Summary

  • Watterson's Calvin and Hobbes explores childhood complexities - from playful moments to serious reflections on mortality and grief.
  • Reflecting societal changes, a 1994 comic strip featuring a bomb joke now carries darker connotations in the era of school violence.
  • While maintaining a whimsical tone, the comic dives into deep topics like death and war, presenting a nuanced view of childhood and growing up.

Bill Watterson's his stuffed tiger Hobbes. While Calvin and Hobbes is as family-friendly as contemporaries like Garfield and The Family Circus, it goes further in exploring the trials and tribulations of childhood, digging into what it feels like to be an excitable, curious kid running up against the adult world. However, in one 1994 strip, that realistic depiction takes a dark turn.

Published April 9, 1994, this Calvin and Hobbes strip just turned 30, with the fact that it would never be published today showing how much society has changed in that short time. In the strip, Calvin calls up the library, trying to get his hands on a bomb-making manual. The joke is that Calvin is just a little kid who thinks explosions are cool and doesn't understand why that information wouldn't be readily accessible. Sadly, in the modern day, a kid looking up bomb-making instructions has connotations that Watterson couldn't have been aware of.

calvin and hobbes inappropriate comic

While school violence has long been a topic of concern in the US, the late 1990s saw it become a near-constant national discussion. Events like 1999's Columbine High School shooting combined with a 24-hour news cycle to sow very specific fears regarding kids' safety. Watterson's comic isn't deliberately engaging with that discussion, but in 2024, it's hard to experience the strip outside the context of school shootings.

Calvin and Hobbes cross a tree bridge, with Bill Watterson art in the background in grayscale.
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Calvin and Hobbes tackled the subjects of death and war on multiple occasions, most famously with the iconic 'Dead Bird' comic where Calvin and Hobbes reflect on mortality.

Calvin and Hobbes' Bomb Comic Is an Artifact of the '90s

Calvin and Hobbes Was Surprisingly Willing to Discuss Mortality

Calvin and Hobbes doesn't shy away from many of the complexities of childhood, but the strip tends to focus on Calvin's internal struggles rather than external factors - his childhood is idyllic in practical , and challenges come in the form of his growing awareness of the world around him and his lack of understanding of apparently important topics. To this end, Calvin and Hobbes tackled the subjects of death and war on multiple occasions, most famously with the iconic 'Dead Bird' comic where Calvin and Hobbes reflect on mortality.

Watterson also penned a week-long story in which Calvin attempts to save an injured raccoon, only for the animal to away. Readers see Calvin deal with grief, realize that his parents are powerless in the face of some problems, and briefly reckon with the idea that if the raccoon can despite his best efforts, his other loved ones might as well, perhaps even including his tiger friend. While the comic includes plenty of strips where Calvin charges around with a ray gun or builds snowmen in violent poses, the vast majority of its references to death of any kind take the subject seriously, mainly focusing on Calvin's growing appreciation of this very adult topic.

Calvin and Hobbes is far from a saccharine comic that treats childhood as a bed of roses, but Bill Watterson couldn't have foreseen how dark this 1994 strip would seem from the perspective of just a few years later.