Tuesday | June 18, 2013
MOST EMAILED
CAUGHT ON FILM
@HuJintao #AndThePITAWinnerIs
President Hu Jintao addresses the American public on China Central Television after his country was named The World's Foremost Pain In The Ass.
FROM THE VAULT
June 16, 2010
Backlash As Helen Thomas Tells Stray To Backlash As Helen Thomas Tells Stray To "Go Home"
Fake Advertisement

NEWSPAPERS

'Cathy' Comic Strip Fans Decry 'Piranha 3D' Tie-In

'Cathy' Comic Strip Fans Decry 'Piranha 3D' Tie-In
A preview of a couple panels from the final 'Cathy' comic strip

LOS ANGELES (CAP) - In what some fans are calling an ill-advised collaboration, the popular Cathy comic strip will come to an end after 34 years with the funny page's most popular neurotic singleton being eaten alive by prehistoric piranhas.

The plotline is a tie-in with the Dimension Films movie Piranha 3D, which is slated to be released on DVD to coincide with the last Cathy strip this October.

"Cathy finally finds a bathing suit that she doesn't think makes her look fat, and the first time she wears it in public she's eaten by piranhas," explained Jon Garson, managing editor of the Universal Press Syndicate, which distributes Cathy. "Get it? It's ironic."

Although the syndicate and Cathy creator Cathy Guisewite are rumored to be pocketing more than $1 million each from Dimension Films in exchange for the Piranha tie-in, many fans of the strip are crying foul.

"It's completely unrealistic," said Sharon Fensworth, president of the Official Cathy Fan Club since 1998. "Cathy would never find a bathing suit she doesn't think makes her look fat."

At her Los Angeles studio, Guisewite previewed the final panel, in which Cathy emits one last trademark "ACK!" as the deadly piranhas pull her under the surface.

"It's a Sunday [strip], so you'll be able to see the blood bubbling up under the water," noted a clearly haggard Guisewite, who some say accepted the Piranha deal because of heavy debts she incurred during years of compulsive gambling and drug abuse. If true, it's a history she shares with many other troubled comic strip artists, like admitted heroin addict Lynn Johnston (For Better or For Worse) and Ernie Bushmiller (Nancy), who infamously died in 1982 when his transvestite lover's nitrous oxide tank exploded in a back room at Manhattan's Studio 54.

As for the controversy over the Cathy ending, it hearkens back to the uproar in 2005 when Cathy finally married her on-again, off-again boyfriend Irving, which prompted the strip's single, overweight female fan base to take to the streets by the thousands, burning effigy Irvings and chanting "Stupid Irving's Not Deserving!"

Several of them even took to looting, breaking the windows to a Chicago Lane Bryant store and running off with more than a dozen pairs of size 28 knit leggings.

Garson, of Universal Press, admitted that some fans might have a problem with the Cathy ending, but he did note that prior to eating Cathy, the piranhas also disembowel Irving in graphic detail.

"Now, that's a concept I can get behind," said fan club president Fensworth. "Stupid Irving."

Meanwhile, if nothing else, the unorthodox ending will make comics history, said comic strip historian Sol Friedberg of the Museum of Comic and Cartoon Art, in that it will be the first Cathy strip not to feature Cathy feeling guilty about eating a donut, or getting an annoying phone call from her mother.

- CAP News Staff
[COMMENT]
MORE showbiz NEWS
Rolex Submariner
bobswatches.com
Fake Advertisement

SponsoredTweets referral badge

  • Banner Stands
    » Browse banner stands by Post-Up Stand. Trade Show Displays, Retractable Banner Displays, and more. High quality, 48 hour turnaround time!
  • Advertise Here
    » Do you have a product or service of interest to CAP News fans? Contact us now for rates and availability!
ALL MATERIAL IS

SATIRE

AND ©2005-2013 BY CRYSTAL AIR PRODUCTIONS
Kanye West has canceled the release of his new album and pulled all existing copies in the wake of the birth of his daughter. "Oh my God, have you heard those lyrics I wrote?" he said. "I'm a dad now. I can't be all rapping about breasts 'n shit anymore." «» Parental advisory groups are up in arms over the naming of the new One Direction sports drink, simply called OD. "Other than their obvious lack of originality, it's the slogan we don't like," said Mothers Against Everything. "Have You OD'ed Today? isn't exactly the message we should be sending children." «» The battle between Rush Limbaugh and WABC heated up as the radio station blamed low ad revenues on Rush's sobriety. "Nobody gives a crap about his politics anymore," said a source. "What they want to hear is the crazy-ass shit he says when he's all hopped up on prescription drugs." «» Celebrity drunk Mel Gibson has come to the defense of Reese Witherspoon after the actress was charged with disorderly conduct during her husband's DUI stop. "That dyke didn't even use a single racial epithet," Gibson noted. "So the Jew media had better just leave that Episcopalian bimbo the hell alone!" «» Singer Carrie Underwood is facing vandalism charges today after digging her key into the side of a vehicle owned by Academy of Country Music chairwoman Sarah Trahern and slashing a hole in all four tires. "And maybe next time she'll think before she picks Entertainer Of The Year," Underwood said. «» President Obama has announced that Hispanics will be the next ethnic group unfairly targeted with racial profiling by federal law enforcement agencies. "We've done a pretty good number on Muslims over the past decade," Obama said. "I think it's time America took on a new challenge and broadened our horizons." «» With the recent flight of its fifth manned space mission, China is poised to become the first nation to successfully launch a fully operational orbiting forced labor camp. Astronauts on board the country's space station module will spend two years testing the effects of weightlessness on human rights abuses. «» New data released from the leaked NSA telephone surveillance tapes reveals that Americans are ordering out for pizza at an alarming rate yet not calling their mothers nearly as much as they should. However, hour-long conversations with fathers explaining how to open a Word document remain at an all-time high. «» A new study finds that teenagers who regularly use a baby pacifier are 95% less likely to become bullies than those who don't. The positive results come on the heels of Michelle Obama's new Binkies For Bullies program that aims to reduce incidents of bullying by turning perpetrators into targets. «» The Pentagon is accusing Chinese cyberspies of hacking the Twitter accounts of thousands of teenage girls after a flurry of mean, vindictive tweets surfaced. "We knew no one would ever purposefully post such awful things about their own friends," said one official. "So we figured it had to be China." «»
Kanye West has canceled the release of his new album and pulled all existing copies in the wake of the birth of his daughter. "Oh my God, have you heard those lyrics I wrote?" he said. "I'm a dad now. I can't be all rapping about breasts 'n shit anymore." «» Parental advisory groups are up in arms over the naming of the new One Direction sports drink, simply called OD. "Other than their obvious lack of originality, it's the slogan we don't like," said Mothers Against Everything. "Have You OD'ed Today? isn't exactly the message we should be sending children." «» The battle between Rush Limbaugh and WABC heated up as the radio station blamed low ad revenues on Rush's sobriety. "Nobody gives a crap about his politics anymore," said a source. "What they want to hear is the crazy-ass shit he says when he's all hopped up on prescription drugs." «» Celebrity drunk Mel Gibson has come to the defense of Reese Witherspoon after the actress was charged with disorderly conduct during her husband's DUI stop. "That dyke didn't even use a single racial epithet," Gibson noted. "So the Jew media had better just leave that Episcopalian bimbo the hell alone!" «» Singer Carrie Underwood is facing vandalism charges today after digging her key into the side of a vehicle owned by Academy of Country Music chairwoman Sarah Trahern and slashing a hole in all four tires. "And maybe next time she'll think before she picks Entertainer Of The Year," Underwood said. «» President Obama has announced that Hispanics will be the next ethnic group unfairly targeted with racial profiling by federal law enforcement agencies. "We've done a pretty good number on Muslims over the past decade," Obama said. "I think it's time America took on a new challenge and broadened our horizons." «» With the recent flight of its fifth manned space mission, China is poised to become the first nation to successfully launch a fully operational orbiting forced labor camp. Astronauts on board the country's space station module will spend two years testing the effects of weightlessness on human rights abuses. «» New data released from the leaked NSA telephone surveillance tapes reveals that Americans are ordering out for pizza at an alarming rate yet not calling their mothers nearly as much as they should. However, hour-long conversations with fathers explaining how to open a Word document remain at an all-time high. «» A new study finds that teenagers who regularly use a baby pacifier are 95% less likely to become bullies than those who don't. The positive results come on the heels of Michelle Obama's new Binkies For Bullies program that aims to reduce incidents of bullying by turning perpetrators into targets. «» The Pentagon is accusing Chinese cyberspies of hacking the Twitter accounts of thousands of teenage girls after a flurry of mean, vindictive tweets surfaced. "We knew no one would ever purposefully post such awful things about their own friends," said one official. "So we figured it had to be China." «»