If you want to take a break from your back-to-school shopping, you could kill some time reading the most recent Bizarro gags with commentary from the cartoonist myself.
In my workspace, the fall/winter school term is already underway, and I’ve done my first Halloween cartoon for 2026.
Here’s an enigmatic clip from the seasonal gag mentioned above. I’ll be drawing some more spooky laffs in the coming days.
Our first “historic” image is just a few months old, and is the last of the rejected crash-test dummy gags. I can’t promise there won’t be any more in the future, but I’m tapped out for now.
Long before I started contributing to and working on Bizarro, King Features published a couple of my cartoons in The New Breed, a daily comic showcasing lesser-known cartoonists who showed promise in the eyes of Cartoon Editor Jay Kennedy.
Jay wrote 1982’s Official Underground & Newave Comix Price Guide, a book I studied regularly, so I was familiar with his name when he mail-ordered some of my self-published minicomix, and we soon began corresponding.
We met in person at the San Diego Comic-Con, where he generously offered to critique my work if I was interested. He had me write and draw gags formatted as a few weeks of daily comic strips—not as a syndicate submission, but as an exercise to get some professional feedback. Those strips were (deservedly) never published, but Jay then asked me to adapt some gags from my minicomix for The New Breed. His encouragement and honest, constructive advice gave me an immeasurable boost in confidence, and I was thrilled to see my work in print in a newspaper.
Countless colleagues can tell stories of Jay’s kindness and generosity. The cartoon community lost a friend and champion when he died in 2007, and later that year, King Features established the Jay Kennedy Memorial Scholarship Fund, "designed to acknowledge excellence among college-aged aspiring cartoonists". The scholarship is awarded yearly to a deserving student.
I’m among the many cartoonists who will be forever grateful for Jay Kennedy. Here’s a favorite quote from him :
In the fine arts, artists generally comment on the world only obliquely; and sadly, only those people who have the leisure to study art history can fully appreciate their comments. By contrast, cartoons are an art form accessible to all people. They can simply laugh at the jokes or look beyond them to see the artist’s view of the world. Cartoons are multi-leveled art accessible to everyone at whatever level they choose to enjoy.
I think Jay would be happy to see me partnered with Dan Piraro and creating the daily Bizarro comics.
Friday’s gag made for a tricky conversion to the strip format, but it’s my own fault for using three word balloons and a caption box. I tried stacking two balloons and the caption on the right-hand side, but decided to tuck the second balloon’s tail behind one of the characters. I rarely use this technique, but sometimes it’s the best option.
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I appreciate you consuming my content.1
All the best from your ink-monkey,
Wayno
1 I’d never actually say that phrase out loud. I use the words facetiously, but the sentiment is sincere.
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