Archive: Beetle Bailey

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Beetle Bailey, 4/6/24

I’m sorry, Sarge doesn’t know any “raunchy” songs. He may be a brute who spends his days preparing men for the horrors of war by delivering arbitrary violence upon them, but in many ways he seems quite naive. He definitely doesn’t know what sex is, for instance.

Mary Worth, 4/6/24

Look, man, we all enjoyed Wilbur’s total karaoke emotional meltdown from last April and his public karaoke-off with his ex the previous November, but I feel like this is going to the well one too many times. I’m over it! I’m going to try to get over how positively delighted Mary looks at the thought of Wilbur “pulling in” hapless “ladies” for unsatisfying sex and even less satisfying relationship behavior, but that’s going to take some time.

Gil Thorp, 4/6/24

As someone who relies on the syndicated newspaper strip Gil Thorp to discover what the teens are into, I’m excited to learn that what they’re into is beloved Gen X indie rocker Aimee Mann, and what they want to hear from her is “Red Vines,” the single from her 2000 album Bachelor No. 2. Naturally, being a 49-year-old man who thought of himself as vaguely hip 24 years ago, I find this news satisfying and will be doing no further research on the subject of teen musical tastes in the year 2024.

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Gearhead Gertie, 4/4/24

I really enjoy the fact that about half of Gearhead Gertie strips are like “here’s a recent NASCAR story or controversy, spelled out in detail for idiots like me who don’t follow NASCAR,” and the other half of them are like “Gertie encounters someone who doesn’t sufficiently enjoy or respect NASCAR and that person just immediately goes to the top of her shit list, and she spends the rest of the week seething about it.”

Beetle Bailey, 4/4/24

My Great-Uncle Stan developed alopecia when he was in the Army, and family lore was that he got a big settlement from the military due to some hush-hush reasons involving some kind of experimental weapons program. I don’t know if that’s really true, but I remember him fondly as an extremely jovial guy who lived in a fun retirement community near Palm Springs that in retrospect was definitely the site of multiple swingers parties every night, so it’s nice to see him getting some representation in Beetle Bailey.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 4/4/24

Ha ha, yes, this honestly is good advice to give to a child growing up in a town full of notorious violent criminals!

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Blondie, 4/3/24

Everyone makes fun of young people for being addicted to social media, but the truth is that old people are also addicted to social media. Which is fine! It’s designed to be addictive! But it’s an underexplored cultural phenomenon and honestly I’m glad that Blondie offers insight into that world. Today’s strip makes the misstep of putting Dagwood’s teen son Alexander front and center, though. Look, I too am constantly annoyed by the “reels” that Instagram and Facebook put into my feed. But I’m a 49 year old man! The teens today are not on Facebook and barely on Instagram. They’re being annoyed by new irritating features on some other site and/or app entirely, probably TikTok but also maybe something I haven’t even heard of yet. And why should I have? Whatever it is, it’s quite frankly none of my business.

Daddy Daze, 4/3/24

Oh, wow, big news: we all suspected the Daddy Daze baby was going to kill the Daddy Daze daddy one of these days, and now it’s finally happening! Not sure I would’ve guessed that he was going to do an elaborate pseudo-legal ritual beforehand, but you know what, that tracks.

Beetle Bailey, 4/3/24

Sure, I make fun of how newspaper comics are hidebound and traditional all the time, but some traditions I like, and one of them is that Beetle Bailey should never, ever know what “horny” feels like. That’s General Halftrack’s job! C’mon now.