Tales Too Ticklish to Tell: Bloom County

by Berkeley Breathed

Three hundred black-and-white and forty-four color strips bring fans up to date on current affairs in Bloom County: Opus dances in an all-female nightclub and discovers the social penalties for... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0316107352
• Release Date: January 1988
• Publisher: Little Brown & Co
• Length: 121 Pages
• Weight: 4.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 7.3" x 0.5" x 8.0"

Customer Reviews

Very possibly the best of the Bloom County collections.

This collection does a marvellous job of walking the fine line between the hilariously funny and the absurdly silly. Some of the other Bloom County collections fall off of that line and land in the absurdly silly zone; for the most part, this one avoids that flaw. A must for any fan of the collection, and a good place to start for someone who isn't familiar with it. Of course, anyone too young to remember the '80s may miss some of the then-topical political references (a murderous alien that looks like a cute, telegenic puppy testifying before congress a la Ollie North, for instance) but for the most part, even if the reference is unfamiliar to the reader, the humor is only reduced, not lost entirely.

Nostalgia so soon?

Bloom County was and still is one of my favorite strip comics ever. It was often topical, referring to presidents, sitcoms, and other Americana of its day. Such subjects, when they appear, give this comic a dated look, almost like watching the Marx Brothers. Most of the strips, however, are timeless. Opus' personality is as sweet and doofy as ever. Oliver Wendell Jones still gets in trouble, the kind no one has the heart to punish him for. Steve Dallas is still a jerk, the kind of jerk that I still find today. All the rest are still there, too, as good as they ever were. It's a funny mix, news from the 80s mixed with topics that work today, and it's still a funny strip. If, someohow, you missed the original run of Bloom County in the daily funnies, you'll find that it's never too late to catch up. Enjoy! //wiredweird

Humor and political insight unparalleled

Berke Breathed was one of those rare political cartoonists whose political insight was the same weight as his humor. "Bloom County" was his greatest vehicle. Some other cartoons have great political scope but just don't make you laugh out loud--"Doonesbury" and "Mallard Fillmore", particularly. While others fake political insight, but are very humorous. "Tales Too Ticklish to Tell: Bloom County" is as good as any of the other Bloom County anthologies, but it's the inclusion of a Bloom Picayune that makes this an extra treat, and serves as a reminder that this strip was special for its time. Boy, do I miss it.

The Way We Were, 1987 Edition...

In 1987, America's obsessions included the Iran-Contra affair, the NFL players' strike, the peculiar pecadilloes of televangelists and the effect they had on their "flocks," and the impending election of a new President from a crop of unlikely candidates. It is this America that Berke Breathed took a snapshot of, and is thus preserved for the ages within the pages of this, the sixth collection of Bloom County comic strips (covering late 1986 through virtually all of '87).The longest and best continuity contained in this book is the one in which the Meadow denizens find themselves completely brainwashed by Bill the Cat's new teleministry. Calling himself "Fundamentally Oral Bill," he manages to convince everyone of the true danger lurking in the shadows of America - "Penguin Lust!" Guess who *that* directly affects... Opus soon finds himself hounded completely out of town, the victim of a misguided religious fervor. The strip then follows Opus as he takes a job as a male stripper for Chippendales, meets up with various celebrities-of-the-moment, and finally ends up aimlessly wandering a vast creative wasteland, completely without direction or a script. ("Boy, do I feel like the Democratic party!", he utters at one point.) Eventually, though, all is forgiven, and he's welcomed back to the Boarding House.In other developments, Opus actually gets hitched to his girlfriend of a year's standing, Lola Granola... only to knock himself out cold on her face when leaning in for a post-nuptial kiss. (It's his nose, you see.) While unconscious, he envisions what life would be like after twenty years of marriage; it eventually ends with Lola leaving him for a rocket mechanic, and Opus left to raise their 23 test-tube babies. Needless to say, the first word out of his mouth when he comes to: "Annullment." Luckily for him, Lola was having second thoughts of her own, and so that storyline (begun in the previous book) is ended.Then, there's the strike... The Bloom County Players' Union, taking a stand against the increased size reduction of newspaper comic strips over the years, walks off the job in a direct swipe at the NFL's labor troubles of that year. In retaliation, W.A. Thornhump (President and CEO of Bloom County, Inc.) hires a "scab" replacement cast, with predictable results.The Iran-Contra hearings are also parodied, as Oliver makes contact with alien raiders who intend to harvest humans for slaves and food ("THEY AIN'T E.T.," scream the newspapers). The federal government retaliates the only way they know how - subponeas. Unfortunately for them, the aliens prove to be extremely telegenic puppy dogs, and public opinion soon overwhelmingly turns in their favor as a result. The representative depicted in these strips may just as well have been named "Lt. Col. Oliver North," because that's exactly who he's supposed to be talking like. Breathed's message is clear - with the right look and the right words, America can and will forgive just a

classic bloom county

This was the first bloom county book I ever read in introduced me to the world of bloom county. Ever since I read this I have wanted all the bloom county I can find. Berke Breathed is a genus and opus rocks