Site Map
  Bloom County Index for
Bloom 		Website Links For
Bloom County 		 

Information About

Bloom County
APPAREL
BABY
BEAUTY
BOOKS
CAR TOYS
CELL PHONES
DVD'S
ELECTRONICS
GOURMET FOOD
GROCERIES
HEALTH & PERSONAL
HOME & GARDEN
JEWELRY
MUSIC
MUSIC INSTRUMENTS
OFFICE PRODUCTS
SOFTWARE
SPORTING GOODS
TOOLS & HARDWARE
TOYS
VIDEO GAMES
SHOPPING HOME
MORE SHOPPING...




Characters



Core characters


  • '''

  • Milo Bloom is a ten-year-old newspaper reporter and probably the most worldly-wise of the whole bunch. Milo was the original protagonist of ''Bloom County''.

  • Steve Dallas is a former fraternity member, unsuccessfully practicing lawyer, would-be womanizer, manager of Deathtöngue , legend in his own mind, and antagonist of the group. Usually seen with a cigarette in his mouth.

  • Bill The Cat is a large orange cat who bears the characteristics of someone entirely burned out on LSD . He's been a cult leader ("Bhagwan Bill"), televangelist ("Fundamentally Oral Bill"), perennial Presidential candidate for the Meadow Party , heavy-metal rock star, and, in the last months of the strip, had his brain replaced with Donald Trump 's.

  • Michael Binkley originally owned Opus ("A boy and his penguin!") and is wishy-washy and overly reflective, when not contemplating the lives of pop-culture icons. His "anxiety closet" has been a staple of many storylines.

  • ''', but failed in translation. He also made milestones with various other technical achievements.

  • Cutter John , a wheelchair-bound Vietnam veteran noted for '' Star Trek '' fantasies and anti-war protests.

  • Bobbi Harlow is the Feminist schoolteacher of Milo and Binkley, as well as the love interest of Steve and Cutter. She was a major character until 1983 , when she faded away completely (referenced only once in the strip's later years, when Opus learns she joined the crew of '' Donahue '').



Other characters


''See also Minor Characters In Bloom County ''


Notable storylines

learns that Bill The Cat has sold-out their heavy metal group, Billy And The Boingers .]]
  • Steve forms a Heavy Metal band consisting of Opus, Portnoy, and Bill, initially called "Deathtöngue". Steve is forced to rename the band Billy And The Boingers after he is dragged before a Congressional hearing investigating the effect of heavy metal music on youth, similar to the Parents Music Resource Center . The Boingers disband after their frontman, Bill the Cat, is caught attending a Bible Study group with a woman whose character is based on Mother Teresa .

  • Oliver Jones finds out about Apartheid and builds a "photo-pigmentizer" with which he plans to start an international brouhaha. He sends the machine to Washington D.C. with Cutter John on a balloon chair (this aspect of the story may have been based on the flight of so-called "lawn chair pilot" Larry Walters ), and Opus is accidentally dragged along. While airborne, several balloons are popped by shotguns, sending the two plummetting into the Atlantic Ocean . Both are assumed dead, so Opus' money is given to Bill the Cat, who wastes it all. Eventually, Opus turns up at the Bloom County Boarding House with Amnesia , which lasts until he is shocked by the news that Diane Sawyer has married Eddie Murphy , after which he reveals that he and Cutter John survived the splash-down and were captured by Russians. The Russians kicked Opus off the submarine and took Cutter John back to Russia. The citizens later swap Bill the Cat for Cutter John.

  • In a spoof of Ayatollah Khomeini 's Fatwa on Salman Rushdie , Opus is the subject of a fatwa by the Mary Kay cosmetics company for writing an editorial suggesting that some women wear too much makeup.

  • 's lawn."

  • Opus receives 779 million dollars in cash from the U.S. Government under the mistaken belief that he is a scientist working on Missile Defense research. Opus uses the money to buy Bolivia .

  • Bill the Cat becomes a Televangelist , "Fundamentally Oral Bill" (a play on Oral Roberts ). He declares "penguin lust" to be the biggest scourge on society. As a result, Opus is banished from Bloom County and briefly becomes a male stripper (who refuses to remove all his clothes).



Notes


For reasons unknown, Breathed's hand-printed signature on his strips is usually presented in mirror image, i.e. right to left.

Among the topical issues discussed at length in Bloom County are US Anti-drug Policy (Dr. Oliver's Scalp Tonic), Christian Televangelist Scandals (Fundamentally Oral Bill), Animal Testing (Attack of the Mary Kay Commandos), hard rock and censorship (Deathtöngue and Billy And The Boingers ), and mass-media advertising (Opus and his weakness for Infomercial s).

Berke Breathed was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in Editorial Cartooning in 1987 for ''Bloom County''.

Breathed decided to end the strip in 1989. In the continuity of the strip, a series of events (initiated by Bill the Cat's body becoming a vessel for Donald Trump's brain) led to the dismissal of the original characters and a plot transition to Breathed's next strip.

Shortly after ''Bloom County'' ended, Breathed started a Sunday-only strip called '' Outland '' with original characters and situations introduced in ''Bloom County'''s final days. However, Opus, Bill, and other characters eventually reappeared and slowly took over the strip. ''Outland'' ran from September 3 1989 to March 26 1995 .

Another Sunday-only spinoff strip called '' Opus '' started on November 23 , 2003 .


Bloom County itself


The fictional setting of Bloom County served as a recurring backdrop for the comic and its sequels, although the nature of the setting was frequently altered.

[[Image:Bloom County May 1989.jpg|thumb|325px|right|Opus's last birthday in ''Bloom County''

From left to right, Reynelda the doll, Ronald-Ann Smith, Binkley, Milo, Hodge-Podge, Portnoy, and Opus.]]In the comics, the county is presented as a stereotypical American Midwestern small town. The small town setting was frequently contrasted with the increasing Globalization taking place in the rest of the world; though Bloom County contained the likes of farmers and wilderness creatures by default, it was frequented by Hare Krishna s, Feminist s, and Rock stars.

While the location of Bloom County is never explicitly mentioned, there have been some clues in the strip. When Oliver Jones identified Bloom County as the place where Halley's Comet would crash into Earth, a sign was seen saying that it was at 35.05 N 146.55 E. This would place it in the Pacific Ocean , about 300 miles off the coast of Japan . Oliver's previous calculation was 39.43 N 105.01 W, which would place it just south of Denver, Colorado . Another strip has Opus stating that Des Moines, Iowa was 96 miles away from Bloom County, which would place it in either Iowa or Missouri .

However, Bloom County's "true" setting was known to residents of Iowa City, IA, during the strip's run. The Bloom Boarding house, which appeared as a high contrast photo within the strip, was an actual residence in Iowa City, where Breathed lived at the time. In addition, several Iowa City local news items directly inspired Bloom County story lines. For example, a Bloom County politician's sexist gaffe, referring to a woman as a "lil' dumplin'", was taken directly from an incident when University of Iowa football coach Hayden Fry made the same comment, infuriating feminists at the university.

The county was home to the Bloom Boarding House, Steve Dallas' law offices, the ''Bloom Beacon'' and ''Bloom Picayune'' newspapers, at least one pond, and Milo's Meadow. In the comic's later years, the county contained what appeared to be a big-city Ghetto ("across the tracks", as it was known).

The geographical profile of the county was fluid as the artistic style of the strip evolved. During most of ''Bloom County'''s run, the rural meadow setting was presented realistically, while in its later years it became increasingly more abstract.

Bloom County's role in '' Outland '' was a bit questionable, as the "Outland" setting of the strip was originally set apart from the county by way of a magical doorway. By ''Outland'''s end, however, the Outland appeared to be a part of Bloom County itself.

'' Opus '' currently takes place in Bloom County.


''Bloom County'' books



Collections

  • ''Loose Tails'' ( 1983 )

  • ''Toons For Our Times'' ( 1984 )

  • ''Penguin Dreams and Stranger Things'' ( 1985 )

  • ''Billy and the Boingers Bootleg'' ( 1987 )

  • ''Tales Too Ticklish to Tell'' ( 1988 )

  • ''Night of the Mary Kay Commandos'' ( 1989 )

  • ''Happy Trails!'' ( 1990 )



Anthologies

  • ''Bloom County Babylon: Five Years of Basic Naughtiness'' ( 1986 )

  • ''Classics of Western Literature'' ( 1990 )


None of these reprints contain complete runs of the strip. Many Sunday strips have never been reprinted. All of the daily strips were reprinted in Comics Revue magazine.


External links