Hey there, fam. Get ready, I’m shamelessly pushing real hard this week.
This week’s comic features Little Donald, the boy ex-president, and his imaginary publicist John:
A Calvinesque and Hobbesian look at 34 felon convictions
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.
Brought to you by the Inner Hive, including longtime member Levon500 and new member Apryl L.
This week I’m making a strong push to those of you who are not Inner Hive members:
WON’T YOU PLEASE CONSIDER JOINING THE TEAM THAT MAKES IT POSSIBLE FOR TOM THE DANCING BUG TO EXIST IN THIS WORLD?
👉 If you were a member of the Inner Hive, this past Tuesday you of course would have gotten this week’s DONALD AND JOHN comic sent directly to you in your weekly email, before it was published anywhere. With exclusive commentary on the comic and the felony convictions and everything bagels and also extra comics.
👉 You also would have gotten another installment of my ongoing story about how in the late ‘90s I found myself writing and performing in character in a regular satirical feature on the most listened to radio station in the nation. (True!) With another sample script.
👉 You also would have gotten the secret inside story of a journalistic boondoggle I’m going on starting tomorrow for one of the biggest companies in the world.
👉 And you would have gotten an exclusive photo of Otis the Wonderdog napping in my “office.”
👉 (If you join on Substack or Patreon today, you can still see all this!)
👉 And next week, you’ll get the secret, inside story about this photo, taken just yesterday.
Yes, I’m pulling out all the stops this week! Won’t you please:
Upgrade to the Inner Hive here on Substack by choosing one of the paid options at the “Upgrade to the Inner Hive” button below👇
OR you can review all your Inner Hive options and platforms HERE.
Thank you very much. Come on, I want to see you on the other side of the wall!
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This week’s Classic Tom the Dancing Bug (published on GoComics yesterday) is “BAD BLASTOCYST” (from 2001).
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And the GoComics Super-Fun-Pak Comix page has recently featured comics from this installment (from 2011).
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I’m now occasionally writing posts for Boing Boing. Here are a couple of items I wrote recently:
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Okay, enough fooling around. Otis the Wonderdog wants to get that email from one of the subscription services saying that YOU signed up for the Inner Hive!
Next week: Back to just the normal, low key pressure to join the Inner Hive.
Bestest Indeed,
Rb
Feel free to share The Tom the Dancing Bug Review with your fellow felons at the button below.
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You’ve been reading the free Tom the Dancing Bug Review newsletter. And you can join the Inner Hive (a paid subscription) and get much more! Inner Hive members receive weekly emails containing:
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👉exclusive commentary, sketches, bonus comics, contests, giveaways, sneak peeks, process pics, juicy gossip, member benefits, other stuff, etc., etc.
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Join at Patreon, and get info about the Inner Hive HERE. The most popular way to subscribe. Base rate is $3/month.
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If you want to avoid third party subscription services and recurring payments, you can even sign up HERE for a one-time pre-paid two-year membership, purchased directly from me.
The Complete Tom the Dancing Bug program continues with its brandest newest book:
Volume 3 - On the Trail of Tom the Dancing Bug!!
ORDERS NOW BEING ACCEPTED!
ORDERS FOR PERSONALIZED, SIGNED, AND SKETCHED-IN BOOKS ARE BEING SENT OUT IN THE ORDER IN WHICH THEY HAVE BEEN RECEIVED EVEN AS WE SPEAK!
TOM THE DANCING BUG: ALL-MIGHTY COMICS, VOLUME 3 IN THE COMPLETE TOM THE DANCING BUG -- 1999-2002. Clover Press’s Complete Tom the Dancing Bug program strides confidently ahead with the third chronological volume, covering every installment of the comic strip, a two-time Pulitzer Prize Finalist, from 1999-2002.
This volume not only includes the comic strip’s favorite formats and characters, such as Super-Fun-Pak Comix, God-Man, the Omnipotent Superhero, Charley the Australopithecine, and its cover character Billy Dare, Boy Adventurer, it also includes the strip’s famed and award-winning urgent turn into political satire following 9/11. Also in the volume is Ruben Bolling’s brief run of monthly full-page comics for The New Yorker, and a special comic for The Village Voice on the 2000 Subway World Series.
Tom the Dancing Bug is the wildly popular, groundbreaking comic strip that Mark Hamill called “wondrous, whimsical, and witty,” and that led Seth Meyers to recently write, “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!”
Ordering your Signed/Sketched copy of ON THE TRAIL OF TOM THE DANCING BUG here.
Order a Signed/Sketched copy of On the Trail of Tom the Dancing Bug directly from me at the link above, and I’ll sign the book and draw an illustration in it.
AND you will get an authenticated bookmark with your copy of On the Trail of Tom the Dancing Bug. PLUS you will get a special sticker with your purchase of On the Trail of Tom the Dancing Bug!
And/or purchase a SIGNED BOOK COMBO DEAL
You can purchase a SIGNED BOOK COMBO DEAL from me, most of which are two-book packages from the Complete Tom the Dancing Bug program, for not-far-from cover price.
I won’t be drawing an illustration in the books at these rock-bottom prices, but I will sign your books, and you'll still get each book's corresponding bookmark and sticker, if available.
And you never know... I might just draw a tiny little something in it anyway, as long as I'm signing it and I've got a pen in my hand.
View all the SIGNED BOOK COMBO DEALS here!
The Tom the Dancing Bug shop at Threadless is growing.
Confuse your friends. Perplex your neighbors. Confound yourself. Various colors, styles, sizes available.
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The 2023 Tom the Dancing Bug Annual
You can now purchase The 2023 Tom the Dancing Bug Annual, a pdf booklet containing every Tom the Dancing Bug comic of the year, plus commentary.
Info here.
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In case you are interested:
Here is the official Tom the Dancing Bug webpage: tomthedancingbug.com
You can join me on:
Threads (@rubenbolling)
Bluesky (@rubenbolling.bsky.social)
Mastodon (@rubenbolling@mastodon.social)
I’m still on Twitter, but mostly just to burn down my account
And I’m on Substack’s own Notes.
I am also on: Facebook and Instagram.
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My email address is tomdbug at gmail dot com
The Tom the Dancing Bug Review. Copyright 2024 Ruben Bolling.
Thank you for reading this newsletter all the way to the end.