Opus (comic strip)

Opus was a

Set in Bloom County, the satirical strip featured Breathed's character Opus the Penguin. It was launched on November 23, 2003, and was syndicated by The Washington Post Writers Group. In early October 2008, the author declared he was terminating the strip because of his expectation that the United States was going to face tough times and his desire to depart from his most famous character "on a lighter note". ^{[citation needed]}

Characters

Opus

Opus is the title character and protagonist of the strip. Though he returned to Antarctica at the end of Outland, Opus traveled back home to Bloom County, only to find that time has changed everything and everyone he once held dear. His employment usually depended on the week's joke – since Opus began, he has so far been a political operative, a garbageman, and a newspaper ombudsman – but he was most often depicted as a syndicated cartoonist.

While his mother, maiden name Bougm,^[2] was no longer "long-lost," she was not all he had imagined her to be after a decades-long search, and he was frequently seeking the comfort of an ideal mother-figure.

In a 2003 interview with The A.V. Club, Breathed revealed that "Opus was named after a Kansas song." (The band's 1976 album Leftoverture includes the song "Opus Insert" and a suite called "Magnum Opus".) He also added, "If you're too young to know who Kansas was, to hell with you."^[3]

Regular characters

• Bill the Cat – the first of Opus' old friends to re-emerge (just months into the strip), Bill seemed to be the only one completely unchanged by time. Still in a state of catatonia, he was occasionally tapped to run for political office but most often seen relaxing by Opus' side. He did not appear in many strips through the summer and fall of 2008, though.
• Steve Dallas – Steve was reintroduced little more than a year in, making him the only character to have appeared in a major role in all four of Breathed's comic strips. Steve, who had come out as gay at the end of Outland, was back to his former chauvinistic ways, apparently as a result of so-called "reparative therapy" (i.e., conversion therapy). Steve's lack of ability to charm women, however, remained. He had aged quite noticeably and appeared to be in his mid 50s, with graying temples and a receding hairline, but still retained his trademark sunglasses.
• Pickles – A little girl with a little bit of "snarky energy" (she first appeared as a self-proclaimed
  Viking
  princess), Pickles immediately began tagging along with Opus and Bill. She appeared much less frequently towards the end of the strip's run.
• Auggie Dallas – Steve's long lost son, reunited with his father after many years. He had nothing but admiration for Steve, even though Steve was sometimes reluctant to act like a father figure. His name may be a reference to
  Augie Doggie
  .
• Michael Binkley – A longtime friend of Opus who began appearing in the strip after a somewhat unexplained twelve-year absence (see below). He appeared as he did in Bloom County, inexplicably not aging as Steve Dallas had.

Other characters

• Senator Bedfellow
  – Though previously convicted on corruption charges, Bedfellow returned later on, still usually drunk and plagued by reporters.
• Editor of the Bloom Picayune – Usually Opus' boss, the Picayune's editor was depicted as hyper-stressed and suicidal, though somewhat older than he was in Bloom County.
• Oliver Wendell Jones – For some reason, Oliver was shown, like Binkley, to be the same age as he had been in Bloom County and Outland. He reappeared on August 5, 2007.
• Lola Granola – Opus' one-time fiancée (back in the days of Bloom County), Lola reappeared on August 12, 2007 as Steve's girlfriend.
• Berkeley Breathed – On November 25, 2007, the cartoonist appeared as himself (using a likeness of Sean Connery as James Bond instead of drawing his own face) and "announced" that Jim Davis's character Garfield is gay in a parody of author J. K. Rowling's ex post facto outing of the Harry Potter character Albus Dumbledore. The strip ended with Breathed calling Rowling a "lily-livered literary chicken".^[4]

Absent characters

Early on in the strip, it was revealed that Michael Binkley had fled Bloom County to become a teenage Tibetan eunuch after a disastrous first kiss (this kiss was described to Binkley by his older self from his anxiety closet in Bloom County). He was not heard from again until June 3, 2007, when he appeared in his child form without explanation.^[5]

At an autograph party for an Opus anthology book, Breathed revealed that the reason many of the original child characters had not returned is because in the years since the end of Outland, the child characters would have aged into teenagers, and Breathed had no interest in reviving the characters in that form.^[6]

"Death"

On August 31, 2008, "

Opus tried to fly to a tropical island on September 14, but when he was asked for his passport, he told the ticket clerk that he smuggled himself into the U.S. 30 years ago. He was promptly arrested by airport security while screaming, "

On October 6, 2008, Breathed announced that the strip would end after November 2 that year,[7] and even decided to do a contest for people to guess what Opus's fate is on BerkeleyBreathed.com. The winner will have $10,000 donated to the animal shelter of their choosing.^[8]

On October 19, 2008, Steve Dallas was shown barging into the Bloom County Animal Shelter's lobby demanding to see Opus, claiming Opus owed him $20. The clerk stationed there informed Steve that Opus had chosen his final eternity and that Steve should do so likewise, and very quickly. The conversation ended with Steve finally realizing he was in a cartoon strip by breaking the fourth wall and asking the clerk who "all those scruffy-looking people [are]" as he looked at the readers, to which the clerk replied, "Probably

The next week, Steve found the tropical island girls and told them to give back Opus. It was then revealed that Opus had let his doggy companion in the shelter go with the girls, said "goodnight", and returned to the kennel. After seeing a vision of former Bloom County residents (Milo, Binkley, Oliver, Cutter John, Portnoy, and Bill the Cat) waving goodbye as they rode off into the distance atop Cutter John's wheelchair, Steve walked back to the animal shelter to find nothing but Opus' bow tie and an empty kennel. The final strip showed a glowing light coming from a box inside the kennel. Steve reaches into the box, and smiles at what he sees. The panel showed the address of a link to the Humane Society, which displayed the last panel as part of the $10,000 contest (it would later be printed in Berkeley Breathed's Opus: The Complete Library). The final strip showed Steve opening a copy of Goodnight Moon and seeing Opus tucked in bed, sleeping peacefully with a mother rabbit watching over him.^[9]

The 2015 revival of the Bloom County comic strip reveals that Opus is still alive, only that he has been unconscious the past 25 years and that the events of Opus and Outland were all an elaborate dream sequence.^[10]

Production history

In numerous interviews before launching Opus, Berke Breathed stated his hopes that the strip would help reinvigorate the medium of