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Dick Tracy, 10/14/26

Dick Tracy has a new artist, longtime Tracy superfan Howie Noel, and I am here to report that, in this house, we are now Howie Noel superfans, as this week has reliably delivered panel after panel of real fucked-up shit, which I mean in the most complimentary possible sense. A detective with a neanderthal-level brow ridge and free-flowing beads of sweat. A weird pinheaded nurse in an archaic outfit. A tiny man the size of a ventriloquist’s dummy, or possibly just an actual ventriloquist’s dummy that the nurse is operating. The tiny man/dummy has unpleasantly long fingernails, by the way. A+ all around!

Mary Worth, 10/14/26

OK, so, Toby is still crashing out over the entirely not real Ian/Mary rumors, but let’s look on the bright side for her: artistically, she’s moved on from her “hideous grey animal-shaped blobs” period to her “mawkish painted animal figurines” period, which should be more marketable if nothing else.

Beetle Bailey, 10/14/26

Look, I know that General Halftrack’s coffee tastes can’t possibly be what anyone would call sophisticated, but I refuse to believe that even the most skilled practitioner could make anything in that circa 1975 Mr. Coffee machine that would live up to the name “barista.”

Hi and Lois, 10/14/26

Oh, so Chip isn’t competent to babysit when Hi’s just trying to get some work done at the office, but he’s perfectly capable of doing so when Lois is horny, huh? Interesting. Interesting.

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Hi and Lois, 10/12/26

I admit that, as a non-kid-haver, I’m not fully up on the ages at which kids are allowed to be left on their own and/or put in charge of their siblings these days, and I’m given to understand that this has shifted since I was a teen, but still: Chip is old enough to watch his siblings, right? Or at least not be dragged along to the office with other kids? This question sent me down a rabbit hole trying to figure out Chip’s age and the amount of freedom his parents allow him, and I’m here to report that he’s learning how to drive, goes on unsupervised dates to the movies, and takes his little brother along on walks around the neighborhood, which you’d think would be enough evidence to make today’s antics unnecessary. On the other hand, at one point he told Dot about Studio 54, which might’ve led to her asking some questions that ultimately resulted in a lot of privileges being revoked.

Judge Parker, 10/12/26

Oh, hey, remember how April was going to pick up Charlotte and take her to school? Well, she never showed up, and the reason why is that she got scooped up off the street and taken to a CIA black site somewhere. I guess they’re calling black sites “regional offices” now, to present a more professional, more chill, less terrifying kind of branding to the outside world. That’s not how most of the US government is doing things currently, but the security services always zag when everyone else is zigging, you know?

Alice, 10/12/26

Big news about Alice’s car saga: Remember when she said that today’s cars were too expensive and didn’t need all that stuff, but then rented a car and backslid and said she could get very spoiled with all the new features, but then later declared her current 25-year-old car “perfect” because it had “no technology” and got her where she wanted to go? Well, it seems she bought a new car after all, and she likes it, but she misses the simplicity of the old car, and the old price tag too. Who could’ve predicted this? You could’ve, Alice! I’ve assembled incontrovertible evidence that you predicted every aspect of the mess in which you find yourself! You have no excuse!

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Hi and Lois, 10/10/26

What really makes this strip, obviously, is Lois in the second panel watching over this scene from inside anxiously, with her arms folded. She wants to make sure Chip is capable of forming appropriate emotional bonds so he doesn’t turn out a broken loser like Thirsty, and also wants to make sure the boys rake the yard properly so their house isn’t a neighborhood eyesore like Thirsty’s.

Crankshaft, 10/10/26

Do they really make pilltainers that are as long as a man’s torso? That’s not a thing, right? Maybe that’s why Crankshaft looks so put off in the last couple panels. The joke in this strip was supposed to be about this comically large pilltainer! I carried it all the way over here! Now you’re telling me the joke is about an app that electrocutes you? This is amateur hour, we gotta get our shit together!

Mother Goose and Grimm, 10/10/26

“The devil wears crocs, and also walks on tippy-toes, which looks really unnatural but it’s the only way to really convey to the reader that he’s wearing crocs, and we already got most of the way into putting together a strip based on this joke and don’t have time to come up with another one, so I guess we’re just going to draw him like this??!”

Mary Worth, 10/10/26

“No, it’s … not true! I mean, yes, it would be gross if it were true, but it’s not true, therefore it’s … not gross? I gotta wake up and start making a diagram here.”