The Angriest Dog in the World (not a Westminster Dog Show post)

February 16, 2017 9:50 AM

From 1983 to 1992, David Lynch published a cartoon in independent papers. The images were supposedly always exactly the same.

The opening box always read:

The dog who is so angry he cannot move
He cannot eat
He cannot sleep
He can just barely growl
Bound so tightly with tension and anger, he approaches the state of rigor mortis

For some of us, the strip is a defining image of the 80s.

He has said in interviews that the origin of the strip was his inexplicable anger.

It is said that he is composing strips again but I can't confirm it.

posted by janey47 (30 comments total)

Hey did you know David Lynch is actually a time traveler and has seen 2017 before?
I mean I always had my suspicions, but now I am sure.
posted by phunniemee at 9:55 AM on February 16, 2017 [3 favorites]

Even David Lynch makes the occasional dad joke.
posted by The Card Cheat at 9:59 AM on February 16, 2017 [3 favorites]

I am completely unable to explain my absolute love for Angriest Dog but I love it very much.

Also one of my favorite FPPs I had the pleasure of posting got its title from this.
posted by griphus at 10:05 AM on February 16, 2017 [3 favorites]

Pete has a police record.
What does he have a police record for?
I guess he likes Sting and their music.

OK, Lynch, that's pretty solid.
posted by Atom Eyes at 10:11 AM on February 16, 2017 [10 favorites]

"If everything is real ...then nothing is real as well."

OMG. Jaden Smith is a young David Lynch.
posted by leotrotsky at 10:18 AM on February 16, 2017 [2 favorites]

dinosaur comics, evolved.
posted by MuppetNavy at 10:21 AM on February 16, 2017 [2 favorites]

I had no idea these existed. Thank you.
posted by Kabanos at 10:21 AM on February 16, 2017 [1 favorite]

I loved these when they first appeared. Fun stuff.
posted by Thorzdad at 10:22 AM on February 16, 2017

Some more.
posted by Kabanos at 10:23 AM on February 16, 2017

Some crossovers are just inevitable.
posted by darksasami at 10:29 AM on February 16, 2017 [10 favorites]

The Angriest Westminster Dog Show In The World
posted by Going To Maine at 10:33 AM on February 16, 2017 [1 favorite]

I am so glad that Dinosaur Comics made this joke 13 years ago, and glad that I now understand.
posted by timdiggerm at 10:38 AM on February 16, 2017 [3 favorites]

No wonder he's so angry: he isn't a dog at all -- he's some kind of weird land barracuda locked into a permanent identity crisis by these fools who mistook him for a dog!
posted by jamjam at 10:42 AM on February 16, 2017 [1 favorite]

I deeply appreciate the "That's it, burn it all down!" puns.
posted by maryr at 10:44 AM on February 16, 2017

I respectfully submit: a David Lynch/K.C. Green mashup
posted by Kabanos at 10:50 AM on February 16, 2017 [8 favorites]

I subscribed to Angriest Dog and Life in Hell for my small magazine back in the early 90s. Angriest Dog let us pay for each strip, whereas Life in Hell was paid for strictly per week. Since my magazine only came out once every six months or so, that didn't work out so well.
posted by user92371 at 10:56 AM on February 16, 2017 [1 favorite]

User92371, I had a Life In Hell cartoon called "What Will You Say on Your Deathbed?" that I cut out while I was first doing hospice volunteer work and that stayed with me for literally years, until it finally crumbled. The best one was: "I'm sorry. I really mean it this time."
posted by janey47 at 11:13 AM on February 16, 2017

Holy shit, here it is! I love the Internet!
posted by janey47 at 11:14 AM on February 16, 2017 [7 favorites]

This definitely calls for an "it me".

Because:

it me
posted by theatro at 11:41 AM on February 16, 2017

More evidence that I do not understand the allure of David Lynch (see also: Dune, Blue Velvet, Lost Highway)
posted by kyrademon at 11:54 AM on February 16, 2017 [1 favorite]

kyrademon: "More evidence that I do not understand the allure of David Lynch (see also: Dune, Blue Velvet, Lost Highway)"

Obviously someone that has never tried melange.
posted by Samizdata at 12:04 PM on February 16, 2017 [6 favorites]

I love this, I love Dune, I am having a harder and harder time with the fact that it's the same person.
posted by Cosine at 3:02 PM on February 16, 2017 [1 favorite]

Always looked forward to this cartoon in the Voice. Great stuff.
posted by Splunge at 3:43 PM on February 16, 2017 [1 favorite]

BTW, thanks for the link to images. I was trying to explain this to the SO the other day. Now I can just show her.
posted by Splunge at 6:30 PM on February 16, 2017 [1 favorite]

Needs a max cannon mashup.
posted by valkane at 7:07 PM on February 16, 2017

Always read it, rarely laughed. Like many, found it obtuse and later, after realizing it was gone, didn't miss it. Lynch's movies much better.
posted by Rash at 9:09 PM on February 16, 2017

There have been a lot of things from the past that have come up recently that seem frankly bizarre, and I don't remember them at all. Which muddies the water when I'm trying to decide if this really is a horrible simulation that keeps changing all the time.

I'm going to go with the vague feeling that I did see this back in the day. There were a lot of odd and questionable comics back then.
posted by bongo_x at 10:01 PM on February 16, 2017

I never really got it but I always read it because I really wanted to get it.
posted by Room 641-A at 7:50 AM on February 17, 2017 [3 favorites]

I remember these and not really getting them which hey philistine me. I appreciate them more now - middle age.
posted by latkes at 8:10 AM on February 17, 2017

This was my first experience with "weird comics" as a child person.
posted by Annika Cicada at 10:47 AM on February 17, 2017 [1 favorite]