#308: If You're Going to Sell a Hat to a Narwhal...
There is an unwritten law of cartooning that says if you have a character that’s an octopus, it must have a top hat. You might remember Nickelodeon’s Oswald, or Orful from the old Laff-a-Lympics, or more recently the logo from Tapas. It’s not a hard rule, bc Squidward from Sponge Bob Squarepants only occasionally wore a top hat, but he might be the exception that proves the rule. Quick Google research bears out 2 things: (1) there is a surprising amount of literature online about the use of the octopus in editorial cartoons for propaganda purposes, dating back to the Russo-Turkish War in 1877 - and now culminating in The Inscrutables #308; and (2) there is a long list of octopus sidekicks and secondary characters in Western popular culture, but there aren’t any truly great octopus cartoon heroes/protagonists, which feels like an opportunity for Artie to come up with a new franchise character. Anyway the reason for the prevalence of the top hat on these characters is no mystery. They need something to decorate their giant round heads. (This is why Spider-Man nemesis Doctor Octopus doesn’t count - he has a normal-sized head.) So Artie has a little more material for his UW summer course curriculum, which will now include a full week on the ‘Law of Top Hats for Comic Octopi’, delving into octopus motifs on late 19th Century political propaganda maps from Northern Europe to South-East Asia, in which octopods in enemy regimentals approach land masses from the sea with menacing looks and tentacles reaching, only somewhat undermined by the cute little top hats perched on their heads. This one, #308, isn’t very political, or menacing, & comes without a caption so I’m not really sure what it means. Other than Artie says it’s an illustration of the old adage that ‘If you’re going to sell a hat to a narwhal, you better make it a top hat’. That adage is about 5 minutes old bc Artie just made it up. I think he just got tired of trying to come up with a caption, and he had a deadline to meet. But happy to hear suggestions... -Ed.
#russoturkishwarof1877
