Chubb and Chauncey was a comic strip by Vance Rodewalt that ran between 1988 and 1998. It detailed the lives of snooty Yorkshire terrier Chauncey and schluppy mongrel Chubb, as well as their long-suffering owner Abby, her fearsome mother and various other residents, human and animal, of the neighbourhood.
This comic strip contains examples of the following tropes:
- Always Someone Better: The spoiled poodle Precious is this to Chauncey. While he's got enough pedigree to take part in dog shows, he tends to scrape in second or third place at best. Precious, by comparison, stars in movies.
- Animal Talk: Dogs can speak to each other, but when speaking to humans the humans just hear them barking or growling. Unusually, they can not communicate with other animals, and each species is implied to have its own language.
- Badly Battered Babysitter: Anyone Abby leaves to look after the dogs.
- "Blackmail" Is Such an Ugly Word: When Chubb gets kidnapped (long story), his kidnapper suggests that he sees himself more as "borrowed." Chubb is not convinced.
- Drives Like Crazy: Upon hearing sirens and screeching tires in the distance, the dogs know that Abby's mother has taken the car to come visit.
- Godiva Hair: Chauncey's fur is so long that he usually looks like he's wearing some kind of fluffy robe. Not that it matters, mind you.
- If I Do Not Return: Chubb starts telling this to Chauncey when Abby volunteers him as a guard dog for her mom (who lives in a horrible neighbourhood and recently had a breakin). Chauncey interrupts him saying that he doesn't want any of Chubb's stuff.
- Lethal Chef: Abby can't seem to cook anything fit for human consumption. That works out well for Chubb, who is happy to eat the scorched remains of her efforts.
- Nearly Normal Animal: Chubb and Chauncey mostly act like regular dogs, but are about as smart as precocious children and can do things like turn on and off the television set. They sometimes walk on all fours and sometimes on two legs, and have opposable thumbs (something Chubb claims is not so strange, because most cartoon dogs have thumbs).
- Say My Name: One strip has Abby furiously shouting Chubb's name over and over again. Chubb, cowering in a hiding place, unhappily thinks that he hates conversations that start like that.
- Sitcom Arch-Nemesis: Abby's mother is this to the dogs.
- Small Name, Big Ego: Chauncey considers himself by far the most important person in the world. The world does not agree.
- Snobs Versus Slobs: The premise of the strip. Chauncey is the snob, Chubb is the slob.
- The Unseen: Arnie the pitbull terrier. Everyone lives in fear of him, but he never appears on screen.
