Amazingly, this morning I saw a spectre of my long-lost childhood in the 1970s: The long-runner Tootsie Pop commercial where the jerkface owl intentionally mis-answers a young man’s question in order to steal the gooey Tootsie Roll center of his candy. It’s an iconic commercial that even my 14-year-old recognizes has been on forever, and in some ways, it’s almost comforting. Knowing that, even in our modern world of stuff and junk, that $&#ing owl is still scamming that idiot watercolor boy provides a sense of continuity that the world seems to lack, leading to today’s can’t-make-it-without-biting query…
The MS-QOTD (pronounced, as always, “misquoted”) also has a DVR setting that records and saves five episodes of ‘The Twilight Zone’ on any channel, anywhere, so that I can always watch Rod Serling if the mood strikes, asking: Which long-runner in pop culture would you most miss if it suddenly disappeared forever?
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Its hard to name just one, but Donald Duck comic is definitely up there. Its been published here since 1951 and pretty much have taught three generations of Finnish children to read. Its not even exaggeration, there are academic studies about its influence and excellent translation.
David Bowie
Doctor Who. I’ve gone through one cancellation, but there was still other media to fill the hole it left (novels, audio plays, spin-off films, etc.), not to mention decades of past episodes to watch over again (even without the lost episodes). But if it were suddenly stopped, no more TV shows, novels, comics, audio plays or anything, I would be upset, and if the past media disappeared as well, I would be devastated.