The Comics Curmudgeon

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2007: Let the comics mockery begin anew!

Hi, everybody! I’m back at last. I see you’ve all been having fun in my absence (1270+ comments worth of fun!), but I’m rested and ready, if not tanned, and eager to get back in the blogging saddle.

So, how was your Christmas? Did it feel like it was brusquely shoehorned into someone else’s drama, as in Mary Worth?

Was everybody else busy and you had to get your holiday greetings from someone peripheral and random, Ã la Abbey the Wonderdog in Rex Morgan, M.D.?

Or were you fobbed off on some generic winter scene that had nothing to do with anyone you know or have even heard of, as in Judge Parker?

Or, perhaps worst of all, did you have to spend the week staring into the dead, soulless eyes of your hideous square-headed family, as in Gil Thorp?

OH FOR THE LOVE OF CHRIST, MAKE THEM STOP STARING AT ME! AAAHHHHHH!

Ahem. Anyhoo, not a whole lot of great interest to report in the comics, as they mostly treaded water during a low-readership week. The most action took place among the foobs, most of which was easily predicted and won’t be rehashed here. There were a few bright spots, though. Mark Trail featured this happy, non-beaver-slaughtering scene:

I don’t know what’s creepier: the chipper “Thanks for not killing the beavers!”, or the way daddy’s fondling that chicken leg.

Speaking of beavers, Barreto needs to get back to Judge Parker ASAP before Sophie turns into one permanently.

In non-beaver news, Mary Worth can pretend that she’s dreaming about her not-boyfriend, but thought balloons don’t lie: her main interest, as always, is herself.

And in Milford, we learn that the aesthetic requirements for “favorite couple” are shockingly low.

And! You may have missed your chance to give the gift of Comics Curmudgeon gear for Christmas, but Valentine’s Day is coming up! What better way to say “I love you” than a shirt bearing the crazed rantings of a drunk? Faithful reader Genetic Mishap, who designed this logo, here re-enacts this classic scene:

She also illustrates that the shirt also works when you’re not imitating comics characters:

Operators are standing by, so buy yours today!

Finally, let’s get the new year off on a good foot with a tacky joke about cancer:

Funky Winkerbean, 1/1/07

See, they totally set up a great Yul Brynner joke here and then completely failed to follow through with it.

This entry was posted on Monday, January 1, 2007 at 10:58 pm and is filed under Funky Winkerbean, Gil Thorp, Judge Parker, Mark Trail, Mary Worth, Rex Morgan, M.D..

220 responses to “2007: Let the comics mockery begin anew!”

Uncle Lumpy
January 1st, 2007 at 11:00 pm [Reply]

Josh – Please don’t ever do that again!
MGArchitect
January 1st, 2007 at 11:06 pm [Reply]

Welcome back, Josh.
Jordon
January 1st, 2007 at 11:09 pm [Reply]

Look innocent. Maybe he won’t notice the mess.
Original Emily
January 1st, 2007 at 11:13 pm [Reply]

Funky Winkerbean is so depressing, they only allow themselves to have a black and white TVs, in case all that color accidentally goes and cheers some one up.
Original Emily
January 1st, 2007 at 11:17 pm [Reply]

whoops…..TV no plural- sorry
bonnach
January 1st, 2007 at 11:19 pm [Reply]

Yul be sorry!

Alternately; Yule be sorry!
The Mighty Sam
January 1st, 2007 at 11:21 pm [Reply]

FW: The best part of chemo is not having to pay for that oh-so-smooth Brazilian.
Uncle Lumpy
January 1st, 2007 at 11:23 pm [Reply]

Josh -

Don’t look in the ficus, ‘kay? And we’ll get the Pacer out of the rhododendrons as soon as we’ve all had a chance to sober up.

Meanwhile, have a nut log – plenty left!
sabrechick
January 1st, 2007 at 11:25 pm [Reply]

My new years wish – To one day be able to hold my own with the elite snarkers ( and from what i’ve read over the last few months you are ALL elite) on this board – To that end…

QUIGMANS- Lucky makes a cameo!!!

TDIET â€“ Those pesky businesses â€“ always trying to save some dough.

OBH â€“ I think the OBH family is at the new Mallard Fillmore movie – Revenge of the Ducks!!

PARDON MY PLANET – When I first read this I couldnâ€™t figure out why the Daughters of the American Revolution were protesting.

FRED BASSETT â€“ A day late and a dollar short â€“ Wait!!! I found a quarter â€“ maybe just a day late!!

CRANKSHAFT – â€œYour eyeballs are turning into rectanglesâ€- They still look like little dots to me.

BEETLE BAILEY â€“ This would make MUCH more sense if Beetle had said â€œpast” differences â€“ It still wouldnâ€™t be funny though.

B.C. – I donâ€™t get this one â€“ Of course Iâ€™m pretty sure it wouldnâ€™t be funny even if I did.
Genetic_Mishap
January 1st, 2007 at 11:27 pm [Reply]

I hope mistletoe is related to kudzu. Watch- from its humble beginning jutting from the bottom of the frame, it will spiral out of control, spreading all over the panels and out-competing all other plant life at Charterstone. Soon there won’t be any soil nutrients left for poor Chinbeard to suck up.
Tukla in Iowa
January 1st, 2007 at 11:30 pm [Reply]

They could have made a good Yul Brenner joke, but instead went for a pun. As usual, the only funny thing about Funky Winkerbean is the title.
Zach
January 1st, 2007 at 11:36 pm [Reply]

I hope that on that wonderful December 25 morning, when every child ran downstairs to their glimmering Christmas tree, they got the one thing that every child wants– a note that says, “Didn’t kill the beavers, honey!”

And I hope that everyone here thanks their fathers tonight for not killing the beavers, because who knows? You might not have the chance to again. Merry Beavermas, everybody! Merry Beavermas!
Monkey David
January 1st, 2007 at 11:49 pm [Reply]

Funky Winkerbean doesn’t even make sense–the network scheduled a movie then SURPRISE! a Bowl Game broke out and they had to preempt it?
MaryPrankster
January 1st, 2007 at 11:54 pm [Reply]

http://www.dailyworld.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061229/NEWS01/612290302
DrBear
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:06 am [Reply]

You mean they couldn’t have done:

“Oh, great, they were supposed to have the fireplace loop on TV.”
“But they’re showing porn with Yul Brenner!”
“Ah, that explains it, they’re showing Yul’s log!”

Now tell me that isn’t 42 times funnier.
DickBlick
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:07 am [Reply]

Funky (oh please tell me what is so dang funky about a bunch of white band camp rejects) Winkerbean is lacking in sense on so many levels. If your wife is bald from chemo would you sit there mocking her with an ebony mane that would make Sampson envious? Shave your head in solidarity with her dammit. Or would that be too fashion forward for one of the Westview crew?
Shave Ezra
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:09 am [Reply]

In today’s (Jan 2) Mary Worth, it seems like she’s actually speaking to the country of Cambodia, like one of those Onion articles where they talk about a country as if it’s a person.
Harry Paratestes
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:14 am [Reply]

Welcome back, Josh, I hope you had many happy holidays.
Plasma
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:15 am [Reply]

Would you feel better if the Thorps were occasionally blinking?
andreavis
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:17 am [Reply]

Looks like Mary Worth’s artist has forgotten how to draw Dr. Jeff, which is why Mary can’t get him into her dream. It’s only been, what, 6 months since he ~~escaped~~ went off to save orphans? Bad news for us, as we will be treated to an entire week of Mary and Toby having coffee and going round and round about how Mary is going to call him. Oh well, he’s been gone since what, June? What’s another couple of weeks, Mare?
Harry Paratestes
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:18 am [Reply]

#16 DickBlick
Maybe he is in solidarity with his wife, and we just don’t know it: perhaps he shaved his nutsack.
Uncle Lumpy
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:26 am [Reply]

Gee, Mark, when d’you suppose those beavers will try to rebuild their dam?

Small favors: at least he’s not photocopying the art any more.
TB Tabby
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:29 am [Reply]

Welcome back, Josh! You’re back earlier than I expected!
Cornwhacker
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:37 am [Reply]

Small favors: at least heâ€™s not photocopying the art any more.

I’m not so sure about that. If Jackelrod hasn’t reused the last panel of the 1/02 strip before, I’m sure he will in the future. That’s a mighty fine Mark Trail drawing, right there. Definitely ripe for the swiping.
Awfulart
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:59 am [Reply]

Broncos beat the swooners.. Bosie St in overtime over Oak. SWONNERS LOSE….!!!!
Rusty
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:01 am [Reply]

Thank god you’re back Josh, the female basketball player in DTGT is exhibiting male pattern baldness, somebody had to point that out. Maybe the most hideous face to grace that strip.
Cornwhacker
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:12 am [Reply]

I’m going to be generous and assume that quaint Judge Parker snowscape is actually a view of Spencer Farm. While it was presumably snowless earlier that day and Abbey and Neddy were going around sleveless just before supper, it morphed into a wintry wonderland pretty quickly.

But then everything’s been morphing pretty quickly in this strip. And Genetic Mishap’s awesome Celeste reenactment would fit right in.
Dingo
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:12 am [Reply]

Apwil, yes, you are old enough to have history. There’s an old Japanese proverb: the reputation of a thousand years can be ruined in half an hour. Your half hour was a long time ago.

Look, Miss Patterson, when your prepubescent rosebud has gone from perkishly pink to skanky brown and you have yet to get a driver’s permit, you have a history.
Yazoo Street Scandal
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:13 am [Reply]

Faithful reader Genetic Mishap is teh hott.
sumokitty
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:22 am [Reply]

OK, I’m new here, which is my excuse for being so late with this comment, but…

Sunday’s A3G gave me some insight into the enigma that is Margo — her mother is Anais Nin:
http://homepage.mac.com/john_pearson/anais.html
Cornwhacker
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:26 am [Reply]

Oh good, it’s the Thorps annual family portrait. Looks like they’ve moved their couch since last year.
Mysterio
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:29 am [Reply]

Looks to me like [i]Gil Thorpe[/i] features a cameo by Colossus of the X-Men.
Gadge Cubic, Mole Preener
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:32 am [Reply]

O Poster Named After a Band/Dylan Song: I had noticed that.

But Monkey David (#13 or thereabouts): it’s rare, but plausible – for example, the New Year’s Eve Packers/Bears game had originally been scheduled for sometime earlier in the day (not a football fan, so I don’t know exactly when) but was changed to later in the evening only a week or two beforehand. So presumably, Cancer Girl and Mr. Cancer Girl might indeed have planned on watching a movie listed in the prior week’s TV listings…

Oh my god, I’m trying to justify Funky Winkerbean in terms of reality.
CHA5NCE
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:38 am [Reply]

A New Year’s Prayer:

Please let Ella’s horrible advice steer Mary into some sort of prison sentence. Oh, and please let Ella turn out to be Aldo Kelrast’s long-lost mother determined to ruin the seductress who killed her boy.

Amen.
Mibbitmaker
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:38 am [Reply]

I…I can EASILY SCROLL THE PAGE AGAIN! Woo-HOO!! HALLELUJAH! STEVE HOLT! HAPPY HAPPY JOY…..

Oh, hi, Josh.

Seriously (?), though… That’s a perfect overview of every furshlugginer approach to Christmas strips that infected the artists’ creativity.

btw… Good thing Genetic Mishap had the correct finger up…
Cornwhacker
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:40 am [Reply]

Waaait a minute… the Thorps just took their 2004 portrait and cropped it differently!

Eat your heart out, Elrod.
Dingo
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:41 am [Reply]

#33 ~~Midge~~ Gadge Cubic: You call yourself a Cream City resident and yet you didn’t know the original starting time of the game? How dare you. How DARE you, sir!

I’m confiscating the boat.
Trilobite
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:48 am [Reply]

Okay, which is more disturbing? That Mary Worth is apparently dreaming about catching Jeff Cory as he falls off of something tall?

Or is it more disturbing that her heartfelt somnoerotic cries of “Jeff! Jeff!” (just look at how she’s ecstatically clutching at her coffin-like bedsheets!) make it clear that, at least on some level, she is totally warm for his form? Betcha if he came back from Impoveristan or Dysenteritopia or whatever fictitious third-world nation he went to tomorrow, Mary would ride him like a pony.

Stay pure, Jeff. Keep doing good works, you don’t need no guilty-dream-driven biddy lovin’.
Cornwhacker
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:49 am [Reply]

2002!!

Okay, that’s enough archive-digging for one night.
Mibbitmaker
January 2nd, 2007 at 2:00 am [Reply]

1/2(/3/4/5/6/7/8/9…):

FC: “Note to self: don’t let Billy watch the news… especially economics coverage!”

Zits: Jeremy and his mom are the comic strip; his dad is…us!

FOOB: Uh, Apes… everything you do is your history. Boy, will she be deprived later!

S-M: …And ol’ Flattop You-know-who will invade Poland to get those photos, missy!

FW: Les Moore – Turning the Separation of Church & State into “There’s no atheists in foxholes!” since 2007

A3G:
LuAnn: “What a horrible night that was!”
Margo: “Not for me… That was the night I met Eric.”
Mibbit: “Oh, then what a horrible night that was for Eric!“
treedweller
January 2nd, 2007 at 2:09 am [Reply]

Josh,
You mean you think that first strip just has a holiday greeting tacked on? I thought that was Mary’s special Christmas necklace . . .

Cornwhacker,
Don’t forget last year. They had to squeeze it in on xmas eve (presumably the 25th was a Sunday) but it’s the same scene. I guess I prefer laziness in the guise of family traditions, though. In 2003 the blonde seems to be a young girl and the brunette seems to be about 45. Now that’s scary.
treedweller
January 2nd, 2007 at 2:38 am [Reply]

oops, I see now where CW mentioned last year’s.
Mr. Oâ€™Malley
January 2nd, 2007 at 2:54 am [Reply]

You know … taking a pun based on a dialect pronunciation in English … and translating it word for word into another language … and expecting the result to be funny? Is there any kind of rational thought at work here, or is the whole operation performed by robots?

“Tobogán” isn’t even pronounced like “toboggan”, so the entire point of the joke, if you could term it that, is completely lost anyway.

We can only be thankful there doesn’t seem to be a foreign-language version of FW. (And I’m sure the foreigners are thankful too.) The task of translating yesterday’s lame pun would be more than anyone could deal with.

On the other hand, I’m starting to suspect that some of these other strips might make more sense if you assume the text is translated word for word from some non-Indo-European language.
Spotted HÃ˜rse
January 2nd, 2007 at 3:25 am [Reply]

(DT)GT: Here we see some awkward and ineffectual basketball being played. And if we can’t seem to get any traction out there, maybe we need to get off the ice rink.
AppleGirl
January 2nd, 2007 at 3:35 am [Reply]

I am doing really well with my No-FOOB New Years’ resolution. I did click the link once, but it was “not available.” Whew! That was close! Thanks, chron.com, for saving me.

Slylock Fox – my new favorite strip. And I found all six differences! However, I thought that was “Greenland,” not “cloud.”
Len
January 2nd, 2007 at 3:56 am [Reply]

#43 — Translating puns is a difficult task. The best persons to do it are the translators who Englishize the French text of the Asterix series.

A Spanish to Yiddish pun/ wordplay:

Aqui es una mesa. (Here is a table.)
A kee es oon a messer. (A cow eats without a knife.)
Red Greenback
January 2nd, 2007 at 4:29 am [Reply]

Welcome home Mudgewig!
Robert Whitaker Sirignano
January 2nd, 2007 at 4:36 am [Reply]

Well, translating puns is one thing, but someone wrote book in French, without the letter “e” and had it translated without the letter “e”.

It’s called “A VOID”.

Find something much stranger.
Len
January 2nd, 2007 at 4:43 am [Reply]

Jason, the roommate from Hell, brings a new “girlfriend” to Cory’s dorm room.

Be careful she doesn’t deposit her egg-sack under the furniture!

http://www.comics.com/wash/watch/archive/watch-20070101.html

http://www.comics.com/wash/watch/archive/watch-20070102.html
Red Greenback
January 2nd, 2007 at 5:00 am [Reply]

Oh, meeohmyoh. Scaduto’s slipped the surly bonds of earth…again.
Doug Puthoff
January 2nd, 2007 at 5:12 am [Reply]

#13 (Monkey David)–You expected “Funky Winkerbean” to make sense? This was the same strip which, a few months back, had “faith-based majorette costumes.”
Doug Puthoff
January 2nd, 2007 at 5:15 am [Reply]

The best news so far this year is that the local paper has replaced the daily “Fox Trot”–at least for a month-long trial basis–with “Pearls Before Swine.” Bill Amend, your sacrifice was not in vain.
KenM
January 2nd, 2007 at 5:17 am [Reply]

Robert (#48): To make fun of the idea of converting Chinese into an alphabetic system, a guy named Chao Yuen-Ren wrote a 93-character short story (admittedly, not as long as a whole book) using only characters pronounced ’shi,’ so that romanized it would look like: shi shi shi shi shi shi shi shi . . . . with various tone marks. Maybe not as weird, but up there, I think.
Doug Puthoff
January 2nd, 2007 at 5:24 am [Reply]

1-2: FW–That strip brought back disturbing images of fifth grade, when our teacher, Mrs. Elam, made us pray after the National Anthem and before lunch. My stepfather told me that was unconstitutional. Anytime I did so, I felt like a lawbreaker.

Zits–I was hoping to see more of Brittany the Cramp Girl. I wonder if she’s any relation to Alice from “Dilbert.”

Curtis–The Kwanzaa strip is now back in gonzo territory. I still wonder if Billingsley somehow found Hunter S. Thompson’s drug supply after the writer’s suicide.

1-1–General comment: Is it me or were there more New Year’s Day strips than Christmas strips? Maybe the war on Christmas has become more subtle.
Pinback65
January 2nd, 2007 at 6:32 am [Reply]

Welcome back, Josh. It was a swell party, but it didn’t feel right, havin’ fun without you around. In the cold light of day, it just seems…dirty.

Anyway, Blondie: “Geez Louise?” When I was in junior high, we had a teacher who, when excited, would exclaim “Geez Louise,” the first and only time I’d ever heard the expression. He was an uninspiring teacher, and the whole class was a painful waste of time. So thanks to Dagwood, a part of my miserable pre-teen existence I’d mercifully kept buried has been exhumed. Asshole.
Goaty
January 2nd, 2007 at 6:53 am [Reply]

Mary Worth could take a few lessons from Judge Parker today. If she hadn’t been such a scrooge and bought her Jeffie-poo a cell phone programmed for international calls she wouldn’t have anything to keep whining about. She has no one to blame but herself… and for not meeting Ella sooner so Ella could advise her to get one since clearly Mary’s days of being an advice-giving Diva are sadly numbered.
Dal
January 2nd, 2007 at 7:28 am [Reply]

The Funky Winkerbean comic could be salvaged with the addition of a fourth panel showing the bald-headed guy heaving a garbage bag with a leg sticking out of it into a Dumpster.
Baby Dâ€™oh
January 2nd, 2007 at 7:44 am [Reply]

#15 Dr. Bear — My exhaustive calculations indicate that that is only 41.4396267 times funnier. Better luck next time.
Loppie Scaduto
January 2nd, 2007 at 7:54 am [Reply]

Hey, in today’s [Jan 2] FW, that figure of Les standing at the left of panel 2… is actually pretty good.

When the heck did Batiuk learn to draw a human body?!? Geez louise, if he keeps this up he could lose his Elrod license! [Can ya dig-g-g it? Bah! Awk-k!]
Sam L.
January 2nd, 2007 at 8:08 am [Reply]

You know what else is creepy about Mark Trail? Mark seems to be the only one with any food.
Sam L.
January 2nd, 2007 at 8:08 am [Reply]

Also, check out that tree in Gil Thorpe. Is that about to fall over or am I just imagining things?
Summerhouse
January 2nd, 2007 at 8:12 am [Reply]

Welcome back, Josh!

Ah, Gil Thorp. The touching story of how a Dick Tracy character (Seam Face) and a transgendered, steroid-using teen (Male-Pattern Baldness Girl) become Milford’s favorite couple. I think it’s going to be a very good Comics Curmudgeon year!
Allie Cat
January 2nd, 2007 at 8:27 am [Reply]

FOOB – I would like to take April and slam her head down onto a counter. That’s true of most of the Pattersaints, but today, she’s especially begging for it!
Scoopernicus
January 2nd, 2007 at 8:36 am [Reply]

The Portland Press Heraldj is ‘auditioning’ new comics. I’m pulling for ‘Get Fuzzy’, but given the paper’s long history of running lame comics (They didn’t even run ‘Peanuts’ until the mid ’80’s) I don’t have much hope. If they put their poll online, I’ll provide a link in the hope that the Curmudgeon Cumminity will do the right thing.
Lulu
January 2nd, 2007 at 8:37 am [Reply]

#56: Yes, I agree. Mary should have known the places Jeff would go wouldn’t have cell phones, access to email or even a good ol’ regular phone. They are a quaint yet simple people. Especially those Vietnamese.
yellojkt
January 2nd, 2007 at 8:38 am [Reply]

Genetic_Mishap has a future career in modeling. Let’s get her some of Neddy’s party dresses now that Neddy’s anorexia and/or age regression has made them too big for her.

I volunteer to be the tastefully artistic photographer.

And Abbey the Wonderdog is the real star of the strip.
yellojkt
January 2nd, 2007 at 9:02 am [Reply]

Lulu (#65):

On of my memories of Vietnam is being stuck in a thunderstorm on a sampan in the middle of the Mekong River while the tour guide calls the main office on her cell phone to figure out what to do.

I don’t know about the mountain villages where Dr. Jeff is buying ten-year-old virgins of either gender, but in the Vietnam travel industry, cell phones are ubiquitous.
Pfooti
January 2nd, 2007 at 9:18 am [Reply]

I’m curious. How likely is it that a college football bowl game, the kind of thing that is planned ahead of time, would come to pre-empt a very old movie, the kind of thing that’s not very likely to be shown on TV any more? Perhaps the game went into overtime?

I can see turning on, say, the Raiders game and finding out it had been blacked out and replaced by “The King and I”, but this just doesn’t make any sense.
Dean Booth
January 2nd, 2007 at 9:33 am [Reply]

Welcome back, Josh.

I’ve been hanging out in the last thread for days, wondering why no one was posting. I feel like that Japanese soldier (or Stan Laurel) who remained at his post not knowing the war was over.
Anonymous
January 2nd, 2007 at 9:39 am [Reply]

In honor of the new year, I have to protest the current plotline of (DT)GT. With the help of the Curmudgeon Community, I was able to follow (barely) the previous story: Stormy Hicks, popularity (and not), lying, chain saws, amputation, football. But now:

- The characters look even less human.
- Who the hell are they?
- Football is almost impossible to follow via GT’s trademarked three-random-flashes narrative technique. Basketball is worse.

Finally, what about “R.J. Brennan, check in for Tyler”? How many Brennans are on that team? “Brennan, in for Tyler!” So pithy. With room for more stylized drawings of inhuman life forms.
benro
January 2nd, 2007 at 9:40 am [Reply]

It’s not uncommon for comic strips to represent an implausible sequence of events to set up a bad pun. FW is one of the more egregious examples of this technique.

Regarding Mary Worth, I am hoping she takes the Charterstone gang on a swift boat adventure ala Apocalypse Now, to find Dr. Jeff as a deranged madman in the jungle. Only a taste of the Gray Beaver will be able to bring him back to sanity..
Devil in the Drain
January 2nd, 2007 at 9:41 am [Reply]

Aargh. That preceding post (about (DT)GT) is me.
Calico
January 2nd, 2007 at 9:52 am [Reply]

#17-and she’s calling Cambodia from the BED, for heaven’s sake-like a teenager.
I can see now why Mary can’t usually remember her dreams-she’s not sleeping well due to the huge, right-angled hunk of concrete she sleeps on with a purple comforter. Next thing she’ll be painting her bedroom walls red.
Shave Ezra
January 2nd, 2007 at 9:53 am [Reply]

#64 – Here’s a link:

http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/insight/guttman/061231jeannine.html

I guess you can either email them or leave a note in the comments.
Goaty
January 2nd, 2007 at 9:54 am [Reply]

Aargh. #71 made me want to go buy mind bleach.
jules
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:11 am [Reply]

Josh! Welcome back! That was some party, y’all, but I’m ready for a fresh start to the new year. :)

I like how yesterday’s Mark Trail and today’s Mark Trail ended with the exact same observation! In case anyone is still wondering: the beavers should start rebuilding the dam tonight. Because they’re hard workers.

Also, Mary is back to meddling in the affairs of Dr. Jeff Cory in the Third World – it’s about time! (Affairs…ha ha! I didn’t mean that, but I’m totally leaving it.)
Smitty Smedlap
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:22 am [Reply]

There may be places in this country where a radio newsman goes into a girl’s high school basketball locker room to record sound bites, but not in one instance would he be doing it for any reason that isn’t totally skeevy.
Concerned Citizen
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:30 am [Reply]

(DT)GT – I know this comes up from time to time and I should know but what does the (DT) stand for? Doing Time? Dead Tart?
Forthillrox
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:31 am [Reply]

My guess is that Non-Sequitur will win out in the Press Herald, due to the fact that it takes place in Maine. Although I have heard from some friends Downeast who think that it slightly overdoes the whole Maine thing. It’s interesting that all of the candidates are from New England.
commodorejohn
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:31 am [Reply]

I gotta say – in the Jan. 1st FOOB, the first panel is one of the most inexplicably funny things I’ve ever seen in my life. It’s like April has gone into opera – “I’LL GET IT!”
Heckler123
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:35 am [Reply]

Welcome back, Josh. I hope your holidays were as much fun as ours.

#21, HarryParatestes – “Maybe he is in solidarity with his wife, and we just donâ€™t know it: perhaps he shaved his nutsack.”

So…you think Funky actually has a nutsack?

Foxtrot has been replaced with Agnes in our newspaper. So depressing.

I start back to work tomorrow – also depressing.
Craigers
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:38 am [Reply]

Archie exegesis for January 1 (go to http://www.archiecomics.com/pops_shop/dailycomics/dailycomic.html and pull down January 1 from the menu).

The New Year’s Archie is always rich in symbolic content as the revolutionary wing of the Moldavian Orthodox Church sends out messages and threats for the new calendar year (battles throughout the first half of the nineteenth century settled a long-simmering disagreement within the Church about how the New Year was settled… the Church still uses the Julian ecclesiastical calendar, and so to the religious wing of the Moldavian Orthodox Church New Year’s is on January 14, but the political wing uses January 1. Tune back in on Janaury 14 for an interpretation of the New Year’s Archie from the Church’s religious wing).

Archie, who as we have previously seen represents the Christ, appears as directly under threat today as Jughead (a metaphor for the Moldavian Orthodox Church) pronounces a threat directly against him (”the giving season has given Archie a royal pain.”). Why the invocation of royalty in particular? My suspicion is that this is connected to the complex question of the royalty of Jesus himself. Tradition (and the Gospel of John) has it that Pontius Pilate placed a sign above the crucified Jesus that claimed that the man was “Jesus of Nazareth King of the Jews.” This is often seen in Catholic iconography as a sign on the crucifix reading INRI.

It should be noted that Orthodox representations of the Crucifixion usually do not have this representation. And furthermore, Archie is represented in the third panel wearing a collar, reminiscent of the clerical collars worn by Roman Catholic clergy. This is unmistakeably a reference to Catholicism. Is this the threat of a new beginning in the MOC’s long-standing campaign (by its political wing) against Catholicism and the Vatican?

I think so, especially when the symbolism behind the strip is taken into account. The use of a necktie to represent a noose is ages old, and it appears here again as threat… Betty (as the Virgin Mary) and Veronica (as a devil, a servant of Satan) are conspiring to suffocate, strangle, or even hang the Christ… and the pairing of the noose and the clerical collar is unmistakeable. The New Year’s Day Archie is a brazen threat against Catholicism.

Note also the obvious use of evil metaphors in panel two… the bats drawn in white in Dilton’s hair as he converses with Jughead. Remember, Jughead represents the Moldavian Church… Dilton does not have a consistent metaphorical role, but rest assured, he is frequently used as a symbol for those who are interacting with the Church in the context of the strip. In this case, as the subject is the Vatican, the bats in Dilton’s hair represent the stereotypical view of Catholics as consumed by evil and its forces.
Joe
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:39 am [Reply]

If cancer patients get Yul Brenner jokes, I wonder if Yul Brenner ever got cancer jokes. “Hey Yule, how’s chemo going!?” I’m not sure that would be in the best of taste, because Yul Brenner eventually really did get cancer, while very few cancer patients transform into Yul Brenner.
Chet McCord, Wildlife Defender
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:44 am [Reply]

Yippee! The Worcester Telegram & Gazette has replaced Foxtrot with Get Fuzzy. I am amazed.
Craigers
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:45 am [Reply]

I wonder if Yul Brenner ever got cancer jokes. â€œHey Yule, howâ€™s chemo going!?â€ Iâ€™m not sure that would be in the best of taste, because Yul Brenner eventually really did get cancer

Sounds like the joke was on him (I just related that to a friend, who warned that “Yul be sorry for making that joke”).
EZ_e
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:56 am [Reply]

Tdiet today: Scaduto uses the phrase ‘kick butt’. It truly is a new year indeed.
Rudy the Chimp
January 2nd, 2007 at 11:09 am [Reply]

I’m somewhat new to the FW storyline, but when did Clark Kent and Lex Luthor (with a disturbing come hither look on the last panel) start shacking up?
Forthillrox
January 2nd, 2007 at 11:18 am [Reply]

A very close friend of mine (at 29 yo) went through chemo last year and lost all his hair. One day, just at the end of his treatment (he had no hair at all; facial, head, eyebrows etc. and was quite pale), I went to pick him up to take him to his birthday party. He answered the door wearing a fedora and a dark topcoat (he’s also kind of heavy set), so I said “Hi Uncle Fester, is John home?”. Oh we laughed and laughed and laughed (well, not really, but he did let out a good chuckle)..

My point: depending on how well you know the person, cancer jokes can be okay, but it’s generally a good idea to shy away from them.

Still that’s no excuse for FW’s uber-lame pun.
Craigers
January 2nd, 2007 at 11:18 am [Reply]

Scaduto uses the phrase â€˜kick buttâ€™.

Actually, I think that “Kickbutt” is simply the young shaver’s name. It fits in well with existing Scaduto Nomenclature Conventions.
liz
January 2nd, 2007 at 11:19 am [Reply]

What’s the comic now showing up in my Foxtrot spot in my chron.com personalized web page? It doesn’t show a title. It has a lot of odd angles on people including from the back. Yesterday’s was mildly amusing, with mother and daughter jumping in the air; today not so much.
HBGlord
January 2nd, 2007 at 11:24 am [Reply]

#90 — It’s 9 Chickwed Lane, which also replaced Foxtrot in my Chron. I’ve decided to keep it.
TB Tabby
January 2nd, 2007 at 11:25 am [Reply]

90: That’s 9 Chickweed Lane. The one with the sexy knees.
TB Tabby
January 2nd, 2007 at 11:28 am [Reply]

TDIET: “Do you di-guh-guh-guh-guh it?”
HBGlord
January 2nd, 2007 at 11:35 am [Reply]

Popeye — Let me get this straight, as it were: The story commenced with Popeye shunning his admittedly fickle girlfriend for the pure yet half-formed affections of a little boy. Wanting to prise her man back from the vise-like grip of his NAMBLA-worthy feelings, Olive starts dating a born-female but male-identified transgendered gorilla to make him jealous.

I’m all snarked out after the weeklong dionysiana (i’m so glad you’re back, Josh — i hope you own two Swiffers), so i’ll let the above paragraph speak for itself.
bootsybooks
January 2nd, 2007 at 11:49 am [Reply]

Hey Josh, glad you’re back.

#78, that’s (death to) Gil Thorpe.

Why is John Belushi (as Samurai girl basketball player) in (DT)GT?

Also, Mark Trail? We get it! We get it! Beavers work hard! They’re as busy as… beavers, I guess. Man, I miss poor old confused Molly.
MaryAnnTheRest
January 2nd, 2007 at 11:57 am [Reply]

Concerned Citizen: (DT)GT means Death to Gil Thorp. I love answering this question because I get to type out Death to Gil Thorp. Death to Gil Thorp!

Welcome back, Josh! I hope you get to post today, TDIET is paging you. Digggggg it.
Dingo
January 2nd, 2007 at 11:58 am [Reply]

bootsybooks, fear not for Molly. Word has it that she’s now running a holistic shop on the edge of Lost Forest specializing in spring water colon flushing. I’m just waiting for the day that Trout Farmer and Mark Trail show up there together… with their Gadgemas gift certificates.
Dingo
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:07 pm [Reply]

In many ways, Molly the Bear is the 2006 representation of Miskel Spillman. She came into our lives, upset the dessert cart of staid comics, lasted on screen for just a brief moment, but left us with something pleasant to talk about for years to come.

Oh, Molly, if only you’d eat the Patterson clan and take over their small rectangle in the Houston Chronicle.
Deanbooth
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:10 pm [Reply]

#55: â€œGeez Louise!” reminds me of an old guy I worked with at a fish hatcher in Arkansas when I was 17 (it was a very good year). He used to exclaim, “Good God Gary, what a gash!”

Now I’d like to see that as a line in MW, when Gary Dent finally gets around to assaulting Ella.
Deanbooth
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:14 pm [Reply]

* hatchery

I not sure what a “fish hatcher” would do.
MossMoses
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:25 pm [Reply]

Genetic_Mishap, your pics look great. I’m just trying to figure out if your fishie necklace has feet or not.

46. Len, there was a radio ad a couple of years ago for an amazing learning method that used clever puns to teach foreign languages:

Announcer: What do you have on your feet?
Lady: Shoes
Announcer: What else?
Lady: Socks
Announcer: Can you spell socks?
Lady: S-O-C-K-S
Announcer: “Eso, si que es” means “that’s what it is” in Spanish.
Lady: Wow, Spanish is easy!
King Folderol
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:27 pm [Reply]

Good God! I’ve been away for so long that I thought Josh or a faithful reader had made up most of these comics.

In Mark Trail, the lesson from that strip seems to be that killing is the only way to solve your problems. Yay, killing!

In Judge Parker, Sophie looks less like a beaver and more like the vicitm of a freak nuclear accident. Yay, nuclear accidents!

In Gil Thorp, the only reason they are Milford’s “favorite couple” is that at least they’ll keep the damage their parents already inflicted on the gene pool limited to themselves. Yay, genetic damage!
lesles
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:32 pm [Reply]

lio has gone meta again. love it when it does that.

and thanks for the article link, MaryPrankster (#14). that the line ‘”I don’t care how you get them. Trap them. Hit them on the head. Run over them. Just bring me a beaver,” said jury President Bill Guidry.’ could appear in a news story courtesy of a public servant … that’s just bloody magic.
TB Tabby
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:33 pm [Reply]

Will today’s FW lead to a story about freedom of religion? I hope it culinates with the school being burned down, with an inebriated duck seen staggering into the night, accompanied by an indignant caveman.
Loppie Scaduto
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:39 pm [Reply]

89 Craigers: What about my cousin Kickbutt? I don’t see your point.
SmartPeopleOnIce
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:39 pm [Reply]

Spoooooonnnn!

Happy New Year, everyone.

That’s all I have to say.

Well, that and: whoever designed Chicago airport should die.

OK, now I’m done.
Mountain Mama
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:52 pm [Reply]

OK. What is going on the last panel of today’s JP? Is he caressing her cheek with that cell phone? Is it set on vibrate? Inquiring minds want to know.
queek
January 2nd, 2007 at 12:56 pm [Reply]

the Freep has replaced Foxtrot with F minus.

sadly, it also dropped Bliss a few weeks back, for some maudlin waste of ink that seems to be made up of rejected Hallmark card sayings.

something that I just remembered to mention: In the Lio just before Xmas, did anyone happen to notice that the name of his pet snake, is Jake? (Ishmael the squid is also a nice referential name. I think. . . )
Concerned Citizen
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:04 pm [Reply]

106 – O’Hare? The Home of the “Either 5 minute or 3 hour layover” Yeah, it’s a horror. It is the world’s easiest spot to get stranded.

Thanks, MaryAnn, for answering the DT question. Unfortunately I now can’t get the image of ugly creatures have idiotic misadventures on an uncharted desert isle out of my brain. Like Shadows Over Ippswitch with a laughtrack.
Chance
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:07 pm [Reply]

In that first picture, Genetic Mishap looks exactly like Dave Mustaine of Megadeth. Rock on!
Concerned Citizen
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:08 pm [Reply]

And thank you, bootsybooks. Any relation to Bootsy Collins? Can you play the space bass?
AhClem
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:09 pm [Reply]

#98 Dingo –

Thanks for the Miskel Spillman reference. Like you, I too am old enough to remember when SNL was actually funny.
roydrink
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:10 pm [Reply]

#103 – The beaver link was on the Holiday Special metapost too. My comment was #820 for the pulbic servant…
jules
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:10 pm [Reply]

Dayton Daily News has replaced Fox Trot with Agnes, which is okay, though I’d been hoping for Sylvia. It only occurred to me this morning how VERY VERY LUCKY I am that they didn’t stick Mallard Fillmore in there; I’d have had to cancel the paper altogether to keep my head from exploding due to elevated blood pressure.
Ham Gravy
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:16 pm [Reply]

Elrod, just hurry it up and get to the part where Kelly Welly shaves the beaver. That’s what I’m waiting to see.
Bitter Scribe
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:16 pm [Reply]

The Gil Thorp Christmas strips used to be even more bizarre, if possible. IIRC, they had two panels of conventional action, then they stopped everything dead so ol’ Gil could pop into the third panel and wish everybody a Merry Christmas, completely incongruously and out of context.

When it came to deconstructing the fourth wall, Brecht and Pirandello had nothing on Gil. The conventional one-panel greeting in today’s post seems sane by comparison.
Bitter Scribe
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:17 pm [Reply]

Also, great news: Prickly City is gone from the Chicago Tribune!
roydrink
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:18 pm [Reply]

#98 & #112 I don’t remember Miskel Spillman, but Elvis Costello’s performance was the best kick ass musical performance ever on SNL!

p.s. not the Elvis on RMMD…
lesles
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:28 pm [Reply]

#113 – apols. my browser crapped out on the holiday metapost after a few days when the comments hit 3 squillion or so, and thence refused to show me any more of the sage wisdom of the curmudgeonites. had to make do with suck-arse christmass/new years television, wallowing in the knowledge of the scads of wittery i will never see. almost re-read camus, i was so depressed.
Poteet
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:39 pm [Reply]

Hooray, he’s back! He’s back!
bootsybooks
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:45 pm [Reply]

#111 Citizen: No, I wish I was related to Bootsy Collins, as a grown man wearing a diaper on stage (and nothing but) is a thing of beauty. But only IF he plays bass.

Bootsy is a diminutive for Boo Boo, which is my actual name. Thanks Dad. He was a big Yogi Bear fan.
Poteet
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:55 pm [Reply]

# 39 — Cornwhacker, having clicked on all three links (yeesh), I have now injected myself with (DT)GT Vaccine, which is like a flu shot but far more painful, and am now protected against reading (DT)GT for another year unless it shows up in a metapost. Thank you. The agony was momentary, the benefit lasting.

# 41 — Okay, so I’m protected for two years. Treedweller, that link of yours was even more painful. Dear god, how can any human being draw other human beings who look like that?

# 66 — yellojkt, I second that. Genetic Mishap, you rule.
Hap Hapless
January 2nd, 2007 at 1:57 pm [Reply]

I wouldn’t mind seeing Blondie’s bowling balls
Ribinin
January 2nd, 2007 at 2:02 pm [Reply]

The Phantom – I often wondered what securities traders did when the got caught in some shady deal. Now I know.

What they don’t know is that they would have been better off in federal prison that messing with the Ghost Who Walks.
HBGlord
January 2nd, 2007 at 2:05 pm [Reply]

#123 — I initially misread that as “I wouldn’t mind seeing Blondie blowing balls”! But i’ve already seen that in a Tijuana bible.
Dadzilla
January 2nd, 2007 at 2:05 pm [Reply]

I fervently hope that Dr. Jeff has a better time in Viet Nam than I did in the 60’s.
Dingo
January 2nd, 2007 at 2:11 pm [Reply]

With Dr. Jeff “Hootcha!” Cory now off in Vietnam, maybe Michael Cimino will come out of obscurity to make a movie called The Beaver Hunter.
DickBlick
January 2nd, 2007 at 2:29 pm [Reply]

I spit on F—-y’s grave. Oh yes, I cried real tears when that courageous canine gave his life to rescue April. Today, after viewing FBOFW, I cursed him and now refuse to say his name. Why did he have to save her? We all would have been spared her current insipidity. If only Elizabeth had jumped in that creek and made it a double tragedy. After I finish this post I plan to drop my Richard Tonner April doll into the toilet and flush repeatedly. God help Mollie (my own OES) if she lifts a paw to help that little wench.
Nyssa23
January 2nd, 2007 at 2:31 pm [Reply]

#82–That was cracktastic! As Joel said in the “Mighty Jack” episode of MST3K, my brain feels as clean as a whistle now. And I didn’t even have to listen to “Metal Machine Music” to get it that way.

Happy New Year, Curmudgeonistas!
Krazy Kat
January 2nd, 2007 at 2:41 pm [Reply]

Yul Brenner lost his hair from a gas attack during the great war.
–or did I dream it?
Poteet
January 2nd, 2007 at 3:02 pm [Reply]

FOOB — I note with interest (and what that says about me I don’t wanna know) that the January Foob letters are not up. The December letters appeared promptly on the morning of December 1, as I recall. Hmmm.
ohgrl
January 2nd, 2007 at 3:10 pm [Reply]

Welcome back Josh, but I must disagree with your description of Mary Worth as non-beaver news. Notice that only ONE hand is clutching that blanket. I think someone’s “killin’ the beaver,” if you know what I mean.
Poteet
January 2nd, 2007 at 3:11 pm [Reply]

RMMD — I still say that a much more flattering portrait of Abbey the Wonderdog could have been used for the holiday strip. She should sue.

MT — Something will go wrong with this live-trap plan. The JackBall will not give up rending hearts so easily. The JackBall demands that cute animals be put in peril, and put in peril they shall be.
Loppie Scaduto
January 2nd, 2007 at 3:16 pm [Reply]

131 Poteet: does this mean that the FOOBs are still busy re-writing them from the prematurely leaked versions, or are they just gonna not have them at all and pretend the leak never happened?

[Or, to put it in Newspeak, will they become unletters?]
Luna
January 2nd, 2007 at 3:18 pm [Reply]

Uhm, Apwil, you are contradicting yourself there, peabrain. If you are such a goddamn spring chicken, then all of your stuff IS ALREADY NEW is it not????

So why donâ€™t we just torch your NEW STUFF and then you can be a young, hip, bitchy smartass with NO STUFF.
ohgrl
January 2nd, 2007 at 3:23 pm [Reply]

So I went home to Toledo for the holidays. It’s been mentioned here before that one of the local radio stations (WRQN/93.5) has a daily punny Mary Worth story, but now they read the real MW, and base their story off that. Even better is the fact that like Aldo, my dad has now become hooked on Mary, and reads her every day. Maybe that’s why he asked my mom to make tuna casserole for Christmas…

PS Bob Kelly, if you’re lurking here, show yourself!
Dingo
January 2nd, 2007 at 3:37 pm [Reply]

#136 ohgrl: Oh. Oh, girl. Tuna casserole for Christmas? I swear, I can hear Jerry Goldsmith’s Theme from Chinatown playing in the background as your mother set that on the table. Honey-glazed carrots? Green bean casserole with Durkee’s French-Fried Onions strewn across the top like a bevy of sleeping sorority girls after an all-night bender? It’s just too… precious.

Question: how are Mark Trail and Kevin Federline alike?
treedweller
January 2nd, 2007 at 3:51 pm [Reply]

I find myself in the uncomfortable position of defending April. Since Liz has about two years of age and a few months of experience outside the patterson clan, her pronouncements of life lessons are as pompous and unwelcome as anything we’ve seen in this strip (well, that’s an extreme statement, but still . . .). She deserved any shot that the younger sister could come up with. I’m giving A the benefit of the doubt on this one.
treedweller
January 2nd, 2007 at 3:52 pm [Reply]

that is, two years of age on April.
Dennis Jimenez
January 2nd, 2007 at 3:54 pm [Reply]

Re: 133 – That’s what I call ballin’ the jack!?!
Poteet
January 2nd, 2007 at 3:58 pm [Reply]

# 134 — Exactly, Loppie. That’s the big question. And I’m gonna keep checking the Foobsite every single day until we have the answer. That’s what Lynn and her demonic little universe have done to me.

# 137 — Dingo, if it were anyone else asking, I might beg to be told the answer. But I’ve seen your links.
HBGlord
January 2nd, 2007 at 3:59 pm [Reply]

#140: Thanks, Dennis — now i have to retrive some Windex to clean the burst of laffspittle from my monitor.
Kdog
January 2nd, 2007 at 4:04 pm [Reply]

I can’t wait until they show Mary dreaming about Jeff and a 12-year-old Bankok hooker. Hijinks ensue!
Luna
January 2nd, 2007 at 4:11 pm [Reply]

#137 Dingo

If you can come up with an answer that doesn’t include the word “beaver,” I’ll go out into the barn and teach myself that solid potato salad dance.
MossMoses
January 2nd, 2007 at 4:15 pm [Reply]

Mark Trail was backup dancer with the Lost Forest Longnose Gars. He also wrestled Jake the Snake. He and K-Fed really have a lot in common but Kevin might be a little more fertile than Mark.
Dingo
January 2nd, 2007 at 4:24 pm [Reply]

Folks, you have to hand it to MossMoses! I didn’t have an answer to the question. It was all to see with what you’d come up (other than bile).
PopeJoan
January 2nd, 2007 at 4:54 pm [Reply]

FoxTrot has been replaced with Girls and Sports in the Journal-Sentinel. My brother asked if it’s supposed to be what happens to Jason as an adult.
I think the trainwreck that would be Jason’s adulthood would be funnier.
Luna
January 2nd, 2007 at 4:56 pm [Reply]

…gotta go limber up…
Poteet
January 2nd, 2007 at 5:06 pm [Reply]

# 140 — BWAHAHA! Thanks, Dennis.

MW — I want to see Mary Worth travel to Viet Nam. I want to see her fall out of a canoe into a river, board and disembark from a helicopter, be terrified by a poisonous snake, and have a shot whistle right over her head. Nothing personal, Mary. I just want to find out if it’s even possible for your hair to move.
Poteet
January 2nd, 2007 at 5:17 pm [Reply]

# 146 — Dingo, I apologize for my distrust. I’m sure you would have come up with a beaverless cleancut answer yourself if MossMoses hadn’t. And your links are educational.
HBGlord
January 2nd, 2007 at 5:31 pm [Reply]

I’ve noticed that a lot of the posts after #120 or so are by many of us longtime attendees of the weeklong-plus party that was the previous Metapost. Hair of the dog, eh?
Cornwhacker
January 2nd, 2007 at 5:34 pm [Reply]

136 ohgirl: I was in Toledo for the first time last week, and by sheer coincidence (?) my hotel clock radio was set to that station! I did eventually remember seeing talk about Bob Kelly on this site in the past; but that first morning, waking up in strange surroundings to talk of Ella Byrd advising Mary to pay attention to her dreams… very odd sensation. I thought I was waking up from a dream about reading “Mary Worth”. Is that really what my heart desired, but my mind rationalized away?
Miss Priss
January 2nd, 2007 at 5:35 pm [Reply]

# 131, 134, 141

Usually, the letters don’t get posted on the website on the first if the first is a weekend or holiday. The site says the studio is closed for the holidays, and the staff will be back on January 3.
HBGlord
January 2nd, 2007 at 5:44 pm [Reply]

#154 — Back January 3rd?! Do Canadians celebrate a Boxing Day for New Year’s too?

Or are they all taking Gerald Ford Day off today, as he was our most Canadian of presidents? (Yeah, i don’t know what that means, either. “Sawwry,” as they might say on Degrassi.)
HBGlord
January 2nd, 2007 at 5:45 pm [Reply]

Miscount — I’m not that egocentric — i’m answering #153, natch.
Skullturf Q. Beavispants
January 2nd, 2007 at 5:49 pm [Reply]

Re #154 — Well, it is true that Ford, as a Michiganian, was one of the most northern presidents of recent memory.

I think Calvin Coolidge was from Vermont.
Genetic_Mishap
January 2nd, 2007 at 6:01 pm [Reply]

Awww, shucks, people…

[Rudolph] They think I’m cuuuuuute! [/Rudolph]

At least, I think most of them do. I have to check out this Megadeth singer…

re: #102- Yep, it’s a footed (feeted?) fish. And I just realized I forgot to remove the pencil from behind my ear. Whoops.
cheech wizard
January 2nd, 2007 at 6:14 pm [Reply]

82- Craigers – glad to see you back. We have missed your learned analysis of the socioreligious implications of Archie as a tool of the Moldavian Orthodoxy. Perhaps you can enlighten us as well as to the reports that the Family Circus is due to be taken over by Jack Chick. Or that the new Judge Parker artist is the same one that does those “Precious Moments” figurines (see Sophie, above) or that Leonard Cohen has been secretly ghostwriting Funky Winkerbean for the past five years.
Gg83
January 2nd, 2007 at 6:18 pm [Reply]

(DT)GT: It’s good to see that the Thorp family is upholding their yearly Christmas tradition of playing “Let’s glue Mommy’s hand to the daughter’s cheek!” Best Christmas game ever!
Sjofn
January 2nd, 2007 at 6:18 pm [Reply]

I know everyone says this, but I need to say it at least once, just because everyone says this and I need to be part of the crowd: God damn is the “art” for Gil Thorp ugly. It’s a horror beyond imagining that someone out there apparently thinks human beings look like that in any way, shape, or form.
Ukulele Ike
January 2nd, 2007 at 6:19 pm [Reply]

So the Curtis Kwaanza storyline is just ripping off The Arabian Nights?

Young Man #1 gets a magical glass disk that lets him see anywhere in the world — the telescope, check. #2 is given the magical sandal that immediately transports him anywhere in the world — the flying carpet, check. Tomorrow #3 will receive the Magic Kumquat that magically cures any disease with just one magical bite.

Has Billingsly done this before? “When the cyclone finally set down Little Mugglawka’s grass hut, she found herself in a colorful fairyland of singing Pygmies, at the start of a Yellow Mud Road!”

MT: Those foreground shots of Theodore the Hardworking Beaver make him look an awful lot like everyone’s favorite Dick Tracy villain from 1940, The Mole.

http://www.cafepress.com/dicktracy.3075462
Key Lime Pie
January 2nd, 2007 at 6:26 pm [Reply]

“In non-beaver news, Mary Worth can pretend that sheâ€™s dreaming about her not-boyfriend, but thought balloons donâ€™t lie: her main interest, as always, is herself.”

Oh, Mary’s news is beaver news, but in her case no news is good news.
toben
January 2nd, 2007 at 6:33 pm [Reply]

how is your local newspaper handling the void that Fox Trot has left in it’s wake?

Here in houston we now have “The Brilliant Mind of Edison Lee” which seems to be a step up from FT…
Concerned Citizen
January 2nd, 2007 at 6:34 pm [Reply]

157 – Genetic_Mishap – The pencil just adds to your charm, plus it’s handy if you want to do an impromptu math problem.
Summerhouse
January 2nd, 2007 at 6:37 pm [Reply]

I have to be driving down the street by 8:10am or I am late for work. I can’t be walking to the car, I can’t be scraping the windshield and I most definitely cannot be, as we see in Post #62, still sitting in the house deciding if I want to call the ugly girl in Gil Thorp “Male-Pattern Baldness Girl” or “male-pattern baldness girl.” God!! This site is going to be the death of me.
Summerhouse
January 2nd, 2007 at 6:41 pm [Reply]

#87 Rudy The Chimp – Thanks for the coffee nasal lavage. Always good for the sinuses.
MossMoses
January 2nd, 2007 at 6:42 pm [Reply]

Mary Worth wouldn’t last long in the third world but it would be fun watching her suffer. However, having said that, I lived in China for three years and noticed many nosy, meddling biddies over there, too. These biddies I’ve never met before ask questions like, “how much do you earn a month”?, or “are you married”?, followed by, “why not”?, “how old are you”?,”how much do you weigh?”, “what’s your blood type”? Maybe it’s a cultural thing but if it is how do you explain Mary Worth?
Loppie Scaduto
January 2nd, 2007 at 6:43 pm [Reply]

147 PopeJoan: “FoxTrot has been replaced with Girls and Sports…”

And The Beatles have been replaced with William Hung…
Summerhouse
January 2nd, 2007 at 7:01 pm [Reply]

Smart People On Ice – I’ve missed you! I was just fixing to aks (as they say where I live) if you were away or had a new name or something. I remember the religious fervor with which Loppie Scaduto adopted that name (a black silhouette against a red sky – something about “with God as my witness, Loppie Scaduto SHALL be my name!”) but I forgot who Loppie used to be. Thought it might be you. Anyway, welcome back.
Genetic_Mishap
January 2nd, 2007 at 7:01 pm [Reply]

I’ve read all the Chron strips of â€œThe Brilliant Mind of Edison Leeâ€. It’s the same joke over and over.

People besides Edison Lee: We’re talking about a normal thing, or a contrived thing. We don’t know. We just do so to see if little Edison can use our discussion as a setup for a snark at the government’s and/or big corporation’s expense.

Edison: *snarks at the government’s and/or big corporation’s expense*

People besides Edison Lee: *look on as if his snark is profound or unexpected*

Someone said it’s the left’s response to Mallard Fillmore. It has the repetition and the humor neglect; all it needs is some more inanity and mean-spiritedness, and I will agree. And maybe a multiple traffic offense on the author’s part.
Poteet
January 2nd, 2007 at 7:02 pm [Reply]

# 153 — Thanks, Miss Priss. (Just one more day! Be still, my beating heart.)

# 163 — Toben, my town will get Bizarro now. I checked it out on chron and have decided we could do worse.

# 165 — FAH-bulous, Summerhouse! A classic comment that I’m glad I didn’t read until after I swallowed.
Loppie Scaduto
January 2nd, 2007 at 7:08 pm [Reply]

169 Summerhouse:

“I remember the religious fervor with which Loppie Scaduto adopted that name…”

Actually, that surprises me!

“… but I forgot who Loppie used to be.”

Conversely, that does not.
Heckler123
January 2nd, 2007 at 7:17 pm [Reply]

#114, jules – It appears that you live in the Dayton, Ohio, area. I have lived here for almost nine years. Tell me – how do you find the strength to endure it? And why does everyone pronounce c-o-u-p-o-n “kyoo-pahn”?
roydrink
January 2nd, 2007 at 7:20 pm [Reply]

The winner of today’s “Work your name(s) into your comic” contest goes to Wilson & Nolan of RMMD. The flying newspaper gives a nice touch to the alley.

And the winner of the worse signature goes to Jack Elrod. We’ve given him the award for the last 2,754 days, a new record!
Doug Puthoff
January 2nd, 2007 at 7:23 pm [Reply]

130 (Krazy Kat)–More information about Yul Brenner can be found on the Internet. (First post of the year to use the catchphrase.

And I also hope more information about Genetic Mishap can be found on the Internet.
phil
January 2nd, 2007 at 7:43 pm [Reply]

Today Cathy revealed her true weight – 110 – kilos that is… God I hate Cathy.
Gadge Cubic, Mole Preener
January 2nd, 2007 at 8:05 pm [Reply]

#37 Dingo: I also have never in my life, and will never in my life, wear a cheesehead hat (unless I am also wearing a negligee – which, so far as I remember, I’ve also never worn in my life). Somehow the state has neglected to exile me for my lack of football fandom.

#82 Craigers: Welcome back, first of all – but second: see, I told you all about the New Year’s thing!

#110 Chance: I am sorry, but I have a very hard time believing Dave Mustaine is anywhere near that cute. If he is, I may have to switch over to Dingo’s team. By which I mean the Chicago Bears, of course.
Ukulele Ike
January 2nd, 2007 at 8:10 pm [Reply]

The New York Daily News newspaper cannot replace Fox trot with anything, because it dropped Fox Trot several months ago, and I never noticed.

The Daily News has also just cut back from four pages of comics to three, without telling anyone it was going to happen.

Cathy seems to be gone, Thank God, but I can’t tell what else is missing…I think they may have shrunk the size of the remaining strips, squeezing seven onto a tabloid page where there were only six before.
Summerhouse
January 2nd, 2007 at 8:15 pm [Reply]

#170 Genetic Mishap – Your post about that Edison Lee strip is interesting. I rebuilt my chron page this morning, and I put it on because there’s been a lot of buzz about it. Then I read it, and it’s SO stupid today – they are asking questions of a guy in a hotdog suit who is giving away samples, and the “punchline” is, I can barely stand to type it – “There’s more than one way to grill a hotdog.” (If the Family Circle tried that, the flood of posts here involving anal rape and hotdogs would overload the server. ) Anyway, I thought that had to be some kind of anomalie. But your post makes me think not. I could look at the archives, but I think I’ll just let the (probable) horror unfold.
Awfulart
January 2nd, 2007 at 8:23 pm [Reply]

From “OOTGP”: The FDA re-approving silicone implants.
Titillating & uplifting story line obviously designed to keep one abreast of the Good Stuff…!!!
Awfulart
January 2nd, 2007 at 8:29 pm [Reply]

# 178 Ukulete Ike: See # 1258..
Marc
January 2nd, 2007 at 8:34 pm [Reply]

I have never, ever, EVER wanted to give Mr. Scaduto more of a reality-check up more than today. The last time Al and Brad Anderson have stepped outside of their house was circa 1981, and ever since, they’ve had to rely on world of mouth about “today’s styles.”

Mr. Scaduto, your anachronism in today’s strip (80’s clothes and the 60’s phrase “dig-gg-g-gg-g–g–g-g it?”) by teen-with-speech-impediment has set me over the edge, and generally, “kick butt” is not usually screen printed onto a sweater vest.

There is too much wrong in today’s strip. I must go..
Genetic_Mishap
January 2nd, 2007 at 8:47 pm [Reply]

Here’s a good example of TBMoEL’s typical humor.

http://www.chron.com/apps/comics/showComick.mpl?date=20061205&name=Edison

As an aside, for a supposed science geek, he sure sounds morose about the fact that NASA is being well financed by the government. Heck, you’d think with this administration’s science standards, that those standards would make good fodder for a strip about a boy scientist/government disser.

Maybe he’s just a miserly whiner, who happens to be a member of a new youth subculture that revolves around the trappings of the scientist. First there were Emos, and now there’s…Physios?

Yeah, he listens to Physio metal, and has all the clothing, props, and buzzwords of the boy genius, but it’s all just youthful hollow pretension.That, and he bitches about money ALL THE FREAKING TIME.
yggdrasil
January 2nd, 2007 at 8:51 pm [Reply]

Hooray for #57. When your characters’ only emotion is smirking your pathetic (as in “causing or evoking pity”) female chemo patient becomes”…the bald-headed guy”.
Genetic_Mishap
January 2nd, 2007 at 8:53 pm [Reply]

I just realized “Physio” doesn’t work. Since mad scientists are usually biologists, I’ll stick with that. “Bios”!
Chance
January 2nd, 2007 at 9:23 pm [Reply]

I present Dave in some of his glory here.
yellojkt
January 2nd, 2007 at 9:39 pm [Reply]

MossMoses (#167),
I would love to see Mary fly to Vietnam and get meddled to death.
Loppie Scaduto
January 2nd, 2007 at 9:42 pm [Reply]

182 Marc:
“I have never, ever, EVER wanted to give Mr. Scaduto more of a reality-check up more than today.”

But daddy-o! Weren’t you here on Nov. 10? C’mon, hipster, ya gotta dig-g-g it! Awk-k!
scuppers
January 2nd, 2007 at 9:44 pm [Reply]

#150 — Ida No, Poteet. I spent the better part of yesterday afternoon on one of Dingo’s recent links, and when, quite unexpectedly, my grown son came upstairs to use the printer, I never hit ‘delete history’ so fast in my life. Having said that, I agree that the sojourn was highly educational.
Len
January 2nd, 2007 at 9:52 pm [Reply]

#138/139 — Treedweller, April is a high schooler, an EARLY high schooler. Lizardbreath is a grad student. There has to be at least five or six year’s difference between them.

Neither one of them has more than two brain cells to rub together, but they’ve got more than two years’ difference of experience…
andreavis
January 2nd, 2007 at 9:57 pm [Reply]

The Columbus Dispatch has replaced FoxTrot with Pearls before Swine. They had a reader poll and that was the winner, pulling in like 40% of the vote. I don’t remember the other choices but I think they ranged from sucky to super-king-kong mega-mega sucky. All in all, we’ve got a good replacement so far. Good thing Castro’s still alive, though, or today’s strip would have been awkward.
Marion_Delgado
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:17 pm [Reply]

Remember everyone:

Funky Winkerbean is NOT where hope goes to die!

It’s where LISA* goes to die!

*and probably Wally
Artist Formerly Known as Ben
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:19 pm [Reply]

As she’s crying out “Jeff, Jeff”, don’t you wonder where Mary’s other hand is? You’re welcome!

Welcome back, Josh.
Red Greenback
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:29 pm [Reply]

Woowee!…Eightball’s so stressed, he’s been gnawing on his steering wheel!
Red Greenback
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:41 pm [Reply]

And by the by, the ashtray wasn’t THAT big Elvis…WUSS!
Luna
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:43 pm [Reply]

A Haiku For Crankshaft, Batiuk and Ayres:

Keesterman mailbox

Lacking humor, lacking wit

Old stale joke stop please
Red Greenback
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:46 pm [Reply]

Elvis, your name is now “Nancy”
Crankenstank
January 2nd, 2007 at 10:54 pm [Reply]

FW: Did I miss something in 20 years of not reading Funky Winkerbean? Is Les gay now, or living with Sinead O’Connor?!?
Gg83
January 2nd, 2007 at 11:11 pm [Reply]

191: I’m not seeing the Castro connection. Can you help me out, please? (Is something sailing way the heck over my head?)
Red Greenback
January 2nd, 2007 at 11:12 pm [Reply]

Mary Worth looks like a qtipâ„¢ or a Billy Idol PEZ dispenser
blase
January 2nd, 2007 at 11:35 pm [Reply]

JP: My guess is that they farmed this particular strip out to Japan. since almost nobody in the world can draw this strip aside from Eduardo the Unfortunate Uruguayan — whose series of misfortunes and disappearances prompted a hasty search for temporary replacement artists.
Gadge Cubic, Mole Preener
January 2nd, 2007 at 11:40 pm [Reply]

Here’s today’s PBS. I suspect the Columbus Dogpatch (as my friends who live in that fair city – who refuse to call it and deny that actual humans ever have called it “C-Bus”) is starting you off with some reruns, presumably to get you up to speed.

Anyway: PBS is a pretty good strip.
Mr. Oâ€™Malley
January 3rd, 2007 at 12:03 am [Reply]

201 Thanks for the info, blase, and get well soon, Eduardo!
treedweller
January 3rd, 2007 at 12:31 am [Reply]

190 Len,
Okay, she’s got a few years on April. But she grew up under Mommy’s apron in Whiteyville, spent a little time in Mtgnickigwatama learning she couldn’t hack it in the real world, and quickly fled back to Whiteyville, right back under the apron. She has no business offering life lessons to anyone. Insult her again, April!
winky
January 3rd, 2007 at 1:30 am [Reply]

i thought that Celeste reminded me of another cartoon character in the panel where she’s waving the microphone, and then it dawned on me… she’s Herbie Popnecker with his lollipop!
whoamItoday?
January 3rd, 2007 at 1:44 am [Reply]

137/190

Lizardbreath is 10 years older than April, graduated college 2 1/2 years ago and been teaching full time since then. Not old enough by a long shot for such sage advice, but I you should have heard my youngest brother at that age, sagely advising my daughters who were teenagers.
SmartPeopleOnIce
January 3rd, 2007 at 12:04 pm [Reply]

#183 (GM) As an aside, for a supposed science geek, he sure sounds morose about the fact that NASA is being well financed by the government.

Um, not to start off the new year all pissy and whatnot, but having recently been at an NIH budget meeting, I can assure you the only thing being “well financed” by the government these days are Haliburton stockholders.

Sounds like TBMoEL is one DWI away from being “Mallard Fillmore”.
queek
January 3rd, 2007 at 12:16 pm [Reply]

156: “Michigander”
andreavis
January 3rd, 2007 at 12:51 pm [Reply]

#202– Thanks, Gadge, I hadn’t realized those of us reading the “Columbus Pisspatch” were getting tired old reruns. (My dad always called the paper that lovely name; it dovetailed with the other, now defunct, daily in town called the “Columbus Citizen’s-Urinal”.)
Poteet
January 3rd, 2007 at 1:25 pm [Reply]

# 207 — SPOI, thanks, and I can’t resist adding that some of the actual pork money that’s been handed out in recent years isn’t even wanted by some of the “lucky” recipients. The Iowa fake rainforest that was the subject of many jokes after being declared the most egregiously awful pork project of 2005 (or was it 2004?) has very little public support here.
Marion Delgado
January 3rd, 2007 at 1:45 pm [Reply]

smart people i kind of like edison lee, because it is the most science y thing in comix (even more so than far side was). the only thing more science-y is sam whatsisname who does 1-panels exclusively for science magazines. and since a great deal of NASA is in the Pentagon budget (moreso than in the past) it would not shock me were it to be well-funded.

For some reason, when i was undergrad in physics, the only jobs we saw listed for after graduation (even with advanced degrees) were never NASA stuff, admittedly. mostly military but not space related. so it was university or bust or Oak Ridge or bust.

I don’t think Edison Lee is really headed mallard fillmore-ward, because that guy is easily as anti-science as Johnny hart.

*cough*

“uh … look … I promise, the dick jokes ARE coming!” – Bill Hicks
SmartPeopleOnIce
January 3rd, 2007 at 2:25 pm [Reply]

#211 (Marion) – eh, maybe I was being a bit harsh on Edison. We’ll see…

Anyway, on to more important topics: Has anyone else noticed that Genetic Mishap looks like an older, hotter version of Margaret?

(I don’t mean “older” like “old”, I mean like “post-adolescent”. Ok, I really mean “legal”. Ok, I’ll just stop now.)
Hippocrass
January 3rd, 2007 at 2:53 pm [Reply]

The really creepy part about the Gil Thorpe Christmas panel is the all the eyes seem to follow you no matter where you move.
*shudders*
Marion Delgado
January 3rd, 2007 at 5:47 pm [Reply]

She does, smart people. It’s a real pity Dennis the Menace will NEVER even inadvertently have ANYTHING worth printing on a t shirt, I say.
fahrenheit451
January 3rd, 2007 at 6:29 pm [Reply]

I also live somewhere in NW OH and WRQN does “read” Mary Worth daily. John Saunders lived in Waterville which is also in the Tol-eee-duh area which might account for it…it’s also probably the one redeeming thing about living here.

Just a nosy busybody comment…
Gatormom
January 3rd, 2007 at 6:59 pm [Reply]

OK, Genetic_Mishap, either show your ID or stop stirring up all these old farts. You look like your 12. Though I’ll give you points for reading the comics at such a tender age.

Oh, and your mom says turn out the light.
Angie
January 3rd, 2007 at 9:10 pm [Reply]

Josh: welcome back! It’s good to be laughing out loud again.
Genetic_Mishap
January 3rd, 2007 at 9:31 pm [Reply]

All right. I’ll stop stirring up the old farts.

Hey. You. Old farts. Knock it off.
Randy S
January 3rd, 2007 at 9:35 pm [Reply]

FW: I think the really stupid thing about this particular strip, is the statement that it was “probably pre-empted by the bowl game”

What “probably”? Presumably they know that The King and I isn’t on because they switched to that channel and saw for themselves that the bowl game is on instead.
SmartPeopleOnIce
January 4th, 2007 at 11:08 am [Reply]

Dang, apparently there’s a fine line between “lovable scamp” and “creepy stalker”.

Another useful life lesson learned courtesy of teh intertubes.

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2007: Let the comics mockery begin anew!

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