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Pardon My Planet, 12/22/24

One of my least favorite genres of “Images You Can Buy On A Poster Or T-Shirt” is “Two Dead Celebrities Dressed In Vaguely Rockabilly Outfits And One Is Giving The Other One A Tattoo And The Whole Thing Feels Vaguely And Unpleasantly Sexual.” I’ve seen this with Marilyn Monroe and Audrey Hepburn (on a giant poster hanging in the men’s room of a restaurant that seemed otherwise respectable) and Charlie Chaplin and Albert Einstein (on a t-shirt hanging on rack outside a store in Italy). This comic isn’t quite the same thing but I think we can agree it’s in the same general ballpark, and that ballpark is distasteful.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 12/22/24

No, I don’t buy this at all. A Christmas Carol is famously one of Dickens’s shortest books and Snuffy is a notoriously stunted and gnome-like man and was presumably even smaller as a child. I’m beginning to suspect he can’t tell different books apart, possibly because he’s illiterate.

Marvin, 12/22/24

Can you imagine feeling like you have to continue to live with Marvin, for you own safety and survival, and the thought of being separated from him sends you into a state of panic? Bleak stuff.

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Hi and Lois, 12/21/24

Hmm, Ditto, interesting: canonically, in the Bible, Joseph doesn’t have any lines (in the sense that no direct speech is attributed to him), while the shepherds actually do, at Luke 2:15. So you’re not making a ton of sense here, unless … your play’s script is heretical??? Are they teaching heresy in our schools and/or churches (not actually clear where this is taking place) now? I think it really says a lot about society and such. Giving Joseph lines. Hmph. The very idea!

Gil Thorp, 12/21/24

Now, normally, “Guy falls off the wagon and immediately gets into an altercation with the cops while the locally beloved idiot teen who says ‘yeet’ all the time looks on and sadly says ‘yeet’” would be the point at which said guy has truly hit rock bottom. But this is Marty Moon we’re talking about. He let loose a string of on-air profanities at a teenager in a pirate outfit! He lost a bunch of money making “friendly” golf bets with a guy who looks like Ben Franklin! He’s got a long way to fall, is what I’m saying.

Gasoline Alley, 12/21/24

Oh, man, I don’t think I realized that Ida Knoe the evil talking doll left Arty the AI to die in his crashed spaceship on the surface of Mars! Unlike the children, Arty doesn’t need oxygen to live, but his batteries will eventually run out, so he’ll have days or maybe even weeks alone to contemplate his own failures and how they led to his inevitable doom. Not sure if Ida Knoe left him there because she was jealous of him or because her magical powers of teleportation won’t work on something without a soul.

Mary Worth, 12/21/24

RED ALERT, REPEAT, RED ALERT

BOWLING HUNK CHRISTMAS WEEK STORYLINE IN MARY WORTH

THIS IS NOT A DRILL

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Getting off to a slightly slow start today but here, my friends, is your comment of the week!

“I’m confused that the words on the cards are not only secular but seem to also have nothing to do with anything happening in December. ‘Hi’? ‘Greetings’? What else is in the box — ‘How’s It Going’? ‘What Up’? ‘Do You Have The Time’?” –jenna

And your extremely funny runners up!

“Mint is an aggressive plant that will take over your yard if you’re not careful. Maybe that was Mark and Cherry’s plan all along? The writing business is in worse shape than ever, so I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re being sponsored by Big Julep.” –BigTed

“The Newnited States government, in attempts to educate their most illiterate communities, have been injecting PBS style lessons into local news and radio broadcasts in far flung areas like Hootin’ Holler. While this same programming managed to boost science and math scores in many struggling urban schools, it’s never really taken root in the proud region of Hootin’ Holler, where throbbing pain in joints from old injuries are held up as most accurate predictors of changes in the weather.” –Philip

“Big Daddy Keane is not happy about being outed as these kids’ father. There was at least some plausible deniability before — he could have been their uncle, or handler of some kind.” –pugfuggly

“I feel like we’re sleeping on the background characters here. There’s the store detective, who’s been alerted that there’s a cartoonist in the building, and the social worker from Child Protective Services, who’s picked up a sweater for her husband while she’s here, but who is monitoring the little melonhead very, very carefully nonetheless. A tense game of cat-and-mouse begins!” –I’m Not Cthulhu, But I Play Him On TV

“Jared, having decided that his vast repository of mansplainable material is wasted on just one woman, is assembling a harem.” –MKay

“Presumably Dawn is going on about a dumb phone call from Jared because, while Cathy’s family takes her skiing at Christmas, Dawn’s dad ditches her and goes to Cancun by himself. Sad on so many levels.” –Twinkles the Elf

“How did you reply? I need to know because I’m desperately trying to learn the patterns of contemporary human speech, but my generative programming has only been able to use 18th century novels as a training set.” –But What Do I Know?

“It’s one thing to kill an animal on camera, but making the corpse participate in some memeable dance is taking it to another level.” –taig

“Or, ‘I assume this was made by Elon Musk — at The Boring Company.’” –Anonymous

“Not sure when Trixie started anthropomorphizing the sun as an elderly person, but it’s probably better than if she assumed it was a weakening god that needed to be fed the sacrificial blood of thousands of slaves to regain its strength.” –jroggs

“Sorry, Margaret. That’s not Santa. That’s Sam the Snowman from the 1964 beloved TV classic Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer … which is, you know … fine if you want a Burl Ives anthology record and some cigars for Christmas … which actually might be something an eighty year-old child might want as opposed to dolls or whatever Santa would bring, so nevermind … you text that letter to Sam, girl.” –Old Man Shadow

“Looking at Gertie’s expression, I think it may actually be good that her fixation is on NASCAR. She could have become a costly hypochondriac or an animal hoarder or someone who files lawsuits against all her neighbors.” –Poteet

“A squirt of Heinz on your Toll House cookie is the latest thing in elite culinary circles. Stir a spoonful of Dijon mustard into your coffee for an extra kick.” –Ukulele Ike

“Lack of aphrodisiacs in her diet or diminished libido due to oxidative stress caused by that factory in the background? You know, environmental exposure to di-2-ethylhexyl phthalate is associated with low interest in sexual activity in certain women, leading to … um, I’m sorry, I was just reading today’s Arctic Circle and assumed climate disaster was the daily punchline with this strip as well.” –Her Father, John Darling

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