Unpleasant heterosexuality comix
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Pardon My Planet, 1/30/25
There’s a joke at the core of this panel that is, if not good per se, at least perfectly serviceable — ha ha, her husband is a dick about her cooking so she’s going to poison him! — but it’s assembled in such a shambolic and confusing way that it actually loops all the way through “bad” to “fascinating.” I love the idea of the husband sitting at the dinner table, white-knuckle gripping his silverware and waiting patiently for his wife to prepare his meal, which he already assumes he’ll hate, because of the shows she watches on TV, but also he declines or perhaps refuses to turn around and look at the TV to see if it’s that show that gets his wife to make the food he hates. Add in the fact that the wife apparently needs advice from a literal witch, a woman skilled in chthonic folk magic and also green, to know that pouring liquid from a bottle labeled with a prominent skull and crossbones is what’s going to kill her husband. I dunno, I think if I had that on hand already, I could’ve guessed it’d be bad to use as salad dressing (or good, depending on your end goal) without the TV witch telling me. I’m just an “independent thinker” like that.
Rex Morgan, 1/30/25
Hey, remember back when Estelle in Mary Worth went on a series of internet dates, each more comically unpleasant than the last? Well, Rex Morgan tried to recapture that magic but instead of Summer’s dates being “fun” bad, they were “boring” bad. Classic Rex Morgan! Anyway, as we all know, Estelle ended up in Wilbur’s sweaty arms at the end of the process, but apparently Rex Morgan is pitching as an alternative to the app scene going to a bar and hooking up with your daughter’s English teacher, who’s been harboring many a sexual thought about you since you came to a parent-teacher conference two years ago that you barely remember, what a coincidence, he definitely wasn’t sitting outside the restaurant watching your internet date unravel and plotting his next move.
123 replies to “Unpleasant heterosexuality comix”
RMMD:
“Pardon me — do I know you?”
“I’m the guy you chased down the street the other day after I left the clinic without ponying up the co-pay!”
JP: Now, I admittedly have no experience with drones. But if you have a drone getting footage of the woods, wouldn’t you see nothing but treetops? If you move it low enough and somehow manage to avoid every branch, I suppose you’d be able to see what’s happening on the forest floor. But how could Alan and Randy possibly have missed it in that case?
RMMD:
“I’m the Exposition Foil to the series of loser dates that the strip portrayed you as having this last week or so. In an all-too-familiar plot contrivance, I’m the Prince Charming who eventually sweeps you off your feet after the dating service inexplicably and inconceivably matches you with three or four people who couldn’t possibly be any more different from you! Now, while these story arcs resolve happily, they invariably leave unanswered the key question of how the dating service could have hooked you up previously with such utterly incompatible people!”
Family Circlejerk – Let’s Eat, Grandma or Let’s Eat Grandma: Punctuation Saves Lives is way more clever than this. On the other hand, who wants to think about Billy eating HTT Grandma?
RMMD-“Yeah. Still not ringing any bells.”
RMMD-“I’ve had lots of ‘conferences’ with teachers.”
MW-“Dirk, is just not bald and fat like Wilbur.”
FC-Grandma knows quite well how to use comas too.
JP:
“I’m talking about the Drone!”
“Leave Alan out of this!”
Pardon My Planet: See, this is why twin siblings shouldn’t get married.
RMMD:
“I was Kelly’s English teacher junior year. And if you don’t mind my complimenting your pulchritude, Miss, ‘Tender Is the Knight’ !”
“Gotta run!”
RMMD: He takes out his iPad and uses the digital pen to write his name, speaking slowly and distinctly. “My name is Augie Shuster. I’ll be your substitute date for this evening. If you look at your syllabus, you’ll see that we will be studying Chapter 3 of “The Delta of Venus” by Anais Nin, first by reading aloud, and then by enacting the work. In case you’re wondering, yes, I grade on a curve.”
Typical mainstream media! They have to “both-sides” a cooking programme with a poisoning programme!
Knowing what Kelly was like in high school, we’re reading two strips about poisonings. Augie leans in and says “I wanted you to know it was me.”
“I don’t want you to think that I am one of those pervert teachers that lust over his students, God no! I’m a pervert lusting over mature women!”
PmP:. Thanks, Josh, I just glanced at cartoon and would’ve missed the famed Skull & Crossbones dressing if he hadn’t pointed it out. For another take on cooking, see BETTY from last week wherein Mom gives Dad and Kid a shopping list of odious veggies to buy so she can make a healthy white pizza. Surprise ending.
RMMD:. A teacher in a green leisure suit? I’d give him a chance as clothing can be changed, but it is indeed creepy he remembers her.
PEANUTS:. Any day is a good day to be crabby. Though joke would have been even better on Curmudgeon Day.
RMMD – “Augie? Augie Shuster? Oh, yeah. We used to call you Augie Doggie and his Doggie Daddy, heh heh. So… How’s your daddy doin’?”
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX:
#4. Define “eat.”. (sick, sick, sick)
This is a very unrealistic depiction of a British person! Their skin is pale and milky, not colourful and vibrant!
MW: Whaa-? “It’s been GREAT??” Has Dawn been seeing the same Dirk that we’ve been seeing her seeing?
RMMD: Josh’s stalking concerns aside, the guy has gone two panels without being obnoxious. Could be The One!
PMP: Rather than maliciously gleeful, the wife looks worried. This obviously isn’t her first try. Hubby stubbornly refuses to croak.
PMP – Dude’s wife is a wannabe comedy writer, but her work is no good. He wishes she would stop watching hit TV shows that inspire her to keep trying, such as the clever parody That Stupid British Baking Show. Here comes the twist: She writes Pardon My Planet!
Don Abundio, translated:
“Wolf! Wolf! Wolf!”
“Wolf! Wolf! Wolf!”
“This will never get old”
MW: no Dawn, it hasn’t been great. He constantly abuses and insults and degrades you. Why are you lying?
@matt w: (At first I thought he had said “junior high,” which would’ve made this work better, because of what junior high students are like in general. I am told that at general meetings of teachers, the junior high teachers are treated like “thank you for your service.”)
PMP: And evidently she’s using the same poison that the witch on TV uses. Guess brand loyalty extends even to uxoricide,
@Peanut Gallery: Translating the real dialogue (“It’s pay day”), that is a master class in how to step on a punch line. If the point is that Mr. Abernathy’s servants are running to him enthusiastically, then he should only have to shout for one panel.
PMP: Ninety percent of the shows on Britbox have murder in the title. In other words, this strip really hits the mark
re. Pardon My Planet: I think I know what’s going on here, or at least I have a theory – the husband is actually in the next room and we’re seeing him through the doorframe that would lead us from the kitchen to the dining area. And I’m basically convinced the TV is in the kitchen, positioned under the cabinet (as odd as that sounds). Perhaps the wife is watching the show on mute with subtitles, as so many of us do in this day and age? Not the “on mute” part, just the “with subtitles” part. In any case, I don’t think the husband can get a visual confirmation from his vantage point and he’s moments away from dying.
PmP I do the cooking in my house, for the most part, and I’ve come to rely on video recipes for ideas and techniques. It occurred to me just the other day how hard it would have been to get detailed recipes off a broadcast TV show, without the ability to pause and rewind as needed. But imagine also having to incorporate some kind of magic poison into your meal, presumably in a way that will shield you from the suspicions of the police? Now that’s stressful watching….
RMMD Wait, wasn’t this an Oil of Olay ad?
MW – FtLoG, Dawn, this shitshow of non-stop abuse has never been “great.” It is, in fact, the opposite of great. The only thing you just said that’s true is that he’s handsome, which is the only thing that really matters to you. And there lies your problem. Have a muffin.
Crankshaft : …Wait, so that time Funky Winkerbean bought the ENTIRE PRINT RUN of a magazine that had a favorable review of Montoni’s was based on real events? And it’s something Batiuk himself did? And, to this day, he doesn’t think it was a bad idea?
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Pardon my Planet : I’m reminded of how an old RPG I read justified the presence of an incredibly large presence of witches in the setting by explaining that their founder had written down her spellbook disguised as an advice book titled “How to Serve your Man”, with every mention of this immediately followed with “IT’S A REFERENCE TO THAT ONE EPISODE OF THE TWILIGHT ZONE”.
CS: How much of an egomaniac do you have to be to buy multiple copies of a newspaper just because your weekly cartoon for teens is in it, and to also think this makes you one of the newspaper’s biggest benefactors?
By the way, “Batton Thomas” life story is has been 100% identical to Tom Batiuk’s, without a drop of exaggeration.
The chopped carrot in Pardon My Planet is a nice detail, I’m sure it’s not symbolic at all.
MW: Maybe I didn’t read it the same way all of you did, but I absolutely laughed out loud at Mary’s “So what’s the problem Dawn?” whilst looking hopelessly bored. She can’t even be bothered with the mundane Weston family stories any longer, even if she does get the tiniest drop of meddle-juice from it to sustain her cold, withered visage…
“I was your daughter Kelly’s English teacher. No? That doesn’t ring a bell?
“Anyway, I’m also a poet and she inspired me to pen this:
“ Lips as sweet as candy
It’s taste is on my mind
Girl, you got me thirsty
For another cup of wine
Got a bug from you girl
But I don’t need no cure
I just stay a victim
If I can for sure
All the good love
When we’re all alone
Keep it up girl
Yeah, you turn me on”
“Anyway, that got me fired but yeah, I’m glad to see the apple didn’t fall far from the tree.”
A lot of benefits to learning to cook, even if you’re the man of the house – it means you can eat what you want and not have to just chew terribly-made British bread, it makes your wife happier and less likely to poison you, it gives her fewer opportunities to poison you – but one big one is that you can see her mixing a big bowl of lettuce and carrots and understand that she’s not baking a cake.
PMP: “Two cups poison , a pinch of oregano and THE SOUL OF A NEWBORN CHILD ehehehe. ” Cookin with the Crone will be back after the break
Rex Morgan: “The lime green hides my erection!”
MW: I’m trying to understand how Dawn defines “great.” My working theory is “Attractive man doesn’t ghost me.” Any actual happiness or compatibility isn’t necessary.
Pardon My Planet: Look at that schlump’s face. Look at it! Maybe this is a little death-play kink he and his significant other having going on, maybe he just wants to die. Either way, he knows perfectly damn well what’s going to happen, he accepts and even welcomes the prospect. This being Thursday, I get the feeling.
PMP: My favorite detail of this is that the witch on TV looks so depressed. She’s been a witch so long that she’s just over it, and she’s discovered that the only real magic in this world is day drinking.
Rex Morgan, M.D.: “Would it help if I pretended to be Augie Derleth, the mediocre poet, Wisconsin folklorist, and extender of H.P. Lovecraft’s Cthulhu mythology?”
“No.”
@I’m Not Cthulhu, But I Play Him On TV:
“What about Augie Doggie?”
“I’m leaving.”
@Professor Well Actually: So that tomorrow Moy can give us a big breakdown scene from Dawn with sobbing and cries of ‘No, it’s NOT great! He’s so MEAN, Mary! He’s so handsome though, I can’t help myself! What can I do? How could something like this happen to ME???’
Thus leading us into the Sunday recap where Mary will undoubtedly give either very trite or very, *very* bad advice.
@Anonymous: “I can do a great Caesar Augustus imitation!”
[Door slams]
PMP: Quite obviously the husband is an alcoholic and she’s using the strychnine cure.*
*Something I’d never heard of but saw mentioned on an old episode of Ironside I watched recently.
Pardon My Planet – This strip reminds me of the Marvel show Loki, specifically how Loki met up with a female version of himself while hopping through the multiverse. But unlike the very attractive Tom Hiddleston and Sophia Di Martino, we have Wilbur Weston and his female counterpart (I’ll call her Willa, no disrespect to Wilbur’s lonely goldfish) , thrown together in an unholy pairing.
I don’t know what God or entity through them together in the same Universe, but it’s clearly punishment for their many crimes. There is no more just punishment than Wilbur(s) having to live with themselves, and Willa is more than happy to commit murder-suicide. She has to use salad instead of baking because she never learned how to make her universe’s version of Mary ‘s (Mario’s?) beige squares.
Rex Morgan – “We had a parent teacher conference together. I was the teacher” is either reminder of a sexual roleplay scenario, or else Augie really recalls that meeting with Summer and his impression was that Kelly must have gotten her intelligence from her father’s genes.
PMP: I love the image of the disgusting, hairy man, in his wife-beaters, sitting at the dinner table.
CS: So Batton suspected that his editor might have been lying to him by running his cartoon only in a few editions available in his neighborhood, and that they would then stop the presses, make up a new page without his cartoon, and then print those papers and send them to the rest of the town. Insecure much?
FC: Correction, dumbshit. You learned how to misuse commas.
MW: “It’s been great. He’s so handsome.”
“So what’s the problem?”
“He treats me like crap. I’ve asked him to stop, but he’s so handsome.”
“Exactly how long had it been since you were last laid?”
@Bob Tice: Well to be fair, Summer’s “compatible match” is a block of wood, and it’s kinda hard to find enough inanimate objects willing to do a dating service.
I don’t know about this Shuster fella. Apart from his jacket being avocado green, he seems to be dressed quite normally for the Morganverse and the colour may be just that the shops and tailors don’t expect anyone to ask for one in blue or grey. On the other hand, his name is “Augie”. What kind of music do you listen to, Augie Shuster? And if you say anything that you could listen to on the radio outside of a college station…
RMMD – Ok, how many parent-teacher conferences do you suppose Summer has attended? A handful? And how many do you suppose Augie has done over his career? Several hundred? All I’m saying is, it’s pretty clear who is the hot one here.
@Lauralot: But if you have a drone getting footage of the woods, wouldn’t you see nothing but treetops?
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You’d get great footage of that naked blue bird smoking a cigar and the other one with a desk piled up with papers, and a pink Cadillac.
@Cleveland Mocks: MW: Twenty minutes. I’d had a quickie with Cathy in the car before we went in the bowling alley!
“I’m Augie Tandy, can I introduce you to my brother Dirk?”
PmP: The world of heterosexuals is a sick and boring life, as Aunt Ida used to say.
@Lord Flatulence: PMP: I love the image of the disgusting, hairy man, in his wife-beaters, sitting at the dinner table.
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Its a sneak peek at “Quirky”, the upcoming Pixar adaption of the Wilbur Weston Story.
@The Quiet Man: a quickie with Cathy
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Aaaack!
PMP: The wife-beater is a nice touch, but the weak chin and fearful expression ruin the image. The guy’s a lame wanna-be.
RMMD: “I was Kelly’s English teacher. Let me tell you about the novel I’m writing.”
PMP: The witch is pouring the poison into a traditional cauldron filled with some sort of ominous brew, but the beleaguered wife is using it to season a salad. I appreciate a cook who is able to adapt to whatever they have on hand.
RMMD: “Augie” is the sort of name a World War II vet would have. “Shuster” reminds me of the teacher from Glee, who was mostly a self-absorbed dick. Guy has two strikes against him from the beginning as far as I’m concerned.
PMP: He’s only pissed because she bought expensive, organic poison.
@Joe Blevins: Or as the Disney villain Dr. Facilier would say, that despite all of the powerful magics he controls, its worth squat if he doesn’t have money, money being the REAL power in the world. And I think I have to agree with that, sadly.
“Let’s see . . . Peter, Paul, and Mary in concert . . . two shows on making your will . . . a marathon of Finding Your Roots with Henry Louis Gates Jr. . . . and a British crime drama on a witch teaching women to poison their husbands . . . man, I hate fundraising weeks on PBS.”
PMP: Hopefully the poison will make him bubble and squeak before he dies.
PmP: There was this adaptation of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, where for some odd reason one of the ingredients for his Hyde formula was rat poison.
Dr. Jekyll (before drinking): If this fails, I may surely die.
Reviewer: Yeah, because you’re ingesting rat poison!
RMMD: I was a teacher for many years. I can attest that the only thing that would cause me to remember a parent from a conference is if they were remarkably unpleasant. So, yes, this tracks. Good job with the realism!
The husband does kinda have a point: that witch on TV is clearly brewing a soup or potion and his wife has followed the directions and ended up with a salad. I bet she even left out the eye of Newt.
RMMD:
…I was the Teacher.
“Yeah, I think I could’ve figured that out on my own. [rolls eyes]”
@TheDiva:
Guy: “My name is Wayne. Wayne Shuster.”
Summer: “Wow, I find that very mildly amusing.”
RMMD — “My first name used to be Bill, but I changed it to Augie in homage to Saul Bellow. Yes, you can buy me a drink. . . ”
PMP — When the Lockhorns cosplay Midsummer Murders. . .
Pardon My Planet – I think they look too much alike to be husband and wife… I think they’re siblings. And OK, maybe they did marry… which would make her poison salad one of the lesser objectionable “creations” made by this couple.
GT: “Illegal headgear”? Soooo, we discover what state Milford is in during this arc. I’m placing my bets on Texas, Florida, Ohio, and Tennessee.
GT: With Britney Spears…uh, Sears…in the house, I’m hoping for a choreographed dance rumble between these wrestling teams like in West Side Story of the Bad video.
H&L: Looks like the kids are watching a movie adaptation of the Hi and Lois comic strip on a large screen TV in their featureless living room which explains the sour looks on their faces. “Can we change the channel, mom? This sucks”
My comments don’t seem to be showing up…
Rex Morgan: Summer’s suitors so far have been: A guy who explained his interest in classic cars because he heard it’s important to talk about your passions (and she sat there with an open expression of bored disdain); a guy who trusted her with his idea for a fun sci-fi novel (and she derided him for not having written it already), a guy who showed good manners by refusing to talk with his mouth full (and she openly sighed in his face), and a guy who expressed his big personality with confidence (and she openly mocked him before rudely getting up and leaving). I mean, sure, dating sucks, but does anyone think these gentlemen enjoyed going out with her? Maybe she deserves ending up with Teachy McLeisuresuit, who enjoys conjugating participles (in bed) and considers himself a fine fellow because he refuses to hit on his students’ moms until a couple years after they’re no longer in his class.
GT: Wrestling, like boxing, is a “sport” where the point is to beat up the other guy. How smart is it to walk up to the person who just proved they could beat you up and insult her?
Look, I’ve got kids who are a year out of high school. If I was to “try out” the “dating scene” in a “singles bar”, I would not be wearing a green sport jacket, and by appearances, Augie and Summer are both 8-10 years younger than me. Hells bells, I didn’t wear a sport jacket to singles bars in the 1990s when I was single.
This throws a wrench in my perception of old, lush, luxuriously artistic Apartment 3G strips from the 60s and 70s. Did the artists for Apt 3G dress their characters in 1950s clothing? If so, my youth was a lie.
6 CHX:. Good placement of cows, Sid. And I understand why our star Melanie skipped the idle horse’s role.
PMP – Homicide is funny, funny stuff, but toss in a little black magic – comedy gold, baby….
RMMD – I’d say the guy with the pointy nose and man-bun in the background has a better chance of hooking up than Augie….
Adios Amigos, DJ.
Pardon My Planet: Really not a fan of how the husband and wife here look so similar to one another they could be siblings.
@Pozzo: Who is killing who in this scenario?
GT ;; I’m not sure how religious headgear gives you an advantage in any sport. But, this is Milford…
@Jonathon Pernisek: 100%
CS- How small does your circulation have to be so that TB buying extra newspapers is noticed by anyone?
MW- “He opened up to me…” Gee Dawn, that “opening up” spanned about 5 seconds based on how long it took us to read the same dialogue you heard. And despite the bold text, we can tell the operative words that in your mind should have been bolded are “to me”. Because you’re sooo special
RMMD – Don’t bury the lede, Augie. Sure, you’re an English teacher, but obviously you’ve won the Masters golf tournament. Chicks dig guys who’ve got a Green Jacket.
“Pardon me, but do I know you? This strip has a huge cast, but unless the characters have distinguishable features such as Mud’s “Fake shitting on stage” or Buck’s “No redeeming quality”, they are easily forgettable”
@Withered Freak: I didn’t wear a sport jacket to singles bars in the 1990s when I was single.
I’m a 52-year old man, and I’m not sure I’ve ever owned a sports jacket.
RMMD: I was the Teacher. You were the parent. Kelly was the student. The building was the school. My name is Shuster, Augie Shuster …Ma’am.
PmP:
Wife: Hopefully this potion will work better than the last one. The last potion transformed him into Wilbur Weston.
@Ettorre: Mud only stuck out to me, because he (originally) loomed over everyone like some sort of giant. That was at least something interesting. Then like all Rex Morgan characters, he caught “Boringcharacter-itis”
@Anonymous #82: I pray Mary’s answer to Dawn is:
“Oh, come on, Dawn. You’re just putting up with this man’s abuse because you think he’s hot. What are you, 12? If you wanted a kind man, you had Jared, and you couldn’t throw him away fast enough. Now you get the hot guy you wanted, and it turns out he’s an abusive prick who’s driven you to change your own diet, and publicly apologize for how you put food in your mouth. If you want a nice man, you might have to accept a less hot man. If you want a hot man, you might have to accept a less nice man. Make up your damn mind! And get your hands off my muffins. Those are for people with actual problems.”
@Isua: Maybe she’s planning on turning him into a rabbit and the carrot is for later?
Totally get the reference!
Josh, I can not believe you have a topic banner of “Unpleasant Heterosexuality Comix” and didn’t included Luann. That’s practically that strip’s working title!
@Hibbleton: It honestly seems like U.K has the domination on Murder Mystery shows/novels etc.
Heck, even the Professor Layton franchise takes place in England and it’s made by a Japanese company!
Rex Morgan – If the parent-teacher conference was during Kelly’s rebellious goth stage, Summer would surely remember it. It must have happened when Kelly was a boring, middle aged teenager.
FC – Instant comma’s gonna get you.
Crankshaft – Sales department meeting: “We sell one more copy of the paper every Tuesday. Let’s get right on that and find out why!”
9CL – I must be a beefwit, because my take on this week is that it’s totally lacking in humor or wit of any kind.
@Giant Pondering Otter: True, while Buck has a very punchable face
Wrecks Moregone;
Watch out, Winter! Ginger BeardAndPonytail is slowly moving closer and closer to you, so when you blow off your new suitor, suddenly he’ll be at your elbow! Since all the background silhouette people have prudently departed between panels, are you sure you can handle Ginger BeardAndPonytail once TeacherMan leaves, brokenhearted? Can you?!???
PmP: So now we know who Wilbur Weston finally gets to marry him, and how quickly she’ll resort to murder to get out of the deal.
@Giant Pondering Otter: What about those Scandinavian ones? They look kinda fun…
@Giant Pondering Otter: #93: I’ve always wondered about all those British murder mystery shows. Gun control advocates over here like to point out Britain’s low homicide rate compared to ours but according to British telly the UK must be the most dangerous place in the world to live.
@Hurting Joshs Feelings: You’re just sitting in your car chugging cough syrup, aren’t you?
RMMD: The seemingly random highlighting makes me making a conversation full of inexplicable pregnant pauses. That sentence, by the way, marks the first and last time I ever hope to use the word “pregnant” in the context of Rex Morgan.
@Young Mr Grace:
Imagine. Makes me imagine.
@The Quiet Man: a quickie with Cathy
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I had a quickie with Cathy/A lunchbreak with Lauren/Man, you know that one was boring/had tuna with Tina/even Dawn could eat cleaner/Sex with these women is a roots country perk/I made them all happy, so why am *I* called the jerk?
Lyrics to “A Quickie With Cathy” by Truck Tyler ©2025 Buck Naked Unwise Music Ltd. From the album “Muddy Boots And Other Delights”
@Young Mr Grace:
Did you get served?
@Weaselboy: Ask Arnold Palmer! It wasn’t just his swinging club….
Six Chex And A Cat Named Elsie: “When someone drives by a cow and sticks their head out the window and says ” MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!” Do you suppose the cow thinks, “Hey! There’s a cow driving that car!”? -Steven Wright
” When some melting Six Chix semi-humanoids drive past a cow, do you suppose the cow thinks, “Hey! There are misshapen morons driving that car!”? – Steven Wrong
@Activist: re 6Cx: Good eye,
dahlingdearie! You immediately realized that was NOT the fabulous Melody Mare! Heaven forbid that she associate with this mediocre comic. Even if it did offer an opportunity to exhibit Horse superiority and popularity! And to show up those dumb-as-rocks Cows who can offer nothing to society except their bodily fluids! Did you ever try to RIDE one anywhere? Or hear anyone *ever* talk about Cow Sense? Hooray for Horses!!! Again, Melody Mare is NOT appearing here today, having better things to do…MW: is Mary going to help Dawn prepare how to respond when the beatings start.
@Guillermo el chiclero: That’s how I always felt about the show NCIS. It makes it feel like marines are more likely to be killed in America by their own spouses/neighbours/random killers, etc… than in the actual line of duty.
@GarrisonSkunk: Steven Wright is Gary Larson confirmed… I mean, have we ever seen Steven Wright and Gary Larson together at the same time?
@Professor Well Actually: Let me get you a salmon square to put on that black eye….
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: On the other hand, who wants to think about Billy eating HTT Grandma?
(*raises hand hesitantly*) Um, me? Om nom nom.
@Guillermo el chiclero: No, it’s the small town of Cabot Cove, Maine.
6C: A finer visual representation of chronically repressed female sexuality finally expressing itself for a brief instant, I do not know of.
Crank: So, rather than comment on the specific strip, because that would mean thinking about it, I’m going to lay out my problem with the whole thing. I’ve got nothing about author inserts, as such, I just prefer there to be something interesting to them. One of my favourite author insert moments is in the Agatha Christie novel Mrs McGinty’s Dead, in which mystery writer Ariadne Oliver rants about how much she hates her creation, a Finnish vegetarian detective, in terms that could also apply to a Belgian neat-freak detective. That’s some insight. If this suddenly swerved into Batton Thomas saying that he actually finds his character “Feuer Grater” as obnoxiously smug as the readers do, but the syndicate says that’s what gets clicks, I’d be there for it, but it won’t.
It also helps that Christie isn’t afraid to show Oliver up; in her first appearance in Cards on the Table, she talks about mistakes and reused plots in her books (based on actual Christie works) and spends time being unshakably convinced that just about all the suspects are guilty before moving to the next one. There’s some real self-deprecation there, which is very different from Batty’s attempts, which generally come across as “Look at me being self-deprecating, because that’s something we True Artists do to show how humble we are about our genius.”
But the biggest problem is that the Funkyverse is increasingly all author inserts. Batty has problems with some kind of service? Ed gets the same problem, and it’s a conspiracy to deliberately make his life difficult. Batty’s excited that a new volume of Silver Age DC reprints is out? Time to wheel out Jeff to talk about how great it is. Batty feels hard done by that nobody recognises his brilliance? Les. Obviously. And in these ever decreasing circles, all Batton Thomas has is the bare bones of Batty’s biography. And … does anyone really care how Batty started in the industry?
Okay, done. And unless something interesting (even interestingly bad) happens, that’s me probably done talking about this “storyline”.
HtH: In retrospect, the “Stare At A Cake Without Eating It” diet was flawed from the outset.
PMP: An aspect to this strip that I don’t “like”, as such, but kind of respect, is that the witch isn’t cackling madly, as you might expect from a stereotyped witch adding poison to her magical brew. She’s as dead inside as Lucretia ‘Burbia and her husband, not to mention every other Pardon My Planet character. That’s commitment to the brand!
@astroboy:To be fair, it’s also true that he opened up about his childhood. Admittedly, he did it in the context of explaining why she was the one being insensitive by objecting to him calling her names, actually, but he did it!
@I speak Jive: #113: That or Sparta, Mississippi.
@Horace Broon: I guess if a certain infamous webcomic is B^U, Pardon My Planet is 8V\.
MW: “So what’s the problem, Dawn? He sounds perfect. You’re lucky to have him, I’m sure. By the way, there’s a muffin crumb stuck to the corner of your mouth. No, the other side, dear. There you got it. So gross and unlovable. That crumb in your napkin, I mean. Not you. I know you wouldn’t let that happen around Dirk, right?”
…because anybody ever is named “Augie.” Does he not sound like he should be leading Santa’s toy-building team? Or, like, inappropriately touching Oliver Twist?
R.I.P. Marianne Faithfull.
” Augie Shusher, I was head husher at Kelly’s school library! I’m a Miss Peach of a guy!Ask anyone!”
@Banana Jr. 6000: #85: I’ve owned several sports jackets, fortunately none of them lime green. I’ve also never owned a leisure suit, even at their height of popularity in the 70s.