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Rex Morgan, M.D., 4/15/08

My, the local yokels in Rex Morgan’s town sure care about stuff, don’t they? I mean, most people respond to news about bacteria and public health policy by saying “Guh, science is hard” and changing the channel, but these folks have taken note of the crisis in their community and chose to get politically involved. Naturally, Rex and June, as representatives of the out-of-touch medical elite, dismiss them as ignorant peasants. In their perfect world, people would meekly follow the dictates of their physician-kings, especially when it came to purchasing expensive prescription medication manufactured by companies who contribute nice pens and notepads to the Morgan clinic.

Rex’s dickish statement in panel two definitely qualifies as one of his most hilarious dickish statements yet. Of course, his obsession with nostril health may be the root cause of some of the more unusual viewing angles this strip has featured in the past:

And let’s not forget this panel from last Saturday!

See, we thought it was about her choppers, but it turns out that we can actually see the MRSA breeding, up there amongst her boogers.

Apartment 3-G, 4/15/08

That’s actually what Margo asks herself pretty much every waking minute of the day. Still, in panel three she looks almost sheepish about the awful plan for exploiting Lu Ann’s brain damage she’s about to unveil.

Blondie, 4/15/08

When I first read this, I thought, “Wouldn’t it be easier if Dagwood just kept a stick of pepperoni in the car?” But if he did, he’d inevitably eat it. In fact, he’s probably going to eat that air freshener.

For Better Or For Worse, 4/15/08

Wait … when the baby boomers were getting married the bygone days of the ’60s and ’70s, did they really decide on a wedding date the moment they got engaged? I don’t think they did, actually. FOR PETE’S SAKE FOOBS, JUST BECAUSE YOU CAN MAKE A PUN OUT OF IT DOESN’T MAKE IT TRUE.

Get Fuzzy, 4/15/08

Ha, he said “wash his own balls!” But what really made me laugh for some reason was “oh my head.” Most people would say “oh my God” or the like, but Bucky can imagine no deity more important than his own misshapen skull.

Judge Parker, 4/15/08

HEY, EVERYONE, MARIJUANA! The Dickens farm has been growing marijuana. That … that revelation turned out to be fairly anticlimactic, actually. At least we’ll be treated to a be-hatted Abbey being held captive by sinister geriatric drug dealers, which should be wonderful and bizarre.

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Beetle Bailey, 3/8/08

Heh, heh, old people have trouble remembering stuff. Oh, and the Halftracks’ marriage has degenerated into petty sniping on one another’s infirmities. Give tonight’s round to the General.

Get Fuzzy, 3/8/08

Satchel’s and Bucky’s relationship has always been a war of attrition. But Satchel, like Aesop’s tortoise or Archilocus’s hedgehog, knows how to pace himself.

B.C., 3/8/08

Hey, what’s this? At no time in recent memory have we seen B.C. combine a road trip, topical humor, and new (albeit throwaway) characters. Yeah, the joke is Family Circus-level wordplay, but you go, new guy!

– Uncle Lumpy

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We mock, but cartoonists’ lives are hard. The drumbeat deadline, day after day for decades, enfevers the brain ’til it cries out, “Stop!” And stop it does — every cartoonist has a trademark way of putting the strip on autopilot so they can take a freaking break. And February, when the days are grey and the year ahead looks endless, is a great time to knock off for a bit. Here’s how they do it:

Crankshaft, 2/6/08

Tom Batiuk relaxes by expanding weak puns into multiple panels for weeks on end. This one is part of a recurring series, “Crankshaft mispronounces stuff.” The setup is completely arbitrary: Ed doesn’t cook, and wouldn’t use a frou-frou ingredient like balsamic vinegar if he did. If you really must make sense of it, assume that vinegar is Ed’s beverage of choice and they ran out of malt.

Dick Tracy, 2/6/08

Dick Lochler just hits the “pause” button on his calendar. Honestly, Chief Liz has known for more than a month that having your “gross” portrait in the museum gets you disappeared — that’s why she called Dick in the first place. Today’s strip is the equivalent of, “Yeah — what you said.” Somebody needs his Gretchen.

Curtis, 2/6/08

Ray Billingsley famously repeats the same themes year after year (this one is “Curtis’s Black History Month essay”). I suppose we should be grateful that Curtis recycles its material every year — Marmaduke does it every freaking day.

Get Fuzzy, 2/6/08

Darby Conley creates some of the best characters on the comics page today, but everybody deserves a break, and goddammit, he’s taking one. Lately, he seems to have taken to his bosom the cause of the television industry writers’ strike — an issue of pressing concern to no one on the face of the earth.* Phone us when you get back, pal.

– Uncle Lumpy

* Emphatically not true! See discussion in the comments, and retraction at #144