Maus and Pinky and the Brain

Don’t read if you like the cartoon strip Cathy

OK, this might be a stretch but... did any one else used to religiously follow pinky and the brain? I have no finer memories than when I used to come home from school, make myself a huge bowl of Coco Puffs and plop down in front of the TV to watch not only the infamous Brain try to take over the world with his hilariously gentle minded cohort Pinky, but also Beast Wars (a newer generation Transformers show (all computer generated graphics) where the characters are robots that can transform into various animals). But let us not forget Animaniacs, Garfield, Chip and Dale Rescue Rangers, and countless other animal based cartoon shows that populated the Saturday morning lineup. In fact, every single cartoon I used to watch as a kid involved animals except those based on pre-existing superhero books. I wonder what has stemmed this fascination with animal cartoons. But, finishing my daily post-school afternoon cartoons, my sugar rush unsatiated by only two meager half hour shows, I would religiously read the comic section in the newspaper. Strangely enough, nearly all of these feature human characters and not animals. It makes me wonder what causes the divide. I guess it must do with the target audience. Do children love animals more than adults? Since I’ve learned everything I know about the working world from Office Space, I’ll assume that comics in the newspaper don’t feature animals because a fat, ugly, cat annoying named Cathy, who is perpetuating her fatness, ugliness, and annoying tendencies by screaming about her fatness while eating carton after carton of ice-cream wouldn’t look as nice pinned up on one’s cubicle as a real human version of the aforementioned.

(ps. Yes, this devolved into an anti-Cathy rant, but rightfully so! There are too many bad comics in the newspaper. Pinky and the Brain even had an episode denouncing Family Circus! Such genius and wit)