Calvin and Hobbes

Calvin: Wow it really snowed last night! Isn't it wonderful?

Hobbes: Everything Familiar has disappeared! The world looks brand-new!

Calvin: A new year... A fresh clean start!

Hobbes:  It's like having a big white sheet of paper to draw on!

Calvin: A day full of possibilities!
           (he and Hobbes get on their sled)
           It's a magical world Hobbes ol' buddy...
           ...Let's go exploring!

Merchandising

Watterson is known for saying that comic strips should stand alone as an art. He states in a press release :

Actually, I wasn't against all merchandising when I started the strip, but each product I considered seemed to violate the spirit of the strip, contradict its message, and take me away from the work I loved. If my syndicate had let it go at that, the decision would have taken maybe 30 seconds of my life.

He did consider animating the strip and admires the art form. When asked if he thought it would be scary hearing Calvin's voice, he responded "very scary." Virtually all Calvin and Hobbes merchandise is unauthorized

Story

Calvin and Hobbes is about Calvin, a six year-old boy and his tiger Hobbes.

Calvin and Hobbes have many adventures throughout the strip, usually varying from day to day. There are however, some recurring themes.

Calvin is very energetic and often gets into trouble. Hobbes is Calvin's constant companion, and an interesting one as well. For starters, even though Calvin sees him as a live talking tiger, everyone else sees Hobbes as an inanimate stuffed animal. Hobbes is usually sarcastic about Calvin's crazy ideas.

Usually each strip is a complete story, though occasionally the story would be played out over several days, sometimes lasting a few weeks. The Sunday strips were usually a self contained story, though they were sometimes part of a longer story.

Among Calvin's many adventures, there are one or two themes that come up several times.

Cardboard Boxes

Cardboard boxes become time machines, brain enhancers, duplicators, and Calvin's own invention, the Transmogrifier which essentially transforms the victim into anything imaginable.

Calvin Ball

Calvin Ball is a sport that pops up often. Basically it is  mixture of several other sports, but the only rule is that it can never be played the same way twice. Calvin created Calvin Ball to protest organized sports.

Wagon and Sled

Watterson said whenever the talk gets ponderous, he sends Calvin and Hobbes down a hill on their sled. This makes it more visually appealing and it sonetime parodies what they're talking about. This also happens in the winter with the sled. At the end of the ride they usually have a spectacular crash, one time even having their sled catch fire.

G.R.O.S.S.

G.R.O.S.S. is the name of the secret club that Calvin and Hobbes created by themselves. The name stands for Get Rid Of Slimy GirlS. The main objective of G.R.O.S.S. is to annoy girls in general, and Susie Derkins in particular. Calvin carries out the club's mission with determination, while Hobbes occasionally defects to Susie's side for "smooches".

Calvin's Roles

Calvin has a particularly wild imagination. Although he does pretend other people and objects are different and more interesting, his most creative imaginings are of himself. Calvin has imagined himself as Superheroes, dinosaurs, Spacemen, and once even a tiger like Hobbes.

Spaceman Spiff

Calvin often imagines himself as Spaceman Spiff on the weekends so Watterson could paint the colorful worlds that Spiff visits. Spaceman Spiff looks wears a black mask and a blue jumpsuit that is over-frilled. In most strips he travels to the far reaches of the universe, gets shot down by aliens, gets captured, and escapes at the last moment. Often, Calvin's real life mirrors Spiff's adventures, people become aliens and his neighborhood and school become distant worlds.

Superheros

When Calvin imagines himself as a superhero, it's usually during the week. He has specifically imagined himself as two superheros over the years, Captain Napalm and Stupendous Man.

Captain Napalm was Calvin's alter ego for two strips. Captain Napalm is the defender of "truth, justice and the American Way." After Calvin started becoming Stupendous Man, Captain Napalm became Calvin's favorite comic book character.

Stupendous Man is the alter-ego of "Billionaire playboy Calvin". Whenever Calvin becomes Stupendous Man, he wears a costume that his Mom gave him, consisting of a mask and cape, and he talks in the third person. Stupendous Man often tries to help his alter-ego Calvin by doing such things as using a giant telescope lens to focus the sun's rays on Calvin's school, incinerating it. Another time, to help Calvin not do his homework, he reverses the rotation of the earth, and apparently, takes the world back to yesterday, thus allowing Calvin another 24 hours(in theory of course).

Tracer Bullet

Tracer Bullet is the Private eye who Calvin occasionally pretends to be. Tracer Bullet is the stereotypical private detective, having eight slugs in him "one lead, the rest are bourbon." As with most of Calvin's alter-egos,  the events in Calvin's life are filtered into Bullet's.

Dinosaurs

Sometimes Calvin imagines himself as a Tyrannosaurus Rex or Calvinosaurus, his own imaginary dinosaur. Usually these strips show other more peaceful dinosaurs grazing or resting in a a very detailed style. Suddenly Calvin, as a dinosaur, bursts in, disrupts the scene and makes a clean kill, which he then devours messily.

Main Characters

Calvin   

Calvin was named after the 16th century theologian John Calvin. Calvin is an impulsive, creative, energetic and occasionally selfish 6 year old. Although he gets low grades in school, he has a vocabulary which rivals an adults, and can discuss philosophy with the best of them. He usually wears a red and black striped shirt, black pants and red shoes. Sometimes the strip mentions that he is wearing his lucky rocket-ship underwear. Calvin is a "trial and error" person, trying things out no matter how foolish they seem. Watterson says:

I guess he's a little too intelligent for his age. The thing that I really enjoy about him is that he has no sense of restraint, he doesn't have the experience yet to know the things that you shouldn't do.

Hobbes

Most characters in the strip see Hobbes as a poorly made stuffed tiger, usually sitting on the ground looking like he's about o fall over. Calvin however sees Hobbes as a real tiger with human qualities, who is larger than he is, and who has thoughts and feelings completely independent of Calvin. Hobbes also appears to fill in for the role of big brother for Calvin, who is an only child. Watterson says:

When Hobbes is a stuffed toy in one panel and alive in the next, I'm juxtaposing the "grown-up" version of reality with Calvin's version, and inviting the reader to decide which is truer.

Calvin's view of Hobbes is shown to be the more real version when Hobbes' actions have consequences that are noticed by others, such as giving Calvin a haircut, tying him to a chair, and leaving him hanging by the seat of his pants from high a tree limb. Throughout these antics Hobbes still appears as a stuffed animal to everyone else. Hobbes was named after Thomas Hobbes, a 17th century philosopher.

    Hobbes is usually aware of the consequences of Calvin's antics, but he rarely does anything more than give Calvin a verbal warning. Hobbes is also sarcastic when Calvin complains about things that annoy him(which is more than the average person by far). Calvin caught Hobbes in the beginning of the strip with a tuna salad sandwich.

Supporting Characters

Calvin's Family

Calvin is an only child, so his Mom, Dad and Hobbes are his only family. His Mom and Dad are practical and reasonable middle aged adults who usually act to foil Calvin's plans. In the early days of the strip, fans were angry about Calvin's parents thought of him. They will occasionally use unorthodox methods to teach Calvin a lesson, however it is shown that they do love Calvin and do such things for his sake. Calvin's father is a patent attorney, his mom stays at home. Calvin's parents Don't have real names in the strip, and are referred to as "Mom" and "Dad" by Calvin, and as "Hon" and "Dear" to each other.

Susie Derkins

Susie Derkins is Calvin's classmate as well as his neighbor. She was named after Waterson's wife's family's beagle. Susie can be described as polite and diligent, with an imagination that is far tamer than Calvin's. Calvin and Susie do have a lot in common, even though they don't want to admit it. Susie has a stuffed animal too, a rabbit named Mr. Bun, and shows no sign of pretending that he's really alive as Calvin does with Hobbes. She is mischievous on occasion, although she regrets it later. Watterson admits that Calvin and Susie do have a bit of a crush on each other, though each pretends to hate the other.

Rosalyn

Rosalyn is a high-school senior, and Calvin's baby sitter, as well as his swimming instructor in the early strips. She is the only sitter who can tolerate Calvin, which comes with a heavy price for Calvin's Mom and Dad. She is apparently the only person that Calvin is afraid of. She is fine with playing dirty when Calvin doesn't cooperate. She has a boyfriend named Charlie who never appears, but Rosalyn does call him on the phone to complain about Calvin, who usually picks up on the other line to tell Charlie how awful his girlfriend is. Rosalyn was originally Calvin's nameless sitter who was only supposed to show up once, but Watterson brought her back for her ability to intimidate Calvin.

Moe

Moe is the bully in Calvin's life who describes him as "a six-year-old who shaves" and not smart but streetwise "that means he knows what street he lives on." Moe shoves Calvin, steals his money, and calls him "Twinkie". He is the only person who's speech is shown as lowercase letters. Watterson described Moe as "big, dumb, ugly and cruel," and a summation of "every jerk I've ever known."

Books