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Cleats
Cleats, 1/22/10
On those occasions when I think of Cleats, I think of “gentle (to the point of blandness) humor punctuated by bouts of unspeakable horror.’ This week’s installment, focusing on the whimsical subject of “Bigfoot football,” has mostly been on the gentle-to-the-point-of-blandness side, but only today did I notice that the Sasquatches are using the withered corpse of a beaver as their ball. So that’s something, I guess.
Family Circus, 1/22/10
Dolly, you panderer! The snowman and snowlady should not be left alone in the yard together until they’re married. This is exactly the sort of ideas you get from public schooling.
Hi and Lois, 1/22/10
Chip’s friend is wearing a little hat secured to his head with some sort of elastic chin strap, so, yeah, it’s probably a good idea that he’s reading Style magazine in the second panel.
The poster on the wall indicates that the boys are fans of Paul Butterfield Blues Band keyboardist Mark Naftalin, which is a little disappointing to me because at first glance I just thought they were proponents of free trade.
Mary Worth, 1/22/10
You’ve gotta feel bad for Dawn as she angrily swoops and dances around the nervous Mary. Not long ago her boyfriend cheated on her with another woman, and now she finds out that her father’s sperm cheated with another egg, before she was even born! I have to say that her withering “something” in the second panel is the piece of Mary Worth dialogue most loaded down with contempt since Mary threw “Capisce?” in Aldo’s face.
Spider-Man, 1/22/10
“He thinks I can point him to Wolverine! And he’ll keep attacking me until I do! Unless — I run away, like a coward! Yes, that’s it! Ha ha, can’t catch me, I have the proportional pusillanimity of a spider!”
Mark Trail, 3/9/09
You know, I was really hoping that Mark would smugly return to his forest home today, so we could get started on the next storyline about poachers or whatever, and perhaps we could begin to forget the retrograde horror that has been the Ken and Patti plotline. But instead, things are getting even worse. Previously, Patti said something about not being able to have a baby, which I assumed meant that her womb had been blighted by the Lord in punishment for her occasionally having negative thoughts about the way her husband slapped her around; today, though, we learn that Ken has apparently been withholding his man-essence from her, but has now decided that it’s time he began reproducing himself. So, in an attempt to provide some sort of balanced view, let me just say this: BABIES DO NOT SOLVE MARITAL PROBLEMS. THEY EXACERBATE THEM. But unless the “tests” our nurse is about to run include a surreptitious vasectomy, it’s probably too late for our doomed couple.
Cleats, 3/9/09
Oh, look, Cleats is taking a break from its kid-friendly sports humor to introduce yet another terrifying demon-thing. Pray to God that it doesn’t turn around tomorrow, showing us the front of its grotesque, unnatural head.
Judge Parker, 3/9/09
“Interesting? Not really … wait, this is Judge Parker. ‘Interesting’ is code for ‘offering an opportunity for a hot lady to show off her breasts.’ So, yeah, I guess that is kind of interesting.”
Slylock Fox, 3/9/09
Koppy Kat’s bust made big headlines, but as a first-time offender, he was able to plea-bargain his sentence down to 18 months in minimum security, thanks to his agreement to discreetly help local museums determine which of their pieces were forgeries. (There were more than you’d think, and not all of them came out of Koppy’s workshop.) To the surprise of everyone, the experience scared him straight; upon his release, he embarked on a career as an art consultant, supplementing his income by churning out “Six Differences” puzzles. But that day’s bust had a just as big an effect on someone else: Max Mouse. As soon as he laid eyes on that unsettling psychedelic drawing of Mickey with one eye and one ear, he realized just how limited his worldview was, and he was immediately seized by a need to expand his consciousness however he could. Six months later, he had changed his name to “Maximum Spirit Voyager,” was living in a commune in New Mexico, and had taken more peyote than most doctors would have believed survivable.
Apartment 3-G, 1/19/09
That painful feeling in your neck is comic whiplash, the result of a sudden return to Apartment 3-G’s native New York, since obviously five days is all that can spared on Lu Ann’s adventures in flyover country. And we’ve gotten back just in time, as Margo’s low-cut-white-jumper-over-black-turtleneck combo is clearly her most hideous outfit yet, so it deserves plenty of strip time. Since Tommie isn’t trying to sneak into the apartment at six a.m. with mussed hair and smeared lipstick, she clearly didn’t get lucky last night (unless you count a doctor waxing maudlin about his failed marriage to be “getting lucky”), but I am sort of curious as to why she’s still in her bathrobe while Margo is all bunned up and ready to face the day. Perhaps she was up late enough watching syndicated episodes of Diagnosis Murder to push her to sleep in a bit, while Margo got coked up and spent the entire night furiously reading Tim Mills’ diary and planning her fantasy wedding, and hasn’t even gone to bed yet.
In panel two, Margo appears to be not so much drinking out of that mug as just kind of holding it in front of her mouth and nose. She may just be hiding the fact that after listening to a single complete sentence out of Tommie, she’s already so bored that she has to bite her lips just to avoid dozing off right there.
Mary Worth, 1/19/09
Did you ever have someone break up for you by tearfully telling you that it’s not you, it’s them, and that they need time to work on their stuff without you and it’s better this way, isn’t it, only to accidentally run into them on the street a week later totally holding hands and snogging with some other dude/chick? Because that’s pretty much what Frank is going to feel like when he tunes in to the All Skating All The Time Channel today and sees Mary in in Lynn’s corner, meddling her to victory.
Spider-Man, 1/19/09
Oh my goodness! Spidey is about to be unmasked by his most dangerous and powerful super-foe … Bat Boy!
Ha ha, just kidding, obviously. Spidey has actually managed to knock himself unconscious by accident, and will be unmasked by a random child as he lies supine in a fetid alleyway in a puddle of his own failure. It is a hideously ugly child, though, which may count for something.
Cleats, 1/19/09
Here it is: as far as I can remember, this is the first Cleats that ever made me laugh. Naturally it involves a traumatized child flopped onto the ice, possibly with a broken leg. I think there may be something wrong with me.
Cleats, Ziggy, and Mary Worth, 12/11/08
Cleats has spent the last few weeks introducing Svanhildur, aka “Swan Battle,” aka “the Gunk of Cleats.” I would like to believe that I don’t actually follow Cleats closely enough to notice when new characters are introduced, but I’m afraid that idea has now been conclusively disproven. Anyway, Edith mocks the idea that swan battles are part of everyday experience; however, my understanding is that swans are merely fancy elitist geese, and geese are — I know this from living for several years near Lake Merritt in Oakland, which was lousy with them — nasty, aggressive birds willing to do battle on the innocent and the helpless with little or no provocation. Take Lynn and her totally innocent, never-got-a-fingerbang-from-him-no-sir friend Greg, feeding these ungrateful parasites in today’s flashback frame. Lynn’s dad was mad at Greg for taking Lynn away from her skating practice; Greg’s parents, on the other hand, were mad at Lynn for fleeing the scene in terror while the savage swans pecked their poor son to death.
The swan in Ziggy, meanwhile, only does battle with the dignity of birds everywhere. Its obscenely lolling tongue is particularly unsettling. Ziggy is right to manifest his patented Undereye Bags Of Horror in response.
Gil Thorp, 12/11/08
I really do keep waiting for this to turn out to be a continuation of the wacky tale of Jeff “Sacko” “6-9″ “That kid who lied about his heart condition” Ponczak and Matt the Hat and Marty Moon and … you know, football season, this ostensibly being a comic about sports and all, but I’m coming around to the idea that maybe we’re firmly planted in a brave new plot of NUT BOY and armed robbery and now, two snobby prep school refugees washing up on Milford’s poverty-blighted shores! Our snooty transfer twins will be just like 90210′s Brandon and Brenda, except oppositely socially mobile, and one of them is named “Bryce” instead of “Brandon”, and they’ll probably be roped into participating in some kind of athletic activity. Perhaps Bryce will complain loudly about Milford’s lack of a polo team or yachting squad.
Beetle Bailey, 12/11/08
Yeah, lady, I’m sure this seems like a good idea now, but just wait until the beatings start.
Cleats, 11/6/08
This is Cleats! I almost never talk about it, except when it becomes a scene of nightmarish horror; but, seeing as it’s ostensibly a good-natured, light-hearted look at the world of youth athletics, that happens more than you’d think. Anyhoo, Edith there is a slightly bookish young lady who enjoys goaltending and fencing. She has terrifying, inhuman mouth-parts that she uses to feed on soccer balls, and rotting flesh.
Pluggers, 11/6/08
You know you’re an impoverished plugger when you live in an apartment so tiny that your can barely fit your legs between your TV stand and your chair, which is just as well seeing as you can’t afford any other furniture. Also, you know you’re an impoverished plugger when you’d like to eat your cat, but you can’t move quickly enough to catch him because you’re weak and keep fainting, because of the hunger. At least this poor bastard hasn’t had to resort to the ultimate plugger indignity: hocking his television.
Mark Trail, 11/6/08
“Raccoons like to wander a lot … around in nature! That’s because they’re wild animals! They don’t care a whit about you, or your family! You’re lucky Sneaky managed to ‘sneak’ out, or else he probably would have ‘snuck’ into your room at night and bit you on the face, for no reason!”
Also, I challenge you all to use the phrase “That will make it easier to chain to a log” in casual conversation today.
Shoe, 11/6/08
“Also, I’m old and dying! So the future can pretty much bite me, you know what I’m saying?”
Psst! If you’re interested in discussing the election, this would be a good place to do it.
Family Circus, 7/12/08
Since the America-hating ACLU prevents the Keane kids from forcibly saving the souls of their classmates during school hours, and no other children voluntarily spend time with them outside of the classroom, they’re left with only one target for their relentless soul-saving agenda: their pets. While their attempts to wash away the sins of their demon-spawn cat went horribly awry, Dolly is thinking that they might have better luck with the dogs. I urge Barfy and Sam to surrender their lives to Christ with a minimum of resistance, as the Keanes’ exorcism techniques have been known to destroy the body in order to save the soul.
(Speaking of the Family Circus, thanks to the many, many readers who sent me a link to this fabulous panel from the ’80s, in which Ma Keane imagines Dolly being hunted for sport.)
Mark Trail, 7/12/08
I admit to being strangely unmoved by the current Mark Trail storyline, despite the fact that it consists almost entirely of Kelly Welly being foolish again. But the prospect of a joint moose/megabeaver attack on Kelly’s hapless assistant, who will scream for help while Kelly snaps gruesome photo after gruesome photo for her new When Animals Kill column, does perk my interest up a bit. Don’t disappoint me, forest beasts! Do your worst!
Cleats, 7/12/08
I was moved to break my long silence on Cleats by the installment in which the genial children’s strip suddenly took a page from a nightmarish Harlan Ellison story. I assumed, naturally, that it couldn’t get any worse and I could get back to ignoring it, but that was before the hungry, sinister carrion eaters arrived, determined to begin picking the flesh off the still-living soccer ball as it lies roasting in the hot sun.
