds one knows it just isn't going to 'sneak up and do it all over you'. Shame but there it is. I did laugh a lot at the police constable thing you once quoted me, though.

However, what the cartoon is mainly about is the age old conundrum of how to be original. You either come up with something unwittingly groundbreaking and brilliant, or you struggle against what has gone before.

I did see a book of Goon scripts at one point. It is illustrated with Milligan sketches. One that stuck in my mind is of an Egg wearing a bowler hat and with a briefcase. The caption said "An egg going to work on a man a day".

*shrugs*
Oh well.

Talk about getting the wrong end of the stick and beating around the bush with it. I thought you were making a comment about the impossible task of impersonating audio humour in a visual medium.

Goon show scripts are great to read Munchkin (and I've always liked Spike's illustrations ) but I think it's far better to imagine what a bagpipe taxi is rather than see a picture of it. This was what the aforementioned comic strip was trying to do.

I mean, who would ever think of turning a radio series into a visual medium anyway?

Don't worry Wowbagger: all viewpoints are valid. If that's what you want the cartoon to be, then it is. I was obviously being obtuse in using an aural effect in a visual medium, which is why I purposefully kept to a reasonably sensible font.