Dilbert (first published April 16, 1989) is an
American comic strip written and drawn by
Scott Adams. Dilbert is known for its satirical
humor about a white-collar, micromanaged office, featuring the engineer Dilbert as the title
character. The strip has spawned several books, an animated television
series, a computer game, and hundreds of Dilbert-themed merchandise items. Adams has also received the National
Cartoonist Society Reuben Award and Newspaper Comic Strip Award in
1997 for his work on the strip. Dilbert appears in 2000 newspapers worldwide in 65 countries and 25 languages.[1]
Themes
The comic strip originally revolved around the engineer Dilbert and his "pet" dog
Dogbert in their home. Many plots revolved around Dilbert's engineer nature or his bizarre
inventions. These alternate with plots based on Dogbert's megalomaniacal ambitions. Later,
the location of most of the action moved to Dilbert's workplace at a large technology company, and the strip started to satirize
technology workplace and company issues. The comic strip's popular success is attributable to its workplace setting and themes,
which are familiar to a large and appreciative audience; Adams admits that switching the setting from Dilbert's home to his
office was "when the strip really started to take off."[1]
Dilbert portrays corporate culture as a Kafkaesque world of bureaucracy for its own sake and office politics that stand in the way of productivity, where employees'
skills and efforts are not rewarded, and busy work is praised. Much of the humor emerges as
the audience sees the characters making obviously ridiculous decisions that are natural reactions to mismanagement.
Themes explored include:
- Incompetent and sadistic
management
- Scheduling without reference to reality
- Failure to reward success or penalize laziness
- Penalizing employees for failures caused by bad management
- Micromanagement
- Failure to improve others' morale, lowering it instead
- Failure to communicate objectives
- Handling of projects doomed to failure or cancellation
- Sadistic HR policies with flimsy (or purely evil)
rationale
- Corporate bureaucracy
- ISO audits
- Budgeting, accounting, payroll and financial advisors
- Stupidity of the general public
- Fourth World countries and outsourcing (Elbonia)
Characters
-
- See also: List of minor characters
in Dilbert
Dilbert in popular culture
The popularity of the comic strip within the corporate sector has led to the Dilbert character being used in many business
magazines and publications (he has made several appearances on the cover of Fortune).
The Toronto Star(in reruns), The Globe
and Mail, Montreal's La Presse, the Florida Times Union, the Indianapolis
Star, the Providence Journal, the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the
Brisbane Courier Mail, the Windsor Star,
and San Francisco Chronicle, among other publications, run the comic in
their business section rather than in the regular comics section, similar to the way in which Doonesbury is often carried in the editorial section due to its pointed commentary.
Criticism and parody
Norman Solomon believes the strip is insufficiently critical of CEOs and disrespectful
of ordinary working people (The Trouble with Dilbert: How Corporate Culture Gets the Last Laugh, Common Courage Press,
1997). The idea that white-collar workers might be in need of more respect contrasts
with a common belief that white collar career is a free choice, but downsizing and some of the
pressures on Dilbert have been predicted in the 1970s by Harry Braverman (Labor and
Monopoly Capital, Monthly Review Press, 1998 being the most recent re-issue). Dealing with those pressures would require
Dilbert to be more blue-collar in terms of strife over his work process, but in
Dilbert the boss can be lampooned but has to be obeyed. Solomon's argument followed a similar one made by his cover artist
Tom Tomorrow in his weekly comic strip This Modern
World. Adams responded in the 2/2/98 strip and in his book The Joy of Work, simply by restating Solomon's
argument, apparently suggesting that it was absurd and required no rebuttal.
Peter Drucker and C. Wright Mills both pointed
out the paradox on which the strip is based but does not address: Dilbert, Wally, Alice and the rest of the gang compete with
each other while trying to produce a collective product. The strip satirizes the victims of this double bind. Solomon's concern
is that it reconciles people to their fate and does not show them a way out.
Bill Griffith, in his daily strip Zippy the
Pinhead, used his strip as a forum to criticize Adams' artwork as simplistic. Adams again responded on 5/18/98, this
time having Dogbert create a comic strip called Pippy the Ziphead, "cramming as much artwork in as possible so no one will notice
there's only one joke...[and] it's on the reader." Dilbert notes that the strip is "nothing but a clown with a small head who
says random things" and Dogbert responds that he is "maintaining his artistic integrity by creating a comic that no one will
enjoy."
In the late 1990s, an amateur cartoonist named Karl Hörnell began submitting a comic strip
parodying both Dilbert and the Image Comics series The Savage Dragon to Dragon creator Erik Larsen. This soon
became a regular feature in the Savage Dragon comic book, titled The Savage
Dragonbert and Hitler's Brainbert ("Hitler's Brainbert" being both a loose parody of Dogbert as well as the Savage
Dragon villain identified as Adolf Hitler's disembodied, superpowered brain). The strip
began as a specific parody of the comic book itself, set loosely within the office structure of 'Dilbert', with Hörnell doing a
skillful emulation of Adams' cartooning style. It later evolved into commentary on the comics industry in general, with much the
same take as Adams has on corporate structure. The strip's final appearance in The Savage Dragon was in issue #99,
cover-dated May 2002; it was collected in its entirety later that same year in Savage Dragonbert: Full Frontal
Nerdity.
The show was also parodied in the animated television
show Family Guy in the episode "Mr. Griffin Goes to Washington." The main character, Peter, claims that "The business
world sure can be funny," and the scene switches over to Dilbert and Wally going over an intentionally poor office joke. Then it
jumps back to Peter who says, "Well, sometimes the business world can be funny."
A parody of the comic strip appears in the Homestar Runner cartoon titled "Dullard,"
which has parodies of most of the characters from the Dilbert comic strip. The strip usually appears as an Easter egg in episodes involving office scenes, where Strong
Bad attaches a strip to his cubicle wall. Jokes used in "Dullard" often mimic the theme of the cartoon they appear in.
These "Dullard" strips, however, are not used to make fun of "Dilbert" in a mean-spirited or criticizing way; they are more of an
acknowledgment of Adams' work.
A parody by Tristan Farnon, creator of Leisure Town, was entitled "The Dilbert Hole" and
was a savage mockery of Dilbert.[2] The parody spread
virally; sites had trouble hosting the comic during the height of its popularity, as United Feature Syndicate and its lawyers
clamped down on it due to its obscenity-laced dialogue and use of the original Dilbert art. The strip appeared on Rotten.com,
amongst other well-known sites.[3]
Language
Terms invented by Adams in relation to the strip, and sometimes used by fans in describing their own office environments,
include "Induhvidual." This term is based on an American English
slang expression "duh!" The conscious misspelling of
individual as induhvidual is a pejorative term for people who are not in the DNRC (Dogbert's New Ruling Class). Its coining is explained in Dilbert Newsletter
#6.
The strip has also popularized the usage of the terms "cow-orker," "splendsmartful," and PHB. The word "frooglepoopillion" is
occasionally used for an extremely large number, a word coined by the marketing department at
the company where Dilbert works, in a strip where it was revealed that the company owed so much money that no word existed to
describe the number.
Some fans have used "Dilbertian" or "Dilbertesque" to analogize situations in real life to those in the comic strip.
Management
In 1997, Scott Adams masqueraded as a management consultant to Logitech executives (as Ray
Mebert), with the cooperation of the company's vice-chairman. He acted in much the way he portrays management consultants in the
comic strip, with an arrogant manner and bizarre suggestions, such as comparing mission
statements to broccoli soup. He convinced the executives
to replace their existing mission statement for their New Ventures Group, "to provide Logitech with profitable growth and related
new business areas," with "to scout profitable growth opportunities in relationships, both internally and externally, in
emerging, mission-inclusive markets, and explore new paradigms and then filter and communicate and evangelize the
findings."[citation needed]
To demonstrate what can be achieved with the most mundane objects if planned correctly and imaginatively, Adams has worked
with companies to develop "dream" products for Dilbert and company. In 2001, he collaborated with design company IDEO to come up with the "perfect cubicle," a fitting creation since many of the Dilbert strips make fun of the
standard cubicle desk and the environment it creates. The result was both whimsical and
practical.[4][5]
This project was followed in 2004 with designs for Dilbert's Ultimate House (abbreviated as DUH). An energy-efficient building was the result, designed to
prevent many of the little niggles that seem to creep into a normal building. For instance, to save time spent buying and
decorating a Christmas tree every year, the house has a large (yet unapparent) closet
adjacent to the living room where the tree can be stored from year to year.
Awards
In addition to the National Cartoonists Society Reuben Awards won by Adams, the Dilbert strip has received a variety of
other awards. Adams was named best international comic strip artist of 1995 in the Adamson
Awards given by the Swedish Academy of Comic Art.
Dilbert was named the best syndicated strip of 1997 in the Harvey Awards and won
the Max & Moritz Prize as best international comic strip for 1998. In the Squiddy Awards, Dilbert was named the best daily strip of 1996 and 1997, and the best comic strip
of 1998 and 2000. The strip also won the Zombie Award as the best comics strip of 1996 and 1997,
and the 1997 Good Taste Award as the best strip of 1996.
Media
Comic strip compilations
Books in bold indicate special compilations or original strips.
- Always Postpone Meetings with Time-Wasting
Morons — 16 April 1989 (first strip) to
21 October 1989
- Build a Better Life By Stealing Office Supplies
- Dogbert's Clues for the Clueless
- Shave the Whales — 22 October
1989 to 4 August 1990
- Bring Me the Head of Willy the Mailboy! —
5 October 1990 to 18 May
1991
- It's Obvious You Won't Survive By Your Wits
Alone — 19 May 1991 to 13
December 1992
- Still Pumped from Using the Mouse — 14 December 1992 to 27 September
1993
- Fugitive From the Cubicle Police — 28 September 1993 to 11 February
1995
- Casual Day Has Gone Too Far — 5
February 1995 to 19 November 1995
- Seven Years of Highly Defective People — 1997; strips from 1989 to 1995, with
handwritten notes by Scott Adams
- I'm Not Anti-Business, I'm Anti-Idiot —
20 November 1995 to 31
August 1996
- Journey to Cubeville — 1 September
1996 to 18 January 1998
- Don't Step in the Leadership — 12
January 1998 to 18 October 1998
- Dilbert Gives You the Business - Collection of favorites
before 1999.
- Random Acts of Management — 19
October 1998 to 25 July 1999
- A Treasury of Sunday Strips: Version 00 — 1999; color version of all Sunday
strips from 1995 to 1999
- Excuse Me While I Wag — 26 July
1999 to 30 April 2000
- When Did Ignorance Become A Point Of View? —
1 May 2000 to 4 February
2001
- Another Day In Cubicle Paradise — 5 February 2001 to 11 November
2001
- What Do You Call A Sociopath In A Cubicle? Answer: A Coworker
- When Body Language Goes Bad — 12
November 2001 to 18 August 2002
- Words You Don't Want to Hear During
Your Annual Performance Review — 19 August 2002 to
25 May 2003
- Don't Stand Where the Comet is Assumed to Strike
Oil — 26 May 2003 to 29
February 2004
- It's Not Funny If I Have To Explain It — 2004;
strips from 1997 to 2004, with more of Adams' handwritten notes
- The Fluorescent Light Glistens Off Your Head —
1 March 2004 to 5 December
2004
- Thriving on Vague Objectives — 6
December 2004 to 11 September 2005
- What Would Wally Do? — 2006; strips focused on
Wally.
- Try Rebooting Yourself — 12
September 2005 to 18 June 2006
- Positive Attitude - 19 June
2006 to 25 March 2007
Business books
Other
- Telling It Like It Isn't — 1996; ISBN 0-8362-1324-6
- You Don't Need Experience If You've Got Attitude — 1996; ISBN 0-8362-2196-6
- Access Denied : Dilbert's Quest for Love in the Nineties — 1996; ISBN
0-8362-2191-5
- Conversations With Dogbert — 1996; ISBN 0-8362-2197-4
- Work is a Contact Sport — 1997; ISBN 0-8362-2878-2
- The Boss: Nameless, Blameless and Shameless — 1997; ISBN 0-8362-3223-2
- The Dilbert Bunch — 1997; ISBN 0-8362-2879-0
- No You'd Better Watch Out — 1997
- Please Don't Feed The Egos — 1997; ISBN 0-8362-3224-0
- Random Acts of Catness — 1998; ISBN 0-8362-5277-2
- Dilbert Meeting Book Exceeding Tech Limits — 1998; ISBN 0-7683-2028-3
- Dilbert Book Of Days — 1998; ISBN 0-7683-2030-5
- Work—The Wally Way — 1999; ISBN 0-8362-7480-6
- Alice in Blunderland — 1999; ISBN 0-8362-7479-2
- All Dressed Down And Nowhere To Go — 2002; ISBN 0-7407-2931-4
- Dilbert's Guide to the Rest of Your Life: Dispatches from Cubicleland — 2007; ISBN
0-7624-2781-7
Merchandise
Animated series
-
Dilbert was adapted into a UPN animated television series, which ran for two seasons from
January 25, 1999, to July 25,
2000. The first season centered on the creation of a new product called the "Gruntmaster 6000,"
including the idea process and testing by one Bob Bastard. The second season had no connecting story arc; plots varied from Wally
finding disciples ("The Shroud of Wally") to Dilbert being
accused of mass murder ("The Trial"). Featured voice actors
included Daniel Stern as Dilbert and
Chris Elliott as Dogbert and Kathy Griffin as Alice.
See also
References
External links
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