Judge not!
Judge Parker, 6/22/2008
Well, speak of the devil and he appears! The distinguished-looking gentleman in panels two and five is the Honorable Alan Parker, Judge of the mumble mumble Court of mumble mumble in Parkerville, ST. He’s in the (endless) process of retiring, and when we last saw him — on November 28, 2006 — he was helping his son, Randy “Work it like a claw” Parker, campaign for his seat on the bench.
As early as the 1960’s, the Judge had grown too respectable to be involved in any kind of action — rough-and-tumble P.I. Sam Driver took care of that end of the business. Now similarly neutered, Sam patronizes his secretary, ignores the advances of beautiful women, and passes the action torch to Steve Shannon.
This happens all the time in serial strips:
Why do authors build strong characters over years, only to turn them to plaster saints? Thank heaven Dick Tracy still keeps his hand in the game.
Flash Gordon 6/22/2008
Zonino! Who knew this was still being published? And with a special guest appearance by King Features superstar Mary Worth in the first two panels!
– Uncle Lumpy
Dr. Weird
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:14 am
Wow, I’m the first! And Flash Gordon’s a CC first, isn’t it? I find it interesting that you can say “Kill him!” and (in the Phantom) “Don’t talk, just shoot him!” while such direct language is forbidden in animated cartoons on TV. Odd.
From the last bunch of comments, ChattyGenes, you must go to the dojinshi store and find Uncle Lumpy a dojin of American comic strip characters! It’s a mathmatical certainty they exist! Then everyone here will have their brains blasted!
Red Greenback
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:14 am
Mary Worth?
Kibo
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:24 am
Mary Worth! Mary Worth!
There, we’ve said it three times, now she has to kill us.
Captain Wrong
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:27 am
Mary’s looking better in those first two panels than she has in years.
RyanE
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:41 am
I hope the amazon in the last panel gets to kill him.
Somehow, though, I doubt the tag “NEXT: GARAKAHN!” is referring to the amazon.
Dang.
Gojira
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:46 am
The Amazingly Lame S-M: So far, MJ’s out of work, Peter’s been sick in bed for a week, and he lets Jameson sucker him into accepting $25 for pictures which almost left him splattered on the sidewalk. That won’t cover groceries, much less rent or even restocking the web fluid he used up making that parachute.
MJ quit, so unemployment’s out. The good news: They do qualify for welfare.
Farley's Revenge
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:47 am
Sunday’s FOOB: Surely having to witness her father publicly experience the best orgasm of her life would scar April for life.
Alas, that’s just one more scar on a psyche that has been scarred so often it resembles Frankenstein’s monster on a bad day.
Farley\'s Revenge
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:49 am
“Best orgasm of HIS life”
*sigh*
The preview is there for a reason. I should use it once in a while.
Shalomi
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:52 am
What the hell? A decades old serial comic that actually is somewhat entertaining?
Mooncattie
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:01 am
MW – Oh, Toby…this “history…of love and war” of which you speak…you’re talking to ol’ Mare, but you’re thinking about you and General Chinbeard…aren’t you? Has the old sub been missing a few torpedoes lately?
And by the way, it’s kind of funny that Councillor Problemguy hasn’t phoned Mary yet about this gossip photo in the newspaper business. You’d think most politicians would be in Super Damage Control Mode by now! Yes, there’s a stigma about our elected/appointed officials admitting to Personal Problems, but we’ll generally give a pass to folks who are grieving for a lost parent. Being photographed at night with Mary Worth is another story!
DarkwingDuck
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:03 am
You mispronounced “snoino.” Hope this helps.
Garrison
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:10 am
Flash looks like he’s wearing a Star Trek 2 Starfleet uniform.
soundman
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:13 am
Hmm. May have to find a feed for Flash. It looks serially delicious.
Ned Ryerson
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:14 am
A3G: 5 G’s is gonna buy an awful lot of pixie stix. Alan Whatsizname in, Requiem for a Dweeb.
Dingo
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:15 am
There’s a small part of me that believes this is how Toby became Mrs. Ian Cameron. (NSFW)
Ned Ryerson
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:22 am
What manner of Taoism is that depicted in Flash Gordon, the Tao Te Ching as translated by Charlton Heston?
Paul Rodgers
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:32 am
Flash Gordon: Great comic, or greatest comic?
kippetje2000
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:47 am
By Toa! So that is what our Galactic Emperor Chennux does on Sundays? (I dare not use bold capitals lest it incur his attention) See how he treats us fleshy gordons. Reminds me of the fundays when I couldn’t wait for a good Sunday lay-out with Calvin and Hobbs and Prince Valiant. And don’t we all wish the old biddy from the Charterstone dimension could be vanquished so easily. Thunc, indeed!
Uncle Lumpy show us more new visions, please.
Donald The Anarchist
June 22nd, 2008 at 2:03 am
JP Face to face…does that mean there’s kissing involved? Either that or he’s worried their conversation has one of those ‘buzz words’ that trigger Homeland Security. Forever after, Judge Parker will regret that subscription to Harpers’. “Special judicial discount, indeed.” For that matter, I wonder if Larry Flint sends him a complimentary issue of Hustler each month…
Flash Gordon So is that supposed to be a shot of Mary’s crotch? I have to digress to mention a shared joke between me and a friend. We would tell unsuspecting people (usually other friends) a little known medical fact that “a certain percentage” of all females are born with vaginal teeth. That percentage is of course zero, but we left that part out. Amazingly, no one ever called our bullshit. They would just listen away, horrified and fascinated. Of course, we never tried it on a doctor…
A3G C’mon Alan. All she wants is a ‘taste’. Isn’t the first one usually free?
FW Look old man, there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch, kapisce?!! Although George Carlin sorta refuted that in one of his books.
MW I just realized. Should that photo have caught Mary’s image. I thought ghouls, like vampires, couldn’t have their image captured. That settles it! This photo is a fake!
RMMD Good Lord. From the look on Charlotte Browns face, you’d think Rex accused her of hiding the MRSA in her cootchie. “No ma’am, that’s not what we mean by spreading…Oh, never mind.”
S-M In 1965, J. Jonah Jameson hired a black man to work as the editor of his metropolitan newspaper. He is convinced that this one act absolves him of ever performing another act of charity, integrity, or just plain fairness. Oddly enough, the laws against “hostile workplace atmosphere” don’t apply as long as you remember to dole out the spite to every single employee equally.
Trekkie
June 22nd, 2008 at 2:04 am
#12 – Hey, time’s are tough for Starfleet. They figured they could offload a bunch of surplus uniforms on the cheap.
Besides, the captains were getting a little nervous with everyone in a red shirt…
Crankenstank
June 22nd, 2008 at 2:08 am
Three techniques to save a dying yet venerable strip:
(1) A wedding episode. Sure-fire readership boost…until it’s over…and then…
(2) A very special addition to the strip. When this does not have the intended effect, move straight to
(3) Cross- appearances. Michael becomes an alcoholic, in the finest tradition of writers everywhere, but only in Mary Worth! Les moves out of Ohio and becomes Luann’s cool new teacher! Marvin and Dennis the Menace become mortal enemies!
Orange Doorhinge
June 22nd, 2008 at 2:09 am
A3G: I used to hate Alan because he was boring. But 5 K to buy drugs to sell to one person who has a couple of friends! And Jones is already suspicious! Don’t worry, Jones! Alan will smoke the whole $5,000 worth of whatever you’re selling him. It can’t be drugs, since he never even smiles. He’ll end up beaten to death by angry “girls” after he sells them baking soda. But what about poor Luann?
PeterW
June 22nd, 2008 at 2:11 am
Wow. Nobody did this yet?
GARAKHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Okay, I’ve fulfilled my obnoxiousness quota for the day.
Luprand
June 22nd, 2008 at 2:28 am
Frankly, I think Sunday’s FOOB should just end on the second-to-last row and let people make up their own minds.
Probably how Lynn wanted people to take it.
Mars
June 22nd, 2008 at 2:41 am
#24: HOLY COW. That was the first FBOFW I’ve laughed at in a LONG time, and for all the wrong reasons!
Donald The Anarchist
June 22nd, 2008 at 2:42 am
FOOB And that was the last time Apewill ever sat in her dad’s lap again, but she had a sudden, intriguing idea about how to make more money for college…
Geoduck
June 22nd, 2008 at 3:02 am
FOOB: I would argue that (non-Flash) Gordon is an exception to the rule, in that he was actually shown progressing from a small service station, and slowly adding on side-businesses over the years. Very much unlike Mike “Manna From Heaven” Patterson.
Mibbitmaker
June 22nd, 2008 at 3:06 am
Sunday, SUNDAY!:
FOOB: Who’re you trying to torment, Lynn — Rod, or us readers??
JP: Judge Parker in his own strip! … IT’S A MIRACLE!!
N-S: Misandry (designed to be seen as misogyny) AND Rolf! A piss-off-Mibbit twofer.
FC: …Made from imported wool! Sorry to be playing with your protectionist head, Billy (not really).
Garfield: …doing their own version of Garfield Without Words (or whatever it’s called). Nice job.
FW: I’d like to enjoy FW once again… Oh, well.
S-M: What is this “poker” of which you speak? You must be talking about Texas Hold ‘em, right, 3-J?
MT: Yep — the whooping crane, the sandhill crane, the frasier crane, the niles crane, the martin crane…..
Oddball Cargo
June 22nd, 2008 at 4:13 am
Yes, Toby (Tobey, Tobie, whatevs)… that’s it. It’s SO much better that Jeff was behaving irrationally and shouting at Mary when you factor in the embarrassment of the public knowledge. If Jeff were merely hurt upon seeing a photo of a dinner that he knew was going to take place, that would be one thing. But since what’s really upsetting him is other people’s opinions, that’s so much better, so much more rational.
It’s not men like THAT that eventually beat their spouses, right?
Oddball Cargo
June 22nd, 2008 at 4:14 am
Also, can you fucking Mary Worth characters stop shoving those fucking roses up your nostrils? Or if you do, shove it much farther, so that you die and the agony ends? Because I’m fucking DEFENDING fucking Mary Worth.
Anonymous
June 22nd, 2008 at 4:21 am
It’s amazing sometimes to compare the 40 or so webcomics I have in my feed to the utter tripe continuously published on newspaper every day. If this is a typical example of Flash Gordon, it stands up well right next to Schlock Mercenary, Wigu, Dr. McNinja and my many other serials. Can we somehow turn this community into an armed mob, storm the comics syndication industry, and demand that FBOFW, Archie and all the other humorless garbage being printed be stricken and replaced with something good? This FG shows that there are still newspaper comics capable of filling the space with something worth reading; let’s get THEM on the page.
The curmudgeon will still have plenty of work excoriating web comics once we’ve done that.
Baka Gaijin
June 22nd, 2008 at 5:01 am
BOOB: Panel 11-April in Pottery Barn with an Uzi, doing what she wanted to do for a long time: buying a cozy for her gun!
Baka Gaijin
June 22nd, 2008 at 5:04 am
Yes, I saw that typo but thought it appropriate.
Sid
June 22nd, 2008 at 6:38 am
Lio: this is the first reference to A Clockwork Orange I have ever seen in the mainstream funnies. Holy cow!
Jen
June 22nd, 2008 at 7:15 am
Sweet merciful crap, I so did not want to wake up this morning to a page full of Dr. P’s O-face. Damn you, Lynn Johnston.
Baka Gaijin
June 22nd, 2008 at 7:27 am
#35 Jen: Yeah, the O-face inspired my O-face: O MY EYES! O I’M BLIND! O FOR ALL THAT’S GOOD IN THE HEAVENS AND EARTH THAT’S SUPERCRAPIFRAGILISTIC!!!
Girl Reporter
June 22nd, 2008 at 7:28 am
Got back home after midnight last night from ten glorious days of vacation. Spotty internet access, no bars on the cell phone, haven’t looked at a newspaper or watched TV, and there are a dozen lobsters living their last hours in a cooler down the basement.
I just laughed out loud at Garfield.(!!)
Maybe that’s what it takes.
Bryan
June 22nd, 2008 at 8:04 am
Steve Roper & Mike Nomad! Thanks Uncle Lumpy for reminding me of that name. I’ve been trying to think of it for months and I just couldn’t get to it. I used to read it religiously when I was a kid. It was that and Dick Tracy (I used to save the Crime Stopper’s Textbook entries).
Gojira
June 22nd, 2008 at 8:39 am
Phantom: Ghost-Who-Vogues is officially an exhibitionist.
MT: Cranes have all-male disco sessions? Is this strip angling for a Dingo write-up?
Single and Looking: Sic transit gloria SaL.
C. Havoc
June 22nd, 2008 at 8:40 am
OK, i> WHO is that guy on the phone with Sam again? I’ve only been reading the stip for two years and haven’t realy gotten up to speed yet.
In all fairness, two weeks in JP time hasn’t really given me the opportunity to meet all the characters.
dreadedcandiru2
June 22nd, 2008 at 8:42 am
I warned you how disgusting the visuals were on today’s Foob. What’s even more disgusting is that Lynn honestly thinks that somebody bland and conventional like John would actually simulate having oral sex in public. Not that she’d admit she was showing him in the midst of having a storegasm, mind.
Gojira
June 22nd, 2008 at 8:47 am
Phantom, again: Btw, anyone else annoyed at the native hostages being depicted as passive loungers, helpless until rescued by Stripey-pants? Chances are, they’d be more actively looking for an opportunity to turn the tables, especially since they vastly outnumber the hostage-takers.
Brick Bradford
June 22nd, 2008 at 9:03 am
Boy, if they still publish Flash Gordon why not my “namesake”, Brick Bradford? The Time Top’s time has come again!
essteess
June 22nd, 2008 at 9:36 am
Family Circus: OK, there’s nothing wrong with a comic strip giving us a bit of a thrill every now and then by showing one of its characters in a state of semi-undress. But, um, this isn’t what I had in mind. Also, apropos panel 2, is Billy auditioning to be a fill-in for Lou Dobbs?
FOOB: Today’s edition was pretty squirm-inducing in its totality, but I think the very first panel deserves special notoriety. It looks like a small space alien is emerging from the middle of John’s face.
Rose Is Rose: You know, in a few years when Pasquale has that kind of dream, i.e., involving wet, semi-naked people, there’ll be a whole other sort of “unidentified substance” in play *SPLURT*. Sorry, had to be said.
Adam@Home: Wait, how big a property do they have, anyway? I thought they lived in The Burbs Somewhere, with fairly limited tract sizes. Oh, wait, I guess in Adam’s fevered imagination — since he’s doing actual physical labor — he’s thinking that they own a ranch in Montana.
Niall
June 22nd, 2008 at 9:36 am
Sunday funnies
A3G: Make that proverb “A rich fool and her money are soon parted”…
BB: Environmental destruction is funny! Ha ha! ha?
FC: America still has sweatshops! Ha ha! ..ha?
H&L: is notable for not containing any despair, depression or disgust. Platitudes are a step up for this strip.
JP: …AHHHHHH!!!! It’s JUDGE PARKER?? Can they doo that? Show the titular character without warning like that? Think of our hearts, Wilson & Baretto! Fifteen minutes, eh? So we shouldn’t see the judge again for a good month, then.
MT: I think “We will learn a lot about China” to be the most topical and understated and still correct that Mark Trail has even been, that I’ve seen.
MW: the throwaway panel hint at what would have been a much better storyline: Mary using her purse as assault weapon to leave a papparazzo bloodied in the floor of the restaurant. Meanwhile, the torch is slowly passed on to Toeby who, in that crennelated shirt, might have something in common with cartoonish inquisitor tormentors of old, a fitting tribute to the Meddling Powers.
RMSA: I’d have gone on the tack of “Mrs. Roberts, we actually have new leads and a couple of new questions that might help both pinpoint the location of the infection and stop its further spread. Would you like your son to help in this?” making her refusal now sound like trying to make things worse. But that would have been sensible, and we can’t have that in Rex Morgan.
SF: Sally Forth, more menacing than Dennis. This now means nothing.
SlyFox: all those crates are suspect – because they’re actually all stacked with “this side up” pointing up. Dockers never do that.
Islamorada Girl
June 22nd, 2008 at 9:39 am
I’ve been reading Judge Parker for decades, and until today, I never knew his first name was Alan. I guess I always thought it was Judge.
anonymous
June 22nd, 2008 at 9:56 am
FOOB: Yes, yes, this is embarrassing not only for the Ape but for the readers! What chaps my ass is what a total waste of space this particular Sunday FOOB panel is – who would want to put THAT up on the refrigerator? There HAVE been, in the past, many enjoyable (at least to look at) Sunday FOOB strips, why this??? Why is Lynn Johnston wasting her, and our, time with several panels of closeups of Dr. P? When there’s so much else she could be putting up there. Waste of time + space = fail. Again. (More strips with lotsa details, more strips with the well-drawn doggies, and what about the Big Wedding? Sunday would be a good time to move this assery along, not closeups of one character being an ass.)
RMMD: I took one quick glance and ALL I could fixate on was MRSA boy’s mom’s Charlie Brown sweater. It stands out like a beacon.
Squid Countess
June 22nd, 2008 at 9:58 am
Flash Gordon – Clearly, that space squid was minding its own space squid business, probably resting after volunteering at a local space squid nursing home, when Flash came swimming past and broke off a piece of tentacle and ran. Let’s remember you can’t come in at the end of a story and start judging. -Squid Countess
.
Journeyman Softheart
June 22nd, 2008 at 10:02 am
I have learned a terrible truth about time and Judge Parker. Examining UL’s helpful guide from June 19th, I discovered that snow appeared in the window of the Spencer farmhouse on December 26th, 2006. Only a few days – perhaps a week – later (on November 24th, 2007), Sam and Abbey are standing outside on a beautiful day watching Biff Dickens barnstorm, setting off the highly, um, enjoyable ‘Abbey paints in cutoffs’ sequence that will live long in memory.
Now, if UL’s timeline is accurate, then it would be quite difficult to imagine weather changing this dramatically in the course of a few days. There are two possibilities: either time passes in the Parkerverse while we are not looking somehow, or some strange power has trapped these attractive but rather boring people in a pocket dimension where the stars wheel overhead and the seasons flash by like light on falling water while they live in slow, immortal stop-motion.
Perhaps Judge Alan Parker holds the key – confront him, Sam! Discover the truth behind your prison of years and hours!
Muffaroo
June 22nd, 2008 at 10:06 am
Other examples of evolutionary cast change in strips:
Barney Google edged out of his own strip by Snuffy Smith (except for the sort-of-annual cameo).
Farley’s replacement being brought in before his demise.
And it looks like Mary Worth will soon be retitled “Mary Worth’s Friend” unless Mary asserts her mettle soon.
Thanks for the WaPo link. Now I can see Sunday strips again. Perhaps the thanks are premature. (There’s a solid advantage over the Chronicle, though, in that now I can’t accidentally click on The Dinette Set.)
Flash – I call BS! That guy says Flash is his friend, and then tells them to kill him. That’s not what real friends do! I think that guy is bad or something.
Clicking on each individual strip and waiting for it to come up is exhausting. Ol’ Muffaroo’s gotta go rest now.
Muffaroo
June 22nd, 2008 at 10:07 am
Journeyman Softheart @49 – The eternal mystery of endless days with the seasons changing in them catches another victim. Look away, lest it drive ye mad! MAHAHAD!
mumbles
June 22nd, 2008 at 10:09 am
JP: A judge asking a local lawyer for a favor? Can’t wait for the Judge Parker Judicial Conduct Hearing. In five years.
TheDiva
June 22nd, 2008 at 10:15 am
FC: Grandma also worked fourteen hour days for mere pennies an hour to make that sweater.
FOOB: No. Just no.
jvwalt
June 22nd, 2008 at 10:22 am
JP: Wow, not only do we get to see Judge Parker — we also get to see Judge Parker’s Big Pink Courthouse! Which would be a nifty name for a kiddie TV show. (One recurring feature: “Guess what’s under my robe.”)
And what kinda phone is that in Gloria’s hand? It’s got at least eighteen identical buttons. Does it dial in Base 21 or something?
John C Fremont
June 22nd, 2008 at 10:56 am
MT – “Bah! Far too much dancing, not nearly enough prancing!”
MW – Worth it for that last panel. Toby Cameron is Peter O’Toole in “Man of La Mancha!”
JP – Craig T. Nelson is Judge Parker in “Judge Parker!”
Foob – I know we were forewarned, but Geez Louis!! Me be sick now!
FC – And from this day forth, he shall be known as Pantsless Billy.
FW – So the Funkerbeanean Civilization has passed through the Survival phase of development, and is stuck in the Inquiry phase. I don’t think they’re ever going to make it to Sophistication.
Flipper
June 22nd, 2008 at 10:57 am
FC: I trust that Billy then told his idiot sister that sweaters should be folded, not hung on plastic tube hangers….from CHINA!!
AhClem
June 22nd, 2008 at 11:21 am
One strip that consistently flies under the radar here is Single and Looking. The main reason is that it’s made from 100% pure Meh, which characterizes many strips that are carried in a handful of newspapers but never amount to much.
Apparently the writer agrees, since he has decided to discontinue writing it:
http://www.comics.com/wash/singlelooking/archive/singlelooking-20080622.html
He has been foreshadowing the demise all week, with references to Family Circus, PBS, and a really bizarre one yesterday.
The final comment in yesterday’s strip bears repeating: Thou Shalt Not Overstay Your Welcome in the Comics. Are you listening, Lynn Johnston?
Sili
June 22nd, 2008 at 11:39 am
Greenbrastic
June 22nd, 2008 at 11:46 am
FOOB: It’s got to be surreal, that awful moment when you first witness your dad in a simulated orgasm. April will not forget this day for a long time.
weiser
June 22nd, 2008 at 11:49 am
JP
At first I was surprised to see the Honorable Judge wearing his robes in his chambers first thing in the morning….but when I saw the stretch, I realized he sleeps in the chmabers and the robes.
I can’t remember, is there a Mrs Judge?
Gold-Digging Nanny
June 22nd, 2008 at 11:57 am
Holy crap, that Flash Gordon is awesome, Uncle Lumpy!
Calico
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:06 pm
There has got to be an old vibrating bed from Vegas that Ape can buy her Dad for Father’s Day, albeit a bit late. Then he can bury his face in the pillows like Connie Duncan when she masturbates.
Run while you can, April. Your entire family is a bucket of dysfunction.
Uncle Lumpy
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:06 pm
#60 weiser –
Yup. Katherine Parker.
weiser
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:15 pm
#63
how could I forget.
Isn’t she young and hot? -not quite in the Abbey category of course.
So what’s he doing spending the night at the courthouse?
Or maybe she’s there, under those robes……
Wolf Shepherd
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:21 pm
#19 – “In 1965, J. Jonah Jameson hired a black man… this one act absolves him of ever performing another act of charity…”
So, you are assuming that he was an unqualified affirmative action hire? Behold the soft bigotry of low expectations.
Poteet
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:26 pm
Foob — Just what I needed to start my Sunday, a dramatic full-on view of John’s nostrils.
FOOBed again
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:44 pm
#63 Uncle Lumpy: Is that Randy’s mom? She looks younger than he does.
John C Fremont
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:52 pm
Gloria Sanchez is Katherine Parker in “Judge Parker!”
True Fable
June 22nd, 2008 at 12:53 pm
Okay, I gotta be frank with you guys – okay, Truman with you guys – I only looked at a handful of comics this morning and brudder, it’s enough to last me a long, long time.
JP Steve’s been there what, a day and a half, and it’s already Driver and Shannon? I thought they were just going to “see how things go” or whatever, but nooo. All you have to do is show your titanium limbs to the hott secretary, give her a little fun playing Whack-A-Terrorist at the old homestead, and you’re a fucking Partner in a veneration law firm, yessirree! God knows that happens to me all the fuckin’ time.
And Alan Parker, hey Yer Honor, glad to finally see you in YOUR OWN DAMN STRIP for a change, you know we don’t just RENT the damn title, we want to see you in action once in a while. So he’s going to have a face to face with Sam, huh? I wonder if it’s to see if Sam still gives a flying fuck about Randy “Claw” Parker’s campaign – oh oh no, that’s been as easily decided as a Patterson accomplishment. Well, maybe it’s to confess that he’s the one who sent Teri Terrorist to Steve’s place, just to spice things up! Whoowee! I’m pumped.
A3G Gee, I need a girlfriend who asks to help me, and I say I need cash, and she just hands it over to me! I had in mind maybe a twenty to tide me over until payday, but NOOOOooo, Luann hands out THOUSANDS of DOLLARS, folding green, cash, moolah, money, Benjafuckinmins, just like that! No questions asked! And to a former junkie who hasn’t bothered to give her the damn time of day lately! Goddammit! It’s true, chicks (ladies, women, girls, etc.) only fawn all over the jerks of the world. Poor little old lonely sweet-loving goat ropers like me don’t stand a chance.
FC Billy’s pissed at NAFTA. Since when has the Family Circus been political? It’s supposed to be all about knee-pad slappin’, mackrel-snappin’, Mary-callin’, crucifix-haulin’ RELIGIOUS goons (oh don’t look at me like that, I’m Catholic and God knows we make fun of ourselves more than anyone else) who regularly pray alongside toy clowns and Spiderman action figures. Get mad, Billy! Get all up in Dolly’s face! Hell, set fire to the sweater, you know that wool came from some sweatshop in Taiwan or something.
MW Love and War? – LOVE AND WAR?!?!? When did Jeff and Mary shoot flamethrowers at each other? When did they unload M-16’s into each other’s bunkers, when did they toss grenades ate glass swans?? I MISSED ALL THAT?
Damn it, I’m complaining to the syndicate RIGHT NOW!!
FBOFW I DON’T EVER WANT TO SEE JOHN PATTERSON UP CLOSE EVER FUCKING AGAIN! I could have gotten lost and died in those caverns called nostrils. Don’t do that, Lynn, damn your eyes. No More Orgasm Sundays, not from John! I thought you hated Rod/John. I’m frankly surprised you didn’t make him get his dick caught in the footrest.
/rant rant!
Red Greenback
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:02 pm
#69: Classic FableRant™! Thanks buddy, you don’t know how much I really needed my fix!
Donald The Anarchist
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:08 pm
#65 More a reference to the fact that hiring a black man to a relatively high profile position (in the Marvelverse, the Bugle is a major, if tabloidy, paper) in the largest city in the U.S. would have been courageous, progressive, evidence that such a person precisely rejects the soft bigotry of low expectations, back in the sixties, anyway.
However, given the bizarre time progression in Spiderman in particular and comics in general, we have gotten to a point where most people would be shocked if a major paper DIDN’T have a multiracial, multiethnic staff working at all levels of the organization. And yet Jonah continues to treat his workers exactly the way he did when his character was first introduced, making Lou Grant look like a profile in sensitivity. What could once be counted as a strong point in his favor (”At least he’s not a bigot”) simply doesn’t ameliorate the fact that he’s an asshole (As Chris Rock would say, “What do you want? A cookie?!!”) That’s what I was referring to.
Jnoble
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:12 pm
JP: Panel 3: Is this a special phone that has 9 extra buttons than a normal one?
Perfect for all your important conversation interruption needs!
Flealick
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:16 pm
FC: Billy’s xenophobic rage could be taken as a parody of Lou Dobbs, of course, but I prefer to enjoy it on it’s simplest level: Blind hatred from a small cherubic child. Of course, I find it’s much easier to become enraged when standing in the living room in one’s underwear before one’s siblings.
I just wonder how quickly Billy’s parents will jump onto the Buy American bandwagon once Billy starts attending school and church functions in nothing but an oversized fuchsia knit sweater and tighty-whities. That’s the sort of thing that could bring outsiders sticking their noses into life on the Keene Kompound, if they’re not careful.
Saluki
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:21 pm
Sam is going to have a meeting with the judge in 15 minutes?
We should be reading those strips around Thanksgiving.
astroboy
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:27 pm
DtM – I am completely freaked out by Mr. Wilson’s knees in today’s strip. I was about to call him Grandpa Kneenuts when I looked closer at the creep-inducing coloration, and now I’ll be having nightmares of Grandpa Vag-nuts. Eeeew. Just eeew.
A3G – I’ve never been into this strip but I have to give credit where credit is due: the story of Alan the world’s dorkiest crackhead has been the most unintentionally hilarious thing in the comics since Steve Luhm’s hair in Gil Thorpe. Surely this storyline deserves a book or at least a webpage to commemorate it’s sheer brilliant lunacy. Bravo, Mr. Bolle!
astroboy
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:29 pm
um, that would be “vag-knees”^^^^
PIMF
Islamorada Girl
June 22nd, 2008 at 1:55 pm
Flare: Glittering Goddess of the Night (ad on left) looks more like a Glittering Pre-Op Drag Queen of the Night. Look at the size of those feet!
queek
June 22nd, 2008 at 2:27 pm
34: not to mention the Metropolis riff, and probably Batman Beyond for the final panel. Nice job, Mr. Tatuli!
PBS: who knew that beer went with roadkill?
BBlues: less time on GraphJam, folks.
Wolf Shepherd
June 22nd, 2008 at 2:40 pm
#71 – I don’t mean to pick on you, but the word “charity” set me off. Hiring someone is not an act of charity. It is an exchange of capital for labor, value for value. It is an act of charity only if the person being hired is not qualified for the position and not worth the remuneration. It sounded to me like you were giving JJJ props for hiring a black guy and that you assumed it was an act of charity. Why charity? Is it inconceivable that a black man could actually be qualified for the job? That assumption is a good example of “the soft bigotry of low expectations.”
I’m not looking for work, but if I were, I would want to be hired because of my ability or my potential, not because my prospective employer wants to feel smug and superior about of his selfless generosity towards poor pitiful me, or because he needs to meet some government-imposed quota, or because he wants to demonstrate how courageous and “progressive” he is.
Sorry to wax serious. Now back to our regularly scheduled program.
Uncle Lumpy
June 22nd, 2008 at 3:24 pm
#79 W.S. –
I read it as, “hiring isn’t charity, but that’s how Jameson portrays it”?
True Fable
June 22nd, 2008 at 3:24 pm
# 79 Wolf Shepherd – I didn’t read the comment that way. I read it that J Jonah Jameson would consider such a thing as an act of charity; the character, not the snarker making the observation; that JJJ was narrow-minded and twerpy enough to think he had to fill some sort of quota.
The whole thing about Spider-Man is that JJJ is too dense to figure out that Peter Parker is not Spider-Man, that Robbie is the real brains behind the successful running of the paper, and that his haircut is as flattering as wearing a picket fence on your head.
Uncle Lumpy
June 22nd, 2008 at 3:26 pm
Yeah, what he said. About the haircut, I mean.
True Fable
June 22nd, 2008 at 3:26 pm
….That Peter Parker IS Spider-Man. sheesh.
Uncle Lumpy
June 22nd, 2008 at 3:28 pm
He IS? Holy crap, I thought it was a strip about two different guys!
Wait, which one is married to the hot chick?
True Fable
June 22nd, 2008 at 3:29 pm
#84 Uncle Lumpy – Oh noes! I didn’t put *SPOILER*! Damn it, now I’m going to have seven posts of bad luck or something. :D
True Fable
June 22nd, 2008 at 3:32 pm
I was always a Gwen Stacy fan myself.
*whew! Is it hot in here?*
Uncle Lumpy
June 22nd, 2008 at 3:34 pm
Somebody should tell Sam Driver that hiring isn’t chastity, either!
commodorejohn
June 22nd, 2008 at 3:37 pm
A3G – Note to self: Luann Powers is apparently very free with her money and, thanks to carbon monoxide ghosts, is unlikely to remember outstanding loans.
BB – Sarge, I know every couple has their fights, but there’s just no excuse for dragging other people into the fray.
Curtis – You know, with all the Rex Morgans, Sam Drivers, and Mark Trails out there, it’s nice to see a comics husband who’s actually attracted to his wife.
DT – If the Crimestoppers Textbook panel is any indication, J. Edgar Hoover has taken over the writing duties for Dick Tracy. Also, “your peeking cameras.”
FC – Um…hooray for the crafts industry?
FOOB – WHAT. THE. FDHGOSDFIXVUIGBfddfagraarrgh ow get it out of my brain
HOTC – Heart, are you seriously wanting to emulate Miley Cyrus? C’mere, kid, we need to have a talk.
JP – Judge …who?
MF – Wow. Look, Tinsley, would it kill you to either (A) limit yourself to subjects that are easily drawn, or (B) invest the extra effort to make your drawings look better? Seriously, that’s the worst Wolverine and Hulk I’ve ever seen, Superman looks like Mark Trail in a cape, and I can’t even figure out who that woman next to Raven is supposed to be. Anyway, I don’t think you’d be a very good superhero anyway, but there are a few supervillains with pronounced noses; you might want to look into that.
NS – Wiley: because the world needed an answer to the question of whether a man could be misandric.
Norm – Actually, MREs are noticeably better than airline food. Seriously.
Edison Lee – Mr. Lee, just kill the little bastard. No jury would convict you.
bats :[
June 22nd, 2008 at 3:38 pm
Flash – a-ah – saviour of the universe
Flash – a-ah – he’ll save everyone of us
Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
Flash – a-ah – he’s a miracle
Flash – a-ah – king of the impossible
He’s for everyone of us
Stand for everyone of us
He’ll save with a mighty hand
Every man every woman
Every child – with a mighty flash
“Gordon’s ALIVE?!”
Oh, yeah, good times.
I’ll leave the panty action to Billy, the splort action to Rose, and try not to fixate on the Wal-Mart knock-off Charlie Brown shirt in RMMD:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/9545446@N07/2601719762/sizes/o/
Little Guy
June 22nd, 2008 at 3:46 pm
8: No, you were right in the first place.
BR: “STOP! You! Come here you…. come here…. touch this! Touch it! This paso doble is RAWWW! What kind of bloody donkey LIFTS?!?! Get back there and keep your *bleeping* arms RAISED, you *bleep bleep*!!!”
bats :[
June 22nd, 2008 at 3:53 pm
62. Calico: how can you even suggest that April buy her father an “old vibrating bed”? Those things are just filled with MRSA!
UncleJeff
June 22nd, 2008 at 4:00 pm
FOOB – April just wants her turn on the vibrating chair.
Prince Valiant – I liked the ending of the storyline with Skyrmir. Nice work if you can get it.
Single and Looking – I think the writer just couldn’t figure out which characters to use. The little fat guy with the back hair was the feature character for a few months. Then, he disappeared for several months. Then, it was the obnoxious Red and her hatred towards everyone she worked with. Then it was the koala bear-like thing and he disappeared in favor of the always-horny woman and the guy with the goatee. I think in the end the writer just gave up on his own characters.
Zaq
June 22nd, 2008 at 4:18 pm
Man. So much happening today, and I really don’t have a lot to say about it. Like everyone else, I’m struck speechless at the appearance of JP himself. Mary Worth is approaching Gil Thorp levels of incomprehensibility. Foob is just plain confusing, since it’s obviously supposed to be some kind of thinly-veiled pseudo-orgasm, but no foob would recognize an orgasm if they were baked into a butter tart. Sally Forth completely pwns Zits by taking the concept that Zits has been hammering into the ground all week (that is, “ha ha the teenagers aren’t they loud when they play music ho ho ho”) and actually making it funnier than the whole week of Zits combined (not that the bar was very high, mind you). In Spider-Man, we see Peter Parker being every bit as much of a feeb as Spider-Man is. Did I miss anything? Seems kind of sleepy today.
kippetje2000
June 22nd, 2008 at 4:24 pm
Hey, John Patterson. Happy endings cost extra. Happy endings from (or in front of) your teenage daughter’ll cost you 5 to10 years. No wonder Ellie has to shave the sheets alone. Lynn Johnston is a Mtigwaki Misogynist!
NosferatusCoffin
June 22nd, 2008 at 4:47 pm
Man, just this one Sunday strip of Flash Gordon is already far more interesting and has far more story depth that all of the Judge Mary Rex Worth Parker, M.D., ESQ., LLC serials combined, times a thousand.
I am going to start reading this strip everyday, for certain.
Dr. Weird
June 22nd, 2008 at 5:04 pm
88 commodorejohn – In MF, the other woman would have to be Starfire, based on the lack of any features in her eyes (she’s pretty much the only hero who doesn’t have them). George Perez should go beat Tinsley up with a drawing board for this travesty.
In any case, HOWARD THE DUCK still finds work in supehero comics (and has a very hot girlfrend in Bev), despite the fact he has a notable beak.
Giant Man’s nose is bigger than a mailbox when he grows and it hasn’t held him back either!
Dr. Weird
June 22nd, 2008 at 5:08 pm
One of my first posts here was complaining about Family Tree, as it was subbing for Doonesbury during its “Don’t want to talk about Democrats beating each other up” break.
For reasons beyond me, the creator of FT is a featured guest at the San Diego Comic-Con this year. While looking up the MF strip, I clicked on the FT link http://www.comics.com/comics/familytree/index.html to see if it was any better. Short answer: No. Longer answer: Mom is displaying some sort of Marvel Zombie grimace in the next to last panel, as if all the flesh that covers her teeth has melted away. Gahhhh.
Smokey Stover
June 22nd, 2008 at 5:20 pm
Lawyering 101: never turn down a chance to do a judge a favor.
A few years ago, the house of a judge in my area burned down. The idiot didn’t have insurance. No problem, a bunch of lawyers gathered funds to help him out. Because he was a judge? Of course not, they said. They just did it because he’s a nice guy.
commodorejohn
June 22nd, 2008 at 5:40 pm
#97 Dr. Weird – Indeed. While I maintain that Crock has the laziest and most incompetent art in the funnies, I actually find Family Tree much uglier; it’s…maliciously awful, like it’s some calculated attempt to see how much repulsion can be generated in comic readers without the strip being pulled. Of course, the writing isn’t any better; conservatives might complain about Doonesbury, but at least Trudeau doesn’t churn out the kind of pompous, arrogant garbage Family Tree foists on its readers. So in a way, I guess it’s really a good Democrat counterpart to Mallard Fillmore.
MrP
June 22nd, 2008 at 5:49 pm
Wow. That’s actually a really, really good Flash Gordon strip, there. I mean, it’s pulp, but the action’s good, the writing’s properly dramatic, the art’s good… This has potential.
buzz
June 22nd, 2008 at 5:53 pm
2 trivia(l) notes:
FLASH GORDON has been in re-runs for the lat couple of years; there haven’t been any new strips done in awhile though there is a new comic book in the works.
STEVE ROPER pushed BIG CHIEF WAHOO out of his own comic strip by dropping in (literally) via parachute.
Shoshi
June 22nd, 2008 at 7:08 pm
98 Smokey Stover — In other words, some lawyers got together and burned down a judge’s house, in order to create an opportunity to get on his good side without appearing to be bribing him or unduly influencing him with inappropriate gifts.
Doug Puthoff
June 22nd, 2008 at 7:42 pm
#96 (Dr. Weird)–I thought the two heroes in the foreground were Storm (of the X-Persons) and the Spectre. It could be Raven, or it could be Mark Spitz with a cowl over his head.
And didn’t Lou Ferrigno have a big nose when he was the Hulk.
Moss Greenback
June 22nd, 2008 at 7:48 pm
Don’t mind me, i’m just trying on a different handle for size. Meh, i’m going back into the Red. … carry on.
J.S.
June 22nd, 2008 at 8:02 pm
Has it already been pointed out that the punchline structure of “Crankshaft” and “One Big Happy” are exactly the same? Ruthie or ‘Shaft misuse a word. Hilarity ensues.
Poteet
June 22nd, 2008 at 8:26 pm
RMMD — Dear God, please end this storyline as fast as possible, preferably with a massive explosion, and then don’t ever let any cartoonist ever build a plot around old, dirty, disgusting, odiferous, germ-filled gym mats ever ever ever again. Amen.
Dr. Weird
June 22nd, 2008 at 8:40 pm
#103 Doug Puthoff – Good point on Storm… she has straight hair and blank when she’s using her power, though she usually has some headgear as well.
#106 Poteet – Are you saying there’s very little meat in these gym mat stories?
True Fable
June 22nd, 2008 at 8:48 pm
Please Lynnie Baby, gather what shredded remains of your dignity you have left to you by NOT trying to explain this piece of CRAP for Sunday, June 22 by primly claiming “oh it’s just a joke.”
You’d have to have Elly in the very last panel saying, “When I try to get that reaction from him at home, he just falls asleep instead” for it to be a GOOD joke.
bats :[
June 22nd, 2008 at 9:20 pm
Act casual, say nothing:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/9545446@N07/2601743628/
Schorsch
June 22nd, 2008 at 9:51 pm
Where does one find Flash Gordon on the interwebnets? I want a daily dose.
P
June 23rd, 2008 at 12:07 am
Monday’s FC: Does Bil Keane forget that he did a series where Jeffy got his tonsils out back in 1970?
Gojira
June 23rd, 2008 at 12:12 am
#110 Schorsch: Flash Gordon is available at TimesUnion.com (like Prince Valiant, it’s a Sunday-only strip)
schlimmerkerl
June 23rd, 2008 at 2:33 pm
Flash Gordon reminds me of an old Mike Nichols+Elaine May routine where an obnoxious woman tourist (May) visits Dr. Albert Schweitzer (Nichols) at his compound in Africa. As she goes off to find her husband, Schweitzer/Nichols says “Wumba, eef zat voman comes back…keel her.”