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Mary Worth, 12/16/25

There’s a lot of hand-wringing about “grade inflation” at elite universities, which I have for the most part thought is overblown, but, I dunno: if they’re giving Ian Cameron a “University Excellence Award,” maybe things really are bad.

Family Circus, 12/16/25

Honestly love Thel’s wary expression here. She specifically told Dolly not to talk to Santa like a dumbass, but she’s clearly talking to Santa like a dumbass, and Thel’s too far away to stop her. The way the composition draws your eye to her is great, and I’m imagining a Vertigo-style dolly zoom shot on her face as she listens to this nonsense unfold.

Luann, 12/16/25

Sorry I started doing Luann on this blog again after like a decade only to become fixated on shoving the “Ugh, Brand and Toni have an active erotic life and it’s disgusting” strips in your face. This one I enjoy because I’m imagining the DeGroot parents sitting forlornly around their living room thinking “When is Brad going to come over and aim the snowflake projector at our house? He said he would do it, but where is he? He better not be fucking.”

Slylock Fox, 12/16/25

What really jumps out at me in both versions of this panel is how old these pirates look. No wonder they seem so upset at this joke of a treasure! They’ve wasted the best years of their lives!

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 12/16/25

Damn, Maybelle Pratt! Turns out Snuffy Smith straight-up does not like you. It’s a good thing you’re leaving town!

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Luann, 12/1/25

Back in the ’80s, when this strip first debuted and its characters were in high school but acted like they were 12, much of its energy was put into the competition between handsome hunk Aaron Hill and awful nerd Gunther Berger for Luann’s love. This eventually ended with Aaron moving off to Hawaii and Gunther actually becoming too good for Luann, but that doesn’t mean the strip doesn’t like to return to the classics, so today, when the characters are in college but act like they’re 15, there’s a new awful nerd obsessed with our heroine, and I do appreciate that they’ve taken steps to make Alan awful in a specifically 2025 way. Like the only way “Oh, do you think there’s a problematic age gap between my belovèd and myself? Well, I’ve done my research about historical sex affairs and come up with a little factoid that proves that’s no impediment” could get more of the moment would be if Alan triumphantly showed Bernice a bunch of AI-generated erotic anime-style images of him and Luann wearing Renaissance clothing to prove his point.

Dustin, 12/1/25

I think this may be the first Dustin I’ve ever seen where Dustin’s dad tries to have a genuine moment of connection and companionship with his son. That moment will end immediately after the third panel here, because Dustin’s terrible little quip will remind his father that he’s insufferable and that’s why nobody wants to spend time with him.

Mother Goose and Grimm, 12/1/25

OK, sure, if Humpty opened up that carton and cracked open an egg in cold blood? That’s a crime, and he deserves his punishment. But if he and the victim were in that carton together? Well, you can’t blame an egg for doing what he has to do in there, in a darkness that could end at any moment or last forever, a world where it’s crack or be cracked.

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Mary Worth, 10/13/25

OK, sorry, Mary, I know you don’t want to think too hard about the strange logic of Olive’s powers and the implications for free will and the nature of time itself, but what Olive’s saying doesn’t make any sense. Oh, she didn’t have a feeling of doom before the balloon crash, because it all worked out in the end (due to her psychic powers, not her prophetic powers)? So how do her visions sometimes help change the future? What about the time she was able to stop Mary from being killed by a falling air conditioner? That scenario had a happy ending, and yet … wait. Did Olive have the unmistakable feeling of doom because Mary survived? Holy shit. Holy shit. This whole thing just got a lot more twisted.

Herb and Jamaal, 10/13/25

Hey, Jamaal, I don’t think … anyone thinks baldness is a curse from God? Why would you even bring this up? Sounds like someone’s actually just overcompensating for some internalized baldophobia and you need to do some work on yourself and your self-image.

Luann, 10/13/25

Big news, everyone! Bernice and Luann have been Consumed by some kind of mysterious Portal. More on this story as it develops, if it turns out to be interesting (it won’t).