Zippy the Pinhead is the main character in the comic strip of the same name, created by Bill Griffith. This article is about the comic strip, the sequential art form as published in newspapers and on the Internet. ... Bill Griffith (born 1944) is a popular cartoonist best known for his comic strip Zippy the Pinhead. ...

Publication history

Zippy made his first appearance in Real Pulp Comix #1 in March 1971. The comic strip began in The Berkeley Barb in 1976 and was syndicated nationally soon after, originally as a weekly strip; it has been a daily feature since 1985. 1971 (MCMLXXI) was a common year starting on Friday (the link is to a full 1971 calendar). ... The Berkeley Barb was an underground newspaper which was published in Berkeley, California, in the 1960s and 1970s. ... 1976 (MCMLXXVI) was a leap year starting on Thursday (the link is to a full 1976 calendar). ... This article is about the year. ...

The Zippy comic strip has a cult following of devoted readers; however, many people find nothing humorous in Zippy and cannot comprehend the strip. This antagonism and confusion is so common that the official Zippy website contains a tutorial on understanding the comic strip [1]. When the original home of the Zippy daily strip, the San Francisco Chronicle, cancelled it briefly in 2002, the Chronicle received thousands of letters of protest, including one from Robert Crumb, who called Zippy "by far the very best daily comic strip that exists in America". The Chronicle quickly restored the strip, but dropped it again in 2004, leading to more protests as well as grateful letters from non-fans. The strip continues to be syndicated in other papers, but often ranks at or near the bottom of reader polls[2]. A cult following is a group of fans devoted to a specific item, usually a film, television or radio program, though some comic books, musicians, writers or others also gain dedicated followings. ... The San Francisco Chronicle, the self-described Voice of the West, is Northern Californias largest newspaper. ... For the Cusco album, see 2002 (album). ... Robert Crumb (born August 30, 1943 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) is an artist and illustrator recognized for the distinctive style of his drawings and his critical, satirical, subversive view of the American mainstream. ... 2004 (MMIV) was a leap year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

The strip is unique among syndicated multi-panel dailies for its near-absence of either straightforward gags or continuous narrative, and for its unusually intricate artwork, which is only slightly simplified from the style of Griffith's 1970s underground comics. The 1970s decade refers to the years from 1970 to 1979, inclusive. ... The term underground comics or comix describes the self-published or small press comic books that sprang up in the US in the late 1960s. ...

Characters and content

Zippy's original appearance was partly inspired by several microcephalics, including Schlitzie, from the film Freaks (which was enjoying something of a cult revival at the time), and P.T. Barnum's sideshow performer, Zip the Pinhead (who was not a microcephalic, but was nevertheless billed as one)[3]. (Coincidentally, Zip the Pinhead's real name was William Henry Johnson; Griffith's full name is William Henry Jackson Griffith, after his great-grandfather, the noted photographer.) However, he is distinctive not so much for his skull shape, or for any identifiable form of brain damage, but for his enthusiasm for philosophical non sequiturs, verbal free association, and the pursuit of pop culture ephemera. His wholehearted devotion to random artifacts satirizes the excesses of consumerism. Zippy's unpredictable behavior sometimes causes severe difficulty for others, but never for himself. Cephalic disorders are congenital conditions that stem from damage to, or abnormal development of, the budding nervous system. ... Freaks is a 1932 horror film from the Pre-Code era about sideshow performers, directed by Tod Browning. ... Phineas Taylor Barnum (July 5, 1810 – April 7, 1891), American showman who is best remembered for his entertaining hoaxes and for founding the circus that eventually became Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus. ... William Henry Johnson, AKA Zip the Pinhead Zip the Pinhead, born William Henry Johnson, (1857 Liberty Corners, New Jersey – April 28, 1926 New York, New York) was an American freak show performer famous for his oddly tapered head. ... A non sequitur is a literary device; in comedy (as opposed to in formal logic) it is a comment which, due to its lack of meaning relative to the comment it follows, is absurd to the point of being humorous. ... A Free Association is an association which meets certain mostly negative criteria. ... Popular culture, or pop culture, is the vernacular (peoples) culture that prevails in a modern society. ... Satire is a literary technique of writing or art which exposes the follies of its subject (for example, individuals, organizations, or states) to ridicule, often as an intended means of provoking or preventing change. ... Consumerism is a term used to describe the effects of equating personal happiness with purchasing material possessions and consumption. ...

Zippy always wears a yellow muumuu with large red spots, and clown shoes. The muumuu or mumu is a loose dress of Hawaiian origin that hangs from the shoulder. ... A clown today is one of various types of comedic performers, on stage, television, in the circus and rodeo. ...

He is married to a nearly identical pinhead named Zerbina, and has two children, Fuel-Rod and Meltdown. He has two close friends: Claude Funston, a hapless working man, and Griffy, a stand-in for Bill Griffith who often appears in the strip to complain about various aspects of modern life. A humanoid toad, Mr. Toad (less commonly Mr. the Toad), appears occasionally, embodying blind greed and selfishness. Nuclear power station at Leibstadt, Switzerland. ... A nuclear meltdown occurs when the core of a nuclear reactor melts. ... The true toads are amphibians in the Bufonidae family. ...

In his daily-strip incarnation, Zippy spends much of his time traveling and commenting on interesting places; recent strips focus on his fascination with roadside icons featuring giant beings; Zippy also frequently participates in his long-running conversation with the giant fiberglass doggie mascot of San Francisco's "Doggie Diner" chain (later, the Carousel diner near the San Francisco Zoo). The website encourages people to send photos of interesting places for Zippy to visit in the strip. This page is a candidate for speedy deletion. ... The San Francisco Zoo is a zoo in San Francisco, California. ...

His most famous quote is "Are we having fun yet?" It became a catch phrase, and appears in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations. At the 2003 University of Florida Conference on Comics and Graphic Novels, Griffith recalled the phone call from Bartlett's: A catch phrase is a phrase or expression that is popularized, usually through repeated use, by a real person or fictional character. ... Bartletts Familiar Quotations, often simply called Bartletts, is an American reference work that is the longest-lived and most widely distributed collection of quotations. ...

When Bartlett's approached me in — I forget what year, 5 or 6 years ago — I got a call from the editor. And he was going to give me credit for the "Are we having fun yet" saying, but he wanted to know exactly where Zippy had first said it. I did some research (I had no idea) and I eventually found [...] the strip "Back to Pinhead, the Punks and the Monks" from YOW [Comics] #2 in 1979. ...[T]hat's the first time he said, "Are we having fun yet?" Certainly not intended by me to be anything more than another non sequitur coming out of Zippy's mind.

Zippy in other media

In 2004, Zippy made his stage debut in San Francisco in Fun: The Concept. Griffith approved of the adaptation, though he did not work on the project.

Rumors of a Zippy movie project have circulated for decades, and Griffith has devoted dozens of strips to his real and imagined dealings with Hollywood. An animated television series, to be produced by Film Roman and co-written by Diane Noomin, was in negotiations from 1996 to 2001, but was abandoned due to lack of financing. DPS Film Roman is an independent animation company, based in Los Angeles, California. ...

Live action footage of an actor portraying Zippy and singing a song about the character was included in the 1988 documentary, Comic Book Confidential. Stand-up comic Jim "The Bob" Wyand's work has been greatly influenced by Zippy's outlook. 1988 (MCMLXXXVIII) was a leap year starting on Friday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Comic Book Confidential is an American/Canadian documentary film that was released in 1988. ...

A collection of about 1,000 Zippy quotes is packaged and distributed with the Emacs text editor [4]. Most installations of the fortune command, available on most Unix-type systems, also contain this collection. This gives Zippy a very wide audience, since most Emacs users can have a random Zippy quote printed on their screen by typing "M-x yow" (on PC keyboards that's Alt-X, then y-o-w, then Enter) and most Linux or BSD users can get a random quote by typing "fortune zippy" in a shell. This article is about the text editor. ... fortune is a simple program that displays a random message from a database of quotes. ... Wikibooks has more about this subject: Guide to Unix Unix or UNIX is a computer operating system originally developed in the 1960s and 1970s by a group of AT&T Bell Labs employees including Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, and Douglas McIlroy. ... Linux (also known as GNU/Linux) is a computer operating system. ... BSD redirects here; for other uses see BSD (disambiguation). ...

Books

• Zippy Stories. Berkeley: And/Or, 1981. ISBN 0915904586. San Francisco: Last Gasp, 1986. ISBN 0-86719-325-5

• Nation of Pinheads. Berkeley: And/Or, 1982. ISBN 0915904713 Reprinted, San Francisco: Last Gasp, 1987. ISBN 0-86719-365-4 Zippy strips, 1979-1982.

• Pointed Behavior. San Francisco: Last Gasp, 1984. ISBN 0-86719-315-8 Zippy strips, 1983-1984.

• Are We Having Fun Yet? Zippy the Pinhead's 29 Day Guide to Random Activities and Arbitrary Donuts. New York: Dutton, 1985. ISBN 0-525-48184-2 Reprinted, Seattle: Fantagraphics, 1994. ISBN 1-56097-149-5

• Pindemonium. San Francisco: Last Gasp, 1986. ISBN 0-86719-348-4 Zippy strips, 1985-1986.

• King Pin: New Zippy Strips. New York: Dutton, 1987. ISBN 0-525-48330-6 Zippy strips, 1986-7.

• Pinhead's Progress: More Zippy Strips. New York: Dutton, 1989. ISBN 0-525-48468-X Zippy strips, 1987-8.

• From A to Zippy: Getting There Is All the Fun. New York: Penguin Books, 1991. ISBN 0-14-014988-0 Zippy strips, 1988-90.

• Zippy's House of Fun: 54 Months of Sundays. Seattle: Fantagraphics, 1995. ISBN 1-56097-162-2 (Color strips, May 1990 - September 1994)

• Zippy and beyond: A Pinhead's Progress - Comic Strips, Stories, Travel Sketches and Animation Material. San Francisco: Cartoon Art Museum, 1997.

• Zippy Annual: A millennial melange of microcephalic malapropisms and metaphysical muzak. ("Vol. 1", "Impressions based on random data".) Seattle: Fantagraphics, 2000. ISBN 1-56097-351-X

• Zippy Annual 2001. ("Vol. 2", "April 2001 - September 2001".) Seattle: Fantagraphics, 2001. ISBN 1-56097-472-9

• Zippy Annual 2002. ("Vol. 3", "September 2001 - October 2002".) Seattle: Fantagraphics, 2002. ISBN 1-56097-505-9

• Zippy Annual 2003. ("Vol. 4", "October 2002 - October 2003".) Seattle: Fantagraphics, 2003. ISBN 1-56097-563-6

• From Here to Absurdity: Zippy November 2003 – November 2004. Seattle: Fantagraphics, 2004. ISBN 1-56097-618-7

External links

• Official website
• Understanding the Zippy comic strip
• Toonopedia
• Still asking "Are we having fun yet?" by Bill Griffith, transcript of Griffith's talk at the 2003 University of Florida Conference on Comics and Graphic Novels
• Fun: The Concept, information about the stage play (archive link, was dead)