Making one of the main characters a houseplant is exactly the kind of daring creative freedom we've seen is totally missing from syndicated cartoons.
Hasty edit: serious remark
this post was submitted on 20 Jun 2025
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Bello Bear
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Bello Bear is a comic strip set in a small deli and focuses on the humorous banter between Bello, his coworkers, and their customers. New comics are posted every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. You can find it on your social of choice or at BelloBear.com. Hope you enjoy!
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Thanks, really appreciate the nice words!
I agree with comment-OP. I was thinking about the rose in The Little Prince, and how it is important that the character be a rose. In fact to make a memorable impression the character has to be a rose, just as the fox has to be a fox, and the snake a snake. I think I see why Bello has to be a bear, though it's not yet clear to me why the plant is a plant.
Developing the characters, I think it was subconscious thing where he just came out as a plant. Seems to me plants would be good listeners, old and wise, and with a hint of snakiness here and there.
I think your intuition was on to something good. TIL that the rose in The Little Prince was based on a real person, with whom the author had a tumultuous relationship. So the author had a lot to pull from when he was writing that character. I hope the personality of the plant continues to show through, as the series progresses.
The first two panels here are really top-notch. An excellent balance of thoughtfulness and humor. Bello's question in panel 3 continues this, but the plant's reply is less satisfying. Bello's utterance in panel 4 is still good, but the plant's final reply, while a decent joke, is a little out-of-tune with the other 3 panels.
- Bello seems to be talking about something existential / emotional, while the plant isn't really reacting to this in an interesting way.
- maybe the point is that the plant and Bello are talking past each other? (i.e. Bello's trying to "reach out" and the plant's not picking up on it.)
- It's not quite clear what the difference between "hunger" and "munchies" is -- they're kind of the same, right?
(I hope you don't mind I write a comment like this, "workshop-style" like in creative writing classes.)
Don't mind, appreciate the feedback. Still honing my writing skills ;)
Then draw a circle around the plant's utterance in panel 3, and also around the first half of the plant's utterance in panel 4, and consider if those parts could have been something else. Not that they're bad, just that the rest of the strip is excellent and those parts didn't keep up.