Commentary by Kevin McShane

Oberlin is a hippie school. Most students there have a certain amount of hippie in them. During their first year, both men and women experiment to find out just how much hippie they really have. For most, this usually involves less bathing and shaving, and more Burkenstocks. When worn by a dude, my friends and I referred to this as “The Jesus Look.”

That’s where this strip came from. It wouldn’t be the first time “The Jesus Look” was the subject of a Toupy story. During the winter term of my junior year, I had an abortive attempt at a full length comic in which Jesus came back to Oberlin for a semester. But that’s for another time. . .

This strip is full of familiar faces to me. The first person in the first row is my high school buddy Steve McPherson. Last person in the top row is me. My freshman year, I grew my hair long(er) along with a goatee. That’s about as hippie as I got.

And in a nod to the urban legend that Charlie Chaplin entered a Charlie Chaplin look alike contest and came in third, the second person in the second row is actually Jesus. Hence the halo.

-K