While Watterson’s newspaper comic Calvin and Hobbes was kid-friendly (though smart enough for adults) and set firmly in the here and now, The Mysteries is a fable for adults set in the distant past. The story begins with a king whose kingdom is beset by inexplicable calamities sending his knights on a mission to uncover the source of the troubles. Only one knight returns, years later and in terrible shape. Watterson and Kascht worked together for years on the book, which is very different from their earlier work.
Watterson retired from Calvin and Hobbes in 1995 and has done only a handful of published works since then, none of them full length. He drew a few episodes of Stephan Pastis’ Pearls Before Swine in 2014 (see “Reclusive Watterson Drew ‘Pearls Before Swine’”). The original art was auctioned off to benefit Team Cul De Sac, an organization formed to support cartoonist Richard Thompson in his struggle with Parkinson’s Disease and to raise awareness of the disease in general. Kascht was also a contributor to Team Cul De Sac, which published the contributions as a benefit anthology.
Watterson was inducted into the Eisner Awards Hall of Fame in 2020 (see “Eisner Awards 2020”).
