Sunday morning toons: Breaking the third wall

The prevailing theme in Bob Geiger toon review for this week might diplomatically be called the genie that McCain let out of the bottle.

At Daryl Cagle's toon round-up it runs the gamut from ACORN to bailouts to Joe the Plumber. Hmm--I guess that's not much of a gamut, really, when you think about it. Sixteen more days until the election's over.

p3 Picks of the Week: R. J. Matson, Bob Englehart, Jeff Parker, Steve Sack, Henry Payne, John Cole, David Horsey, Jimmy Margulies, and Brian Fairrington.

p3 World Toon Review: Cameron Cardow (Ottowa, Canada), Thomas Boldt (Alberta, Canada), Angel Boligan (Mexico City, Mexico), and Patrick Chapatte (Geneva, Switzerland).

Ann Telnaes cracks the McCain Code.

p3's favorite flightless waterfowl, he of the generous beak and derrière, is conspicuous by his absence this week in the strip that bears his name. We're being softened up for the proverbial "It" next week. But even though Opus remains off camera today, an angry Steve Dallas manages to break through the third wall of cartooning.

And while you prepare yourself for whatever is to come, you can read the Salon.com interview with Opus creator Berke Breathed, who explains why the strip is coming to an end: "a mad penguin, like a mad cartoonist, isn't very lovable." Breathed will focus his future efforts on children's books.

While we're mentioning political cartoonists who've made the transition to children's story author: In conjunction with its review of cartoonist Jules Feiffer's latest book, the New York Times has a slide show featuring some of Feiffer's drawings. (Trivia follow-up: Feiffer wrote the screenplay for this, which ain't no "Popeye.")

Portland homeboy Jack Ohman has the word.

And speaking of violating the third wall of cartooning, here's the Chuck Jones classic "Duck Amuck" from 1953 (voted #2 on the list of 50 Greatest Cartoons).

(For the adventurous among you, here's "Duck Amuck" dubbed into Italian.)

p3 Bonus Toon: Jesse Springer
gets his Halloween tricks in early. (Click to enlarge.)