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Archie, 4/30/07

I was going to say that coming up with a spoof of the Gap called “the Goop” was the funniest incidental gag I had yet seen in the Archie newspaper strip, but then I realized how very, very low my bar for this feature has been set and I got kind of depressed.

Either the Goop has wowed the fashion world this season with a new line of clothes made entirely out of lead, or the strain of trying to keep Riverdale’s hottest brunette and hottest blonde emotionally and sexually satisfied has sapped Archie’s man-essence and left him a feeble weakling. Either way, Dilton is rightfully horrified.

Mark Trail, 4/30/07

Some commentors seem to think that this supposed to be a response to my claims that Mark is gay; in fact, I’ve never asserted anything of the kind. Rex Morgan? Gay. Beetle and Sarge? Very gay. But Mark Trail? Mark is completely asexual. His desire for physical intimacy with other human beings regardless of gender is either entirely absent or buried so deeply by psychological trauma that he only gets aroused by peeping in on frogs and birds while they do it. Frankly, today’s strip does not disabuse me of this notion. I dare you to imagine Mark’s right hand in panel two as about to do something erotic without shuddering.

Ballard Street, 4/30/07

At first glance here, I assumed that Scooter was imitating his Wall Street heroes’ habit of celebrating business victories with a little nasally-ingested stimulation. I still think that version is funnier.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 4/30/07

I’m very excited about the potential feedback loop being set up here: Rex stalls Hugh, then Hugh says something condescending that makes him sound like a pompous jackass, which pisses Rex off and makes him all the more determined to delay him. This could go on for weeks, with each strip ending with a sitcom-style muted horn going “Wanh Wahn WANNNH”. Eventually, Rex will just be walking in place somewhere in the bowels of the garage, mime-style, while Hugh berates him.

This isn’t the first time someone’s let lose an aside like Hugh’s within earshot of Rex, though usually it’s in regard to his medical procedures. “I’m sure it’s the kidney … or maybe the liver?” “Well, which one is it man?” “Maybe it’s the spleen!” “Of all the incompetent…”

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Hey kids! I’ve frequently gotten requests to link the comments of the week to the strip they refer to, so as to provide a richer context for their snark. I’ve done so this week, at least for those that referred to strips I have on my site, and hope to do so in the future, providing it doesn’t turn into an enormous pain in the ass. Anyway, here’s this week’s to comment:

“‘Curious Conclusions’ sounds like the kind of board game Mary Worth would play on a Saturday night with a few friends, a mug of cocoa, and some good old-fashioned apple crumble. The loser, of course, would be immolated.” –Tats

And the hilarious runners-up:

“Dear Amazing Spider-Man ghost-writer and artist: You know what would make it a lot easier for me to believe that the setting is ‘night — in the shadow of the Los Angeles Coliseum’? If it were actually night-time in the picture. Or if the Coliseum cast a shadow, for that matter.” –GG

“Amazing how Liz manages to regress at an alarming rate, while simultaneously Ellie-aging in her appearance. By September, she’ll look to all the world like a 120-year-old wrinkled, bed-ridden crone, but she’ll really be, in fact, a fetus verging on embryo status. And then the abortion and euthanasia debates will really intersect!” –Mibbitmaker

“The level of detail in Slylock Fox is both astonishing and completely pointless. If the purpose of comic art is to tell a story, the story here is one of ritalin. Not enough ritalin.” –Proteus

“I love Ted bluing out in that panel. It’s like Ted is Patrick Swayze, and he’s finally walking into the light as Sally Forth, tears in her eyes, whispers ‘Ditto,’ and then drops her eyes back down into that half-lidded smirk I hate so goddamn much.” –jake!

“Note the frisson between Max Mouse and Tiffany Fox, their eyes locked in mutual fascination. (‘How does one go down a one-way street without breaking the law?’ Max asks suggestively, his meaning barely coded.)” –Old Bean

“I can’t wait until the end of this thrilling ‘bird-strike’ plot line when Mark punches out a 767.” –reader-who-posts

“Mary Worth has been at basically the same pace as long as I can remember. When I was a kid, she talked to a guy by the pool for two years.” –Yitzchok

“Margo didn’t try. There, I said it.” –Montag

“And in the department of unreasonable expectations, my leg is bigger than Cherry’s waist. She must have sold her internal organs on the black market.” –fizzy logic

“You can tell their love is unpure and evil since the little hearts above their heads are black. Which kind of goes without saying since this is Marvin, which itself is little more than a montage of the unholy and repugnant.” –Potato

“I was just looking at Jughead, and thinking about how I always think he’s going to grow up to be Dagwood. Then I thought how maybe he’s going to grow up to be the Joker. Either way, these are the best years of his life.” –Phil

“Honestly, how many people did ‘Snuffy’ Smith have to kill to earn that name?” –Harold

“That’s some smooth pillow talk [Darrin]’s got there. Apart from the fact that it’s so indirect it takes a flow chart to figure out what he means, I like the way it manages to work fraudulent medical research, obesity and heart disease into the act of telling someone she’s hot.” –Albtraum

“After reading the 4/26 Apartment 3-G, I realized I loved Margo. I love her for doing all that my id desires and all that my superego thwarts. She’s a finger-quoting, Tommie-bashing, and probably embezzling marvel, since these balloon and streamer galas suggests some money is being pocketed somewhere.” –MsChicken

“I wish the Dennis the Menace artist would put as much time into Dennis’ poor hands (typically rendered as flippers) as he does into Mr. Wilson’s ear. It’s like, of course Dennis is menacing, he’s fuckin’ part dolphin.” –RaJ

“FW: ‘Now why wouldn’t I think you’re sexy, when you look exactly like me but with long hair?’” –Squawk

“Is it possible for someone with facial hair in Mark Trail to NOT make everything sound sinister? Replacing an old, obsolete building with a new one is pretty sensible, but it reads like they’re going to toss newborn babies into jet engines.” –Citric

“400 years / 20 Phantoms = 20-year crime-fighting careers. What do the old Phantoms do during their 30-year retirement? Design pants, perhaps?” –Dean Booth

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Beetle Bailey, 4/29/07

The last four panels of this strip make up one of the saddest and most poignant little vignettes of homoerotic longing you’ll ever see. Denied their one outlet of physical contact, Beetle and Sarge take a long, wordless walk away from the base that defines their lives, through the countryside, through an enormous ice field in the middle of the city, and finally to some incredibly starry place of refuge. C’mon, guys, you’re miles away from anyone. You can at least let your hands touch.

Family Circus, 4/29/07

I am an unapologetically misanthropic bastard, but even I’m not such a sneering, above-it-all crank that I will hate on this cartoon. I will state now and for the record that I am and always have been pro-hugging. However, I do question the “silent performance” selling point of hugs that I’ve highlighted for you above. Is the fact that hugs are relatively quiet really one of their advantages over other forms of affection? Is their silence to be understood as their differentiator from loud, sloppy tongue kissing or boisterous slaps on the back? What if you and your intended hugging target are wearing raincoats, or pleather clothing, resulting in hugs that are squeaky? I’m all for hugs, but I’m just not sold on this angle, is what I’m saying.

Judge Parker, 4/29/07

Cedric is being remarkably blasé about the fact that his wife is a crazy crazy stalking lady, and whoever the word balloon on the right is coming from is way too ready to file her away under “good stalker,” but this cartoon is eight kinds of awesome for Neddy’s “Uh.. define insanely!” line. “Holy cow … I just got here” is a good runner up. “I mean, I was planning on cutting a swath through every married domestic in the Île-de-France région, but 48 hours a little fast even for me.”

Doodles by Mac and Sack, 4/29/07

I’m not going to get into the fact that this stupid damn koala (who is apparently named “Bosco” for some reason) has gotten himself tangled up in yet another larger, meaner beast’s digestive tract, or that, I wouldn’t have chosen Benedict Arnold as an archetypical liar (though I admit that his traitorous behavior probably involved a certain degree of dissimulation), or that what the Lying Lion is doing looks less like lying and more like smugly contemplating how exactly he’s going to prepare Bosco — in a nice white wine reduction sauce, perhaps — before devouring him. No, I want to point out, with disgust and disdain, the “what’s missing” panel, which I won’t even dignify with the name “puzzle.” Hmm, I wonder what’s wrong with this lion? Right number of toes … full, lustrous mane … two eyes … a tail … nope, I’m not seeing it.

Mark Trail, 4/29/07

God, first birds, now frogs. Sunday Mark Trails are a never-ending stream of filthy animal porn. I like to imagine that the formulation “a little romancing” was the end result of lengthy Pibgorn-style battle with the editors over acceptable content.