The Mandalorian and Grogu and Storytelling

Karen and I saw "The Mandalorian and Grogu" a couple of days ago. I don't usually review movies, but this one inspired me to share some thoughts on storytelling.

We agreed that the movie was fine. Glad we saw it. A friend told me ahead of time that it felt like two TV episodes stitched together, and I wouldn't be surprised if that's literally what it is: Mando and Grogu go on one adventure for the first hour of the film, then go on a second adventure for the second hour. It has aliens and spaceships and explosions, so if you like that stuff you'll have a good time.

The question that occurred to me walking out of the theater was, "What was it about?"

The best stories have text and subtext. There's a plot, and then there's a deeper story that's often the reason we care about the plot. 

For example, "The Wizard of Oz" is about a kid on the verge of adulthood who yearns to leave her dull ordinary life and, with the help of colorful and sometimes magical companions, overcomes obstacles to earn her place in the larger world. That's also what the first "Star Wars" movie and many Disney Princess movies (Cinderella, Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Mulan, Moana) are about. Different texts; similar subtexts.

I have no idea what "The Mandalorian and Grogu" is about. Nothing, as far as I could tell. Mando and Grogu make a fun team and are devoted to each other, but we already knew that. Grogu is adorable but we already knew that, too. Neither character grows or changes, we don't learn anything new about them. They are assigned a mission--which they have no personal stakes in--complete the mission, and the movie's over. 

Not every movie has to have deep meaning. I can appreciate a "summer popcorn flick" and, as far as it goes, "Mandalorian and Grogu" is a fine enough one. But if you ever walk out of a movie wondering why it felt flat or empty in a way you can't quite put your finger on, ask yourself that question: "What was it about?" If nothing comes to mind, you have your answer.

Squirrel Ahoy

Squirrel! 

For years, I've said that I'd know our neighborhood had recovered from our 2017 firestorm when I finally saw a squirrel in my yard. Squirrels require infrastructure: decent-size trees, stuff to eat, places to hide from predators. Barren land doesn't offer them much, but a suburban maze of fences and mature foliage is a squirrel paradise.

Today, 3,158 days after the fire, we saw a squirrel run along our backyard fence. So I guess we're all good now. Right?

(Photo is not of the squirrel we saw--it scampered away too fast--but it looked just like it.) 

250 Words on Practical Education

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

I took the usual mix of science, math, art, English, and history classes in school, some of them excellent. But as I look back, it may have been two electives that made the largest lasting difference in my life.

I studied electronics in seventh grade. The class covered everything from wiring a doorbell to acid-etching our own copper circuit boards. I learned how electricity works, and to respect but not fear it. 

As a result, I've always been adept at light electrical work: changing a switch or outlet, rewiring a lamp, soldering a splice, popping a new fuse into an appliance. I don’t mess with 220 volts, but I have a practical grasp of electricity that has served me well. 

I also took typing in summer school following my sophomore year of high school. I didn’t want to dedicate an entire quarter to it, but thought I’d see what I could learn in six weeks. I'll always remember typing a slow cadence in time to Elton John’s “Benny and the Jets.”

That class got me through a lot of papers in college and may have landed me my first job afterward. I suspect one reason I was hired to write for a newspaper was that I was a fast and accurate typist. Learning touch-typing changed my life.

As academically inclined as I was, I’ve always supported education in the trades and basic life skills. A diploma should certify that you have the tools to launch in whatever direction you choose. 

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250 Words on Outliving Mom

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

As of today, I have lived longer than my mother did. From now on, I will be older than she ever was.

The math checks out, but emotionally it’s impossible. Mom was a responsible grown-up adult! A bedrock wellspring of wisdom and wit! Meanwhile, I’m still pretending I know what I’m doing and making it up as I go.

Psychologists have studied the milestone. In lineages with genetic traits—I know a family in which nearly every male had a heart attack around age 60—surpassing a parent’s age can feel like cheating death or living on borrowed time. It can change your approach to risk-taking and life itself. 

My family doesn’t fit that sort of pattern, so my reaction's different. I feel more like an ancient mariner who has sailed off the edge of the map. Until today, Mom’s life always provided a subconscious polestar. Even when our courses diverged, I always knew where hers was, and measured my distance and direction against it. Now I navigate uncharted waters. “Here there be dragons!”

I wish Mom had had more time. She missed much in the past couple of decades, and now that I’m the age she was when she died, I know she wasn’t any more ready to go than I am. That makes the milestone a melancholy one.

But she prepared me well. It’s my turn to set course and sail, still making it up as I go. Second star to the right and straight on ‘til morning. 

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250 Words on Burning Out and Fading Away

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

“It’s better to burn out, than to fade away. My my, hey hey.” —Neil Young, born in 1945.

There’s an idea baked into rock and roll—a refrain, if you will—celebrating the idea that growing up is the worst thing that can happen to you. Better to go out in a blaze of glory like Jim Morrison, Janis Joplin, Sid Vicious or Kurt Cobain, a tragic Peter Pan, than to be wheeled on stage wheezing your greatest hits when you’re over the hill. As James Dean said, “Live fast, die young, and leave a beautiful corpse.”

Which sounds dramatic and romantic until you grow up and still want to make a living.

“Hope I die before I get old,” sang The Who’s Pete Townsend, born in 1945. Sorry, Pete.

“I’d rather be dead than sing ‘Satisfaction’ when I’m 45,” said Mick Jagger, born in 1943. He said that in 1975. The Rolling Stones toured in 2024. Guess what their encore was.

John Lennon had a different perspective.

“I hate it,” Lennon said. “It’s better to fade away like an old soldier than to burn out… Making Sid Vicious a hero, Jim Morrison—it’s garbage to me. I worship the people who survived. Sid Vicious died for what? So that we might rock? No thank you! I’ll take the living and the healthy.” Sadly, John didn’t get to grow old. 

As someone who hopes to tell stories and get better at it until I’m ancient, I’m biased toward Lennon’s take.

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Schulz Event Report

 

Shot by Karen from the back of the museum's intimate theater while I talked about the original Mom's Cancer webcomic.

I think my Mom's Cancer: Anniversary Edition book talk and signing at the Charles M. Schulz Museum yesterday went very well, and folks who attended seemed to agree.

About three dozen people came, just about the size museum staff and I anticipated, with both friends and strangers in the mix. It's a weird collision of worlds having cartooning friends, old high school friends, Facebook friends, long-time social friends, neighbors and family gathered in the same room but I'm grateful to them all--maybe especially to those who didn't know me at all but came anyway! They asked good questions at the end and then bought enough books to make Leo from Copperfield's Books glad he came. 

Speaking from behind a lectern that has Charles Schulz's name on it never gets old.

Signing books for folks out in the museum's Great Hall. Copperfield's had copies of all of my books on hand, which is rare and greatly appreciated. I didn't really clock that I'd been seated directly beneath the gaze of Charles Schulz until the friend who took this photo, Mike Harkins, pointed it out to me. That' ain't bad, either.

Many thanks to Copperfield's and everyone at the Schulz Museum, who know how to run a good event and always make me feel very welcome (including sending me home with an unexpected bag of swag)! It all made for a great day.

Signing at the Schulz

Friends! I'm giving a talk and signing books at 2 p.m. next Saturday, May 16, at the Charles M. Schulz Museum in Santa Rosa, Calif., and I hope you'll come! Over the years the Schulz Museum has been like a second home to me--I've done a ton of events as a cartoonist and been a charter member since it opened--and Jeannie, Gina, Jessica, and other management and staff have always been supportive and terrific. I love the place!

I'll be talking about the Mom's Cancer: Anniversary Edition in the museum's theater at 2 o'clock, then signing books provided by heroic local independent bookseller Copperfield's in the Great Hall as long as they'll let me. The talk is free with admission, and the museum itself is worth a visit if you have any interest in comics and "Peanuts." 

This is the final public book event currently on my calendar (I do have some radio and podcast stuff coming up and will keep you posted). It'd mean a lot to see you there! 

Roadrunners Beware!

On our morning walk through the neighborhood this morning, Karen and I encountered a coyote boldly trotting down the middle of the street. It wasn't a complete surprise--neighbors have spotted it (or maybe a pair of them) before--but it was our first sighting. We suspect it was heading from an open field (good rodent hunting!) to a nearby creek.  

Interestingly, it was being loudly harassed by two crows who dive-bombed and chased it down the street. I wonder whether the coyote killed a crow; they are smart birds with long memories, and they definitely perceived it as a threat. 

250 Words on Living on the Edge

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

“Innovation occurs at the intersection of things,” wrote Eben Bayer in A Brief History of the Future. “The greatest opportunities are in chaos. There is a maximum opportunity to change everything.”

Bayer captured an idea I’ve heard called “The Fisherman’s Credo”: you’ll find the most fish where water conditions change. Fast to slow, shallow to deep, warm to cold. Life thrives along the boundary where drastically different environments collide. 

I think it’s especially true in science and the arts. Someone who can meld ideas that have never been combined, or make connections nobody has ever made, is onto something good. 

That’s one reason I’m ambivalent about young cartoonists going to school and paying good money just to learn cartooning, or journalists just to learn journalism, or business majors just to learn business. I can see the practical value. But I wonder if there’s more value in nurturing some unrelated interest or passion and then bringing that to your cartooning, journalism, or business. 

In my case, my education and former work in science is the secret sauce that flavors everything I do and helps my creative work stand out. I know other cartoonists who are physicians, nurses, attorneys, archaeologists. Nobody else could make the comics they do, and I think that’s the goal: developing a unique voice. Telling stories only you can.

Working the seam where different ideas clash doesn’t guarantee success, but it almost always yields something interesting and worthwhile. Whatever makes you distinctive and weird also makes you valuable. 

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Potpourri

The game show "Jeopardy" has a category called "Potpourri" that is a catch-all for random answers. This is a Potpourri Post of questions.

1. Because we live in Earthquake Country, Karen and I have an app that alerts us when an earthquake is imminent (based on the fact that sending phone messages at the speed of light is faster than the speed of seismic waves through the Earth). In fact, we were both awakened by an alert at 2:42 a.m. last night. 

My question: why is it always the middle of the night? There's no geological explanation, but the odds of me being jolted out of bed by my phone screeching at me like a trumpet of doom are greater than random chance would suggest. 

BTW, we never felt the quake, which was a 4.6 some distance away.

2. Karen and I recently took a flight and had trouble getting the "TSA Pre-Check" notation to show up on her boarding pass. After a call to a helpful (really!) TSA representative, we learned that Karen had made a typo in her Known Traveler Number. Once corrected, we had no trouble.

But she'd been using that wrong number for years! Flying all over the place, back and forth across the country, using an incorrect Known Traveler Number that, until now, always granted her access to the Pre-Check line. 

My question: how safe should I feel flying our friendly skies knowing that apparently any random combination of letters and numbers has a good chance of speeding you through airport security?

I'll take Potpourri for $600, Alex.

250 Words on Homegrown Food

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

When I was 9, my grandparents took my sister and me to visit friends of theirs in Phoenix, Arizona as part of a month-long swing through the western states. One morning they let us pick grapefruit and oranges from trees in their yard. Then they halved the grapefruit, squeezed the oranges into juice, and put them on the table for breakfast.

Although I’d eaten apples off a tree and tomatoes and strawberries from a garden, this was a thunderclap of culinary novelty! An entire meal, harvested for free, “farm to table.” Wow!

I’ve always gotten tremendous satisfaction from growing my own food. Oh, not much of it. Karen and I aren’t farmers living off the land. We have a small suburban yard with a smaller raised planting bed, but every season we fill it with basil and tomatoes to produce enough green pesto and red pasta sauce to last the rest of the year.

We’ve tried other crops: squash, beans, peppers. They’ve been hit and miss for us—usually miss. Tomatoes and basil are reliable and versatile.

You also have to account for what the neighbors are cultivating. We never need to grow zucchini or lemons because we can count on friends begging us to relieve them of their burden. It’s a nice hyper-local barter economy.

There is nothing like sitting down to dinner and saying, “This meal was in our garden this morning.” It tastes better, must be healthier, and feels like the way food should really be prepared.

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250 Words on Being Too Good to Ignore

[I try to start my day writing 250 words on anything. I’ll post one every Tuesday until I run out of good ones.]

My two favorite books about writing and creativity are On Writing by Stephen King and Born Standing Up by Steve Martin. In particular, Martin had some advice that hit hard and stuck with me: “Be so good they can’t ignore you.”

Yes.

When I was young I thought I really wanted to draw superhero comics (a career that holds no appeal to me today). I kept looking at artists I considered the worst working for DC and Marvel and thinking, “I’m better than them, they should hire me instead!” 

That attitude is common among aspiring creators, but in retrospect its ignorance and arrogance is embarrassing. First, I can see now that I really wasn’t better than those artists. Second, those artists had 30-year track records producing professional-grade work on deadline, while I had none. Third, I was an idiot to set my sights so low.

Don’t aim to be better than the worst. Aim to be better than the best. 

But that’s so daunting! You could never be as good as Jack Kirby or Neal Adams or Charles Schulz (or Stephen King or Steve Martin)! Impossible!

But you can work hard and do your best and fall short because you’re right, you’ll never be better than the best. But maybe you’ve made yourself better than 90 percent of your competition instead of 1 percent of it. Maybe now you’re so good they can’t ignore you, and even if they can’t hire you today, I guarantee they will remember you later. 

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Speaking at Stanford Med School

Bryant Lin and I before the class started.

I had a terrific time at Stanford University yesterday, talking about Mom's Cancer with a class of mostly medical students at the invitation of Dr. Bryant Lin. 

The class is a speakers series on the broad topic of narrative medicine. Bryant is in the unique position of being both a narrative medicine practitioner--his book Sunshine: An Exploration of Living When You Are Dying, will be published by Penguin Random House later this year--and, as that title hints, a husband and father with Stage Four lung cancer. Bryant is incorporating his diagnosis and treatment into his medical school curriculum. He is his own case study. That's a crazy kind of brave that only a great teacher would attempt.

It was a small class, about 14 students. I love lecturing to medical students because they're all smart, confident, and eager to perform well (having gotten straight A's most of their lives), so they play along with silly workshop exercises that, by the end of the class, have them drawing their own four-panel graphic medicine comic. A few of them really lit up, and I'm often surprised by how thoughtful and touching some of their work is considering that an hour earlier they'd never tried to make a comic. 

I've been a guest lecturer for this class a few years in a row. As I was leaving, Bryant said he was sorry he'd forgotten to bring his copy of The Last Mechanical Monster for me to sign. I replied, "I'll be back next year--and so will you." "Thanks," he said quietly. "That's the plan."

My opening slide, showing the sketch that inspired me to tell our family's story in the form of a comic and later because a page in Mom's Cancer. Photo by the class T.A., Cyril Sebastian.