| The following is a selection
of boos, catcalls, farts and other abuse aimed in the Quigmans
general direction. Please
note
that this is certainly not all that there is, but it's all that I found.
It is, after all, a BIG internet. |
| Daily News of Los Angeles QUIGMANS: WAS IT SOMETHING NIGEL VAPID SAID? I'd like to say a few words about your daily cartoon the Quigmans. Namely, to wit, it is senseless, brainless, idiotic, simple, shallow, imprudent, witless, irrational, inane, ridiculous, mindless, ludicrous, muddled, absurd, scatterbrained, crackbrained, wild, injudicious, imbecile, addleheaded, lunatic, insane, mad, crazy, moronic, freakish, incoherent, senile, preposterous, asinine, cuckoo, goofy, half-baked and harebrained. - Bob Hutton Burbank |
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| Austin American-Statesman In the last survey of readers of the Austin American-Statesman comics page, thousands of readers ranked The Quigmans among the five least liked cartoon panels. |
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| The Philiadelphia Enquirer WELCOME TO THE FAR SIDE OK, all you Quigmans fans (all two of you), I hope you noticed that The Far Side appeared in yesterday's funnies. That should make up for whatever lack of weirdness you may have noticed since the demise (read cancellation) of The Quigmans, a quirky comic featuring balloon-headed characters whose only fault was that it wasn't funny. It wasn't funny cuckoo; it wasn't funny ha-ha. |
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San Antonio Express-News |
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 There's
currently a site on the net called comicsremixed.com.
What is does is take a variety lame comics (Dennis the Menace,
Heathcliff, Wizard of ID, The Quigmans) and swap the punchlines
between them. The results are bizarre and often hilarious.
Much funnier than the original cartoon. Go see for yourself.On the day the Quigman comic on your left appeared, 1-29-09, the site hosted the cartoon but puposely left it free of any caption. The intent wasn't entirely clear but I'm guessing that (A) the cartoon is so bad it could only be improved by the removal of the punchline, or (B) No punchline could possibly make it amusing. Either way... <big grin>. |
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| From forums.timerift.net: [various complaints about obscure comic strips] Oh, and let's not forget the same 5 strips they keep recycling in The Quigmans. That guy needs some new material. - Tygre |
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| From misetings.com: Speaking of garfield, comics that should die: Garfield Family Circus Quigmans Adam @ home Cathy PC and Pixel If your newspaper is kind enough not to publish some of these, implying that you don't know what they are, trust me. They suck. - avatarofdumb |
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| From comicscommunity.com on
the 12-29-08 Quigmans: "Not only is this strip ugly in its drawings, not frequently funny, but Buddy Hickerson couldn't even make the effort to complete (syndicate) this panel last week, when it was topical!" - Bob Ingersoll |
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| A response, on toplessrobots.com,
to a an opinion about comics which are
too crummy to continue: "One of the strips worthy of inclusion that I was actually glad to see wasn't on the list, The Quigmans, gives me hope. It means that so few papers even bother to run that piece of garbage, and thereby let Buddy Hickerson get away with recycling the same gags over and over (quite literally, as the reason why he hasn't put out a Quigmans collection since 1991 is because then fans would realize how often he reuses previously published strips), that it'll fall into limbo just out of a lack of papers willing to keep it on the comics pages. Maybe then, Hickerson will go back to a career more suited for his abilities, such as sucking farts out of dead cats. Naw, I kid. No matter how bad his artwork, or how condescending his "jokes", he can always rest assured that he'll get commissions from the Dallas Observer, and support from the frumpy fiftysomethings running the used bookstores he frequents in search of attention. So long as he can convince idiot editors that he's "edgy", he'll always have a place alongside other zombie weekly newspaper comics such as This Modern World (rapidly approaching Millard Fillmore levels of humorless preachiness), The City, and the absolutely pointless Tom the Dancing Bug." -Texas Triffid Ranch |
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| From newsgroups.derkeiler.com: "Quigmans - grotesque and unfunny, a bad combination. Often this looks like Easter Island Comix." -JGM |
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| From aperfectworld.blogspot.com: "When I feel bad about my drawing skills, I read the Quigmans and feel much better." - toonhead |
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7-20-08: The boys at somethingawful.com are
getting into the Quigmans-dissing act. Here's the original Quigmans
cartoon they found worthy of their attentions and how they reacted: "The joke is stupid, but what's the point of the K-Mart t-shirt? And what the hell is wrong with his pants?" - Mister Kingdom "K-Mart was the stereotypical store of the ignorant, impoverished underclass -- in the 1970's. This cartoonist shows that not only is he perpetuating false stereotypes (poor and uneducated does not equal stupid), he's also three decades behind the times." - Dr. M "That joke is poo poo. 'I'm holding it. I'm not holding it but I can hold it.' OK, so you're not holding it." - davidspackage "The Quigmans has been around since the early to mid '80s, and this "cartoonist" (who rarely writes or draws his own jokes) is known for reusing old comics from decades past over and over again. So in all likelihood, this comic was drawn in the 1980s. (Actually, it was from 2003. =mike=)" - Deep Hurting And finally, just to prove Buddy doesn't have a monopoly on misogyny:  |
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| From newsgoups.derkelier.com Looks like Buddy Hickerson's "The Quigmans", which has been around since March 1985, has changed syndicates. I think it started with the L.A. Times syndicate and then became part of the Tribune Media Services group when they bought out The L.A.Times in 2000. Personally I get more enjoyment not from the panel, but from this guy who detests all things Hickerson: http://www.quigmans.com/quigblog.html D.D.Degg and Wow. Fascinating stuff. He really has a hate on for the strip, doesn't he? I haven't seen that level of snark since ... well, since the last time I visited the Foobiverse! nancy13g |
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| From Howard
Bunt's Blog: I find these days, as I open my comic strip page in my local paper, in comparison to other strips on the page, For Better or For Worse is really struggling. Even The Quigmans, which I have often thought was the poorest, written and drawn series in my local paper, is starting to compare favourably to For Better or For Worse. The strips that surround it in the paper are filled with the work of artists who appear to be actually trying to make someone laugh, or to tell a story, even though they are often not successful. |
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| Somethingawful.com (Note: These excellent rants refer to this Quigmans cartoon, from 12-1-07:  Caption: "I'm sorry, dear. You love snacks and you needed a purse, so I naturally assumed you'd love the Hot Pocket-Book." -------------------- -by Deep Hurting Speaking of hideous facial expressions... The first time I saw this was on the student wire service that runs many of my topical cartoons. I thought for sure that it had to be the work of a student, instead of a professional. But no, a quick Google search shows that this is in fact a professionally drawn strip, which the author has been drawing since 1986. 1986. He's been drawing it for over 20 years. Supposedly after working on-staff as an illustrator for the Denver Post, and while contributing to the National Lampoon. After all that time, this is what the drawing looks like. That also means that, for a period of close to 30 years, editors have looked at artwork that looked like this, or even worse, and have repeatedly said, "Yes, I would like to pay you to produce more of this, and then litter it throughout the pages of my newspaper/magazine/periodical." Look at the shading on those pants. Look at the lettering. This was done by a well-established professional, not an obvious amateur. WTF is this bullshit, anyway!? And while we're on the subject, how can ANYONE stand to draw a comic that's NOTHING but a blatant rip of the Far Side, with even worse artwork, day in and day out, for DECADES?! Much less several people, apparently? Dan Piraro and Wiley Miller brought their own thing to the formula, and also happen to be pretty good illustrators. But the same cannot be said for the vast majority of Gary Larson's clones. You know, I used to think anyone could learn to draw, with enough time and practice, and innate talent didn't necessarily have to be a requirement. But comics like Cathy and this [Quigmans] cause me to question my belief–even someone who's the worst artist in the world should be able to become fairly skilled after a period of constantly drawing for twenty years, if that were true. No, the frequent and short deadlines on a comic are not an excuse, either. Not after that long. ---------------- - by jidohanbaiki As soon as I learned how to read, I read this strip everyday in the comics pages. Even as I five year old, I was always fascinated with how crappy and creepy all the characters looked and was always dumbfounded by it's humor. I thought maybe it was just something you had to be an adult to get. My feelings were pretty much the same about "Sylvia." It's been about ten years since I've seen the Quigmans, and it looks like the style has changed but it still looks like it was drawn in about five minutes with a goopy dried out ball point pen. This is what my art looks like when I just don't care and I'm drawing while on the phone checking my bank balance. -------------- - by Nausicaa The extra galling part is that yes, people SHOULD improve over time if they work hard enough, but it's the fact that they're ACCEPTED while they're still at the poo poo stage that's extra annoying. I know I wouldn't want to see my stuff published that I didn't think was a respectable level of skill. Even a trained, skilled cartoonist will evolve and change over time - except they usually don't get WORSE. ------------- KillerJunglist Oh come on... This guy isn't even trying! Is that Zippy the Pinhead in the background? What the ever loving gently caress is up with Ms. Coulter's mouth? And I'm actually offended by the lettering and choice of "word". YeeEAARcH! indeed. |
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davidkamp.com
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rockwoodcomic.com |
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| wired.com Reader Paul Riddel commenting on the shutdown of the Dysfunctional Family Circus web site back in 1999. "What's really pathetic is not just the fact that so many people over the past five years responded to the idea of tormenting Bil Keane's dopey characters -- seeing as how The Family Circus is a blight upon the newspaper comics page comparable to Garfield or The Quigmans -- but that King Features Syndicate let this slide for nearly five years, and only now issued its cease-and-desist order," |
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| comicscurmudgeon.com "Quigmans: Eeww!" - gh |
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| subgenius.com "A few years ago the LA Daily News used to have the Quigman's. Then they ran a readers survey to determine which comics they would axe. Quigman's came in as the number one most hated comic strip of all. So, I wrote a letter to the paper defending the comic. They ran the letter, but axed the Quigman's. Bastards."- c.spencer, 8/18/95 |
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| http://www.websnark.com "I don't know about how many Far Side webcomics are out there, but there are a surfeit of syndicated gag panels. My newspaper right now has Non-Sequitur, Pluggers, and Bizarro, and at one point had the Quigmans (until it was thrown out because nobody liked it)" - Chaomancer Omega, 12/30/2005 |
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| 101reasonstostopwriting.blogspot.com In regards to a proposed new strip: "Good Elvis Almighty, those cartoons are painful, and not in a good way. And what's scary is that I could see him getting a syndication gig for newspaper comic pages wishing to replace The Quigmans or Mallard Fillmore with something slightly more likely to engage a chuckle instead of the gag reflex." - Paul Riddell, January 23, 2007 |
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| From joshreads.com -
in reaction to the Quigmans comic of 1-9-07 "Well, the joke in Quigmans is lame, so maybe John Kerry drew the panel." - mibbitmaker "Ugh, haven’t seen this one before. Horrible artwork. That woman looks like Joe Lieberman in a wig and a skirt." - Squawk "The really sad thing about the Quigmans is that I remember when Hickerson’s stuff was in the National Lampoon. It was just as crudely drawn but it was a LOT funnier. Some of the best ones were multi-panel efforts, and of course he wasn’t putting ‘em out once a day… So I guess frequency and format have a lot to do with it, but it’s always sad when somone who used to make me laugh out loud can barely elicit a grimace now…I mean, really, this is just typical Lockhorns shite…" - Donald the Anarchist "The Quigmans would do better if it just switched into some sort of German depress-o-vision. They need to toss off the pretense of a more white trash Lockhorns and embrace the sheer dullness and black and whiteness of it." - Clouseau "Is that a tranvestite hooker in And my favorite: "To see a former Quigmans contributor obsess over whether the head Quigmans guy is stealing from him, go to quigmans.com. It gets to the point where he googles himself and the writer and because he has more hits he concludes that he’s more popular and relevant. Unfortunately, since he once contributed to Quigmans he will forever be known as a no-talent ass-clown." - reader-who-posts That's me, the no-talent ass-clown. I'm so proud. |
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| http://www.rottontomatoes.com "Quigmans is a poor man's Far Side." |
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http://web.archive.org/web/20010725124647/www.hpoo.com (Story about a cartoon exhibition) The weakest work, strangely enough, comes from two Dallasites. Dan Piraro contributes covers to his famed "Bizarro"collections--good enough for some, but hopelessly inadequate for presenting his talent when his strips for the now-defunct "Wahoo Reader" would have made a better choice. "Quigmans" creator Buddy Hickerson's work elicits a curled lip instead of a chuckle: his drawings resemble those of a baboon on Prozac. One exception works because of its obviousness: "Classic Rock" portrays a skeletal, spiderweb-enshrouded deejay (presumably based on Q102's Redbeard) surrounded by Eagles, Foghat, and Rush vinyl. |
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| http://www.thesunlink.com From the Bremerton, Washington Sun editorials page "Comics are sadistic" To the Editor: I've been a longtime subscriber to The Sun and enjoy reading the comic sections of papers. The majority of your comic selections are humorous or entertaining and are acceptable reading for children. The Sun has one comic that is neither acceptable to children or adults. It is neither funny nor entertaining, but is disgusting and sadistic. At other times it's stupid, gross and demeaning to people. This comic, "The Quigmans," needs an R or an X rating to be acceptable for a family paper. I feel sorry for The Sun and our community if there are readers of The Sun who find "The Quigmans" funny or entertaining. I've felt this comic unacceptable for a family paper for some time. The particular comic that has given me the impetus to voice my opinion to the editor is "The Quigmans" in the comic section on Sept. 11. What can be found funny about somebody about to be run over and killed be a semi-truck? How many in our community have had a friend or relative killed in a auto-related accident? Christopher Olmsted - Port Orchard |
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http://www.thesunlink.com From the Bremerton, Washington Sun editorials page "Sadistic cartoons" To the Editor: I readily concur with Christopher Olmstead in his evaluation of the cartoons "The Quigmans". I also enjoy reading the "funnies" and have since I was a child. He is right in calling [this cartoon] sadistic. It is strange that [this] drawing is never upbeat - always degrading. I had gotten in the habit of skipping it, but then thought better of it, and started reading it again with the idea of making a fair judgment. It was timely that Mr. Olmstead should bring this to your attention. Political views should cover a broad range. Comics, on the other hand, need to be acceptable for family reading. Among your newer comics, "Pickles" and "Rose is Rose" are excellent, both in drawing and content. Iris M. Strehlow - Bremerton |
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Amish Tech Support |
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http://tgs.gargoyles-fans.org JEB- The Quigmans is a local one panel comic strip with terrible artwork I usually avoid. |
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READERS' COMICS SURVEY
2000: THE RESULTS |
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http://www.dallasobserver.com 10-17-96 "Bye-bye, Buddy" The Morning News dumps a cartoonist for daring to make fun of politicians. BY GLEN WARCHOL (parentheticals courtesy of Mike Stanfill) In The Dallas Morning News, politics is no joking matter. Dallas cartoonist Buddy Hickerson learned that lesson the hard way when his quirky, irreverent cartoon, The Quigmans, was exiled from the comics page recently for daring to do what folks--at least those outside certain Middle Eastern countries--do every day: poke fun at national politicians. "I knew the rules about the comic page," a doleful Hickerson says of his clash with the News. "You're not supposed to do direct political assaults in the comic page." (Yeah, but he did it anyway. I guess being quirky and irreverant, much less doleful, doesn't mean very much when you break the rules.) The News has received letters complaining about The Quigmans' absence, Hickerson says, but "of course I don't know the numbers on that." (This is a really peculiar statement. I simply can't picture the comic editor saying..."Yeah, we've gotten lots of letters about our decision to can your crummy strip, but we're not gonna tell you how many! So THERE! Nyahhhh!". You think Buddy might have fabricated this statement in an attempt to gain sympathy? Nahhhhhhhh!) The 35-year-old Dallas-based cartoonist and illustrator (Hickerson has done illustrations for the Observer) says he tried to explain to the News that it was personally important for him that The Quigmans be seen in his own hometown. "He [Langer, editor for the Morning News] isn't really convinced it's my town. He doesn't see any buildings with my name on them," Hickerson says. (Can you spot the raving egomaniac in the previous paragraph? Speaking of egomania, Buddy was actually 39, not 35, at the time of the story. I've caught him lying about his age on several occasions. Pathetic.) Hickerson says it's unclear if the News will resume his cartoon when the political campaign season is over, or continue to ban it from the funny pages. (They eventually brought it back for a brief run and then unceremoniously dumped it shortly thereafter.) He fears that the News will continue to buy the cartoon from his syndicate and trash it, rather than allow any other paper to buy the syndication rights and run it. (These fears were unwarranted because Bud's pals at the Dallas Observer quickly picked up the rights for The Quigmans, but even THEY dumped it after running them for about a year or so. Frankly, I think they acquired the rights just to annoy their conservative competition.) "It's my hometown paper, for God's sake," Hickerson says. "I'd like to see it in the paper." (Wrong! Buddy really just wants other people to see his NAME in the paper. Shortly after the Morning News permanently pulled The Quigmans Buddy moved to California where the cartoon is, presumably, still printed.) |
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http://forums.timerift.net And I also have to agree with Dink that I have an editorial they can choke on if they print Duckbumps, Rogue Agent, and Pimp in Training but not OMGs! Those three comics suck. Oh, and let's not forget the same 5 strips they keep recycling in The Quigmans. That guy needs some new material. |
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http://www.dailygamecock.com 'Quigmans' shows distasteful humor This letter is in response to two distasteful caricatures by Buddy Hickerson ("Quigmans") that appeared in The Gamecock on Sept. 9 and Sept. 27 (2002). Mr. Hickerson's sense of humor is far from funny and is very offensive. To make fun of a person because of his size shows a lack of sensitivity. About 8 million to 10 million women and 1 million men suffer from eating disorders, and this is something that needs to be taken seriously. Promoting, Educating and Encouraging Realistic Self-Image (PEERS) is a student organization here at USC that strives to make students aware of eating disorders. Therefore, we are asking that caricatures of this nature not be published in the future. Lindsay Trammell and PEERS members TRAMMELL IS PRESIDENT OF PEERS |
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http://acaseinpoint.blogspot.com/ January 9, 2004 There are a few truly offbeat cartoons which have made syndication, but some are so poorly drawn as to refute my claim that good writing carries bad art. Really bad art can keep people from reading at all. Notable here would be the Quigmans, which is weird and sometimes funny, but hurts the eyes. |
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| http://www.millarworld.net/lofiversion/index.php/t48492.html February 11, 2005 It was crap when someone here posted the preview and its still crap. Granted I'm one of those guys who thinks Family Guy is only funny because EVERYONE TELLS YOU its funny. . .but really American Dad is just awful. . .its like Quigmans style humor. . .painfully obvious. |
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| Link November 24, 2004 Ripleys Believe it or Not- a lot of people like it, but I think it's boring Garfield- not funny anymore Prickly City- don't like it Curtis- I never liked it Lockhorns- It kind of says the same thing over Quigmans- it's dumb I think thats about it. I'll probably think of more later. |
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| http://www.ex-christian.net I always hated one called "The Quigmans" and even worse than that was this local Alaskan cartoon strip called "Muskeg Heights". ABSOLUTELY ATROCIOUS!!! Blech! |
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| http://joshreads.com/?p=503 (The host of this blog was inviting suggestions for comics he might find mockable or ironicly non-humorous. The contributor, Micedwhale, certainly knows his crummy comics.) I am trying not to get busted by my boss so I did not check the Chronicle or really the list on the right hand side. But my choices would be The Quigmans, Speed Bump, Monty, Strange Brew, Brewster Rocket, Clear Blue Water and the bizzare Ballard Street, as far as mockery Jane’s World,Prickly City in all its poorly drawn madness, and I am on the fence with Bob The Squirrel. Busted gotta go. |
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| http://forums.comicbookresources.com (The host of this forum was starting an online magazine and was asking for suggestions from readers.) Single framed cartoons would be great. Political cartoons are fine, we expect to publish some of course, but non-politcal single frame cartoons, i.e. the far side, would be absolutely amazing. Just stay away from the Quigmans. I hate the Quigmans. |
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| http://www.reviewjournal.com In December of 2005, the Las Vegas Review Journal held a poll asking it's readers to name their five favorite comics. The top ten results were: Zits - 975 Pickles - 861 Blondie - 455 Mother Goose and Grimm - 415 Baby Blues - 406 Hagar the Horrible - 404 Drabble - 383 Buckles - 359 FoxTrot - 337 The Family Circus - 334 The Quigmans was 59th on the list, garnering only ten votes. |
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| http://sclerotic-rings.livejournal.com I've known Mike Stanfill for about four years, thanks to his BuddyWatch site (and considering the number of humorless weekly newspaper editors who keep running the baboon-on-methadone "comic" The Quigmans and thereby keep Buddy Hickerson off welfare, Mr. Stanfill's work is a matter of public service)... |