Comment of the Week

Amen, sister. Don't we all wish we were Kristy? I have no idea what this is about, and I don't care: being Kristy just seems right.

Handsome Harry Backstayge, Idol of a Million Other Women

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Hi and Lois, 5/5/24

I guess the point of this strip (to the extent that any given Hi and Lois comic can be said to have a “point”) is to shore up the Walker-Browne brand and remind American that the Camp Swampy gang and the Flagstons’ suburban hellscape coexist in a single universe of shared IP. Personally, I’m more intrigued by the comic book time effects: when the strip launched in 1954, Lois presumably had a birth date that would’ve put her roughly in the same demographic as her grandmother in the middle second row panel here. But what really makes this for me is Ditto looking cruelly at the cookie jar and whispering that delightfully batshit sentence at it, simultaneously erotic and threatening, the sort of thing that, if your parents overheard you saying it, they’d repeat it to every romantic partner you ever brought home for the rest of your life, to your mounting distress.

Beetle Bailey, 5/5/24

Elsehwere in the FlagstBaileyVerse, Killer is making a dating app profile! As much fun as the main body of the strip makes spinning a web of lies in an attempt to attract some hapless young woman seem, I must point your attention to Killer’s look of beaten-down resignation in the first throwaway panel. Being the most oversexed soldier in your unit is a job, and Killer is determined to be good at it, but like every job it wears on you after a while.

Mary Worth, 5/5/24

Maybe Killer doesn’t need to put so much work into this, though. After all, if the person you meet on the apps turns out to not be for you, you can always just smooch the nearest attractive service worker to fulfill your natural romantic needs! (Just kidding, if Killer tried this today he would immediately be arrested, because of woke.)

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Daddy Daze, 5/4/24

Look, I’m just going to say it: I find the Daddy Daze baby, with his fixed, manic smile, his uncanny ability to move about and manipulate objects despite his infancy, and his inscrutable language of “ba”s, to be off-putting and frankly a little scary. So no, I’m not on board with the Daddy Daze daddy telling him to go out and start collecting memories from the very brains of his hapless victims.

Family Circus, 5/4/24

I know the upcoming Garfield movie is a big media event and the studio is making lots of deals to cross-promote it everywhere. I’m just a little surprised and frankly disappointed that the Catholic Church decided to get in on the action.

Beetle Bailey, 5/4/24

Wait, if you’re supposed to wear civvies to the General’s party, why’s he wearing a uniform? I was going to say that Beetle Bailey was drawing on its deep knowledge of contemporary military culture and uniform rules for the nuances of this joke, but then I realized how absurd that was, had a good laugh, and then went to lie down. Anyway, I think it’s just a mistake.

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cotw COTW COTW COTW!

“Amen, sister. Don’t we all wish we were Kristy? I have no idea what this is about, and I don’t care: being Kristy just seems right.” –Handsome Harry Backstayge, Idol of a Million Other Women

And your very funny runners up!

“I hope someday the quote at the beginning of a Sunday Mary Worth is just, ‘Fuck you! Stupid ass.’ –Old Man” –Brian Houska, on Bluesky

“I’m sure that ‘Ol’ Snort’ is part of deep Snuffy lore, but honestly, on first read I thought that Jughaid was asking his uncle if he feared bears more than cocaine addiction.” –pugfuggly

“Ah, Hootin’ Holler — it’s a town so backward that human beings are about 15th on the food chain.” –BigTed

“Musk’s latest self-driving car still can’t successfully home in on Wilbur.” –Hibbleton

“The real heroes are the garbagemen of Santa Royale! That huge SUV was completely destroyed just by crashing into a garbage can, which to be that heavy I must assume is made of uranium!” –Ettorre

“Nah, it’s too easy to suggest it’s their sex tape. Better to imagine it’s a video Chip found on the side of the road and brought home in hopes he gets the house to himself some night to investigate. After discovering it’s a bootleg of C.H.U.D., he’ll recognize the wanting is better than the having, a truism Hi could have laid on him anytime.” –Bobby Sneakers

“Trying and failing to maintain my sanity in the face of the non-Euclidean nightmare geometry of that car wreckage. Did it hit the wall so hard that it disintegrated into a vapour gently wafting away on the breeze?” –Schroduck

“For at least the last seventy years, only children and poetasters have believed that poetry has to rhyme. Menace level: Archaic!” –But What Do I Know?

“It would be the height of irony if Walt got electrocuted by banging his cane into a light socket. It would also be a quick, merciful death and the end of the strip, but you can’t ask for everything. Or can you?” –I’m Not Cthulhu, But I Play Him On TV

You are the cavalry to the rescue. The 7th Cavalry, to be precise. In other words, you’re going to make everything worse and then die. We’d have been better off at Calvary, at least there we’d get to the crux of the issue.” –Voshkod

“With the dramatic emphasis on Leo being a vegan and his shock at the director saying beef, I presume that the writer thinks a vegan is some kind of sleeper agent who is activated by any mention of meat in their presence.” –ectojazzmage

“Little does she realize that the new bath towels will be free of mold and mildew (for a while), freeing up her breathing, making her feel physically better, and thus contributing to an improved emotional well-being. It’s a domino effect, but with cloth dominoes. Also, I’m sure Wilbur will turn things around, and this date will go fantastically. I’ll just ignore the heavy-handed telegraphing. Did I mention I got new bath towels a few days ago?” –taig

“Wilbur can save this date if he pivots the conversation to his apparent worldview of ephemeral essences where senses are an illusion and someone’s true appearance is revealed when you see not how they look, but who they are … Only Mary is truly immune to his astral appearance projection, having had to fend off the psychic waves of Aldo all those years ago. When Wilbur, like that omnipotent kid from the Twilight Zone, goes mad with power and rules Charterstone with an iron combover, they will clash, and their battle will be legendary.” –InvasionOfTheZIM

“Noone should be so hungry that they’re forced to have meal with this guy. Surely there’s got to be a soup kitchen in this town.” –Maltmash3r

“Meagan, while Wilbur’s distracted by talking about himself, c’mere a sec, I have a question for you: You don’t appear to have a right thumb, and kudos to you for holding your glass regardless, not all heroes etc., but do you, in fact, have legs? Because you can just … leave. You know that, right?” –els

“I can’t tell if Henry is trying to talk the other adults into swinging or investing in crypto, but Alice is having none of it and good for her.” –Tabby Lavalamp

“Do it, Meagan. Drink whatever’s in that test tube.” –Lomo

“My mom pulls ALL the strings. She hypnotized our hostess into bringing her a steaming mug of hot chocolate on a dinner plate, when everyone else is drinking cocktails.” –Peanut Gallery

“‘So what do you want to do now?’ ‘Oh, wait a couple of strip days for more psychological and/or physical violence to occur.’ ‘Oh, okay!’” –Bob Tice

“‘This time???’ The worst thing Wilbur has done on this date is assuming there’ll be another one.” –astroboy

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