FOXTROT

'''FoxTrot''' is an American comic strip written and illustrated by Bill Amend. As of December 2006, ''FoxTrot'' is carried by over 1,000 newspapers worldwide.^[1] It was published on a daily schedule from its inception in 1988 until December 31, 2006, when Amend switched it to a Sunday-only format.¹
The strip covers a wide range of subject matter, including spoofs of pop culture fads and popular consumer products.

Contents

Characters

Places

Popular culture

Scientific references

Style

Passage of time

Parodies and subtleties

Computers

Books

Merchandising

References

External links

Characters

The ''Foxtrot'' comic is centered around the daily lives of the Fox family, consisting of parents Roger and Andy, and their three children, Peter (16), Paige (14), and Jason (10). Additional minor characters include Quincy, Jason's pet iguana, and the friends and classmates of the children.

Places

The Fox family's address is 1254 North Elm Street, but the city and state have never been specified. On the subject of the Fox's specific location, Bill Amend has stated: "I've never established a town name for where they live. The mall sign was meant as an homage to the Hillsdale Mall in San Mateo, California, where I used to shop as a teenager."
Several storylines in the strip have focused on summer vacation trips to various places. Early on, the Fox family spent summer vacation at Uncle Ralph's Cabin.^[2] Later vacations by the Fox family have included trips to Hawaii, the desert, various amusement parks, and campgrounds.

Popular culture

In addition to typical family humor, the strip has many stories built around fandom, nerdiness and popular culture. The characters—primarily Jason and Andy—frequently have new obsessions or interests which reflect the time period at which the strip was published. At least two FoxTrot strips have directly mentioned Wikipedia.
Jason is often portrayed as having a fascination in various science fiction and fantasy titles including ''Star Wars'', ''Star Trek'' and ''Lord of the Rings''. He also plays Dungeons & Dragons (often with his friend, Marcus), and is frequently seen playing video games (which are often referenced by their actual titles).

Scientific references

Amend majored in physics at Amherst College, and his knowledge of physics is sometimes reflected in ''FoxTrot's frequent inclusion of complex mathematical or physics formulae, usually written by Jason. Jason is also used to express Amend's knowledge of computer languages.^[3]

Style

Passage of time

FoxTrot is similar to other comic strips in that the characters do not age (although in one very early strip, Roger's 45th birthday was celebrated). There was an in-joke on the lack of aging in a strip published shortly after the September 11, 2001 attacks, in which Andy told Jason that Roger had donated blood even though he was scared of needles because "We all have to grow up, kiddo." Jason replied, "Whoa, did I stumble into ''For Better or For Worse''?", referring to a comic where the characters actually do grow up, up until early 2006.
Although the characters do not age, past events are occasionally referenced in the strip—most notably, Jason's summer at Camp Bohrmore, a technology-based summer camp. Other past events in the strip may be referred to as happening "last year" even if the referenced storyline was printed more than a year ago.

Parodies and subtleties

The characters appear to be aware that they are living a comic strip, with references to such events as ink shortages and "whitening" toothpaste that erased Roger's teeth lines. In scenes where a character is reading a newspaper, Amend will often add a joke headline to the paper (such as "Cartoonist to join NASCAR Circuit"), usually accompanied by a caricature of himself. Other strips are sometimes referenced as well, and characters from other strips occasionally make cameo appearances.
Often, when a band, video game, or brand name is referenced, the name in question is a portmanteau of other names (such as "World of Warquest", frequently played by Jason -- the name is a portmanteau of World of Warcraft and Everquest).

Computers

Several FoxTrot gags revolve around the use of a computer in some way. The first computer to appear in the FoxTrot strip was an old Apple II used mostly by Jason to play ''Star Trek'' video games. By 1991, Andy bought an unidentified style of Compact Macintosh; mid-1990s strips show a newer, unidentified Macintosh desktop computer, similar in design to a Macintosh LC or Power Macintosh. The Fox family has also had an iFruit (a parody of the original Apple iMac), which Andy purchased in 1999 after Roger's disastrous attempt at online trading which resulted it the family selling their old computer, and because she thought it was "cute". More recent strips have included a newer computer which resembles the most recent model of iMac.
Although the computers are never directly referenced as Macintosh products, Bill Amend has stated, "The computer itself is an Apple, but I never did specify or decide which model it was, neither did I make a strip of how the Foxes got it, because the only important thing about it is that it is their computer, but after the revolution of the Internet and new computer products and jobs now available to ordinary life I could finally make a good strip in which they switch to their iFruit computer and to show that Roger has some knowledge of the computer but not a lot."

Books

There have been 35 ''FoxTrot'' books published so far, all by Andrews McMeel Publishing. Of the 35 books, 25 are collections and 10 are anthologies. The anthologies are comprised of the two or three previous collections, and include Sunday strips in color.

Merchandising

During the late 1990s, the character of Jason Fox was licensed to Wolfram Research as a product spokesman for its Mathematica software package.^[4] In fact, Mathematica was referenced at least once in the strip (though several years before Jason was licensed).

References

1. FoxTrot to Cease Dailies Universal Press
2. FoxTrot: The Works (pp. 60-1), , Bill, Amend, Andrews McMeel Publishing, , ISBN 0-8362-1848-5
3. Death By Field Trip (p. 87), , Bill, Amend, Andrews McMeel Publishing, , ISBN 0-7407-1391-4
4. Wolfram Research

External links

''Links last verified on January 3, 2007''

★ FoxTrot.com

★ Universal Press Syndicate FoxTrot Page

★ Bill Amend's Homepages

★ FoxTrot comics at GoComic

★ Biographies of Bill Amend

★ Bill Amend's press release about FoxTrot Ceasing Dailies