Admonishing Saturday
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Mary Worth, 7/30/22
It honestly hasn’t been the greatest week for the comics this week, but I absolutely started hooting and hollering when Mary, bristiling in boldfaced type, said that “No, Jared, I don’t know how it feels to be disrespected.” You’re (relatively) new here, Jared, so you maybe you don’t know this, but when some sort of disrespect happens in a relationship involving Mary Worth, that disrespect only goes in one direction: away from Mary and towards the other person. Cruising a guy at his mother’s funeral or having a vacaton fling with a Broadway star, even though you’re already in a relationship: that’s something Mary did to her boyfriend, not something that was done to her. Never something that was done to her. One man — one man — dared to act disrespectful to Mary, romantically, and we all know how he ended up (dead). So you need to take a step back, Jared, Mary is not like you!
Rex Morgan, M.D., 7/30/22
“You’re an American, Tildy! You’re going to go into that hospital and die and then go bankrupt, just like everybody else.”
146 replies to “Admonishing Saturday”
MW. “Endearing Quirks, the Next Generation.”
“She lied to me, she ignored me, she didn’t respect me.”
“I know Dawn wouldn’t want to hurt you intentionally.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because I do that to Jeff all the time. It’s just more convenient.”
G%T: For breakfast, the boys are having the McCormick Inn’s famous green eggs and ham.
G%T: “How’re Mimi and the kids?”
“Well, I’m living in this hotel. That should give you some idea.”
MW-“Dawn, is her father’s daughter. You must take her for all her faults.”
MW-“No, Jared, I don’t.” Of course not. Mary is used to lying to people, ignoring them, and not respecting them.
JP-“In my new spinoff comic starting Monday!”
FC-Terry being Billy’s prison pen pal.
Spiderman-“You’re friendly neighborhood Spider-Man!” Who just tripped over a root.
CS: “Angie, look at this! Somebody scribbled ‘Crankshaft’s an asshole’ on our certificate!”
“Yeah, that was me.”
RMMD: “You’re going to die and go bankrupt! But not necessarily in that order!”
MW: Isn’t it amusing when someone calls immature, self-centered entitlement, “self-respect?”
9CL: OK, now I’ve officially gotten the willies.
Mary Worth:
Mary: “If she acted carelessly with you, I’m sorry.”
Jared: “Wait, why are you sorry? You didn’t do anything.”
Mary: “This is Santa Royale, junior — I’m responsible for everything that happens here.”
Jared: “Really? Then would you stop me from being such a jerk all the time?”
Mary: “Nope, I’m enjoying it too much. Sorry!”
Rex Morgan: For Rex, the “family discount” is if you owe him your first-born (but not your second-born).
Blondie: Oh no, it’s Dagwood in shorts! Say, wait a minute… they almost create an illusion that his legs are normal. Luckily, the fact that he’s wearing them with a belt and tucked-in T-shirt lets us remember what a freak this dude is.
Family Circus: Once again, Billy is complaining about his terrible privilege, but doesn’t mind Mommy doing menial labor for him all day long. Meanwhile, the way she’s squeezing that pillow lets us know what she’s imagining doing to his head. What a cute family!
Dennis the Menace: Dennis will appreciate those worms when he’s grown up, and spending every night in a bar getting blitzed on mezcal.
Mary Worth : how it started : “I don’t want my break-up with Dawn to be the end of our relationship! She’s too much of a dear friend to me for us to never see each other again!”
how it’s going : “Dawn was so disrepectful in the way she treated me, I *HAD* to break up with her! I *HAD* to sever all ties with her, because if I had kept up that relationship it would mean I have no respect for myself!”
…If it’s what Mary is intentionally trying to do (convince Jared he was right to break up, and that he doesn’t actually need to reconcile/be on good terms with Dawn to move on), well, it’s impressive she managed to get that turnaround in what, two sentences?
*******
Pluggers : also don’t know how to dress a table, and often end up eating with two identical butterknives and no spoons/forks.
********
Six Chix : if this really was Netflix subtitling, there would be blatant differences between what is spoken and what the subtitles say, possibly due to the subtitles being based on a different translation than the audio track.
MW: Mary has successfully planted the seed in Jared’s subconscious; “She didn’t mean to hurt me.”
GT: Mimi refuses to tell Gil the name of her new boyfriend but he grows suspicious when his kids start referring to him as; “Coach &%$@head!”
FC: Billy blathers on as Thel tries to shake Jeffy out of his sack.
DtM: Henry smiles coyly at the thought of feeding Dennis a handful of worms.
MW: I see that the Pigeon of Platitudinous Pomposity has been released to celebrate Mary on the occasion of her first sacramental “Dispensing of Advice” to Jared. Very moving.
MW: Mary didn’t say she had never been disrespected, she said she doesn’t know how that feels. “No I don’t know how that feels. Your feelings will be the end of you, Mof Jared.”
MW: The answer to your question, Jared,; “Do I know how it feels to be disrespected by Dawn” is Is Dawn still breathing?
RMMD: PHFFFT! As far as death rattles go, needs work.
RMMD: Rex and June don’t do family discounts for medical care, no exceptions. The twins have already racked up a staggering debt between their various boo-boos and ouchies. And poor little Sarah? Her grandchildren’s grandchildren will still be paying off what she owes long after she’s dead.
MW: “Dawn would never hurt you intentionally, Jared. Sure, she intentionally made you feel like a lesser man by stringing you along while she was still sleeping with hunky Hugo, and she intentionally kept doing this by openly ogling other men while she was dating you even though you told her how awful it made you feel, and she intentionally lied to you about being too innocently busy to have dinner with you while she was actually going dancing with other men even though she knows how uncomfortable you are with that, and she intentionally cut off all contact with you when you told her you wanted decency and honesty or you’d have to break up with her and she knows it’s eating you up inside and she’s intentionally leaving you stuck with that agonizing lack of closure. But intentionally hurting you? Nah.”*
GT: Hang on, did Gil accept Luke’s bizarre wager or not? He just kind of stormed off without answering. And how old is Emmett Tays, anyway? Is he supposed to be a past athlete of Gil’s from 10-15 years ago, or was he part of some retconned team from last year that went to the state championships rather than petering out and finishing second or third in the conference under Neal Rubin’s watch? Are Emmett’s parents still beating the shit out of him? Call me a softy, but that seems just a tiny bit more important than Gil’s trophy collection.
9CL: Fanservice is enduringly controversial topic in many regards, but I think we can mostly agree that the hypothetical people who were clamoring for “Amos in thighhigh boots” are on the very, very wrong side of history.
*Just so no one gets the wrong idea: Jared is still terrible and not at all innocent himself in these proceedings. (This refusal to just let Dawn have her space after dumping her is unforgivably pathetic and manipulative.) But my goodness, Mary is just so full of shit.
JP: It figures. The Americanized version of Dr. Who’s weeping Angel would be long on looks and short on substance.
MW: I think Jared takes the prize for Least-Earned Self-Respect.
FC: Billy’s height as shown relative to the bed is that of a normal 18 month old child, and with him being the tallest of the melon heads, Thel gives them a treat and empties out the dresser drawers to let them sleep there one atop the other in lieu of bunkbeds.
June, when you point a finger, three fingers point back at you! And one points to someone standing over to the side. Never thought of that before.
Panel 2 of RMMD is a screenshot from an exciting new videogame genre, the first person scolder.
SlyF – Love Is . . . Tentacle sex on a log under the sea.
JP. Meanwhile, Sam and Sophie are finishing up another game of “help me, stepdad, my head’s stuck in this washing machine.”
MW – A second man acted disrespectful to her too. We don’t know that he ended up dead, but he never answered his cell phone again.
@richardf8: Exactly!!!
MW: Is “WTH” supposed to be “WITH” or “WHAT THE HELL”?
Honestly Mary is turning into the biggest jerk of all of them
9CL – Most people would remove their pants before putting on thigh-high boots, but Amos isn’t most people, praise Cthulhu.
Maybe this is why Amos always wears those baggy slacks, they make this maneuver more possible?
The best thing that can be said is that at least the twins were outside playing in traffic the whole time and had no part in this tawdry display. They will have to read about daddy’s vinyl fetish in the next series of “Dear Edda’s Children” circulars that Amos issues.
MW: “Jared, dear, stop being a little bitch.”
MW: I despise Mary.
9CL: Today’s strip was strange. It had absurdity that I found amusing, and Edda actually complimented Amos.
Luann: Don’t worry, Tiffany. All he wants is his cut of the action.
Dustin: Not even DustinDad can drink and eat enough at an event to recoup $300.
FC: “Oh, Billy, you know you’re not supposed to spend time with the ‘poors.’ You might catch something.”
CS: The scribbler was Mitch, and the scribbling was a cry for help. Unfortunately, it’s illegible.
FW: It’s funny, because Batiuk is a crappy writer!
Jared Not the Idiot Son-in-Law saying he has self-respect reminds me of the time George Costanza claimed artistic integrity as a motive, to which Jerry rebutted, “You’re not artistic. And you have no integrity.”
Marvin – I originally interpreted “one-butt kitchen” to mean the house had only one bathroom off the kitchen. It just seemed to fit for a Marvin cartoon.
Meanwhile, let’s welcome new mudge Wilbur “Bravo” McGuire, reported to be the dad of a noted major leaguer:
MLB Reese McGuire Masturbation Bust Captured on Video
Aldo Kelrast, Hero and Martyr.
MW: Apparently there are some things that even Jared has too much respect for. Who knew?
Or perhaps “if Dawn wants to hurt you, she’ll invite you on a cruise. Apple, tree, etc.”
Mary Worth: They called Seinfeld “A show about nothing” so what does that make this comic? At least Seinfeld had plots, and people with personalities. Wow Mary Worth, you managed to “out-nothing” Seinfeld!
MW: I, for one, would like to give Jared a shiny gold star. He has too much self respect to date Dawn, but not enough self respect to not try to explain his actions to Mary.
Mary Worth: Any day we get to revisit Aldo Kelrast going over the edge in his…Mercedes-Benz Taurus? is a good day.
People who disrespected Mary (aside from Aldo)
-Ted Miller
-Shovey McShovington
-Wilbur (When he wanted to “surprise” them with him being alive)
Well, it’s a small list but it’s something.
Also Mary Worth: “Do you know how that feels, Mary?” “Do I know what it feels like to be a sentient blob of mayonnaise? I do not. Ask Wilbur, he’ll have some insight.”
So Broom Hilda’s desperately running to a toilet for a shit?
@pastordan:
1989 Dodge Aries. The “K” in K-car is for Kelrast; this is widely known.
Rex Morgan, gave me flashbacks towards “Night in the Woods” where Bea’s mother had cancer, and her father went nearly bankrupt to pay for treatment, but she died anyway. Then Bea was forced to work in her father’s crappy family-owned hardware store just to make ends meet, abandoning her dreams of going to college and making something of her life.
Then I remembered that Night in the Woods is incredibly fucking depressing.
Thanks Rex Morgan…
@Uncle Lumpy: In the east, he is revered as Holy Aldo Kelrast, Hieromariastalker. The troparian in his honor is really quite lovely:
(In answer to your next question, yes, I am going to hell for this.)
MW: “Of course I don’t know what it means. Everyone here knows that if they dare cross me, they’ll be begging to escape this mortal coil. You’re probably wishing that too, aren’t you? It’s a normal feeling, dear.”
RMMD: Without her apathetic husband and her daughter being Satan itself, June is able to flaunt her flimsy authority toward a pre-dementia ridden old woman. Don’t pity Tildy, though; she fully deserves it.
@Uncle Lumpy: Ah, right. Good picture of a K-Car, by the way: in its natural habitat by the side of the road.
MW – Is Mary apologizing for Dawn acting carelessly? What’s she going to do, take her back to the Stepford Lab and reprogram her to be a proper girlfriend?
MW – In addition to Aldo Captain Kangaroo, that weirdo “Mary Muffin” guy disrespected Mary. He’s probably buried on the grounds of Charterstone somewhere.
love is… What the hell kind of sailing rig is that? Oh, got it. love is… when he names his junk after you.
RM: The doctor gives June the side eye. “The old broad is pretty sick, and June is going full Nurse Ratched on her. Remind me to never go here if something ever happens to me. You don’t even get your own hospital gown.”
MARY WORTH: Hahahaha, Mary is emagig in some straight Alexis Colby levels of passive-aggressive combat right there!
Jared: “She didn’t respect me. Do you know how that feels?”
Mary (eyes narrowing): “Speak for yourself, loser! My name is Mary Worth, bitch! Everyone respects me and don’t you forget it!”
MARY WORTH (2): And the kicker at the end where Jared says that he has “too much self-respect” (snicker) to put up with such callous behavior? That utter lack of self-awareness is just a masterclass in comedic timing and ironic juxtaposition! Pure comedy gold right there.
MARY WORTH (3): Jared: “I have too much self-respect to put up with that! So anyway Mary, can you please make the girl I just said treated me like total garbage like me again?”
Mary’s already starting the gaslighting early on Jared. Like it’s stated, Jared is indeed quite loathsome in his short time here from his uncomfortable need to be a doormat to blindly following the path of his genitals when Jess (who hasn’t heard of the term “opposite gender friends” or “don’t just kiss people out of nowhere”) came along. But Dawn’s been around for several decades and in that time, she’s literally gone through negative character development. For decades she’s been a college sophomore majoring in art (because Dawn and Toby share a brain dead braincell) but has made no effort to do anything but mooch off her dad, party, go out with friends, and have strings of failed relationships. As the artists have switched, so has her attitude. She used to be rather pathetic and unintelligent with a penchant for moping but now she’s angry, entitled, and still as unintelligent as ever. Essentially, she’s become the co-ed genderbent version of her father.
@pastordan:
The little curls of rust at the panel margins is what sells it.
Re: Aldo—show me the icon!
FW – Yeah, it’s called writing.
In the first panel, Flash’s head is around half the size of the rest of his body. I guess he wasn’t the model for the Vitruvian Man.
Breaking Cat News – No, it’s just another word for nothing left to lose.
JP – Abbey is auditioning for the remake of the Iron Eyes Cody pollution ad.
Vintage A3G – Well, idiot Bradley just got Tommie fired. I hope.
MW – “Dawn wouldn’t want to hurt you intentionally.” No, she thoughtlessly did whatever she wanted and didn’t give a flying fuck about how you would feel. She’s a great example of maturity and thoughtfulness. And you, Jared, were controlling and entitled. But I’m sure that everything will be fine after I throw a few platitudes out there.
Rex Morgan – Tildy is a cantankerous, inconsiderate prima donna who expects other people to accommodate her regardless of how much it inconveniences them. These are not endearing quirks. She’s an annoying pain in the ass. Second opinion: she’s ugly, too.
MW: “I have too much self-respect to put up with that!” said the man who lives in squalor despite having a well-paying RN job and no family or dependents other than his cat.
RMMD: “If we give you a discount, Tildy, we have to give everyone else a discount, and that’s socialism! Do you want socialism, Tildy? Of course you don’t!”
REX MORGAN M.D.: June: “That bitch, Mary Worth, better watch out! Because from now on, I’m Queen of the Withering Scold!”
C’shaft: “You mean you have OTHER customers in this restaurant? What are we giving you that generous seventy-five cent tip for?”
HotC: Are you so sure she’ll be suspended for grifting less fortunate students? There are school boards in my area who would give her a “Young Entrepreneur” award for that.
JP: “Strangely, though, I can imagine not not being with Sam.”
Pluggers are really bad at basic table skills.
JUDGE PARKER: Abby: “….mostly because the quaaludes are kicking in, as you can see by my blank unmoving expression.”
JUDGE PARKER (2): Like if you haven’t been paying attention to the story, you’d think this was a story about Neddy practicing her ventriloquism on a beautician’s dummy-head for some reason.
FUNKY WINKERBEAN: Phew, good thing there is a art exhibit (with a basic copied-from-Wikipedia bio attached to it) so the most famous comic creators in this universe can get some recognition and attention. (Of course, their own creator got Flash’s name wrong yesterday AND today, so I guess they really DO need the extra attention.)
Which is why it’s featured in a exhibit celebrating the visual arts…wait something’s not right here. (Like was Batiuk so anxious to have Flash give smoldering bedroom eyes to his …”partner” that he forgot basic information about his own character?)
Zits: Pee brain.
DT: In panel one, The Mysta Fountain is in a classic feminine pose a la the Myrna Loy statue in Hollywood (scroll down for full views). But what the hell is going on with the legs in panel two? Is it squatting on a lily pad like a bullfrog?
MW: “I have too much self-respect to put up with that!”
“Really? You? Huh. I’d never have guessed.”
RMMD: June looks like she’s about to rip out Tildy’s heart and show it to her before she dies.
I’m astonished that Judge Parker focuses on “who said I burned down the B&B” to the complete exclusion of “who burned down the B&B.”
RMMD: “What’s this ‘family discount’ horseshit? I expected you to treat me for free.”
MW: “I have too much self-respect to put up with whatever bullshit you’re about to try to sell me about Dawn’s endearing quirks.”
Judge Parker: They have the closeup on the wrong part of Abbey.
@MKay: 9CL: OK, now I’ve officially gotten the willies.
By this, you mean your willie is aroused, at the sight of Amos wearing…?
Dennis the Menace: That’s why we gut fish before we eat them. But for you, Dennis, we’ll make an exception.
Mary Worth: The only reason Dawn was dating Jared is that she didn’t think she needed to give blow jobs to keep him around. Now that he’s dumped her for being careless (if that’s a catchall term that includes lying), she’ll go back to dating men who are out of her league.
RMMD – The poster will soon be hanging up in hospitals everywhere: June Morgan wants YOU (to get the hell out of her Emergency Room).
Crankshaft: Don’t worry Ed. After you guys have been farting in the cushions all morning, we can’t get anybody besides Marvin to sit in this booth.
@taig: Dustin: Not even DustinDad can drink and eat enough at an event to recoup $300.
Then DustinDad needs to be asking to learn the nuances of the word “fundraiser”, not “gala.”
@Sequitur: Old man eggfarts. Those cushions will need to be burned, perhaps nuked from orbit.
MW: I’m crying…not from pity at poor neglected JarJar but from the lachrymator compounds released by the peeling layers of this onion – the deeper we slice the more intense the tears flow…tears of revulsion as we now see Jared’s true self emerge. And none of this bodes well for poor Jess. She exists only as a foil for poor neglected JarJar, to give his self-esteem a huge boost.
And Jared, you’d better learn now that Mary will swat down every flimsy excuse you give for why you broke up with Dawn. Poor, misunderstood Dawn.
MW – Disrespect Mary! Have you ever heard the old expression, Flying with Aldo….
RMMD – Tildy has sprung a leak….
Adios Amigos, DJ.
MW – Even the birds are trying to get away from Jared.
@Hibbleton: #18
This has always bothered me a little about FC…how ridiculously shrunken the children are relative to their supposed ages. Billy, Jeffy and Dolly have the stature of 3 or 4 year olds, and I’m pretty sure they’re a few years older than that. PJ is the only one seemingly drawn to scale.
@pastordan: And cursed is the fruit of his looms, Jared….
@76 Daisy:
According to canon, Billy is seven, Dolly is five and Jeffy is three.
@Bravo McGuire: Why do birds suddenly disappear, every time time, he is near; Just like she, they loath to be, close to him….
Jared, you didn’t have too much self-respect to date a Weston, so you damned well take what you get. If you think things are bad now, wait until she’s gained weight and lost her hair.
Luann: This is not a video call, so Tiffany will have to imagine the angry face Greg Evans has attempted to put on her father.
Sheesh, Jared, you’re allowed to break up with Dawn if you want to. And she doesn’t have to keep in touch with you if she doesn’t want. You don’t owe her friends an explanation. And they sure as hell don’t owe you one.
@The Rambling Otter: #38
To Mary, “the past exists only as you remember it.” She has evidently suppressed those unpleasant memories of being disrespected/deceived/stalked/assaulted. Her mental powers are truly formidable.
@Sequitur: If anyone is worthy as cannon fodder, it’s the Keane wunderkindt….
@Uncle Lumpy: isn’t that the inscription on the Kelrast Kross?
Crankfeld : The comic about nothing.
Popeye: pretty long winded way to just introduce Cher singing, “Gypsies,Tramps,and Thieves”, if you ask me.
MW: This is the kind of story that we’ve all had forced on our ears at one time or another. The recommended response is to grab your tray and say, “Good luck with all that.” Needless to say, that’s not the way Mary will go.
RMMD: Doesn’t she mean “There wouldn’t be a family discount” if she or Rex had treated Tildy? Like, I’ve always thought English was June’s first language, but maybe not.
@Ukulele Ike: Old Man Eggfarts.
Oh yeah. Blues singer from the 1930s. Very influential percussion style, that staged a comeback in the 70s when beatboxing became a thing
@Dr. Larry Erhardt: “ Luann: This is not a video call, so Tiffany will have to imagine the angry face Greg Evans has attempted to put on her father.”
I liked it better in the old days when he didn’t even have a face. Then, in typical “Luann” fashion, one day he suddenly had one and there was no payoff whatsoever from the months of drawing him while he is reading a menu, or sitting in the shade of a giant fern.
MW:
Karen stormed through the door and into the studio, her eyes aflame as she tossed the comics page onto the coffee table in front of June. “What the hell does this mean, June? Did you do this on PURPOSE?”
June had just taken a hit and eyed Karen as she held her breath, then released it in a puff of smoke as she replied, “Not sure what you’re talking about, Kar. You looked stressed. Want a hit?”
“No. I. Do. Not. Want. A. Hit.” Karen stood with arms akimbo and glared at June. “Are you TRYING to get Mary Worth dropped from the syndicate? Because if you’re not, you’re doing a damn fine job of it, in spite of your lack of effort!”
“Again, Karen,” June replied patiently, “not sure what you’re talking about. What’s wrong now?”
“W.T.H.”
“W.T.H.” June took another hit, then quenched the burning joint and set it aside as she exhaled. “W.T.H. Can you be more specific than that?”
“You lettered the word balloon with WTH instead of the word “WITH” which is what I intended and which I’m pretty sure you knew when you did it.” Karen flung her arms wide. “How many times do I have to tell you, the readers catch this stuff? You should read some of the comments they make on those websites. They’re always looking for mistakes, almost as if they’re OUT to get us. It didn’t take long for this one to get noticed today, believe me.”
The phone rang on the table next to the sofa, and Karen waited for June to pick it up, but June was only watching it, smiling broadly as it continued to ring. Karen stalked over and yanked it off the table, holding the phone to her ear using just the four fingers on her right hand. “Hello…yes, this is Karen. What?…No, no I wasn’t aware….” she shot June a warning look. “Are you sure it wasn’t a printer’s error?…Well, I’m at a loss to explain–no, no, we’ll be sure it never happens again. Yes, I know it’s not the first time something like this has happened. No, I’m not questioning–well of course she would never use that kind of language…! Yes, yes, I realize Mary is supposed to be a model of decorum and–WHAT?? No, you can’t! You just–no, believe me, that would be the very WORST thing you could do!…You can’t be serious! This isn’t that kind of strip! NO, PLEASE! PLEASE! You’ll RUIN it! You’re wrong, the two are nothing LIKE each other….What? Well, there’s Mister Solo, and Libby, those are both cats…and then there’s Pierre the dog…and there are some fish. Yes. Goldfish, two of them named Willa and Stellan, and then some koi. Well, I think they’re koi. We’ve never said so but I think that’s the general assumption. Oh, and today’s strip featured two pigeons. We sometimes put pigeons in to add movement to the–why do you need to know about the animals? …You have got to be kidding me. NO. There is no WAY. Listen, that trainwreck already ruined–it won’t WORK with this strip, I’m telling you! Not the artwork, and definitely not the attitude. This is MARY WORTH we’re talking about….No, you listen to ME!! You can’t put a sweet young hip thing in place of–but you’ll lose the whole premise of the strip, don’t you understand? The wisdom flows because she is older and has experienced life! If you change THAT, the whole house of cards–hello? HELLO?” Karen’s four fingers carried the phone back to the table where she placed it slowly and deliberately.
June watched as Karen sat down heavily on the sofa next to her. “Wow, Kar. What was THAT about? Sounded pretty heavy.”
“The syndicate is dropping us.”
“You’re shitting me!” June stared, aghast. “All because of WTH?”
“No, it was more than that. I think that just gave them an excuse they were already looking for.” Karen picked up the remains of the joint and lit it.
“What do you mean?” June felt suddenly straight.
“They’re changing the concept entirely. They think the characters and writing and the artwork are getting too stodgy.”
“STODGY??!! Who even TALKS like that??” June took the joint from Karen and took a deep draw. “So what do they want us to do with it now?” forcing the question as she held her breath.
“Nothing. They’re making it a companion strip, linking it up to another one and giving the whole enchilada to the other artist. Starting next month, they’re changing its name to Mary TRAIL.”
“But what about all the work we’ve done? What about the characters we’ve developed, and their stories, and everything they’re in the middle of? Readers will want things to be resolved! You just can’t leave everything hanging!” June tried to think what would become of Jared, the Adonis she had always knew she had been born to draw.
“They already have that figured out. This is something they must have been thinking about for a while. Mary is going to get out of the condo management gig and move to Georgia, and Toby and Ian are going to follow and set up housekeeping in a cabin in the woods, and Wilbur is going to join Mark Trail on the “Woods and Wildlife” staff with a column called “How to Eat Like an Animal.”
June tried to wrap her head around the concept. “Okay. Okay. But what about Jared?”
“Jared is going to help them all move to Georgia, break up with Dawn AND Jess, and start hiking the Appalachian Trail to get his head straight.”
“Well, what about the cats, and the dog, and the fish? That woman CAN’T DRAW ANIMALS! You KNOW that, Karen.”
“Apparently, they know that, too. And they can’t afford to carry Sid’s expensive contracts if the things aren’t even going to be featured. So all of the animals are being put down. So to speak.” Karen fought back tears.
Stunned, June opened her mouth to say something, thought better of it, then tried again. “Karen. You don’t mean they’re going to euthanize our animal characters in the new strip…?”
“No. Worse than that. They’re going to make them HUMAN characters to replace some of our people who won’t transition over. They’re dropping Dr. Jeff Cory, Carlos Alora, Estelle, Iris–I couldn’t listen any more. It’s all over, June.”
The two women looked around the studio, all their in-progress artwork and writing now just the detritus of a shattered dream.
“What. The. Hell.”
@32 Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: on Marvin: Scratchy Scrotum reads Marvin so I don’t have to…and I wish he wouldn’t!
Curtis: It’s like the Peanuts strips where Violet talks about her dad, if the other characters bought it instead of cutting her down with lines like “My dad goes to PTA meetings.”
FC: “Terry’s lucky. He doesn’t have a framed picture of a clown staring down at him when he’s trying to sleep!”
FW: In a very special tribute to Stan Lee, Batty pays homage to the times Stan refered to “Bob Banner” and “Peter Palmer”.
HtH: Did … did Hägar just raid his own parents’ house?
JP: Maybe the issue here is that Abbey just isn’t very good at imagining things?
C-Shaft: “He’s kidding, right? He doesn’t actually expect us to keep this stupid booth clear seven days a week. Please tell me this is a gag.”
DT: Looks like something Hef would have installed in the Playboy mansion, except Mysta (obviously) wouldn’t be wearing a suit and (hopefully) would have an actual nose instead of holes in her face.
FW: Show off what, exactly, Durwood?
JP: While the repeated Botox injections have largely frozen the rest of Abbey’s face, the tear ducts still work, sort of.
6C: Okay, I laughed.
SFx: Not trying to yuck your yum if watching cephalopods go at it is your thing, but when octopi have procreative sex it puts a very short timer on the remainder of their lives.
RMMD: has Tildy been told about losing her driver’s license yet?
@Charterstoned: Bravo! I’m thankful that I wasn’t drinking my tea while I read that, because I would have ruined my Kindle.
Jared hiking the Appalachian Trail raises a question: what is his Trail name? Candy Striper? Respect? Storm Trooper of Love?
I’m really sure that when he gets to a shelter to spend the night, any hikers already there will suddenly remember an important appointment and leave.
@Sequitur: #78
Thanks!
@59 Sequitur: Jeremy, like Hank Hill, must have a narrow urethra.
Marvin: Looking at how tiny Marvin is to the adults, are we sure he’s human and not just a massively deformed chihuahua? Why aren’t they kicking him around like a soccer ball? A smelly shit-filled soccer ball. Wait, I think I just answered my own question.
“All right, Jared, fine, I’ll buy that you guys broke up because Dawn went dancing once without you and not because you’re a doe-eyed prick who preys on vulnerable women, but ‘self respect?’ That is just a bridge too far.”
@Anonymous: – this was Manjack, by the way, I have too much self-respect to not sign my comment
@Baja Gaijin: #92 I hope you didn’t take a close look at today’s Family Circus…ye gods!
Mary Worth to Jarred, translated. “Kindly shut the fuck up and stop talking about this. You and your problems bore me, child.”
@97 Daisy:
De nada.
@102 Daisy:
Why? What’s wrong with today’s Family Cir… (looks over the bed by the FALCONS pennant) Oh! Heh, heh, heh.
@102 Daisy: Billy is rather shrimpy for his age, true, though not as rotund as Marvin. He might be eminently kickable.
“Mary Worth”: Besides the late great Aldo, wasn’t Mary also disrespected by that guy she went on a date with who told her he didn’t like seafood and therefore didn’t want to go to the Bum Boat with her? And she was so insulted, she conjured up a floating head of Jeff because he did like seafood.
Note: telling someone you don’t enjoy seafood when they pester you to go to a seafood restaurant is really not disrespecting them at all, but no one is allowed to disagree with Mary Worth, so in that case it was.
FC: Your comments led me to further examine the artwork today. And now I’m wondering why that radio(?) is balanced on the headboard of Billy’s bed. Would it have been too much trouble to add a nightstand between the beds?
@Calvin’s Cardboard Box: Or blocked by his own speech bubble.
@Dennis Jimenez:
Why do birds suddenly disappear, every time time, he is near; Just like she, they loath to be, close to him….
It’s either “they loathe” or “they are loath.”
CS – “They say I can’t go to the wedding because I’m a flight risk. Flight risk!! I’ve been farting into the same seat cushion for seven months now!! I’ve got the federal marshals so far up my ass, I can smell bryl-cream!!”
– Corrado “Crankshaft” Soprano aka Uncle June.
@Your Friendly, Helpful, Nonpedantic Grammar (Velvet) Hammer: It’s either “they loathe” or “they are loath.”
Your a idot.
“Rex Morgan”: Oh no! Could this be the end of the riveting “Don’t tell Andrzej!” “We have to tell Andrzej!” “I don’t want you to tell Andrzej!” “We are going to tell Andrzej!” “I don’t want anyone to tell Andrzej!” “I’ve got to tell Andrzej!” storyline? Gee, I’ve been on the edge of my seat, how sad it could all be over. What on earth will Andrzej do when he is told Tildy went to the hospital and crashed the car??? (Probably shrug it off.)
@Alison: “Don’t tell Andrzej!” is the new “Where’s Rocky?”
@114 I speak Jive:
Or, “Dogs are good.”
“Andrzej said Abbey burned down the B&B!”
@Charterstoned:
Bravo!
Of course that scenario would be an absolute horror. I have this nasty feeling that I’ll be dreaming nightmares about Mary Trail tonight.
Butchere’s some food for thought: what if Jules fell out of favour with KV and they instead handed over Mark Trail to Karen Moy? How disgusting would that be?
@Oversized Garden Ornament:
KC, not KV, and scratch that intrusive ”c” in ”But here”. iPhone is not my friend. iPhone wants me to garble my comments. iPhone doesn’t like my trash-talking Mark Trail.
@I speak Jive: Jared hiking the Appalachian Trail raises a question: what is his Trail name?
Solo Hand?
@Baja Gaijin: Baja reads Marvin so I don’t have to.
And remember, tomorrow is your turn in the box to check up on the Trufans.
Re: Your Friendly, Helpful, Nonpedantic Grammar (Velvet) Hammer
I hope you also noted June Morgan‘s use of disappoint as an intransitive verb. I hate that.
@117 Oversized Garden Ornament:
Jared: “She lied about where she was.. She ignored me when we were together… She didn’t respect me! Do you know that that feels?”
Mary Trail: “No, Jared, I don’t. But do you know how the Fists-O-Justice feel? Because you’re about to find out!“
Marmaduke-When you thought it was safe to go back into the pool.
S4th: He speaks! The ”remarkably handsome old gent” speaks! And he’s very polite about what he’s observed so far. Of course, a “talk” with Ted might be just a prelude to fleeing for his sanity.
Boy, Marvin is just a tiny little troll, isn’t he?
@Daisy:
” This has always bothered me a little about FC…how ridiculously shrunken the children are relative to their supposed ages.l
I guess it might be to exaggerate their cuteness or something.
It actually bothers me a lot less than the child friends of Dustin and Jeremy (of Zits), The Jeremy character is suposed to be like ten but is as short as a five-year-old, and the newly introduced Parker in Zits is supposed to be 5 and a half but is about two feet tall. Are all comics children pygmies nowadays?
@Sequitur: How could I forget that?
@Oversized Garden Ornament: Moy writing Mark Trail would be horrible, but she couldn’t do any worse than Jules. There would be a lot of platitudes thrown around, but at least the strip would lose the hip self awareness it has now.
I would be happy if June Brigman took over the artwork. Her style isn’t exactly like the MT artists through the years, but at least her artwork isn’t cartoony like the current MT.
@Charterstoned: That’s it. Definitely.
On-der-zedge.
@I speak Jive:
”I would be happy if June Brigman took over the artwork” (speaking about Mark Trail).
I rather like Brigman’s artwork. My major complaint is that she has some difficulty keeping her characters consistent (Jared’s nose changing randomly, Toby’s bustline going up and down like a yo-yo, etc, etc), but it’s generally clean and pleasant and not too cartoonish.
Most of the problems with MW are IMHO caused by Moy’s plotting, but she’s by far not the worst writer we snark at here. Judge Parker, for example, would be unreadable as a novel, and I won’t even mention Batiuk.
Beetle Bailey-Sarge covering up his abuse of his Privates.
Blondie-Sorry, Daisy, but you won’t be screwing that pooch.
@130 Liam:
Sarge’s privates have a hard time standing at attention.
@Oversized Garden Ornament: Brigman’s animals are too cartoonish, but they beat the wooden renditions Jules puts out there. Boy, do I miss Jack Elrod.
@I speak Jive: Gungan Bro.
@Sequitur: #105
Heh heh heh!!
@Oversized Garden Ornament: Well the Parker story line ended today and I hope to god we never have to see that awkward shit again.
Mary’s Worth It?: Is Jarhead with the Blues Brothers Band? “Maybe Aretha, here, can explain it better then I can,Mary.”
“R-E-S-P-E-C-T, find out what it means to me…..”
@richardf8:
Zits: ” Well the Parker story line ended today and I hope to god we never have to see that awkward shit again.”
I sincerely hope so. That story was not just awkward, it was wrong. Parker struck me as deeply disturbed and, to be frank, creeped me out.
@Arabella:
What I’d like to know is what did the football do that it has to sit in the corner?
Late thread mashups: Dick Tracy’s reactions.
@Uncle Lumpy: EVERYBODY says Abbey burned down the B&B.
@139 Baja Gaijin:
I like the Crankshaft best. It’s the one that most deserves Dick’s response.
@140 Ukulele Ike:
Not me. I said from the beginning that Abbey did not burn down the B&B.
DT:
“It looks just like Moon Maid”
Yeah, and every other one of those Lunarian girls, Columbo.
DT: Wouldn’t that gang of Lunarian supremacists consider Moon Maid a race traitor, for allowing Junior Tracy to sully her Lunarian genitalia with his Earth penis?
@Daisy: #76: HTH Grandma would probably blame the kid’s stunted stature on fetal alcohol syndrome, the result of Thel’s drinking.
@Oversized Garden Ornament: #126:
“exaggerate their cuteness or something”
That’s the reason the Campbell’s Soup kids were so rolly-polly and cherubic. A hundred years ago people thought fat babies were healthy babies. Only recently did Campbell’s finally slim the kids down.
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: I hope you also noted June Morgan‘s use of disappoint as an intransitive verb. I hate that.
Son, I am disappoint, that she didn’t use it as an adjective.