Friday, March 26, 2010

John gets cranky in his strip

Click to enlarge.

6 comments:

DreadedCandiru2 said...

This sort of explains why he doesn't like sharing his toys, doesn't it? Simply put, here's a guy who was never ready for fatherhood who wound up being a parent despite himself.

Anonymous said...

Yep, that seems so very John Patterson.

Just like "All in all, I prefer scrubbing my house with a toothbrush to having young children" seems to sum up Elly Patterson to a tee.

How less annoyed and distracted the Pattersons' lives would have been if they had not succumbed to parental / relative-induced / societal / whatever (unexpectedly knocked up?) pressure (surely it was NOT an innate desire!!) to produce children!!

-- But,of course, like their creator Lynn, the Pattersons DID (and had to!) produce said annoying children, and thereby the inspiration for this comic-strip that shows little sense of balance, affection and depictions of unfeigned and warmhearted family love.

It often reads as if Lynn was inspired by a very active dislike (not merely her daily frustrations) of her kids in order to create this comic strip. How very sad for her kids. :(

April Patterson said...

Simply put, here's a guy who was never ready for fatherhood who wound up being a parent despite himself.

Of all the things he and Elly could have in common, it has to be that they both expect to be able to put their children on a shelf and have them stay there quietly unless/until the parent feels like interacting. Poor kids.

April Patterson said...

It often reads as if Lynn was inspired by a very active dislike (not merely her daily frustrations) of her kids in order to create this comic strip. How very sad for her kids. :(

I agree--there seems to be so little joy expressed when it comes to being a parent.

howard said...

You hit the point pretty well with this one. Ultimately, John's little outing with Mike will prove that John should have stayed in his chair reading the paper. We have one more strip in the sequence tomorrow, but somehow I doubt it's going to be John and Michael laughing at how funny their situation is. Most likely it will be John and the Super Vac smoking a cigarette.

The part we don't know after all these years is how good a dad Dr. Rod Johnston was. Lynn Johnston has made it pretty obvious what her opinion of Rod's poor parenting was like through John. However, Lynn also completely left out Rod's community activism when portraying Rod through John. Is it possible that she would have left out his being a good dad, or would she have embraced that aspect of him if it appeared?

April Patterson said...

Is it possible that she would have left out his being a good dad, or would she have embraced that aspect of him if it appeared?


It's hard to tell. I also wonder how differently Aaron and Kate experienced his parenting. I've always had the impression that Rod must have legally adopted Aaron, or else he would have been Aaron Franks instead of Aaron Johnston. I believe Aaron refers to Rod as his father, as opposed to his stepfather.

OTOH, this is the same guy who promised to "take on" Aaron if Lynn took on Lynn Lake. Kate accompanied Rod to California when his Riding Rails company was featured on an episode of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. For some reason, I can't imagine Aaron doing something like this. But of course, this is a bunch of conjecture.