Hello, everybody.
This week’s comic features that heroic tech billionaire Lex Luthor as he must face the evil and woke Superman, an alien to our land and a threat to our pure bloodline (stay away from Lois, you filthy foreigner).
This has always been the way America has seen this, right?
Read this week’s Tom the Dancing Bug on GoComics HERE.
Read this week’s Tom the Dancing Bug on BoingBoing HERE.
Read this week’s Tom the Dancing Bug on DailyKos HERE.
Read this week’s Tom the Dancing Bug on The Contrarian HERE.
… Right?
Brought to you by the Inner Hive, including longtime member long-time member RobbÜry415 and new member Bill Schaffner.
And thanks to John Hudgens at Z-Team Productions for help in creating the Lex Luthor logo.
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As promised / threatened…
The sketch comedy troupe Please Don’t Destroy (SNL, Treasure of Foggy Mountain, Law & Order) just released a comedy special documenting their tour last summer, and it’s hilarious — I really recommend it.
In fact, on social media I dropped this nugget a couple of days ago:
And due to whelming popular demand, I’m presenting here that very photographic proof.
In Please Don’t Destroy’s preparation for this tour, they did a run-up show at a tiny venue in Brooklyn, Union Hall. And in that show, I played the role of “Martin’s Doctor,” a learned man of cunning skills.
Very proud that my interpretation of the character was honored by subsequent performers. Humbled.
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Just saying…
Hey, I’m told by Threadless that Tom the Dancing Bug t-shirts are currently on sale for $12.
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Pre-announcement announcement: NEW BOOKS COMING!
I’m burying the lede here, because the big news in the world of Tom the Dancing Bug is that the next two volumes in The Complete Tom the Dancing Bug program, and their pre-launch Kickstarter page, were announced by Clover Press yesterday!
I’ve never been involved in a Kickstarter before, so please be kind.
From the article in graphicpolicy.com:
Ruben Bolling’s groundbreaking and wildly popular comic strip Tom the Dancing Bug is a two-time Pulitzer Prize Finalist that has won multiple awards including the Herblock Prize, the Berryman Award, and a Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award. Now Clover Press is completing its eight-volume collection of definitive editions of the award-winning political humor comic strip with the release of two new volumes of Tom the Dancing Bug, which collect seminal strips originally published from 1990 to 1998. Fans can now follow the pre-launch page for the Kickstarter page to get an email when the project launches later this summer.
Just a year ago, in an article about Bolling, The New Yorker extolled the 1990s Tom the Dancing Bug comics that will comprise these two volumes: ”In the nineties, ‘Tom the Dancing Bug’ felt like a quietly thrilling revelation, beloved by many but never a household name. Bolling seemed to tease all of pop culture, much of human nature, and comics history at once, always with sensitivity and an eye for the subtly absurd.”
Blending a surreal sense of humor with razor-sharp political satire, Tom the Dancing Bug has delighted fans for decades, and Bolling’s work remains as vital and important as ever. Clover Press’s new collections will give readers a chance to see the strip and Bolling’s art evolve throughout the 1990s. Tom the Dancing Bug: Secret Origins collects Bolling’s early comic strips from 1990 to 1994, and Sex, Tom the Dancing Bug, & Rock ‘N’ Roll will collect Bolling’s strips from 1994 to 1998. In addition to the two 200+ page 8″ x 9″ books, the Kickstarter campaign will feature a collectible 11″ x 13″ lithograph print, a slipcase that will hold all 8 volumes of Clover Press’s Tom The Dancing Bug, t-shirts, and more to celebrate Bolling’s beloved dancing bug.
I can’t wait to see Volumes 1 and 2 join their brethren, Volumes 3 through 8!
You can buy these existing volumes right now, even as you read this sentence. Information is here.
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This week’s Classic Tom the Dancing Bug
This week’s Classic Tom the Dancing Bug (published on GoComics yesterday) features Hollingsworth Hound, in “Policies That Put Children on the Path to Lead” (from 2016).
For help with the pun in the comic’s title, I’ll note that a few years ago, I wrote a pedantic poem to help people with the proper spellings of lead/led:
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Super Fun x2
And the GoComics Super-Fun-Pak Comix page has recently featured comics from this installment (from 2022) …
… and also this 2022 installment.
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In conclusion
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NOW AVAILABLE FOR ORDER:
VOLUME 8 OF THE COMPLETE TOM THE DANCING BUG,
COLLECTING THE YEARS 2020-2023,
COVERING THE CRAZY 2020 ELECTION
AND THE INSANE AFTERMATH...
IT'S THE GREAT STORM, TOM THE DANCING BUG!
Clover Press's promotional copy for the book:
Clover Press’s Complete Tom the Dancing Bug program bursts forward with the eighth chronological volume, covering all of the most recent installments of the comic strip, a two-time Pulitzer Prize Finalist, from 2020-2023.
It’s the Great Storm, Tom the Dancing Bug! includes Bolling’s award-winning work covering the last year of the Trump presidency and the post-term MAGA insanity. All the favorite Tom the Dancing Bug characters try to make sense of the dark times of the early 2020s, including: the Smythe family of Chagrin Falls; Lucky Ducky, the poor little duck who’s rich in luck; and Billy Dare, boy adventurer. Also in the volume is Bolling’s comic contribution to “Weird Al” Yankovic’s hit graphic novel, The Illustrated Al.
Tom the Dancing Bug is the wildly popular, groundbreaking comic strip that has won multiple awards, including the Herblock Prize, the Berryman Award, and a Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award. Mark Hamill called it “wondrous, whimsical, and witty,” and Seth Meyers recently wrote, “The fact that Tom the bug can keep dancing in this day and age is a testament to Ruben Bolling’s skills as a cartoonist!”
Buy your SIGNED/SKETCHED/SWAGGED copy of It's the Great Storm, Tom the Dancing Bug, and you get:
Your copy of IT’S THE GREAT STORM, TOM THE DANCING BUG! signed/dated by me, and personalized if requested;
Your copy of IT’S THE GREAT STORM, TOM THE DANCING BUG! will have an illustration hand-drawn by me in it
A special authenticated (i.e. signed) It’s the Great Storm, Tom the Dancing Bug! bookmark;
A special It’s the Great Storm, Tom the Dancing Bug sticker (3.25″ x 4″)
An exclusive pdf booklet, The It’s the Great Storm, Tom the Dancing Bug, “Artist’s” Edition,
The option of purchasing another book from The Complete Tom the Dancing Bug Collection for only and extra $10, $20 or $30 (depending on volume), if you choose one of the GREAT STORM COMBOS
The 2024 Tom the Dancing Bug Annual pdf, containing every comic from the 2024, is available here.
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The Tom the Dancing Bug Review. Copyright 2025 Ruben Bolling.