This Modern World

This Modern World
Several of the main characters in This Modern World. From left to right: Sparky, Biff, and Blinky.
Author(s)	Tom Tomorrow
Current status / schedule	Running
Launch date	1988
Syndicate(s)	self-syndicated
Genre(s)	Humor, politics

This Modern World is a weekly satirical comic strip by cartoonist and political commentator Tom Tomorrow (real name Dan Perkins) that covers current events from a left-wing point of view. Tomorrow also runs a weblog that informs readers about stories of interest, often presented as a follow up to his cartoons. This Modern World appears mainly in alternative weekly newspapers.

Visually This Modern World draws inspiration from a retro, 1950s sensibility, with brightly colored illustrations that are also inspired by clip art. Initially, the strip was almost completely composed of actual vintage clip art and magazine cutouts, assembled collage-style and often manipulated and retouched. However, Tomorrow has gradually replaced cutouts with his own drawings, which merely mimic the clip art look. Usually drawn in four panels, it is not uncommon for all panels to be identical or nearly so, with only the dialogue and/or facial expressions changing.

The '50s theme extends to the typically verbose dialogue of his human characters which is often bubbly, over-enthusiastic, and naïve. The stupidity of the humans is countered by Sparky, a fast-talking penguin (although the strip occasionally postulates he is actually an auk) with a red visor, who provides much of the strip's political commentary.

A recurring theme in the comic books (though far less so in the strips) was that of "reality engineering", wherein "the very fabric of space and time" is mined for "the good of mankind". This periodically generates "reality discontinuities", where reality breaks down. These are (generally) resolved by reality engineers.

From 2000 to 2001, an animated This Modern World series was produced by Flickerlab for Mondo Media, with Bob Harris as the voice of Sparky. Each episode was approximately five minutes long.

The series has been through several incarnations through the years, the first of which appeared in the "Suburban High Life" comic books published by Slave Labor in the late 1980s. Characters include:

In an "intermediate" version of the strip, a character named Tom Tomorrow was in the strip. He was a private eye who was dressed in a radiation suit so his face was never seen. He was eventually phased out.