Who Here Loved the CATHY Comic Strip?

I loved Andy Samburg as Cathy. Does that count?

AAACK!!!

Sorry, OP, but no. I am not going to read comic strips with reader comments. Just. Isn't. Going. To. Happen.

I found it tedious and too hung up on weight. Unfunny, too.

CHOCOLATE!

CHOCOLATE!

CHOCOLATE!

AACK!

I remember the arc where she dated a younger man, who was all ready to go to the gym at midnight, when Cathy just wanted to sleep.

And then they went camping...

These might be reruns -- I recall it ended with Cathy getting pregnant...

You call THAT overeating?

As a lesbian I looked down on ditzy, flaky, man-crazy and food-obsessed Cathy, although now looking back I realize she was a nice person.

Frau comic strip.

The only Cathy I liked were Cathy and Kathy from Kids in the Hall

I liked it. A lot of the strips were right on the mark when it came to a single woman's life. But It thought it totally copped out by having Cathy get married and get pregnant. I guess a lot of fans of the strip thought it was the perfect happy ending, but I thought it was a "jump the shark" way of ending the strip. Marriage and a baby; you can't get much more jump the shark than that.

I stick with Apartment 3-G myself.

I'm a Mary Worth gal -- I mean guy.

Cathy got married a couple of years before the strip ended. I think that was where it jumped the shark. It had to be difficult for Guisewite the creator as she aged (she's in her 60s now) to keep putting forth comics about the perpetually 30 something Cathy, when she was so closely linked to the character and was clearly a long way from 30 (and thin, and married with a child). Also Guisewite was such a boomer and the strip was so boomer oriented that her talking about a single woman in her 30s in the 2000s didn't seem particularly authentic.

I read Cathy every day and up till the late 90s it was funny. In the 80s it was VERY funny. I recall laughing out loud at the library reading her very early stuff. I don't know why they never put her stuff from the 70s in books. True the art was absolutely horrible in them, Guisewite much improved her drawing ability as she went along, but they were among the best years.

[quote]Cathy got married a couple of years before the strip ended. I think that was where it jumped the shark.

I would say a bit early about 1998. The problem was whenever the creator put Cathy in a new situation it was very funny. But she kept returning Cathy to her parents and Irving and the same old office (after Cathy got rehired). Those situations and characters were funny once but were worn out. It was so wrong for Cathy to marry Irving.

There were so many excellent storylines earlier.

When her boss sexually harassed her and Cathy knocked him out and when the boss woke up instead of being mad (as she thought he'd be) he thought he had spent the night with her.

Early on when Emmerson pursued Cathy to her disdain.

Her boyfriend the personal trainer who was younger

Her boyfriend the doctor.

When she dated the old man, (I'm dating my grandfather!!!)

Her mother's school reunion was hysterical

Andrea's militant feminism

Later on when Andrea abandoned it to marry a man she hadn't met in a month.

When she bought her first computer

[quote]True the art was absolutely horrible in them, Guisewite much improved her drawing ability as she went along, but they were among the best years.

There was a "Zippy the Pinhead" strip where he was complaining about the other comics on the comics page and said, "And Cathy! It looks like she drops string on the floor and Xeroxes it!"

I've always wondered who was a fan of that comic.

I find most comics catering to the 'family values' crowd. None are edgy, or rarely would give me a smile, or an outright laugh. Yawn. . .

I bought some used Cathy compilations from the 70s online (sad, I know) and while the art was terrible, the content was much edgier. It dealt a lot more with Cathy (and Iriving's) sex life, as in, it was clear that both were quite sexually active and not just with one another. Mirroring the whole conservative boomer shift that occurred in the 80s, Cathy's love life became a lot more chaste, and the strip regressed to a sort of 1950s mentality with Cathy freaking out about her big date on Saturday night. Sex was hardly mentioned.

I laughed at the appearance of the "How Annoying" category link at the bottom of this thread more than I EVER laughed at "Cathy".

[quote]while the art was terrible, the content was much edgier. It dealt a lot more with Cathy (and Irving's) sex life, as in, it was clear that both were quite sexually active

That was most likely a result of everyone toning down sex due to the AIDS crisis.

Emmerson was much better than Irving, marrying Cathay off was the worst mistake evah.

I shared a two hour bus ride with Guisewhite once in the late 80s (long story). Nice lady, very funny, great conversation.

[quote] I shared a two hour bus ride with Guisewhite once in the late 80s

Oh, so you were on the M79 crosstown?

R16 Maybe people were just more innocent then and it was easier to get a laugh.

The frau-iest frau shit that's ever been frau'd

CATHY was the voice of a generation

I miss Cathy!

Thanks for the memories. I read Cathy religiously back in the day.

Brenda Starr was so much more glamorous. Cathy looked like a fire plug and made those guttural noises. Maybe all the chocolate didn’t agree with her since she didn’t actually have a digestive system.

Like the lesbian upthread, I looked down on Cathy. She reminded me of my mother’s friend Lisa who was perpetually single and self-deprecating and neurotic.

And, as the lesbian DLer says, I realize now that she was a nice person.

Cathy was a fag hag. They didn't show the cartoons of her hanging out a gay bars with her gay pal.

I really identified with her boyfriend Irving's struggles as a closeted gay man in a relationship with a woman he loathes.

It was definitely one of the strips I read regularly in the 80s. Not particularly brilliant, but LOL often enough to be in the top 10. The daily comics era ended for me with the demise of The Far Side and Calvin and Hobbes.

Pearls Before Swine meets Cathy. Pearls cartoonist Stephen Pastis had mocked other strips as well, most notable Family Circus

When I was a kid, I had a crush on Irving. I figured if he could like Cathy, somebody could like me.

Sad but true.