Effective July 12, United Feature Syndicate will distribute Prickly City, Scott Stantis’ daily and Sunday comic strip. Currently the strip is syndicated through Universal Press Syndicate.
Launched in 2004 and appearing in more than 100 newspapers nationwide, Prickly City centers around the friendship between a coyote pup named Winslow and a young girl named Carmen. In the ongoing storyline, the strip offers a conservative perspective on political and social events that is especially topical at a time when Democrats control Washington.
As Republicans deride President Obama’s and Congress’ policies and attempts to expand government, the poignant humor found in Prickly City could not be more timely.
The strip has an unmistakable conservative bent, though Stantis shows he can needle Republicans, as well, as when he mocked South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford. In this recent series of strips, Carmen returns from a covert trip to Argentina smelling of “wet dog.” Winslow believes she was “seeing another coyote.”
Carmen is a feisty libertarian-conservative, while Winslow is a coyote with political aspirations. He can also be patronizing, condescending, and impulsive, and his liberal responses produce much of the strip’s humor. Carmen is continuously frustrated by Winslow’s assumption that she should be a liberal feminist.
Through it all, though, Carmen and Winslow are friends to the end.
Stantis has been the editorial cartoonist for the Birmingham News – Alabama’s most-read newspaper – since 1996 and produces a weekly editorial cartoon for USA Today.
Stantis’ work has been featured in Newsweek, U.S. News and World Report, the New York Daily News, and many other national publications, in addition to television programs such as “CBS This Morning” and “Nightline.” He is a past president of the Association of American Editorial Cartoonists and was the creator of the popular comic strip The Buckets, which is currently drawn by Greg Cravens.
For the record, Scott Stantis did create “The Buckets,” but it is now drawn AND written by (Memphis-based) Greg Cravens. And it is consistently funny.
That would make all three of Scott’s strips (including his short-lived “Sydney”) that was syndicated thru United.
does anyone know why Universal are no longer distributing it?
At least it is still continuing. How many “conservative” strips still exist ? They seem to be the first to go, i.e. cancelled.
Good to see, i’m a fan of Scott’s work!