Robot 6
From a dusty corner of comics history comes the ’90s comic book TV series Bob
After being largely forgotten for the past 19 years, CBS is releasing the comics-related oddity show Bob on DVD. Starring comedian Bob Newhart, the show explored the real-life oddities of working in the comic industry in a tongue-in-cheek manner. Newhart played a veteran comics creator who was bringing back his 1950s super-hero Mad Dog after being canceled in light of the Comics Code and Wertham-era investigations on comics.
During its two-season run in the early 1990s, it was looked at by comics readers as a potential bright spot in a fallow time for comics on TV screens. It’s comedy circled around the idea that publishers wanted Newhart’s character to revive the jovial Mad Dog as a dark vigilante in the vein of Watchmen or The Dark Knight Returns,with a compromise being reached to resume publication but the simmering tension going on as the series progressed.
Although comics fans initially hoped the series would be a bright light in the fallow dearth of comics-to-TV hits in the early 90s, the retro-stylings of the show seemed out of place with the current tastes of comics fans. The series is notable for having a bustling amount of comic creators as guest stars, including Jack Kirby as seen here:
While Christmas is almost a year away, I wouldn’t be surprised if this ended up in more than a few stockings of comic book fans. The DVD collection is due in April.
6 Comments
Kiel Phegley
January 19, 2012 at 12:34 pm
If my internet-addled brain is remembering correctly, Mark Evanier did some writing for this show, which may explain the Kirby appearance.
My particular favorite part of this whole thing was the tie-in comic Marvel produced. It was a flipbook where one side was a ’50s style cornball superhero comic done by Ty Templeton while the other half was a more ’90s-esque modern story of the character. I think the latter was actually written by Evan Dorkin, so I wonder now whether that was as much a parody as the Templeton stuff, but it’s been years since I’ve read those.
Sean
January 19, 2012 at 12:45 pm
Yes the first season was about a comic creator but then it got changed to a greeting card company worker
Wayne
January 19, 2012 at 1:20 pm
Fairly funny premiere show, where Bob is talking to the slick new publisher. He gets his first sight of the new Mad Dog and is appalled.
Bob: Where’s his little pal Buddy (Mad Dog’s kid sidekick)? And… what’s that bloody rag he’s holding?
Harlan, the Producer (Grinning): That’s his little pal Buddy!
El Santo
January 19, 2012 at 1:25 pm
I’ve said it on another site, and I’ll say it here: EEEeeeeeEEEeeeEEEEEeEEeE!!!
Seriously, this and Darkwing Duck is what introduced me to comic books when I was a young El Santo.
sandwich eater
January 20, 2012 at 8:02 am
Why have I never heard of this before? Although, I suppose that back when this show aired I was more interested in the the excellent superhero cartoons of the era than a live action show about comics creators.
Bill Reed
January 25, 2012 at 1:00 pm
Anyone else remember Marvel’s Mad Dog series? A flipbook with the ‘classic’ version by Ty Templeton and the ‘modern 90s’ version by whoever the hell.