A strange Pearls Before Swine meta-comic, about comics moving people. With the text in mirror image:
I’d appreciate some deeper analysis of this one.
A strange Pearls Before Swine meta-comic, about comics moving people. With the text in mirror image:
I’d appreciate some deeper analysis of this one.
May 10, 2013 at 8:18 am |
I reckon it’s the whole strip that’s in mirror-image – ie the frames are in reverse order, as well as the text being in mirror-image. But, even if that’s so, it would still be good to hear someone’s analysis! I don’t really get it – but perhaps I just don’t know the context. I know the mouse is the snarky character, but haven’t read this particular strip in any context it has with other strips.
May 10, 2013 at 8:27 pm |
I think this is just right. Reading the whole strip backwards makes a lot more sense than reading the panels from left to right. And then the idea of moving the readers makes sense — making them move to a mirror to look at the strip in reverse.
May 10, 2013 at 8:24 am |
I don’t think it requires deep analysis or context; from the second panel I deduce that he’s making a joke about “moving” people — i.e., getting them up off their butts — by the simple expedient of getting them to go over to a mirror and hold the strip up so they can read it more easily.
And that Rat ain’t no mouse.
May 10, 2013 at 10:34 am |
The human is Stephen Pastis, who writes and draws the strip, while the rat is Rat, the strip’s most obnoxious character. The comic strip frequently breaks the fourth wall, most usually by having Rat complain to the cartoonist about the strip. This particular strip plays on the two meanings of “moving” people (moving them emotionally vs. moving them physically) and on the fact that most people who bother to read a reversed comic strip will do so by getting a mirror. Of course, the reaction of many, when confronted with such a strip, is not to read it at all.
Ha! I happened to have a mirror within arm’s length when I read the strip this morning!
May 10, 2013 at 5:53 pm |
Whatever the intent, it failed for me. I’m used to reading backward type because of my background in printing. It would have been a touch harder had it also been upside down.
May 10, 2013 at 6:16 pm |
A lifetime of learning to cope with “dyslexia” makes it even more humorous. You can read either direction. (or upside down)