Guardian dumps Steve Bell after 40 years

[ajsmith2]

Dunno if this is maybe more of a Shelf Abuse or Gen Bullshit topic, but anyway:

https://bleedingcool.com/comics/guardian-newspaper-drops-cartoonist-steve-bell-after-40-years/

[madhair60]

Bell end

[Lisa Jesusandmarychain]

That cartoon of Priti Patel was not his brightest idea.
I think they would have got rid of him , anyway. He was commanding a six figure salary for drawing Boris Johnson with a bum for a face, and the Guardian haven't got a pot to piss in atm. Am very surprised they've not introduced a paywall by now, fair play to 'em for that in a way, really.

[NoSleep]

Before If... there was Maggie's Farm in Time Out and then City Limits, which was brilliant.

[Lisa Jesusandmarychain]

Also, " Gremlins" in Jackpot comic.

[Petey Pate]

I think they would have got rid of him , anyway. He was commanding a six figure salary for drawing Boris Johnson with a bum for a face, and the Guardian haven't got a pot to piss in atm.

I think Private Eye revealed a while ago that "Matt" of the Daily Telegraph is paper's highest paid member of staff, though unlike Bell, his cartoons are poorly drawn and not funny.

[Absorb the anus burn]

His cartoons have been so out of tune with the centrist (and conformist) nature of The Guardian that I'm surprised he lasted the last five years...[nb] His portrayal of Sir Eric Armrest as the PM's butler was surely the last straw for this this sorry mess of a newspaper.[/nb]

[Ignatius_S]

That cartoon of Priti Patel was not his brightest idea.
I think they would have got rid of him , anyway. He was commanding a six figure salary for drawing Boris Johnson with a bum for a face, and the Guardian haven't got a pot to piss in atm. Am very surprised they've not introduced a paywall by now, fair play to 'em for that in a way, really.

There was a dispute between Bell and the editor, over a cartoon they wouldn't publish, which be became public a while ago - think something like two years ago. Since then, iirc, there was another one that they spiked. When the first dispute became so public, I thought it was likely a matter of time before he left.

Re: Guardian finances - I think it was last year that they made a (slight) profit in years - the reader contribution has meant to have been pretty successful.

[idunnosomename]

❤ Simon Hedges liked

I think Private Eye revealed a while ago that "Matt" of the Daily Telegraph is paper's highest paid member of staff, though unlike Bell, his cartoons are poorly drawn and not funny.

[Lisa Jesusandmarychain]

❤ Simon Hedges liked

That "joke" doesn't make any sense. " Italian debt follows you round the room" , indeed. What the fuck's that supposed to mean? Load of old bollocks.

[Zetetic]

Re: Guardian finances - I think it was last year that they made a (slight) profit in years - the reader contribution has meant to have been pretty successful.

Touched on in this thread a bit:
https://www.cookdandbombd.co.uk/forums/index.php/topic,81515.0.html

Hard not to read the cutting as a choice rather than something forced upon them.

[dissolute ocelot]

His penguins were cute. But ultimately his role in the thing was come for the underpants, stay for Jonathan Freedland. And these days it takes a lot more than a drawing of David Cameron in fetishwear to bring them in.

[poodlefaker]

Martin Rowson's cartoons are a hundred times worse than Bell's.

[Brundle-Fly]

It was Steven Appleby's strips I could never quite get. Baffling stuff some of it.

[seepage]

^ Oh God, I'd forgotten those

[Ambient Sheep]

He was commanding a six figure salary...

A "high 6-figure salary", at that.

I mean the guy's pretty good, but going on for a million quid a year?!

They should have done a Vordermann on him, offered him 10% of what he's currently on now (which would still be at least double the average UK salary) with a "take it or leave it".

The fact that they didn't do this leads me to infer that Viner was never a fan.

[Ambient Sheep]

It was Steven Appleby's strips I could never quite get. Baffling stuff some of it.

Oh God, yes.

I don't think my brain has ever quite recovered from those baffling strips he did for NME in the late 80s(?) that, amongst other things, featured a race of space aliens that were basically walking talking arses.  Hairy arses, at that.

That makes it sound far more fun than it was, btw.  I'm not sure that even poo would have approved.


Fake EDIT: Just did some Googling, seems they even made a kids' cartoon series out of it ten years later, ffs.  Presumably they left out the talking buttock creatures.

Ironically it looks ever-so-slightly more fun to me now than it did 30-35 years ago, but still... meh.  Sorry Steven, not my thing.

[idunnosomename]

I liked Steven Appleby, I have retained his Happy Families stocking filler book over the years.

Captain Star was made by Cosgrove Hall for CITV and didn't really work. I remember Small Birds Singing in the weekend Times as a kid and putting some in a scrapbook because I thought it was charmingly bonkers.

[Jockice]

Are they going to bring back Varoomshka then?

[Ferris]

I think Private Eye revealed a while ago that "Matt" of the Daily Telegraph is paper's highest paid member of staff, though unlike Bell, his cartoons are poorly drawn and not funny.

According to a quick google, he's on 650,000 GBP per year and the paper bought him a rectory and gave him an interest free mortgage for a holiday home.

...for that.

[Virgo76]

That "joke" doesn't make any sense. " Italian debt follows you round the room" , indeed. What the fuck's that supposed to mean? Load of old bollocks.

In fairness, I don't think trying to analyse a joke like that is ever going to work is it?
Boring facts: Matt is the grandson of writer V.S. Pritchett.  The author and screenwriter Alex Garland is also the son of the retired Telegraph cartoonist, Nicholas Garland.

The Guardian's recovery has been halted by the lockdown. They are in trouble again now.

[poodlefaker]

Matt manages to smuggle a cock and balls onto the face of every person in his cartoons, and still those squares in the Telegraph boardroom haven't noticed. He's sitting in his rectory laughing at them.

[Cuellar]

According to a quick google, he's on 650,000 GBP per year and the paper bought him a rectory and gave him an interest free mortgage for a holiday home.

...for that.

Matt does it again!!

[Consignia]

The latest If... strips are about Johnson and his subservient butler, Keeves.



Can't see how that's at all incompatible with the Graun's editorial line.

[boki]

Matt manages to smuggle a cock and balls onto the face of every person in his cartoons, and still those squares in the Telegraph boardroom haven't noticed. He's sitting in his rectory laughing at them.

Doing the Lord's work takes on many forms.

[idunnosomename]

Im obsessed with the cock n balls revelation



Every face looks like a little cock with a big ol ballsack. Every one

[Twonty Gostelow]

The latest If... strips are about Johnson and his subservient butler, Keeves.



Can't see how that's at all incompatible with the Graun's editorial line.

He hardly ever made me laugh and If... always looks too ugly to me. The stupid lower case i amongst all upper case doesn't help. (And it's lady's maid. </twatpedant>)
A good artist though, and plenty of people say I'm wrong.

[Consignia]

I wasn't a huge fan of If..., but I've found it sporadically funny over the years. You can get long chains with boring crap though, and jokes which make a single comic decent, stretched over weeks.

[idunnosomename]

Somehow his David Cameron with a condom on his head just annoyed me

Not to mention his BUSH IS AMONKEY LOL which was the precursor to the ORANGE MAN BAD liberal satire hellhole of today

[NoSleep]

(And it's lady's maid. </twatpedant>)

Only if there's one lady downstairs.