So is Calvin, the most fearsome terror of the funny pages not actually surnamed “The Menace,” a bad kid? I say no. He’s too thrilled by life, he’s got too fascinating a mind, and Watterson, per the Tenth Anniversary Book, says “I wouldn’t want Calvin in my house, but on paper, he helps me sort through my life and understand it.” Children have a way of clarifying things.
Related: 7 Scientific Reasons You’ll Turn Out Just Like Your Parents
It Is Still Funny
Comedy ages like a trash bag full of old food left out in Bear Forest on Hibernation-Is-Over Day. Humor changes, sensibilities change, and something from 27 years ago is probably going to make you laugh because you remember laughing at it 27 years ago, not because your belly’s for-realsies rumblin’. And since when I picture Cracked’s readership, I only picture the most impossibly cool, intelligent, and beautiful sophisticates imaginable, I will not try to pick a “proof that Calvin and Hobbes is funny” example designed to appeal to all of your elegant tastes. I’m just picking a strip I find really funny, 27+ years later.
Andrews McMeel Publishing
I’m not going to explain what I find funny about this strip. I’m not going to explain which moments make me giggle, but know that it’s more than one. I will tell you I’ve got a pretty good melody working for that song in the lower panel if I can only teach my son the backup harmony part. Lastly, know that if you don’t find it funny, the part of your soul where happiness happens is broken. Sorry, I don’t make the rules.