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Gil Thorp, 5/16/09

If I’ve been ignoring Gil Thorp, as I’ve been doing of late, you can pretty much just assume that it’s because it’s been pointless and boring (as opposed to its more entertaining mode, when it’s pointless and delightfully deranged). The baseball-season plot revolves around YouTube videos, and you know that any time a continuity strip takes on modern Internet culture, you’re in for a roller-coasters ride, if roller-coasters had no hills and didn’t move at all.

Making things worse is the choice of Bill Hawkins as this spring’s protagonist. Bill is a quiet, hard-working type who has managed to woo the Amazonian Molly despite his complete lack of a personality or sense of humor. We are left to wonder just what sort of rowdiness the guys were getting up to down there. Drugs? Orgy? Drug-fueled orgy? Thanks to Bill’s goody two-shoeism, we’ll never know.

(Speaking of Gil Thorp and pointless Internet culture, I keep meaning to mention that Marty Moon has a Twitter account, featuring important updates like “I’ve been growing my beard for charity. Was I supposed to tell anyone about it first?”)

Archie, 5/16/09

Ignore for the moment the joke in today’s strip (easy enough to do, right?) and take a look at that terrifying Archie-resembling ventriloquist’s dummy in the foreground of the first panel. What could its meaning or significance be? Where does one even go to get such a thing made, and how would notorious deadbeat Jughead pay for what must be a custom job? Does Jughead spend the nights on which Archie is out on a date with Betty and/or Veronica alone in his filthy room, acting out the part of his best friend through the magic of ventriloquism? It’s all so unsettling that I almost didn’t notice that Jughead also appears to have a copy of a magazine with his own face on the cover, presumably an Oprah-esque lifestyle publication for people who want to be more like Jughead.

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Marvin, 5/15/09

One of Marvin’s favorite time-padding techniques/crimes against humanity involves taking a joke that, at first, seems to be not particularly funny, and then repeating it every day for a week until you literally want to tear your own eyes out of your head just so you can be sure that you’ll never see Marvin again. The current running joke (which at least features less recycled art than Belly Laffs did) is that Marvin is in some kind of dream sequence in which all of his family members appear as stick figures, and utter stilted sentences that contain the word “stick” as the punchline-like conclusion. This was bad enough — in fact, my description doesn’t even do how bad enough it was justice — except that the stick figures Marvin encountered became less and less stick figure-esque over the course of the week until we got to Friday’s strip, in which his grandfather, though more poorly drawn than usual, exhibits exactly zero stick figure-like characteristics. At least he still says the word “stick,” though! ‘Cause that’s the payoff. See how they put it in italics there? Ha ha! Stick!

Crankshaft, 5/15/09

So Pam was terribly anxious that her daughter might be streaking at her graduation, until she remembered that she was in the buff at her own graduation, back in the day, which has caused a sudden onset of smugness, presumably at her own daring and/or hotness. Her husband is profoundly aroused by the thought, if by “profoundly aroused” we mean “gripped by panic and bordering on a major cardiac event,” and since this is the Funky Winkerbean universe, that is exactly what we mean by “profoundly aroused.”

Mark Trail, 5/15/09

Yesterday, Andy categorically refused to do anything NOW on Mark’s cue, so it appears that today Mark has simply hurled the enormous St. Bernard at his enemy. The real question, though, is what exactly went on between Andy and the non-bald baddie between the two panels that left both evil-doers looking so shaken and depressed.

Judge Parker, 5/15/09

“We’re also delighted that you’re holding your head at that angle so our readers can get a good look at your fabulous mullet! Market research has shown that mullets are one of the most popular things to appear in this strip, right behind tits.”

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Mark Trail, 5/14/09

SURPRISE, everyone! It’s Mark Trail Plotline Payoff Day! Of course, the latest outbreak of violence in Mark Trail comes as a SURPRISE! to no one, as it’s how every single Mark Trail plot is resolved. But it is noteworthy that Mark is leading not with a fist to the jaw, but with with a shoulder to the groin. Is it possible that he’s actually become bored with punching people? Does he need to mix it up by causing pain to sideburned ne’er-do-wells with different parts of his body? Is that the only way he can keep himself interested in his work, and keep that magical feeling of how SURPRISingly wonderful life can be?

Something doesn’t seem quite right as Mark comes in low on Blueshirt McMoron. You’ll notice that, from the viewer’s perspective, Mark’s head is on our side of the baddie’s torso, but his elbows are between the dude’s various limbs, and he doesn’t seem to be leaning forward enough for that to be the case. It’s like some sort of optical illusion. Or, I guess, it’s like Mark is actually a pre-existing 2-D drawing that was dropped into the space and cropped somewhat inexpertly.

Also of note in this ruckus is the fact that Mark is shouting “NOW, ANDY!” after which Andy appears to do exactly nothing. Maybe he’s busy off-panel dragging Rusty away to safety, or taking the opportunity to take care of annoying pup Sassy by eating him.

Spider-Man, 5/14/09

I know that “continuity strips” (as they’re called in the biz) have to keep hammering even the basic elements of their plotlines home because even their most dedicated fans skip two days out of every five, but I think Peter’s last-panel thought balloon is a little much. “Hi, newspaper readers! Just wanted to let you know, in case you weren’t clued in by the title of the strip, that this feature isn’t just about some self-satisfied douchebag visiting his aunt in the hospital! It also showcases guys in tight spandex battling each other in dramatic lighting!”

I also think that the thought-balloon is a little self-serving. I don’t recall anything that exciting happening during their battle; I mostly remember the sandwich-eating.

Mary Worth, 5/14/09

Oh my God, the message of this Mary Worth plot really is going to be “Ladies are incapable of rational judgement and should have their potential romantic partners screened for them by their father, even when said ladies are medical professionals in their thirties, and even when said fathers think that Mary Worth makes a good romantic partner.”