Comic Dogs

Marmaduke was whelped onto a bed of newsprint way back in 1954. Brad Anderson brought him into this world and he's still sharing his overgrown puppy with us, all these decades later.

In case you've been living in an isolated monastery in the remotest ranges of the Himalayas, Marmaduke is the Great Dane, belonging to Phil and Dottie Winslow, who entertains us with his big dog antics. Oh, he's a big dog, but inside that big dog is a lap dog begging to get out. Some would claim that the humor of Marmaduke lies in the idea that he doesn't really act like a dog. Those of us who live with truly large dogs would beg to differ. Marmaduke is wholly a big dog. That's why he makes us laugh - we know him.

We've been sitting in that armchair with a 150 lummox climbing across our laps, wiping the drool string off on our favorite blouse. We've been on the end of the leash while the giant dog loses his mind over a squirrel overhead making unintelligible wisecracks or suffered the various humiliations that only a very large dog can inflict. And we love them for all their endearing indignities, just like we've loved Marmaduke for over fifty years.

Satchel lives with Bucky T. Katt, a cranky antisocial Siamese cat and long suffering human advertising executive Rob in a Boston apartment in Darb Conley's Get Fuzzy strip. Satchel is distinguished by being one of the few - if not the only - mutts in comics who knows his parentage. His mother was a Shar Pei and his father was a Labrador Retriever named Copernicus retired from guide service and descended from a long line of military and guard dogs. Copernicus is terribly disappointed at his son's life path as a house dog. Like many of us, he struggles for acceptance from his own family. Satchel's parents are both from Nova Scotia, another piece of knowledge unique among his fellow doggy denizens of the comic strips.

Poor Satchel is chubby, naive and ever at the mercy of the cynical and sociopathic Bucky, which makes it all the sweeter when he occasionally gets the better of the cat, proving that sometimes the innocent do prevail. He's also been known to fumble his way into a profound declaration of truth from time to time and even fire off an inadvertently smart remark or two. Satchel is the personification of the struggling Everyman. More than most, he is a representation of the gentler, sweeter side of us and we love him for that reflection, even while we shake our heads and think, "what a dumb dog!"

On the other side of the coin sits Dogbert, the megalomaniac Beagle from Dilbert. If Dogbert weren't a dog, he'd be Bucky Katt's hero. At one time Dogbert achieved world conquest, but became bored and walked away from the position. Now he prefers to take on consulting jobs for his owner, Dilbert's boss. If Satchel is the innocent, innocuous side of us, Dogbert is all that is conniving and deliciously vicious and avaricious. He flim-flams customers, hoodwinks Dilbert's boss, dreams of one day again enslaving the human race (what does he think he is, a CAT?). One of his rare concessions to acting like a dog is the inability to control his tail when he's just thoroughly scammed someone - his tail wags. One wonders if Dogbert is housebroken. One suspects Satchel isn't.

Our portrayal of ourselves using our closest companions allows us a mirror to see what we cannot tolerate looking at in true form. Somehow it is easier to take looking at our own foibles and flaws, egotism and manias when they are shown to us in the forms of the pets that share our lives and are so much a part of the way we visualize ourselves.

This was provided by the writers at Discount-Pet-Mall: Where you can find your much needed Dog Kennels.