Max’s big chance
Judge Parker, 10/25/09
I know I’ve been kind of missing in action over the past several Judge Parker storylines, as they just haven’t had that classic mixture of ludicrous and emotionally detached that first drew me to this strip. But I have high hopes for the noir-ish plot brewing now. “D’Vito” is a transparent Bernie Madoff stand-in who was gunned down hours after making bail, and “Henry” is one of his victims, an apparent patsy set up for the murder — oh, and also dying of colon cancer.
Anyway, coming events promise to offer lots of opportunities my favorite Judge Parker recurring theme: that the privileged main characters can just barrel ahead and do whatever the hell they want because rules don’t apply to them. Sam, smelling a rat in this case, visited Henry in jail and essentially told him (Henry) to that he (Sam) would be serving as his (Henry’s) defense attorney, a proposition to which Henry never actually agreed pre se. Nevertheless, I’m sure that the police will allow Sam’s law partner to poke around all the potential evidence in Henry’s house. Also, in those first two panels: lying to get evidence from someone who may be a potential witness or co-conspirator? Sure, why not? All that, and soothing a troubled millionaire whose feeling are apparently tender after he assaulted a photographer are all in a day’s work for Sam Driver: Smug Dick at Law! Oh, and as panel three assures us, there will also be breasts.
Slylock Fox, 10/25/09
Is this the cruelest Slylock Fox Sunday mystery ever? One must picture Max Mouse, finally allowed to go work on a case on his own for once, carefully counting off the paces in some rural backwater, digging enormous holes with a shovel three times as long as he his tall, desperately looking for Slick Smitty’s ill-gotten gain — all while the perp himself is just standing there with his girlfriend, laughing. You have to imagine the level of anxiety he must have reached before he finally pulled out his itty-bitty cell phone to call his boss, who will of course never allow him out of the house alone again now that he’s shown his incompetence at basic ratiocination. It’s a sad, sad day for tiny prey mammals.
Dennis the Menace, 10/25/09
I have to kind of admit that I kind of like this Dennis the Menace for the glimpse it offers us into Henry and Alice’s bucolic pre-Dennis lives. I imagine them in college, both of them tall, gangly young people recruited for their skills on the volleyball court. I like the thought of a pair of mirror-image crushes from afar — Henry attending games played by the women’s team, Alice going to the men’s games, each pair of eyes settling on a player that strikes their fancy, with a long physique that looked good in those short volleyball shorts. Then, at a party thrown by members of one or the other team, the two finally work up the nerve to talk to one another, and, over a few cheap keg beers, begin to see the dim but hopeful outlines of a future together. It will be a future dominated by their awful, hated son, of course, but it would be impossible for them to know that, so let’s leave them for the moment in their youthful happiness.
On that note, I also appreciate the fact that the strip has left to our imagination exactly how Dennis has managed to turn a game of volleyball played in an apparently dry yard into some kind of mud-soaked nightmare.
Beetle Bailey, 10/25/09
In light of the many Beetle Bailey strips that depict man-on-tree sex, I find at least one form of camouflage depicted here particularly troubling.
October 25th, 2009 at 11:04 pm
Isn’t it always a sad day for tiny prey mammals? I mean, it’s sort of in the job description.
October 25th, 2009 at 11:04 pm
I especially like how Rocky, in his time of trouble, turns to essentially a total stranger he bought a horse from.
Now, if it was Rex Morgan, we’d know exactly what was to come, right? But Sam? What on earth would they talk about?
October 25th, 2009 at 11:06 pm
Beetle Bailey — Please, please tell me that’s a nose!
October 25th, 2009 at 11:10 pm
A shopkeeper named Silas and stolen precious metals on the same weekend? Are Snuffy Smith and Slylock Fox flirting with literacy? What is the world coming to?
October 25th, 2009 at 11:12 pm
The Army’s new strategy for victory in Afghanistan is apparently to send a squad of furries over there to gross out the enemy.
October 25th, 2009 at 11:16 pm
Judging by where the “mud” is, “volleyball” to Dennis the Menace is a codeword for coprophagia
October 25th, 2009 at 11:16 pm
BBailey This appears to be some sort of poignant, military-themed homage to ‘All That Jazz’. The creatures that Cookie has fucked though the years line up to taunt him with empty plates and vacant eyes, as his life winds to a close.
Next bivouac: ‘My Dinner With Andre.’
October 25th, 2009 at 11:20 pm
Slick Smitty is a real ladies’ man. He likes to impress chicks by showing them how he is smarter than a tiny rodent. Smitty’s gonna get some lovin’ tonight!
BB: Can anyone explain how a big yellow ball of hair qualifies as camouflage?
October 25th, 2009 at 11:22 pm
Sunday MW: So, Mary’s getting Adrian to go talk to her wun twue wuv. Great, now he’ll never come out of that coma.
October 25th, 2009 at 11:28 pm
Wait, many of the characters in Judge Parker are qualified to practice law? I guess it makes sense, in view of the strip’s title, but I still find it rather disturbing, like finding out that Dagwood actually works at the Department of Homeland Security, or that Cathy is CFO of Microsoft.
October 25th, 2009 at 11:35 pm
Josh, I’m amazed you got through that discussion of this Dennis while keeping it as clean as you did.
Amazed and disappointed.
October 25th, 2009 at 11:35 pm
So the troops at Camp Swampy will be all set if there’s a war at a national park, or a petting zoo. Excellent. But isn’t Cookie(?)’s chow supposed to be awful? Why would woodland creatures line up for it? Wouldn’t they just cut the middleman and eat…the middleman?
October 25th, 2009 at 11:40 pm
Why is one tree costume so much better than the other? And why is one of the would-tree-bes clearly naked in his suit? And come on, Beetle Bailey, it is the Sunday before Halloween; you do not have to make up a flimsy excuse to put your characters in costume, a flimsy excuse has been provided you by the calendar.
October 25th, 2009 at 11:45 pm
#7 sugarpie,
That makes a scary amount of sense. Cookie just seems like the kind of man who lost his virginity to an elk in a French brothel.
October 25th, 2009 at 11:54 pm
#14 AfkaB –
Or an Ent in the Bois de Boulogne.
October 25th, 2009 at 11:57 pm
14. AFKAB: I’m a little confused. By “elk,” do you mean:
1. the animal that North American routinely call a moose (palmate antlers, uniformly brown pelt), or more accurately Alces alces;
2. the animal that North American routinely call an elk (that Native Americans refer to as a wapiti), known in scientific nomenclature as Cervus canadensis; or
3. a member of a fraternal philanthropic group (not the group that scoots around in local parades in small motorized cars)?
October 25th, 2009 at 11:59 pm
Shylock’s *real* explanation? “You’re an incompetent fool, Max, and I’m done with you forever.”
And at that point the secret signal goes to Slick Smitty, who quickly seizes the shovel, bonks Max on the head, and tosses him in the oh-so-convenient hole.
Yes, it was cruel of Shylock Fox to trick Max into digging his own grave, but that’s just the way the world’s smartest animal detective rolls.
Redhead McTramp will take care of Smitty; the poisonous snake will deal with Redhead; the crows will pluck apart the snake, and the unseen horror inside the log will engulf the crows.
Shylock Fox will then sit back, sip a glass of champagne, and proclaim “I love it when a good plan comes together.”
- yeff
October 26th, 2009 at 12:01 am
1. Slick Smitty stole and buried a bag of silver coins? What, did he mug Judas Iscariot or something?
2. If you read the second and third panels in Dennis the Menace as more or less immediately consecutive events–as one often does with comic strip panels–it almost sounds like Alice considers “Make up your mind” to be some degrading sexual slur.
3. BB: “Where are all the men?” Mm-kaaayy, I’m right there with you, Sugar Cookie.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:14 am
#14 bats:[
Well, I guess it could be any of the three. As long as they went to Paris with big dreams in their heart and left with blurry prescriptions for penicillin in their purse.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:16 am
This whole scenario with the “buried sack of silver coins” is clearly some sort of Mamet-style big con. Smitty’s girlfriend, with her too-red hair and granny glasses, is clearly wearing a disguise, so she’s probably in on it. Don’t be surprised if the deceptively stupid-seeming Max Mouse ends up with Smitty’s entire bankroll (and the girl as well), while Smitty heads to Sing Sing and Slylock is left none the wiser.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:28 am
Is today’s Beetle Bailey a demonstration of camouflage training, or an example of the Army’s new lowered recruiting standards?
October 26th, 2009 at 12:32 am
# 16 bats:[ — Per your DT sendup two threads ago, thank you so much for the tiger/agent panel, which was wonderful.
MW — Will Jeff actually stay in the room while Adrian emotes to Scott? Please, no. Nonononono.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:34 am
MW- why, in the midst of an H1N1 outbreak are all the medical people in Mary Worth repeatedly touching their faces? My kids have been repeatedly told not to do that since last spring.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:41 am
Why did the black mark on Alice’s chest go from “shadow under breast” in panels two and three to “electrical tape over (or somewhat under) nipple” in panels six and eight?
And yes, I am staring at Dennis the Menace’s mother’s breasts.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:44 am
Too tired to snark the early Monday comics, but my pulse raced a little to see a return to Action in Mary Worth!
October 26th, 2009 at 12:45 am
Is today’s Beetle Bailey a single-panel gag that had six small panels and a title card added and was stretched into a Sunday strip?
October 26th, 2009 at 12:45 am
GA — I’m heading for bed and can’t see Monday yet, but I’m hoping that maybe, now that things have calmed down, we’ll find out what the hell happened to Walt. It’s not that I actually care that much, but dangit, he’s really old and it’s his comic strip.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:50 am
Looks like Dennis and Joey used “volleyball” as a con because his mother wouldn’t knowingly agree to participate in a muddy t-shirt contest.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:51 am
I was going to make a joke about Spook from Wizard of Id and Bullwinkle from Rocky & Whatshisname, but I got tied up when I tried to morph the word “furry” into a name to represent someone that likes to dress up as trees. Annnnd I’ll leave that to all of you.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:52 am
Beetle Bailey: It takes dedication to wear a tree suit with no eyeholes in the military. The guy in the log seems kind of bummed out at how poor he looks by comparison.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:53 am
Poteet@27 – the fascist house dick who was harrassing whotshername turned on him, but his tazer blast caused Walt to spin off down the town like IronMan on 220v/50Hz.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:58 am
Today’s “Judge Parker” is a low-point for the strip. I can’t figure out any of the pertinent plot points, which isn’t a major issue because I never read “Judge Parker” for its stories. However, there’s an attractive woman in only one of the panels and we’re only treated to single ridiculous, geography-themed name (one with which we’re already familiar, I might add) and there’s no ridiculous hang-ups of the rich and powerful to mock. I never thought I’d miss these things, but they’ve apparently become the only reason why I read “Judge Parker.”
I think I can use my cairvoyant comic powers to read Slick Smitty and his girlfriend’s joyous thoughts: “No eyewitnesses, a pre-dug grave AND our accuser is conveniently small and stupid…”
I never, ever thought that I would live to see the topic of mud wrestling brought to the comics page, but thanks to “Dennis the Menace,” another dream has been fulfilled.
I have no idea what setting the “camouflage” in today’s “Beetle Bailey” is supposed to help the men blend into. Perhaps some sort of industrialized farm being ravaged by bears and other north woods wildlife? It’s this exact sort of efficiency and precision that has made Camp Swampy’s soldiers such a valued asset in the recent Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts.
October 26th, 2009 at 1:11 am
#29 Black Dragon – A guy who dresses up as a tree is a “firry”.
October 26th, 2009 at 1:17 am
Prince Valiant
I don’t understand the lavish praise, even from a small group of praisers. The artwork is great. But the bizarre story lines over the last few years have given me the same feeling I had when Dick Tracy introduced Moon Maid. They should drop the fantasy magic and go back to hacking up ordinary people with ordinary swords and battle axes.
October 26th, 2009 at 1:31 am
#29 via #33: …or a “barky”.
October 26th, 2009 at 1:37 am
Monday, Monday. Can’t trust that day.
Is it wrong that I figured the answer to the Jumble hint of “This helped the pretty biologist get ahead” was, “Giving head”?
October 26th, 2009 at 1:39 am
Monday, monday…
Crock: “Funky Winkerbean thinks they own depression, do they? We’ll show them!”
MW: You know, the panel is drawn as though Adrian caught them mid coitus. Which she did.
Ziggy: You know, if you’re a bum, you’ve got to go for the people who look kind, and willing to give you their spare money. This means people who own pants.
October 26th, 2009 at 1:47 am
In Mary Worth’s final panel Monday –
(a) Jeff is restraining Adrian from putting a pillow over Scott’s face
(b) Jeff is about to confess to her that he is also in love with Scott, and they will have to have a hissy-fit-off to determine who gets to pine over a comatose patient
(c) Scott is dead but neither of the Corys really know anything about medicine. It will be up to Mary, who knows a thing or two about dead things and having dated Jeff for years without once seeing a ’stiff’.
(d) Jeff is about to confess that since Scott’s arm has been in that position on top of his body in a sling for hours, rather than down by his side where it should be, they are going to have to amputate it after the lack of bloodflow brings on gangrene.
October 26th, 2009 at 1:49 am
At least, by the look of Gina’s clean clothes and Joey’s mud caked appearance, Dennis will be the last of his gene pool’s line. But that’s a good thing, right?
October 26th, 2009 at 1:58 am
Rex Morgan, MIA oh my God NO not geezers who escaped from a nursing home! I’m a rough tough cream puff of a piercings-laden hoodlum and a typical representative of my Young People of Today demographic, but I just cannot handle a pair of old skins who got away from a residential facility! There’s no telling what might happen; there might even be a pair of really uptight middle-aged suburbanites out looking for the old farts, when they aren’t exchanging limp feelers toward each other – oh I just made myself sick. Hold me, I’m scared….!
October 26th, 2009 at 2:03 am
“1. Slick Smitty stole and buried a bag of silver coins? What, did he mug Judas Iscariot or something?”
#18 Teddytoad, I laughed until I cried, and now I want to make passionate love to you.
October 26th, 2009 at 2:09 am
Mr. Smif goes to Washingline What sort of noise is “Gzzaaw”? I know it’s supposed to be snoring, but it sounds more like something fueled by Snuffy’s backwood meth lab operation.
October 26th, 2009 at 2:20 am
9 dickweed lane This is the best day this comic has had since the last time it featured the cat. Well, except for the time Seth and Mark showed up. Other than that – pffft.
Apartment of Doom See? She’s up to no good. I just might enjoy the living hell out of this storyline if it involves pulling the wool over Prof. Pap’s eyes. Now if only the same could happen to Prof. Pompous over at Mary Worth.
Children of the Circle As long as it isn’t Grandad AND Dad for the same kid.
Oh come on, some of you were thinking that too!
October 26th, 2009 at 2:25 am
Okay lets see… bear, cow, tree, hay bundle, pig, log, trash can, moose. The troops of Beetle Bailey are preparing to invade… a farm in Idaho?
October 26th, 2009 at 2:46 am
Sinners in the hands of an angry Jumble:
(Warning: Jumble spoiler)
In LIMBO ’til Creation’s ebb
(Where OXIDE takes what insect leaves),
It’s KOSHER to regret the web
Of sin that EGOISM weaves.
Pursue GOOD LOOKS in this life and be vexed –
Amass instead good graces for the next!
October 26th, 2009 at 4:21 am
MW: Having been obliged to spend a great deal of time in ICUs recently, I can testify that, unlike the GQ-like presentation of Det. Scott, real people in comas generally have a lot of tubes hooked up to them.
I see some kind of electronic equipment from the early transistor era behind the neatly posed lawman, but since he doesn’t seem to be wired up to it, I can only conclude that it is a 7-band EQ for the mono sound system in the Santa Royale hospital.
I admit that in one hospital I visited they had a wireless connection to the patient hookup, but since the patient monitor had an LCD display with not an analog voltmeter in sight, I would guess that such is not the case here.
All we need now to complete the hospital experience is for an accountant to burst in and demand to know if Scott’s insurance will cover the cost of a private room.
October 26th, 2009 at 6:05 am
#46 Mr. O’Malley – Or like at the Otto Hackenkopf Memorial Hospital in Greater Metropolitan Roopville, maybe a pair of nurses will duck into Det. Scott’s room because one wants to adjust her bra straps and the other wants to duck out of sight so someone else will answer that noisy old lady’s nurse call light down the hallway. Or a couple will decide a coma patient’s room is the perfect spot for a tryst, until a guard walks by and catches them and then the whole hospital is thrown into a tizzy, except for a select few of us who are laughing our asses off at the sheer stupidity of it all.
October 26th, 2009 at 6:08 am
Does dressing up as a blonder version of Cookie really count as camouflage?
October 26th, 2009 at 6:12 am
Also, I like the cautonary tale that came with Slylock Fox; ‘If you pour milk on your dog, he will remember. Waiting for the perfect moment – waiting for decades if necessary, and when you suspect it the least, he will have his revenge.’
October 26th, 2009 at 6:20 am
JP: The kerning’s a little tight in some of the speech text. In panel 2 I guess that’s supposed to be “Lt. Yelich”, but I read it as “Lt. YEUCH” and assumed the “YEUCH” was a reaction to those helium balloons rising above the desk. Understandable, actually — look at the consternation on his face.
Then in the second-to-last panel Sam seems to be saying “What do he want?” Whatcha think he want? He be lookin’ for some herb, yo.
October 26th, 2009 at 6:22 am
JP: Oh yeah, and panel four. Concealing material evidence. That’ll go over big at discovery.
October 26th, 2009 at 7:15 am
JP: I was confused by the third row. Which character is shown in close profile in the first panel, bottom row? Isn’t that Sam? If it’s Other Guy, why change the perspective? At first I thought the narration ballons were reversed in the second panel, bottom row. But now I just think it’s poorly drawn overall. Except for the breasts.
October 26th, 2009 at 7:20 am
I can’t hear you! I have Judge Parker in my ear!
October 26th, 2009 at 7:26 am
The line, “I hate serving chow during camouflage training, you never know…” while the second in line is disguised as a pig makes me think that there was a massive coverup of the terrible, terrible time Cookie roasted a camouflaged recruit on a spit.
October 26th, 2009 at 7:42 am
Only for the losers! Ahahahaha!!
*is snatched by a hawk*
October 26th, 2009 at 7:43 am
Wow, FW made me laugh today, in a way that only abject displays of total human misery can. “It can always get worse” should be the subtitle to this strip, like MD is for Rex Morgan.
October 26th, 2009 at 7:57 am
JP: Well, good. After days on end of Square-Jawed White Guys talking about the current plot, we’re finally moving on—to SJWG talking about the previous plot.
MW: Adrian looks to be getting into her fighting stance in panel one. Clearly, she’s had to wrassle her dad for a lover’s affections before. Keep that center of gravity low, Adrian!
MT: “No need to worry about the poachers! After all, what did they do to us this time? Fire guns in the vicinity of our campsite, and knock me unconscious, leaving me to be eaten by alligators! For the life of me, I don’t know why you’ve become such a fearful child, Rusty!”
yy331 Odinthor: Happy Yester-Birthday!
October 26th, 2009 at 8:31 am
yDtM: Beach volleyball. Alice a la the AVP, Henry a la “Top Gun”.
You’re welcome.
JP: Um, you mean Rocky still got himself in trouble after all that not-so-subtle pressure on Teh Uglies?
October 26th, 2009 at 9:01 am
When I read Slylock Fox I thought the answer was going to be, “Because Slick is a lying bastard who likes to fuck with Max’s tiny mind.”
October 26th, 2009 at 9:05 am
Mud? In Dennis the Menace? Oh, I wish that were mud, but we both know that’s not true.
October 26th, 2009 at 9:16 am
Oh, this is just going to be an absolutely splendid display of wit in Marvin this week. My goodness me. I wonder if there’s any chance of my being bitten by a brown recluse today. They’re pretty lethal, right? Well, we’ll just cross our fingers and hope.
October 26th, 2009 at 9:25 am
A vehicle with four pluggers in it is not likely to leave the ground, at least not without a magically buoyant Jesus fish on the back, which I first thought pluggers would almost certainly have (possibly in mass quantities) on their minivans, but then I thought some pluggers might be fish, so the whole thing seems sort of blasphemous. Then I shifted over to worrying about why, exactly, it was necessary to put an ellipsis after the question mark and exclamation point, both of which are quite solid sentence enders all by themselves. I guess pluggers just don’t know when to stop, which is sort of the plugger mission statement, after all, but pluggers should stop. Immediately.
October 26th, 2009 at 9:26 am
Thanks for the Mitchell biography, but the last picture got me thinking that there is another chapter that they didn’t bring up. Both the adults have pointy noses while Dennis has that awful pug nose. OK, what was the nose shape of the Women’s Volleyball Coach?
October 26th, 2009 at 9:28 am
Shoe: I am certainly familliar with Shoe.
October 26th, 2009 at 9:32 am
Safe Havens: That guy’s all wrong for you. In good company, you should feel comfortable letting your hair down (so to speak). Let’s go for a walk and talk about it, hm?
October 26th, 2009 at 9:35 am
Baldo today has a somewhat Plugger-esque joke, but it’s illustrated beautifully in that third panel. Nice.
October 26th, 2009 at 9:50 am
#30: Haven’t you guessed, Jacob? The soldier in the eyeless tree suit has to be Beetle.
October 26th, 2009 at 10:01 am
Judge (on 3rd Thursdays only) Parker: Why are Sam and Steve shouting so loud that they’re disturbing the old geezer on the street?
Slylock Fox: editors discarded the “real” third panel and just repeated one to throw off the readers. The “real” third panel showed the dog savagely mauling the little brat in the high chair.
Mary Worth: It’s official. The plot is now as comatose as Detective Whodidnthaveanyfriendsbackat the crimescene.
October 26th, 2009 at 10:10 am
Lumpy -
Loved the last two lines of your JUMBLE poem:
“Pursue GOOD LOOKS in this life and be vexed –
Amass instead good graces for the next!”
Perfect meter, and they stand alone as a cautionary for today’s lifestyles.
Good work!
October 26th, 2009 at 10:12 am
Log with nose sticking out, your costume is unconvincing. Garbage can, what would you be doing in the woods, anyway, with a moose, a pig, and a bale of hay?
October 26th, 2009 at 10:21 am
Once again, no time to read, but time to snark…
Archie: I have to say, that’s a great Hiram Lodge profile in panel 2. And the only reason I remembered his first name is because last week I read through the “Archie marries Veronica” comic, the 2nd issue with the actual wedding, after they finish college. It ends ten years later, after Archie finishes a day at some post in Lodge Enterprises, and Veronica announces she’s pregnant. Two more parts to go, and I expect the last issue will end in a “it was all a dream” fashion… because the only resolution Archie comics are allowed to have is 300 dpi.
Beetle is brilliantly stupid. Or stupidly brilliant. Or just stupid.
Dennis: Did… did Dennis just serve an “oh snap” to his mother?? Wow. MenaceWatch: +10 points.
Tracy: See, the Sunday comic actually managed to convey important information missing from the weekday ones. Locher, you can’t script. You had the space to put this info here as well. You can’t even put it in the recaps. Fail, Locher, fail. Plus, that alliteration wasn’t even very good.
My Cgae: Sigh. Why do I find Ashley’s temperment so interesting? Despite having nothing in common with her. Or is it just the cute stripes?
PBS: Points to Pastis for not starting this on a Monday but in mid-week.
Rex: Oh, this is rich. “What?! Nursing home escapees? Man, those are dangerous!” Plus another great panel for bats :[’s collection.
Sally: The answer’s easy: to have someone make them look good.
Slylock: You know, I think there’s been more Count Weirdly appearances in the last six months than all others combined… Still no Cassandra since the pregnancy news, either.
October 26th, 2009 at 10:31 am
9CL – I just had a sneezing fit. Who knew I was allergic to kitsch?
Doonesbury – I’m not the only one having flashbacks here, right?
Smirky Schadenfreude – Great punch line. I’m smirking on the inside.
Garfield – It’s like he’s watching Funky on TV.
Gil – “Glen Campo… isn’t he a lineman for Wichita?”
Marfield – “…and THAT’S why they’re so MEAN!”
Mary – Adrian slips farther and farther into her “Prince Valiant” fantasy, refusing now even to use word balloons. “It is sad,” Jeff thinks to himself. Next: Merlin’s Surprise!
October 26th, 2009 at 10:32 am
Pluggers – The plugger grandpa, incidentally, is the only living creature in the car.
Rx – You want to get rid of those two, Pierce? Just tell them you’re locking the front door, and turn your back on them for a minute. It worked for the nursing home.
Rose – As the bird freezes to the branch a week from now, he can reflect on how dangerous contagious stupidity can be.
Shoe – Continuing the quest for a punch line that fits the horrified expression in the last panel, today I think it’s “I killed and ate your dog.”
October 26th, 2009 at 10:33 am
yeff @y49 – At least the old DFC strips are still easy to find. I remember when it was going away and I carefully downloaded all 499 of the collected entries, one by one, and saved them to disk. Not necessary, as it turned out, but still worth doing.
teddytoad @18 – It’s going to be hard for anybody to top your first comment there. Nice one.
Dennis (from Sunday) – Looks like Alice has received a “Dirty Mitchell” with extra sauce.
Black Drazon @29 – I think the word you’re looking for is “woody.”
Uncle Lumpy @45 – Most erudite Jumble-related post yet!
October 26th, 2009 at 10:50 am
I once dressed as a vampire for Halloween. Someone yelled, “You suck!”
Well, that was okay. After all, I was dressed as a vampire.
Then someone yelled, “You suck like Ziggy!”
Now, that was just hurtful.
October 26th, 2009 at 10:50 am
FC Sat. – Jeffy doesn’t realize that the short haired kisser isn’t a man – that’s none other than K.D. Lang!
Rock it, baby.
October 26th, 2009 at 10:55 am
RMMD: Skinhead’s abject terror upon being told that his intruders are escapees not from a maximum security prison, a mental institution for the criminally insane, or an Ebola quarantine ward, but instead from a (shudder!) nursing home shows that he is laboring under the misconception that Alzheimer’s is contagious. This is understandable, since he has already been subjected to two weeks’ worth of RMMD, which in and of itself can cause severe loss of one’s higher mental faculties.
October 26th, 2009 at 11:00 am
I like that when Dennis plays volleyball, it’s so hardcore that you grow a beard.
October 26th, 2009 at 11:04 am
Baldo – Hispanic pluggers!
Bizarro – Oh look, it’s Mr Bean!
FC – Bil smiles, content with the knowledge that Dolly has surrendered to her god-given role as nothing more than a baby factory.
FB – At a glance, one would believe that those two kids are copypasted, but on a closer examination that doesn’t seem to be the case after all. If the creator ever runs out of jokes (which can’t happen too soon), he could probably start drawing those six differences puzzles.
Heathcliff – Who put that huge phallic object in my Heathcliff?
Pluggers – That’s clearly a misprint. It should read: “A plugger grandpa has no doubt what the outcome of an election should be.” Hence, they’re driving to a teabagging rally.
October 26th, 2009 at 11:05 am
FW: We now return you to Funky Winkerbean’s regular diet of misery. Batiuk really puts the funk in Funky.
S4th: Aria shows up at the Schwaller’s party in a sexy Princess Leia costume, forcing Sally to face some unpleasant realities about the state of her marriage. This is why the Schwallers are inviting the Forths this year.
Dennis the Menace: Dennis gives his mother a lesson in cultural relativism, or in this case, behavioral relativism.
October 26th, 2009 at 11:08 am
FW – If there’s one thing I like more than watching Les’ chances of bedding Cayla shrivel, it’s the possibility that Corey Winkerbean is in trouble with the law.
Bring on the MISERY!
Of course, the cops could be coming to tell Ma and Pa Winkerbean that their boy has been found toes up at the bottom of a ravine…riddled with CANCER.
October 26th, 2009 at 11:10 am
#83 anonymous: Nice placement of the verb “shrivel.”
October 26th, 2009 at 11:29 am
10/26
FW: “Be still, woman! Dare you mock the wrathful god Batiuk?”
MT: Who are these “rangers” of whom Mark speaks? Everyone knows that conservancy law is enforced by magazine writers in faded UPS uniforms.
6C: What does a witch’s curse look like in text speak anyway? “may ur 1st brn hav teh hed of a chikn”
Archie: Hiram Lodge actually keeps a bust of himself as a Greco-Roman god. There’s a level of either hubris or insecurity that’s pretty hard to fathom.
Phantom: Chatty Python is just begging to get his dead ass handed to him, isn’t he?
JP: “Of course he had the walking get out of jail free card with him. Must be nice.”
GT: Today’s installment covers two settings. In one of these places, homoerotic horseplay is all fun and games. In the other, it very much isn’t. See if you can tell which is which.
S4th: Oh who are you kidding, Ted? As if your closet doesn’t have half a dozen costumes yearning to breathe free.
BB: Because as you know, Army tanks are roughly the size of a Toyota Tercel.
HtH: “Wait, did I say that out loud?”
Gaffield: “Candygram.”
DtM: Semantic hairsplitting. Can you feel the menace?
FC: “Haha! Good one, Dolly. No, we had yuo and all your brothers sterilized at birth. None of that is gonna happen.”
DT: “You know, when I get around to it I may check on the detective who didn’t escape and the accomplices who didn’t sell me out.”
Crock: Crock is now openly pressuring his inferiors into suicide. There are too many characters for his liking, and Maggot and Grossie aren’t collapsing from heart failure the way they’re supposed to.
SFx: A man in a white muumuu is sitting in studio apartment with a one-handed clock and a moldy drumstick on the floor. On a crumpled piece of paper is a creative but unworkable design that’s consumed about six months of the man’s time. Slylock knows who to talk to when he calls the state’s mental health services department. Do you?
October 26th, 2009 at 11:29 am
@57 buckyswife says — “MW: Adrian’s had to wrassle her dad for a lover’s affections before. Keep that center of gravity low, Adrian!”
At least that was the excuse for their wrasslin’. For humans*, the lowest center of gravity’s obtained when flat on your back.
* Whether Adrian qualifies is left as an exercise for the reader.
@75 Muffaroo re Shoe: Well, y’know, things happen.
October 26th, 2009 at 11:36 am
I fucking hate Camouflage Day.
October 26th, 2009 at 11:39 am
A3G: “I’ve got bigger fish to fry”? Is this what casual interaction is like with Pill Poppin’ Bobbie—a series of non sequiturs?
“Have a good day, Ms. Merrill!”
“A bird in the hand!”
“Do you need help with your bags, Ms. Merrill?”
“I’ve got a bee in my bonnet!”
It’s like some kind of cliche-Tourette’s.
PBS: My biggest accomplishment today: I’ve managed to use the phrase “Calm you face” twice!
October 26th, 2009 at 11:40 am
87. Red Greenback
Camouflage Day. It’s not just for soldiers anymore!
October 26th, 2009 at 11:41 am
BB: I’m more disturbed the fact that many of the costumes depicted here are child-sized. What kind of “men” are these?
DtM: Is it wrong that I’m excited by the vaguely-come-hither look in Alice Mitchell’s eye in that last panel? Will she and Henry be enjoying mud-caked post volleyball coitus perhaps? Knowing Henry, probably not. But still, fun to think about for a few seconds.
October 26th, 2009 at 11:43 am
88. buckyswife
Now, try to use “Now me smaller den hamster!”
Or better yet, “Dreenk beer. Life eemprove.”
It would work best in front of a class of students.
October 26th, 2009 at 11:46 am
89 Sequitur: I’m not sure my students need the latter piece of advice; they’re pretty much sold on that idea already.
October 26th, 2009 at 11:52 am
Thanks for the b’day wishes, Mollificent and buckyswife! Um, wish I had a funny jape to add; but I’m still getting over yesterday’s sugar coma. Mmm…apple pie à la mode…(”Would you like your apple pie à la mode with ice cream?”, asked the waitress)…
October 26th, 2009 at 11:57 am
Luann: It will really get scary when they start handing out stuff from that old box of sex toys.
October 26th, 2009 at 11:57 am
I’m not the one to usually notice such a thing, but I feel compelled to note that the inking on today’s Dennis kind of is pretty disappointing. I visited the Dennis site and found they have a different dude drawing the Sunday strips than they have for the weekday strips.
October 26th, 2009 at 11:58 am
#87 Sequitur: Yeah, I would always ditch… somehow I’d always win the prize!
October 26th, 2009 at 12:04 pm
#91 odinthor: “Sure! And can I have some café au lait too?” “Room for cream?”
October 26th, 2009 at 12:06 pm
A3G: Can’t wait to see what sort of gift she gets her dealer – will it be the dinner collection from CostCo?
Archie: That’s a level of arrogance that’s actually kind of funny. So was Archie’s hair in the second panel, like Mr. Lodge’s rage was palpably pushing it back.
Baldo: Plugger-esque, but at least it’s well-drawn. And we won’t see this panel a thousand times with a new caption.
ReFOOB: Aw, emotional abuse! How charming!
FW: Whoever said “Things can always get worse” should be this series’ subtitle is dead-on. What are the odds Corey just committed a crime to get three squares, a bed, competant medical treatment, and a reason to still hold hope in prison?
Garfield: “Trick-or-treat for UNICEF.”
GA: Yes, nothing says love quite like “I’m hiring you for your clumsy ineptitude.”
Luann: Newsflash, Mrs. DeGroot – most parents throw out non-candy stuff like carrots or (I swear this happened last year) yogurt because it’s gross to hand out fresh stuff on Halloween. But then again, I’m sure you’ve never noticed how everyone waits till after Mischief Night to plaster your house with eggs, either.
PBS: Larry’s question mirrors Funky’s, but the results are infinitely better.
Pluggers; OMG, how topical! For nine years ago.
Zits: Wow, a whole week of zombie jokes. Maybe if I wasn’t a comic book fan and hadn’t been subjected to a deluge of Marvel Zombies series with the same damn joke, I’d find this funny.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:09 pm
PBS — Thank you, Stephan Pastis. I couldn’t quit laughing even after I quit looking.
FW — So what happened to Cory?
(1) Committed major felony
(2) Committed lesser felony and is in critical care with swine flu
(3) Committed misdemeanor and was diagnosed with minor melanoma, but is very sullen about it
(4) Was hit by car while jaywalking, lost a leg, and was then diagnosed with Stage Four cancer
(5) Knocked someone up, and to save time, she’s already five months along
(6) Knocked someone up and she’s already five months along and has just been diagnosed with terminal cancer
(7) Is hiding somewhere and sneering just for the hell of it
October 26th, 2009 at 12:18 pm
FW: I find it amusing that even though their son has gone missing for about half the day, the Winkerbean’s first reaction is not concern for Cory’s well-being, but annoyance and weary resignation. It would serve them right if the cop car pulling up in panel two is not delivering the shame-faced boy home from whatever shenanigans the cops caught him in, but coming to inform them that Cory’s violated and battered body had been discovered in the woods by some hikers.
reFOOB: Since in this case, “home-made” seems to amount to “throw together whatever random crap we haven’t donated to Goodwill yet,” I can’t say I blame Michael here.
Luann: Hope the DeGroots appreciate the aesthetic value of eggs and toilet paper.
MW: Scott must be improving; he doesn’t even have the breathing tube in now. Either that or Dr. Jeff already pulled the plug.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:24 pm
Beetle Bailey: Why is a Camp Swampy soldier camouflaged as Captain Caveman? Are they all part of a lame Stargate crew, preparing to visit 1970s Saturday Morning Cartoon World and help defeat the Really Rottens in the Laff-alympics once and for all?
October 26th, 2009 at 12:24 pm
97. Poteet
I like,
(8) Left the comic and is looking for employment in a strip that’s not as morbid such as Mary Worth or Lio.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:27 pm
Oh, Poteet. Since TheDiva @ 98 opened up the subject of reFOOB, the rules state that you may comment to your heart’s content.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:30 pm
Fine, I’ll be the one to say it…
That’s not a disguise.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:30 pm
Shylock: The redhead is obviously a hooker. No man named Slick Smitty is looking for an actual long term relationship.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:38 pm
Well, guys, it’s October 26th, 2009. GeoCities, one of the last reminders of a time when there was something special about having a website, has been shut down. In honor of the occasion, everybody put on the poorly-done MIDI of your choice, then hop on over to xkcd and check out its loving tribute.
Blondie – I’m with Dithers. I was scouring thrift stores years before all the posers.
BrS – COULD SOMEONE PLEASE START ACTING IN A MANNER THAT MAKES ANY KIND OF SENSE AT ALL
DT – *checks watch* Well, I suppose it’s about time for this storyline’s Grisly Villain Death…
FW – Oh hooray, it’s time for some more bile to be spewed at You Goddamn Kids Today.
GT – “A mean sonofagun?” Well, you know that’s bad.
HOTC – Well, hasn’t this strip taken an odd turn in the past few days.
JP – Yes, it was definitely lucky that Sam was there to badger the police officer into destroying evidence to save his celebrity guest a lawsuit. Lucky indeed.
Love Is… – a
trainboat going into a tunnel.MW – Um, why the sling? He wasn’t shot in the arm, and he didn’t even land in a position likely to break it. Also, as we might have expected, Dr. Jeff looks much, much more grief-stricken than Adrian.
NS – Random vaguely jokelike slams against generic wealthy businessmen are still as funny as ever. By which I mean that they haven’t gotten any funnier. Hint, hint.
PBS – I love this strip.
RMMD – Sinister, sinister, sinister!
SM – And so yet again, we have a guest character who is a much, much better superhero than Spider-Man. Cripes.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:38 pm
Artist formerly known as Ben @19:
Ah, you bring back such romantic memories. I once had the stereotypical short-term affair in the City of Light.
I didn’t bring back any unwanted diseases, although the guy did whisper in my that he “wanted to give me a baby.”
(Just between you and me, I think what he really was after was American citizenship.)
October 26th, 2009 at 12:41 pm
102. JustAGuyGuy
Are you referring to yesterday’s Beetle Bailey? Or today’s Heart of the City?
October 26th, 2009 at 12:43 pm
Me @ 105:
“…whispered in my ear…” that is, lest anyone get other ideas. :)
October 26th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
IN 2009 THE NEWSPAPER EMPIRE LAY IN RUINS. IT IS ESPECIALLY HARD ON COMICS, ALREADY SHRINKING INTO OBLIVION UNTIL THEY MAINLY CONSIST OF STYLIZED SCRIBBLES WITH NO DESERNABLE INTEREST. THEY ARE, BY NOW, REDUCED TO INTERNET MOCKING FROM COMMENTORS APING MONTY PYTHON ROUTINES. THESE ARE THE LATEST OF THE BREED…
9CL: A Solange strip is a good apology for a Thorax strip.
Archie: On Lodge’s bad side, he murdered Archie decades ago.
BBlues: Good work, kid — the Larry Gelbart era Radar couldn’t have done it better.
ReFOOB: I was happy with either one back in the day, stupid brat.
FW: So true. I miss last week already.
GT: Gil (thinking): “Oh, great, more ‘gay’ jokes from the Comics Curmudgeon!”
Luann: When all the kids finish pranking them, they’ll be lucky to have the yard, much less the house, left intact!
MT: “We’ll let the rangers worry about them”?? Alright, who are you, and what have you done with Mark Trail? …Let me guess, the story’s being dumped in the middle, right?
October 26th, 2009 at 12:46 pm
@89 Sequitur, @90 buckyswife were discussing:
Now, try to use “Now me smaller den hamster!”
Or better yet, “Dreenk beer. Life eemprove.”
If you swap the order of the terms, you have the makings of a useful syllogism there. Am I right, ladies?
October 26th, 2009 at 12:51 pm
109. Écureuil Écumant
Logic suggests you are correct.
Croc suggests, “Yooou all crazy persons!”
October 26th, 2009 at 12:55 pm
And now I go from Monty Python to The Late Show….
PCity: David Letterman (ducking the wife for a second): “Wanna bet?”
The… Mind of Edison Lee’s Friend:
She left out “Producer of 48 Hours: Mystery”.
October 26th, 2009 at 12:58 pm
A3G: One good thing about Apartment 3-g is that it always keeps you in suspense. For instance, today’s strip makes you wonder: Why is Margo’s father working as a concierge in a hotel? Does he moonlight after his day job being a rich businessman? Did he lose his job as a rich businessman? Does he work undercover for the DEA on prescription pill sting operations? Does Frank Bolle only have one middle-aged male template?
DT: After Fee Fi and Della Contessa saved his life, Dick might actually feel something close to remorse after he brutally murders them while attempting to apprehend Mr. Pops.
Also, can anyone figure out why the FBI agent was even in this storyline? If this was Judge Parker, I’d say she was there for the cheesecake factor, but this is Dick Tracy, where everyone looks equally grotesque.
FW: “Things can always get worse”: Tom Batiuk’s personal mantra.
October 26th, 2009 at 1:01 pm
Dear God. Every man in the armed forces has got to hate Beetle Bailey’s guts. When have these pansies ever done anything that hasanything to do with the military? Besides man-on-tree sex, of course.
October 26th, 2009 at 1:05 pm
Firry and Barky, both very good, clever, clean ones. What’s wrong with me that my brain immediately went to Woody?
October 26th, 2009 at 1:15 pm
Luann – Or you could give out Chick Tracts.
October 26th, 2009 at 1:37 pm
Beetle Bailey is a depiction of how Army life was back in the 1950’s.
The Army is feeling much better now. (Said in my best Buddy Ryan voice.)
October 26th, 2009 at 1:39 pm
The Walker’s ought to take a walk in the woods more often. A fifty-five gallon drum of industrial waste, truck tires, old sofas – all these would be better camouflage.
October 26th, 2009 at 1:40 pm
The sad part about that Slylock Fox is the little inky — and apparently non-anthropomorphic — mouse peeking from the rock, wondering, “You know, if the price I have to pay for a bi-pedal life of the intellect, a paying job, and a sweet i-Phone is a lame-o pink bowler, well, then, no thank you.”
October 26th, 2009 at 1:49 pm
Au contraire, Darkefang! Batiuk’s mantra is more along the lines of “It’s always darkest before it goes completely black.”
October 26th, 2009 at 1:59 pm
Judge Parker: Sam Driver may be an ethically challenged lawyer, but when he talks the poilce jump, ie the Sheriff’s Deputy with Rocky and Detective Yelich with the City force.
October 26th, 2009 at 2:03 pm
A moose, a pig, and a bale of hay walk into a bar. Then out of nowhere comes a Beetle Bailey punchline!
No, most of America didn’t laugh either, but the birds had a colorful lining for their cage.
October 26th, 2009 at 2:05 pm
Harold@24: I had the same question…what is with Alice Mitchel’s boob?
Nearest I can tell she wears a breast plate to play volleyball.
weird
~Crazy
October 26th, 2009 at 2:06 pm
The final Funky Winkerbean…
October 26th, 2009 at 2:28 pm
=v= DtM: It is not without some measure of alarm that I’ve noticed a slow transformation of Alice Mitchell from the dress-wearing Revolution Road-type housewife to someone sporting clothing you might have seen in the early 1960s. Perhaps her cost-cutting healthcare plan finally nixed her Miltown prescription, and she’s emerging from her 50-year haze.
I fear that she’ll soon burn her rocket-cone bras, or start a catering business.
October 26th, 2009 at 2:57 pm
what I found disturbing is that mud from dennis’s face and hands seems to have been SOMEHOW TRANSFERRED to his mother’s face and bosom.
October 26th, 2009 at 6:00 pm
Jeff looks like he’s going to grab Adrian and hiss “IF SCOTT DIES I’LL NEVER FORGIVE YOU! NEVER, YOU HEAR ME??”
October 26th, 2009 at 6:22 pm
So…what we learn in today’s Beetle Bailey is that Cook is crazy?
But either way, why would being in camouflage make the men more hungry? Is it just that Cook can’t tell the difference between the men and starving woodland creatures and therefore he feeds them all?
October 26th, 2009 at 6:48 pm
BB:
TROOPS! OPERATION WINGED FURRY COMMENCES AT 0:400 HOURS!
October 26th, 2009 at 9:21 pm
Beetle Bailey: The Army has really changed since I was in the field with my old-timey metal mess kit! Now the mess sergeant feeds the troops on fine china, although they will apparently have to eat their chow with their fingers.
October 27th, 2009 at 12:04 am
Your surmise on BB is correct, Josh – just one more subterfuge forced on gay guys in the military by Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell
October 27th, 2009 at 8:50 am
106. Sequitur
Either/or, apparently O__o