Post Content

Mark Trail, 6/12/15

Oh, good news, everyone: Mark has recovered from his little getting-hit-with-a-tree incident, mostly. Though he does seem a little groggy, so maybe there’ll still be some fun with this. Amnesia, perhaps? Or maybe that was a radioactive tree, which will cause him to become Tree-Man, the man with the … proportional … powers of a tree? Whatever the case, I think we can all agree that it would be pretty hilarious if in panel two Mark said “Yeah … I’m OK!” and then just silently stood there, hand on his knee, for a full minute, letting the water drip off of him.

Judge Parker, 6/12/15

Man, Marie sure does take an unseemly interest in people’s sex lives, doesn’t she? “Yep, I’ll be gone tonight! Just completely out of your hair … out here in the guest house … in case you wanted to have any guests … like if you wanted Mark’s penis to be a ‘guest’ in your vagina … anyhoo, see you later!”

Post Content

Spider-Man, 6/11/15

I’ve been watching the new Daredevil TV show on Netflix, which I enjoy, despite the fact that Vincent D’Onofrio works to bring out Kingpin’s human side instead of going into full-on “Faster! Work faster!” mode. One thing I find mildly irritating is how coy the dialogue is about who these people are, though: they never actually call Kingpin by that name, and, even though the show takes place in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, they only refer to other superheroes obliquely. At one point a character says “maybe if I had an iron suit or a magic hammer…”; how the actor resisted winking hammily at the camera at that point is beyond me. Anyway, that’s a long way of saying that I absolutely love this name-dropping cabbie and I hope he gets his own MCU spin-off series where he just blabs about superheroes and supervillains he’s had in his cab to non-super passengers displaying varying levels of disinterest. “Dr. Doom? They call him a menace to humanity, but in my experience he’s nice guy, good tipper. Doesn’t like take the Deegan — always thinks he knows a shortcut, which never quite works out, but hey, if you’re paying, you’re the boss, is my attitude.”

The Phantom, 6/11/15

One of the slow-boiling plots in the Phantom involves the fact being the Phantom means siring a new Phantom every generation, but the current model managed to actually father twins, and also we live in the 21st century where women can be superheroes, so which of the kids is going to be the next Phantom? This could be the rationale for the Ghost Who Parents Remotely “accidentally” leaving his phone on while he takes care of business, as soon he’ll figure out if either of them is comfortable enough with a little mild extrajudicial torture to follow in his footsteps.

Post Content

Slylock Fox, 6/10/15

Slylock and Count Weirdly have a pretty adversarial relationship, which mostly consists of Slylock humiliating the Count and undermining his schemes, no matter how victimless they are. But oh, as soon as Weirdly has a time machine and Slylock decides he wants to go freak out some dinosaurs, all of the sudden they’re best pals. I’m not sure what’s sadder: that Weirdly is so lonely and hungry for Slylock’s approval that he’s willing to overlook years of abuse just to spend some quality time chrono-journeying with him, or that Slylock’s ethical code, always more focused on strict enforcement of the law than on kindness, allows him to exploit the sad Count like this.

Mark Trail, 6/10/15

As the Trail’s extralegally adopted ward, Rusty generally refers to his guardians by their first names. Thus, panel two, in which he blurts out “Dad!” at the unconscious Mark, should be emotionally affecting. Unfortunately, he’s blurting “Dad” out of that … face, with the dead black eyes, and the flesh and the tears and the lips and the gums all the same off-peach color, and NOPE NOPE NO THANK YOU NO THANK YOU AT ALL SIR

Blondie, 6/10/15

EQUAL OPPORTUNITY UNSPEAKABLE FILTH