The Very First ‘Peanuts’ Comic Strip Reimagined — Reviewing ‘Here Comes Charlie Brown!’

This review is going to be a little different. The book in question is only 12 pages, and the content isn’t original. It’s nearly 75 years old. Here Comes Charlie Brown!, adapted by Gene Kannenberg Jr., is a deconstructed 3D pop-up rendition of Charles M. Schulz’ very first Peanuts comic strip. Good Ol’ Charlie Brown ran on October 2, 1950 and is widely considered the most iconic comic strip of all time. 

It is also a perfect haiku-like combination of art, text, and paranoia, with a variation of the Elizabeth Browning sonnet How Do I Love Thee? thrown in for literary measure. Everything that is great about Schulz and Peanuts is established right out of the gate in just twenty words and four perfect panels, which have influenced every comic strip that has followed.

For a little background, I am originally from Santa Rosa, California, the same Northern California city where Schulz lived from 1969 through his passing on February 12, 2000. Schulz was a huge part of Santa Rosa’s identity, culture, and community. He regularly donated to a Santa Rosa based charity called Canine Companions which trains and provides medical service dogs, and he and his wife Jean donated $5 million with an additional annual endowment to Sonoma State University to help the local public college keep pace with changes in technology. 

Scattered around the city are five foot tall sculptures of Peanuts characters, sponsored by local businesses and painted by local artists. If you ever find yourself in Santa Rosa, which lives up to its motto of “In the middle of everything,” you can use this map to visit the nearly 100 privately owned statues that are still on public display. 

Schulz was, is, and forever will be Santa Rosa.

The first thing I noticed about this pop-up book is the way it opens. There’s a backward oriented flap that, when closed, protects the pages from incidental damage. The flap also provides an opportunity for a second cover with a cool little Easter egg from the days when Schulz was initially pitching his strips to newspapers. 

Printed on the inside of the flap is a copy of the original strip which the book is based on. The eight printed pages within take those four panels and separate them into three dimensional elements. The ‘pop-up’ element is unique, very different than the standard pop-up mechanism I’m used to. 

My kids’ pop-up books open flat, using little strings with cleverly folded and glued pieces of printed paper that pop up from the page. These pages don’t open flat. They open to about 120°, creating a ‘pocket’ that provides the depth of each panel, with the elements existing in different layers. It’s really quite clever. 

One of the other things that really gives the book a nostalgic feel is the use of Ben-Day dots for color. This is a daily strip which ran on a Thursday, so it wouldn’t have been colored in any of the original printings, but it does appear that Here Comes Charlie Brown! uses combinations of the period correct four dot colors (cyan, magenta, yellow, and black) to create the illusion of many more colors and hues. 

When you’re finished marveling over the clever mechanics and faithful reproduction of Schulz’ work, there’s a must-read afterword by Kannenberg, where he lays out his own reasons for admiring Schulz, why this particular strip was selected and what’s so special about it, and the process of lovingly and dutifully presenting the piece.

Here Comes Charlie Brown! will be available at your local book store on March 26, 2024 for $16.99. It is currently available for pre-order.