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'Boondocks' creator makes trip to USF

By AMBER MOBLEY
Published November 21, 2006

TAMPA - The creator of the controversial comic strip and cartoon The Boondocks sums up his creation this way: "a kernel of a good idea" with "some ignorance on top of it," mixed with the angst of rap group Public Enemy and the comedy of Monty Python.

Aaron McGruder made an appearance Monday night for the University of South Florida lecture series. But instead of giving a speech, he took questions from a crowd of nearly 500.

The Boondocks addresses racial issues, pop culture and politics as it chronicles the lives of Huey Freeman, his little brother, Riley, and their eccentric grandfather, who moved them from south Chicago to the suburbs.

At times, McGruder even surprises himself with the content of his TV show. Case in point: an episode where civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. repeatedly said the N-word.

"It was like, oh my God! This just aired? Who would air this?" he asked. "Nightline called me the next day at 10 a.m."

Trying to explain the method to his madness, McGruder said, "It's a show for people who look at the world and say, 'There's something seriously wrong here.'

"There are people who get satire, (people) with critical thinking skills. And then there are those who don't get it," said McGruder. "This show was created for people who get it. Everyone else we're really not too concerned about."

The Boondocks comic strip made its national premiere in newspapers in 1999. Eventually published in 350 newspapers nationwide, it became a cable cartoon with a cult-like following in 2005.

Turning the comic strip into a cartoon, said McGruder, has allowed him "a wonderful amount of creative freedom" as well as access to a younger audience. It's an audience that "gets it" more than "your average newspaper reader (who) is a 50-year-old white man."

The comic went on hiatus from newspapers in March. McGruder said if the comic returns, it will probably be online.

"I got sick of the strip and sick of politics," McGruder said. "It was Bush, Bush, Bush. Okay, he's dumb, we get it," he said about the comic's relentless criticism of the president.

And speaking of politics, the USF lecture series appears to be striving for balance. Its last speaker was right-wing author Ann Coulter.

Amber Mobley can be reached at amobley@sptimes.com or (813) 269-5311.

[Last modified November 20, 2006, 23:37:46]