UPDATED: Iowa Paper Drops 'For Better' Comic As Other Clients Decide

By: Dave Astor Earlier this month, The Gazette of Cedar Rapids Editor Steve Buttry sought reader input on whether or not to keep "For Better or For Worse" as the comic prepared to go into "new-runs" Sept. 1. Now, Buttry has announced that "FBorFW" will be dropped from the Iowa newspaper.

Meanwhile, Universal Press Syndicate Assistant Vice President for Communications Kathie Kerr said "it's still too early to know for sure" how many of the other 2,000-plus "FBorFW" clients might stop publishing Lynn Johnston's comic. "We don't consider newspapers canceling a feature until we receive the cancellation notice," she explained, when contacted this afternoon by E&P.

The Washington Post is taking "FBorFW" out of its print edition but will continue running it online, according to a Post piece brought to E&P's attention by ComicsDC blogger Mike Rhode. Earlier this month, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution announced it would be dropping "FBorFW." Late last month, The Bismarck (N.D.) Tribune made the same announcement. (In both the AJC and Tribune, the replacement strip is "Daddy's Home" by Tony Rubino Jr. and Gary Markstein of Creators Syndicate.)

Buttry wrote in a column: "Reaction from more than 300 people who voiced their opinions was split. Nearly two-thirds of the responses in a GazetteOnline poll strongly favored giving another comic a chance. By a narrower margin, responses directly to me favored keeping the strip, or at least giving it a couple of months to see how it works out....

"A huge groundswell of support could have changed my mind. With the split response from the public, this became a clear decision, if not an easy one. The first three letters of 'newspaper' are important to us...."

Johnston plans to start the 1979-launched "FBorFW" over with a mix of old and new material -- with new content redrawn in her old, looser, less-detailed style.

In a column, New Hampshire Union Leader Publisher Joseph W. McQuaid said older strips might seem almost new to readers who haven't seen them in years.

"I picked up this strip for the Union Leader and Sunday News when it was close to being brand new," he wrote, "and it has remained one of the most popular. (When the original family dog died rescuing a toddler, it choked up half the newsroom.) Still, I'd be hard-pressed to remember particular episodes. Perhaps it will be like swimming up a whole new stream."

But Buttry said he would've been more inclined to keep a different kind of "FBorFW." He wrote that Johnston's "own marriage has ended. I could support her in dealing with marital discord in the comic or in continuing with Elly and John Patterson as a married couple and not basing the strips so much on her own life.

"If she wanted to shift the strip's focus more to Elizabeth and Michael's younger families, we would follow along. If Johnston decided to take a break and come back later with a new strip about a newly divorced woman, we'd be one of her first customers."

Buttry -- who said The Gazette will audition other strips in the "FBorFW" slot -- also had lots more to say about the comic. His complete piece can be seen here.

McQuaid's piece can be seen here.

Rhode's ComicsDC blog can be seen here.

E&P's Aug. 18 story about The Gazette and "FBorFW" can be seen here.