Now that I have a copy of the new Look and Find: Peanuts, I can confirm that it is just a smaller-dimension reprint of 2011’s Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown Look and Find. There actually have been some very minor changes made on one of the spreads, but I leave it to the over-dedicated Look-and-Finder to find what they are. This is not going to be the time-waster that a good Where’s Waldo volume is (although Woodstock is wearing a cap on the cover that makes it look like he wants to hide on a Where’s Waldo page.)

Among the spreads in this are one recreating the scene where Charlie Brown is selling off his comic book collection, recreating a scene from the winter of 1990 where he was trying to raise money to buy a gift for Peggy Jean. Now, that original strip was a single-panel daily, and none of the titles are legible, but here on this blown up version, it’s clear that he collected Laff, Humor, Fun, Funny, Comic, Comics, and Comix, and even what we can see of the covers on those last few titles suggest that they, too, are of a humorous nature. This seems a somewhat odd choice (and I’m saying that as someone who only purchased humor comics in his pre-college days.) Charlie Brown is a person who play acts or fantasizes of adventure at various times. He has no superhero comics, no westerns, no drama? In the strip, in the famous “What a beautiful gory layout” Sunday strip, he is specifically drawn to the titles in the top row – such non-humor fair as Mangle, Slaughter, and Jab. While I wouldn’t expect his collection depicted today to include those specific title (they do reflect 1950s crime comics more than they do anything that is in significant supply today), it seems to me like they’re excessively Milquetoasting him by giving him nothing but funny funnybooks.

Having this book also makes me realize that the art for last year’s A Charlie Brown Christmas Wrapping Paper Activity Book was recycled from the Vicki Scott, Paige Braddock, and Bob Scott art in this book. Which makes sense; the busy, character-filled layouts from this project serve that one well.

In any case, if this book is of interest to you, you may want to order the earlier version instead, which is not only physically larger, at the moment it’s cheaper as well!

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