The popular “Dilbert” comic strip that parodies the trials and tribulations of office life is being pulled by nearly 80 publications where it regularly appeared, according to its author.
“Dilbert was cancelled in 77 newspapers this week,” cartoonist Scott Adams tweeted Tuesday.
The elimination of the 33-year-old strip appears to be one of many cuts made by Lee Enterprises, which is reportedly scaling back its cartoon pages overall. The reaction to Adams announcement on Twitter was divided between fans who will miss seeing “Dilbert” in their funny pages and critics who don’t find it funny.
“Am I being controversial if I say I still enjoy the strip?” asked one Twitter user.
“Have you tried making it funny or good?” another social media user wondered.
Illustrator Dan Piraro said his cartoon “Bizarro” was also a casualty of Lee Enterprises’ reduction in the number of comic strips it runs daily.
“Lee Enterprises, a newspaper group that is majority-owned by a large investment firm, stopped running ‘Bizarro’ and many other comics in their papers this past week,” Piraro wrote on his webpage.
While he said most readers see his comics online, Piraro called print media “our most reliable — and almost only — revenue source,” and said newspaper sales help him stay in business. Dilbert told Fox News he, too, was dealt a “substantial” blow financially by “Dilbert” running in fewer papers.
Several right-wing publications pursued the narrative that “Dilbert” had been “canceled” due to some sort of political agenda. Neither Adams nor Lee Enterprises returned a request for comment by the Daily News.
According to Daily Cartoonist, comic strips including “Baby Blues,” “Red and Rover,” “Mutts” were cut from Lee Enterprises publications.
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