17 Comments

1. 

   Electric cars are seen as a great corporate investment opportunity, as shown by Tesla’s stellar stock market valuation. It isn’t clear that a company producing clown cars would do as well.

   I think we have to acknowledge that Russian nesting dolls, clown cars, and big sneezes are just not such great competitors. Let’s add Pinocchio to the team, making it Death 7, Russian Clown Gesundheit Pinocchio 4.

   My money is still on Death.

2. 

   He had an opportunity to get in on electric cars early, but passed it up in favor of clown cars, which randomly appealed to him more.

3. 

   Why not let Pinocchio join #TeamRussianClownGesundheit, to make more of a contest out of this? The same way a baseball team might add a player after the season’s begun.

4. 

   I agree with B.A., but at the same time I would also drop Russian Dolls and Gesundheit from the team (for non-performance). Call it “Team Pinocchio Clown Car”.
   P.S. None of this matters anyway. We all know that in the end, Death will win.

5. 

   How about we swap out “gesundheit” for Pinocchio?

6. 

   “P.S. None of this matters anyway. We all know that in the end, Death will win.”

   How morbid!

7. 

   Perhaps, larK, but surely the Line of the Day.

8. 

   I just thought I’d point out that I thought the hearse was fairly well-drawn.

   I always get a kick out of seeing them in comics.

9. 

   @ Bill – If it’s a trade, I’d hang on to “Gesundheit!” and drop the “Matruschkas” (the latter being simply too many mouths to feed, and they don’t do anything for the health of the team).

10. 

    I think the comments about the clown car investment are correct, but I’m still a little CIDUed. Why couldn’t the CEO be ‘focused’ and ‘driven’ when going after them? He picked the wrong horse to back, ok, but he could still have worked hard on this investment.

11. 

    Unless the clue is in ‘looked’. He based his judgement on the way the two cars looked, rather than making any real effort into ‘looking’ into it.

    Yea, that’s probably it. Never mind. Sorry.

12. 

    I think the Beetle Bailey needs a few more guys to make the joke work.

13. 

    @ B.A. – I agree (who has ever seen a clown car with only four clowns?), but those four virtually exhaust the entire complement of recognizable privates in the strip. Sarge would not have the authority to send an officer on this mission.

14. 

    Kilby, why would they have to be recognizable cast members? There must be other privates on the base, so just draw some random clowns.

15. 

    They don’t have to be regulars, but part of the fun in these four examples is the comparison to what each character normally looks like: witness Killer’s disgust with his predicament, compared to Zero’s total obliviousness, and of course Beetle’s afro wig, which replaces his eye-covering helmet. Extending the lineup horizontally would just have added “generic” clowns, without this kind of duality (and would have resulted in shrinking all the characters to fit in the panel). Adding a second (or third) rank behind these four (again, with such “generic” clowns) could have heightened the joke in the way you wanted, but it would have been much harder to draw (and may have made the panel too “busy”).

16. 

    Kilby, the generic clowns could have been standing behind them, sketchily drawn to signify they weren’t important other than to swell the ranks (therefore not being much work for the artist, and not making the panel busier).

17. 

    I’m not sure you actually do want more Beetle Bailey clowns. They are actually supposed to fit in one normal-sized car, and Beetle is just joking about the really tiny car.

    But if you do, there are more characters available. Rocky and Cosmo are perfectly legitimate regular characters, even if not seen as frequently as the other four privates. If needed, Julius, Corporal Yo, and Chip Gizmo could also be pressed into service.