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Non Sequitur (comic strip)
Encyclopedia
Non Sequitur is a comic strip
created by Wiley Miller
(usually credited as just Wiley) in 1992
and syndicated by Universal Press Syndicate
to over 700 newspaper
s. The strip can be found online at gocomics.com, and it is also available via email and on mobile phones.
Translated from Latin
as "it does not follow
", Non Sequitur is often political
and satirical
, though other times, purely comedic
.
The strip has undergone many changes through its history. Originally, the comic was a single panel gag cartoon, similar to Gary Larson
's The Far Side
. It grew more political (from a moderately liberal
perspective) in tone during the 1990s, to the point where it often became a borderline editorial cartoon
. Today, the comic has become more traditional, with a multi-panel format and recurring characters. The horizontal daily strip
sometimes displays only a
single panel.
Non Sequitur has been honored with four National Cartoonists Society
Awards, including the Newspaper Panel Cartoon Award for 1995, 1996 and 1998, and the Newspaper Panels Award for 2002. It is the only comic strip to win in its first year of syndication and the only title to ever win both the best comic strip and best comic panel categories.
girl with a pessimistic view of the world (but not of herself), often employed in the strip for satirical purposes. First appearing in the strip in 1998 with her sister Kate and parents (it can be assumed that this was set before their divorce), she is the most famous character of the strip and frequently its leading character.
to Danae in how their personalities and view of the world differ. Her appearances became smaller with the creation of Lucy, who started acting as Danae's straight man.
program "NoozTube", often frustrated by how mass media treats him, and used by the strip to comment on the media. As the cast of characters grew and merged together, he became the often-bewildered father of Danae and Kate. His name may be a reference to the confrontational conservative talk show host, Joe Pyne
, but is equally likely to be a tribute to beloved World War II
correspondent
Ernie Pyle
; Joe thus represents the love-and-hate relationship many mainstream Americans have with the media. In his early appearances, Joe looked much like former President George H. W. Bush
, whose family has a home in Maine.
His ex-wife and Danae and Kate's mother, Jennifer Pyle, is not seen
and seldom referred to. She is said to have run off with a biker while the family was on a trip to New Hampshire
.
. Miller commented, "I created a series of characters that came from our visits to Maine. "Offshore" Flo is patterned after the Maine Diner
in Wells
. I wanted to capture the essence of Maine people's genuineness—down-to-earth, good-natured people—and work in the accent... It's set in Whatchacallit, Maine." Flo often can be seen with a coffee maker's pot in her hand, though her diner also serves liquor, which is the source of Captain Eddie's tall tales.
.
y boy in Danae's class who has a crush on her. In Non Sequitur Sunday Color Treasury, the author describes how he was inspired by a reader to create the character.
s of his boating expeditions, usually involving giant lobsters or aliens, to anyone who will listen in Flo's coffee shop. The irony of course, is that many of these tales often have (more than) a grain of truth to them.
. The Graevsytes also appeared in Danae's Halloween
series in October and November 2002. In the Non Sequitur Sunday Color Treasury, Wiley Miller
said he decided to stop using them after some violent images came out of Iraq. However, he left the door open for future appearances, which happened on Sunday, October 1, 2006.
from the Friday the 13th films.
Clydesdale
who, like Hobbes
of Calvin and Hobbes
, plays the silent observer most of the time. Lucy was introduced in the July 11, 2003 strip, in a storyline that had Danae and Kate going to a summer horse riding camp. At the end of the summer, Danae became good friends with Lucy and took her home. Danae, and occasionally Kate, are the only ones who can talk to Lucy, and all three of them are fully aware that the conversations only take place in their imaginations.
s.
who can't stand the overly obvious or hypocritical. His symbol is the word "Duh" with a slash through it (No Duh!). Usually appears only on Sundays.
He has appeared being interviewed by Joe on his radio show. Obviousman's secret identity is Mark Cohen, a California realtor and amateur magician, who has taken on a mission in life of freeing the people from the curse of mindless obedience to the dictates of the mass media, and to at least slow, if not reverse, the dumbing down of America. His arch-nemesis is Professor Obfuscate.
In the book Non Sequitur's Sunday Color Treasury, Miller stated that he named Obviousman's true identity after a friend who had died of cancer in 1999. The real Mark Cohen
was a realtor and an avid collector of comics and original comic book art. Miller explained, "This was my way of memorializing him. He was dearly loved throughout our profession as a great ambassador of comics as an art form."
An animated short, Obviousman: The Movie, can currently be found on the Non Sequitur website. Wiley Miller voices Obviousman.
who takes a journey to the cloud city of Helios. Story ran on Sundays from February 20 to July 24, 2005. Another story began on September 9, 2007 with a Sunday strip "The Return of Ordinary Basil" reviewing events thus far appearing on September 2 and concluded on January 6, 2008.
), a medieval peasant, a cavewoman, and a female immigrant. Homer was developed into a spin-off
strip called Homer the Reluctant Soul, which Wiley attempted to market online, and featured in a book by the same title.
) is a French Canadian
who hates "ze" cold and finds himself at odds with very clever (and very hungry) polar bears.
) often appears in the strip to delegate hellish punishments, such as watching reality shows.
, a major newspaper in the Muslim
-majority country of Malaysia, as part of its weekday line of comic strips. The comic, however, generated controversy in the country and its government following the paper's printing of the syndicated strip satirizing the protests over the controversial Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons
on February 20, 2006. The cartoon depicts a street-side cartoonist
offering caricature
s of Muhammad
"while you wait" with a caption stating that the cartoonist has finally realized his goal of being the most feared man in the world.
The New Straits Times subsequently issued an apology. Wiley Miller commented on Malaysia's response of the strip, stating in a February 1, 2007 interview that it is "much ado about nothing."
Comic strip
A comic strip is a sequence of drawings arranged in interrelated panels to display brief humor or form a narrative, often serialized, with text in balloons and captions....
created by Wiley Miller
Wiley Miller
David Wiley Miller , an American cartoonist whose work is characterized by wry wit and trenchant social satire, is best known for his comic strip Non Sequitur, which he signs Wiley...
(usually credited as just Wiley) in 1992
1992 in comics
-Year overall:* Image Comics explodes onto the scene, releasing eight ongoing and limited series, starting with Youngblood in April; followed by Spawn in May; Savage Dragon in July; and Brigade, Shadowhawk, and WildC.A.T.S. in August....
and syndicated by Universal Press Syndicate
Universal Press Syndicate
Universal Press Syndicate, a subsidiary of Andrews McMeel Universal, is the world's largest independent press syndicate. It distributes lifestyle and opinion columns, comic strips and other content. Popular columns include Dear Abby, Ann Coulter, Roger Ebert and News of the Weird...
to over 700 newspaper
Newspaper
A newspaper is a scheduled publication containing news of current events, informative articles, diverse features and advertising. It usually is printed on relatively inexpensive, low-grade paper such as newsprint. By 2007, there were 6580 daily newspapers in the world selling 395 million copies a...
s. The strip can be found online at gocomics.com, and it is also available via email and on mobile phones.
Translated from Latin
Latin
Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and...
as "it does not follow
Non sequitur
Non sequitur is Latin for "it does not follow." It is most often used as a noun to describe illogical statements.Non sequitur may refer to:* Non sequitur , an irrelevant, often humorous comment to a preceding topic or statement....
", Non Sequitur is often political
Politics
Politics is a process by which groups of people make collective decisions. The term is generally applied to the art or science of running governmental or state affairs, including behavior within civil governments, but also applies to institutions, fields, and special interest groups such as the...
and satirical
Satire
Satire is primarily a literary genre or form, although in practice it can also be found in the graphic and performing arts. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement...
, though other times, purely comedic
Comedy
Comedy , as a popular meaning, is any humorous discourse or work generally intended to amuse by creating laughter, especially in television, film, and stand-up comedy. This must be carefully distinguished from its academic definition, namely the comic theatre, whose Western origins are found in...
.
The strip has undergone many changes through its history. Originally, the comic was a single panel gag cartoon, similar to Gary Larson
Gary Larson
Gary Larson is the creator of The Far Side, a single-panel cartoon series that was syndicated internationally to newspapers for 15 years. The series ended with Larson's retirement on January 1, 1995. His 23 books of collected cartoons have combined sales of more than 45 million...
's The Far Side
The Far Side
The Far Side is a popular single-panel comic created by Gary Larson and syndicated by Universal Press Syndicate, which ran from January 1, 1980, to January 1, 1995. Its surrealistic humor is often based on uncomfortable social situations, improbable events, an anthropomorphic view of the world,...
. It grew more political (from a moderately liberal
Liberalism
Liberalism is the belief in the importance of liberty and equal rights. Liberals espouse a wide array of views depending on their understanding of these principles, but generally, liberals support ideas such as constitutionalism, liberal democracy, free and fair elections, human rights,...
perspective) in tone during the 1990s, to the point where it often became a borderline editorial cartoon
Editorial cartoon
An editorial cartoon, also known as a political cartoon, is an illustration containing a commentary that usually relates to current events or personalities....
. Today, the comic has become more traditional, with a multi-panel format and recurring characters. The horizontal daily strip
Daily strip
A daily strip is a newspaper comic strip format, appearing on weekdays, Monday through Saturday, as contrasted with a Sunday strip, which typically only appears on Sundays....
sometimes displays only a
single panel.
Non Sequitur has been honored with four National Cartoonists Society
National Cartoonists Society
The National Cartoonists Society is an organization of professional cartoonists in the United States. It presents the National Cartoonists Society Awards. The Society was born in 1946 when groups of cartoonists got together to entertain the troops...
Awards, including the Newspaper Panel Cartoon Award for 1995, 1996 and 1998, and the Newspaper Panels Award for 2002. It is the only comic strip to win in its first year of syndication and the only title to ever win both the best comic strip and best comic panel categories.
The Pyles
Originally Danae, Joe and "Offshore" Flo were separate characters in their own segments but their storylines were eventually fused and they were billed as being family. Joe and his daughters moved to his native New England to live near his mother following his divorce and withdrawal from major media outlets.Danae
Danae Pyle is a pre-adolescentAdolescence
Adolescence is a transitional stage of physical and mental human development generally occurring between puberty and legal adulthood , but largely characterized as beginning and ending with the teenage stage...
girl with a pessimistic view of the world (but not of herself), often employed in the strip for satirical purposes. First appearing in the strip in 1998 with her sister Kate and parents (it can be assumed that this was set before their divorce), she is the most famous character of the strip and frequently its leading character.
Kate
Kate Pyle is the more optimistic sister of Danae. Often used as a foilFoil (literature)
In fiction, a foil is a character who contrasts with another character in order to highlight particular qualities of another character....
to Danae in how their personalities and view of the world differ. Her appearances became smaller with the creation of Lucy, who started acting as Danae's straight man.
Joe
Joseph "Joe" Pyle is an unemployed former host of the talk radioTalk radio
Talk radio is a radio format containing discussion about topical issues. Most shows are regularly hosted by a single individual, and often feature interviews with a number of different guests. Talk radio typically includes an element of listener participation, usually by broadcasting live...
program "NoozTube", often frustrated by how mass media treats him, and used by the strip to comment on the media. As the cast of characters grew and merged together, he became the often-bewildered father of Danae and Kate. His name may be a reference to the confrontational conservative talk show host, Joe Pyne
Joe Pyne
Joe Pyne was an American radio and television talk show host, who pioneered the confrontational style in which the host advocates a viewpoint and argues with guests and audience members...
, but is equally likely to be a tribute to beloved World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
correspondent
Correspondent
A correspondent or on-the-scene reporter is a journalist or commentator, or more general speaking, an agent who contributes reports to a newspaper, or radio or television news, or another type of company, from a remote, often distant, location. A foreign correspondent is stationed in a foreign...
Ernie Pyle
Ernie Pyle
Ernest Taylor Pyle was an American journalist who wrote as a roving correspondent for the Scripps Howard newspaper chain from 1935 until his death in combat during World War II. He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1944...
; Joe thus represents the love-and-hate relationship many mainstream Americans have with the media. In his early appearances, Joe looked much like former President George H. W. Bush
George H. W. Bush
George Herbert Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 41st President of the United States . He had previously served as the 43rd Vice President of the United States , a congressman, an ambassador, and Director of Central Intelligence.Bush was born in Milton, Massachusetts, to...
, whose family has a home in Maine.
His ex-wife and Danae and Kate's mother, Jennifer Pyle, is not seen
Unseen character
In fiction, an unseen character is a character that is never directly observed by the audience but is only described by other characters. They are a common device in drama and have been called "triumphs of theatrical invention". They are continuing characters — characters who are currently in...
and seldom referred to. She is said to have run off with a biker while the family was on a trip to New Hampshire
New Hampshire
New Hampshire is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. The state was named after the southern English county of Hampshire. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Atlantic Ocean to the east, and the Canadian...
.
Flo
Florence "Flo" Pyle is Joe's mother and owns Flo's Offshore Diner in Whatchacallit, MaineMaine
Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...
. Miller commented, "I created a series of characters that came from our visits to Maine. "Offshore" Flo is patterned after the Maine Diner
Maine Diner
The Maine Diner is a diner in Wells, Maine. It serves breakfast, lunch, and dinner.The diner, which has a seating capacity of 90 and a year-round staff of about 60, serves an average of 1,200 to 1,500 patrons on a good summer day. The restaurant is known for its seafood chowder and lobster pie and...
in Wells
Wells, Maine
Wells is a town in York County, Maine, United States. Founded in 1643, it is the third-oldest town in Maine. The population was 9,400 at the 2000 census. Wells Beach is a popular summer destination.-History:...
. I wanted to capture the essence of Maine people's genuineness—down-to-earth, good-natured people—and work in the accent... It's set in Whatchacallit, Maine." Flo often can be seen with a coffee maker's pot in her hand, though her diner also serves liquor, which is the source of Captain Eddie's tall tales.
Bob
Robert "Bob" Pyle is Joe's brother, often seen having a drink with him at a bar. He often tries to convince Joe to take a hold of get-rich-quick professions or become a cable news show host. According to the strip of January 15, 2003, he is an attorney, and in the strips of May 28-29, 2007, it is indicated he has a practice and has spent twenty years representing personal injury cases. He is single and avoids relationships with women. He vaguely resembles cartoon likenesses of Richard M. Nixon from the years when Nixon was president.Uncle Reginald
Uncle Reginald Pyle is the ghost of an alcoholic elderly relative haunting Joe's house. Sometimes the reader is given a glimpse into an alternate world (perhaps the past as well) where Reginald is still alive. In this reality he lives with his brother Montgomery "Monty" Pyle in a large, Victorian mansion with numerous servants including Smithers, the butler. Danae, Kate and Flo are well acquainted with Reginald, but Joe refuses to believe he exists in ghost form.Brenda
Brenda Santa Fe runs Brenda's Clam Hut and is a frequent visitor of Flo's Offshore Diner (possibly since her restaurant does not run into the night hours, like a diner does). She can frequently be seen in the latter as a customer while Captain Eddie tells his stories. She has a crush on Joe, but after Joe showed little interest, she ran off with another man. She sometimes wore a sweatshirt displaying the letters "KPT", a common abbreviation for Kennebunkport, MaineKennebunkport, Maine
Kennebunkport is a town in York County, Maine, United States. The population was 3,720 at the 2000 census. It is part of the Portland–South Portland–Biddeford metropolitan statistical area....
.
Victoria
Victoria Santa Fe is Brenda's older sister. She is much more brash than Brenda, and originally showed less interest in Joe. They began dating eventually, however, and Joe's family frequently urged him to propose to her. She works at Brenda's Clam Hut. On the last day of 2009 she appeared with a "pre-marriage agreement questionnaire" for Joe. Flo says she did not know they were dating much less engaged, and Joe responds "Neither did I." Over the next three weeks Joe successfully answers all the question and they become engaged. On January 18, 2010, Danae finds out they are engaged.Jeffrey
Jeffrey is a fairly nerdNerd
Nerd is a derogatory slang term for an intelligent but socially awkward and obsessive person who spends time on unpopular or obscure pursuits, to the exclusion of more mainstream activities. Nerds are considered to be awkward, shy, and unattractive...
y boy in Danae's class who has a crush on her. In Non Sequitur Sunday Color Treasury, the author describes how he was inspired by a reader to create the character.
Lars
Lars is a Martian who appeared, beginning on May 2, 2009, in a series of strips that involved Jeffrey building a spaceship and going on an expedition to Mars. Lars acted as a helper in building the spaceship and a guide on Mars. Before Lars' appearance, Danae came along to see Jeffrey building the spaceship—consequently making her appear in the rest of the story.Captain Eddie
Captain Eddie is a commercial fisherman from Maine (with the associated accent) who continually tells tall taleTall tale
A tall tale is a story with unbelievable elements, related as if it were true and factual. Some such stories are exaggerations of actual events, for example fish stories such as, "that fish was so big, why I tell ya', it nearly sank the boat when I pulled it in!" Other tall tales are completely...
s of his boating expeditions, usually involving giant lobsters or aliens, to anyone who will listen in Flo's coffee shop. The irony of course, is that many of these tales often have (more than) a grain of truth to them.
The Graevsytes
Introduced on September 8, 2002, the Graevsytes bear similarities to The Addams FamilyThe Addams Family
The Addams Family is a group of fictional characters created by American cartoonist Charles Addams. As named by Charles Addams, the Addams Family characters include Gomez, Morticia, Uncle Fester, Lurch, Grandmama, Wednesday, Pugsley, and Thing....
. The Graevsytes also appeared in Danae's Halloween
Halloween
Hallowe'en , also known as Halloween or All Hallows' Eve, is a yearly holiday observed around the world on October 31, the night before All Saints' Day...
series in October and November 2002. In the Non Sequitur Sunday Color Treasury, Wiley Miller
Wiley Miller
David Wiley Miller , an American cartoonist whose work is characterized by wry wit and trenchant social satire, is best known for his comic strip Non Sequitur, which he signs Wiley...
said he decided to stop using them after some violent images came out of Iraq. However, he left the door open for future appearances, which happened on Sunday, October 1, 2006.
Horace
Horace Graevsyte, the father, carries his head on a plate (he seems to be a ghost of a decapitated man).Boyle
Boyle Graevsyte, a teenage boy, bears some resemblance to Jason VoorheesJason Voorhees
Jason Voorhees is a fictional character from the Friday the 13th series of slasher films. He first appeared in Friday the 13th , as the son of camp cook-turned-murderer, Mrs. Voorhees, in which he was portrayed by Ari Lehman. Created by Victor Miller, with contributions by Ron Kurz, Sean S...
from the Friday the 13th films.
Lucy
Lucy is a talking pygmyPygmy
Pygmy is a term used for various ethnic groups worldwide whose average height is unusually short; anthropologists define pygmy as any group whose adult men grow to less than 150 cm in average height. A member of a slightly taller group is termed "pygmoid." The best known pygmies are the Aka,...
Clydesdale
Clydesdale (breed)
The Clydesdale is a breed of draught horse derived from the farm horses of Clydesdale, Scotland, and named after that region. Although originally one of the smaller breeds of draught horses, it is now a tall breed. Often bay in colour, they show significant white markings due to the presence of...
who, like Hobbes
Hobbes (Calvin and Hobbes)
Hobbes is a character in the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes by Bill Watterson. He is Calvin's stuffed tiger, and is depicted with two distinct identities.-Hobbes Personality:...
of Calvin and Hobbes
Calvin and Hobbes
Calvin and Hobbes is a syndicated daily comic strip that was written and illustrated by American cartoonist Bill Watterson, and syndicated from November 18, 1985, to December 31, 1995. It follows the humorous antics of Calvin, a precocious and adventurous six-year-old boy, and Hobbes, his...
, plays the silent observer most of the time. Lucy was introduced in the July 11, 2003 strip, in a storyline that had Danae and Kate going to a summer horse riding camp. At the end of the summer, Danae became good friends with Lucy and took her home. Danae, and occasionally Kate, are the only ones who can talk to Lucy, and all three of them are fully aware that the conversations only take place in their imaginations.
Petey
Petey is dog of humble origins who has found his way into Kate's ownership. He can also talk to Danae and Kate. He constantly lets Rölf get him in trouble.Rölf
Rölf is Brenda's dog and Petey's friend. The size of his muzzle far exceeds his brain's. He's also a symbol of the strip and can be seen in the cover Non Sequitur's Beastly Things. Rölf has also appeared in a short-lived series in Non Sequitur called B.E.Paulie
Paulie is Captain Eddie's cat who is always with Eddie, accompanying him on his various fictional adventures, and usually sits on his shoulder, in place of the usual parrot accompanying a pirate.Other recurring characters
The majority of these characters only or mostly appear in Sunday stripSunday strip
A Sunday strip is a newspaper comic strip format, where comic strips are printed in the Sunday newspaper, usually in a special section called the Sunday comics, and virtually always in color. Some readers called these sections the Sunday funnies...
s.
Obviousman
Obviousman is a superheroSuperhero
A superhero is a type of stock character, possessing "extraordinary or superhuman powers", dedicated to protecting the public. Since the debut of the prototypical superhero Superman in 1938, stories of superheroes — ranging from brief episodic adventures to continuing years-long sagas —...
who can't stand the overly obvious or hypocritical. His symbol is the word "Duh" with a slash through it (No Duh!). Usually appears only on Sundays.
He has appeared being interviewed by Joe on his radio show. Obviousman's secret identity is Mark Cohen, a California realtor and amateur magician, who has taken on a mission in life of freeing the people from the curse of mindless obedience to the dictates of the mass media, and to at least slow, if not reverse, the dumbing down of America. His arch-nemesis is Professor Obfuscate.
In the book Non Sequitur's Sunday Color Treasury, Miller stated that he named Obviousman's true identity after a friend who had died of cancer in 1999. The real Mark Cohen
Mark J. Cohen
Mark J. Cohen was a realtor and a collector of comic books and comic book art, and a prominent cartoonists' agent and dealer in original comics art. He was an occasional contributor to the Gasoline Alley comic strip....
was a realtor and an avid collector of comics and original comic book art. Miller explained, "This was my way of memorializing him. He was dearly loved throughout our profession as a great ambassador of comics as an art form."
An animated short, Obviousman: The Movie, can currently be found on the Non Sequitur website. Wiley Miller voices Obviousman.
Ordinary Basil
Ordinary Basil is a boy at the dawn of the Industrial RevolutionIndustrial Revolution
The Industrial Revolution was a period from the 18th to the 19th century where major changes in agriculture, manufacturing, mining, transportation, and technology had a profound effect on the social, economic and cultural conditions of the times...
who takes a journey to the cloud city of Helios. Story ran on Sundays from February 20 to July 24, 2005. Another story began on September 9, 2007 with a Sunday strip "The Return of Ordinary Basil" reviewing events thus far appearing on September 2 and concluded on January 6, 2008.
Ele
Ele (Extinction Level Event) is a cynical cat-like creature who lives in the time before man. Appearing in Sunday strips only, she has appeared in two major runs—one from 2000 up to July 2001, and one in early 2006.Homer
Homer, called Honor in his female incarnations, is a departed soul who aside from dealing with living in the afterlife has to deal with real life whenever he returns to earth. He has been an ancient Roman (who barely escaped PompeiiPompeii
The city of Pompeii is a partially buried Roman town-city near modern Naples in the Italian region of Campania, in the territory of the comune of Pompei. Along with Herculaneum, Pompeii was destroyed and completely buried during a long catastrophic eruption of the volcano Mount Vesuvius spanning...
), a medieval peasant, a cavewoman, and a female immigrant. Homer was developed into a spin-off
Spin-off (media)
In media, a spin-off is a radio program, television program, video game, or any narrative work, derived from one or more already existing works, that focuses, in particular, in more detail on one aspect of that original work...
strip called Homer the Reluctant Soul, which Wiley attempted to market online, and featured in a book by the same title.
Pierre of the North
Pierre of the North (a play off of Nanook of the NorthNanook of the North
Nanook of the North is a 1922 silent documentary film by Robert J. Flaherty. In the tradition of what would later be called salvage ethnography, Flaherty captured the struggles of the Inuk Nanook and his family in the Canadian arctic...
) is a French Canadian
French Canadian
French Canadian or Francophone Canadian, , generally refers to the descendents of French colonists who arrived in New France in the 17th and 18th centuries...
who hates "ze" cold and finds himself at odds with very clever (and very hungry) polar bears.
Lucifer
Lucifer (that is, SatanSatan
Satan , "the opposer", is the title of various entities, both human and divine, who challenge the faith of humans in the Hebrew Bible...
) often appears in the strip to delegate hellish punishments, such as watching reality shows.
St. Peter
St. Peter guards the gates of heaven and has interacted with numerous characters including Captain Eddie.The bulldog
In numerous strips that deal with the home life of upper middle-aged couples, a pet bulldog with exaggerated fangs can be seen.Books
- The Non Sequitur Survival Guide for the Nineties (1995) ISBN 0-8362-1785-3
- Non Sequitur’s Beastly Things (1999) ISBN 0-7407-0016-2
- The Legal Lampoon: a biased, unfair and completely accurate law review (2002) ISBN 0-7407-2673-0
- Why We'll Never Understand Each Other: A Non-Sequitur Look At Relationships (2003) ISBN 0-7407-3387-7
- Lucy and Danae : Something Silly This Way Comes (March 1, 2005) ISBN 0-7407-5099-2
- Non Sequitur's Sunday Color Treasury (2005) ISBN 0-7407-5448-3
New Straits Times controversy
Non Sequitur was published in the New Straits TimesNew Straits Times
The New Straits Times is an English-language newspaper published in Malaysia. It is Malaysia's oldest newspaper still in print , having been founded as The Straits Times in 1845, and was reestablished as the "New Straits Times" in 1965. The paper served as Malaysia's only broadsheet format English...
, a major newspaper in the Muslim
Muslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
-majority country of Malaysia, as part of its weekday line of comic strips. The comic, however, generated controversy in the country and its government following the paper's printing of the syndicated strip satirizing the protests over the controversial Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons
Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy
The Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy began after 12 editorial cartoons, most of which depicted the Islamic prophet Muhammad, were published in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten on 30 September 2005...
on February 20, 2006. The cartoon depicts a street-side cartoonist
Cartoonist
A cartoonist is a person who specializes in drawing cartoons. This work is usually humorous, mainly created for entertainment, political commentary or advertising...
offering caricature
Caricature
A caricature is a portrait that exaggerates or distorts the essence of a person or thing to create an easily identifiable visual likeness. In literature, a caricature is a description of a person using exaggeration of some characteristics and oversimplification of others.Caricatures can be...
s of Muhammad
Muhammad
Muhammad |ligature]] at U+FDF4 ;Arabic pronunciation varies regionally; the first vowel ranges from ~~; the second and the last vowel: ~~~. There are dialects which have no stress. In Egypt, it is pronounced not in religious contexts...
"while you wait" with a caption stating that the cartoonist has finally realized his goal of being the most feared man in the world.
The New Straits Times subsequently issued an apology. Wiley Miller commented on Malaysia's response of the strip, stating in a February 1, 2007 interview that it is "much ado about nothing."