 About the comic
Footrot Flats is a comic strip set in rural New Zealand. It has appeared daily in newspapers right accross New Zealand and other countries such as Australia since the mid 70s when it started. It has long been a favourite in those countries and even has quite a following in countries such as the USA, where it is quite hard to come by.
Most of the comic takes place on the Footrot Farm although other places such as Cooch's farm, the Murphy's farm and the local town are often seen. Wal and the Dog even went on a holiday to Australia in Footrot Flats 20.
The exact locations were never really solid until the animated movie was developed. For the benefit of the people working on the film, Murray Ball sketched up a map of the Footrot Farm and surrounding areas.
Most of the comic is set on the farm of Wal Footrot although the main character is his dog. Most of the main characters are either Wal's neighbours, relatives or animals on his farm. The dog says a lot in the form of thought bubbles, sort of like Snoopy or Garfield, but it is rare for any of the other animals to say anything. The Characters section of this site gives descriptions of each of the main characters along with pictures of each one.
It's been around since 1975. Some of the characters have changed over the years. Some examples are Pongo and Rangi who were little kids in earlier series but are teenagers in more recent series. The characters in general changed over the first couple of years so that you can see quite a bit of difference with the way they look in Footrot Flats 1 & 2.
It's full of the good kiwi humour that kiwis and aussies can relate to. The author Murray Ball, has a unique way of portraying every day trivial events in a very humourous way. The comic also benefits from a wide range of likeable characters. Some of the favourites are the tough super-tomcat Horse, nature loving Cooch, old Cecil the ram and of course the Dog.
Yes. Plenty of book stores sell the recent issues of Footrot Flats although many of the older issues are out of print or hard to find. The most recent one is Footrot Flats 27 and that will be the last one. You can read an article that contains some details. We shold be thankful. The author originally planned on ending the series long before 27.
If you're in New Zealand or Australia, you could probably find, "The Dog's Tale" in your local video library. You may be able to in other countries as well. Look it up!
One of the visitors to this site from Sweden let me know that over there, the comic is called "fähunden" and the dogs name is "flippen"?
About the animated film
What is it? |
About the author |
Getting the comic
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