My Favorite Cartoon? Olivier B. Bommel — If You Know What I Mean

My Favorite Cartoon? Olivier B. Bommel — If You Know What I Mean

What’s your favorite cartoon?

✍️ Author’s Note

A light-hearted reflection for a December morning: a return to one of the gentlest figures in Dutch cultural memory. Olivier B. Bommel is not merely a cartoon hero but a companion of earlier decades — a mirror of our national quirks, vanities, and virtues. A small tribute to the bear who always meant well, if you know what I mean.

When asked about my favourite cartoon, I could offer many respectable answers from Disney to Miyazaki, but the truth is simpler, older, and far more Dutch: Olivier B. Bommel, the flawed, warm-hearted, aristocratic bear from Maarten Toonder’s universe.

Bommel — or “heer Ollie,” as Tom Poes unfailingly calls him — published his first adventures in 1941, two years before my own debut on this planet. For decades I collected the stories, and I still remember their long rerun in the NRC, where they became daily companions over morning coffee.

He began merely as a supporting character in the Tom Poes serial, but his personality — pompous kindness, noble confusion, and that irresistible combination of vanity and generosity — quickly made him a star in his own right. Tom Poes was the clever one, the moral compass; Bommel was the catalyst of folly, blunders, and unintended consequences. Together they balanced each other like Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, though in this version Sancho is the one wearing the housecoat.

Bommel’s world was rich in characters who felt too familiar:

• Mayor Dickerdack, ever eager to delegate responsibility;
• The Marquis de Canteclaer, aristocratic snob and self-appointed guardian of old-world dignity (“this, err… Bumble”);
• and the countless committees, clubs, and councils where Bommel’s membership was always controversial, if not outright rejected.

And then there were his lines — small pearls of Dutch cultural memory:

“Money is of no consequence.”
“If you know what I mean.”
“Like my dear father always said…” (followed by something his father likely never said at all.)

Bommel was not wise, but he was good. A bear who wanted to be noble in a world that was often petty. A gentleman of somewhat murky lineage who nonetheless believed in decency — even when he struggled to explain what, exactly, he meant.

The final story in 1986 gave him the conclusion he deserved: peace at last, and marriage to his neighbour Miss Doddel. A gentle closing of the book on a very Dutch form of humour — warm, slightly melancholic, mildly absurd, and never cruel.

So yes, when asked about my favourite cartoon, my answer is simple:
Olivier B. Bommel.
A bear who believed that kindness still counts — if you know what I mean.

William J J Houtzager, Aka WJJH, December 2025

📌Blog Excerpt

My favourite cartoon? Olivier B. Bommel: the flawed but kind-hearted bear from Maarten Toonder’s timeless universe. First appearing in 1941, he grew from a supporting character into the moral and emotional centre of the stories — a gentle parody of Dutchness in all its earnest confusion. This piece is a small tribute to Bommel, Tom Poes, and the warm humour that shaped generations.