Doom, gloom, and so forth
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Beetle Bailey, 6/24/25
One of my favorite bits of actual Beetle Bailey character evolution over the past few years is Zero going from being a friendly but very stupid farm boy to being a friendly but very stupid farm boy who is also a highly skilled killing machine. Anyway, I obviously really enjoy this strip, in which Zero grins dumbly at the collection of shells he’s amassed. He seems unaware that each of those shells, the byproduct of his expert marksmanship, is the harbinger of one or more awful deaths, but Beetle and Killer know, and are profoundly unsettled.
Herb and Jamaal, 6/24/25
Herb, why are you looking so smug? One of your regulars is complaining that you’re using substandard meat in your tacos! Or maybe using chicken when you advertised beef! The “foul”/”fowl” joke only works in writing, so I’m not really sure whether it’s coming across here! At any rate, you’ve got an unhappy customer and I’m not sure what you think is so darn funny about it!
Mary Worth, 6/24/25
“Her brother seems to be taking care of her … at least that’s the impression I got in the approximately 45 seconds it took for him to lure her out of my apartment. Do you think I should, like, send an email to see how that whole thing is going?”
165 replies to “Doom, gloom, and so forth”
Mary has obviously judged this to be a five-muffin situation.
Mary Worth Mashup: Another missing final panel that really shouldn’t be missing.
Blondie: I love the image of Daggy running from a beehive he plucked from a tree, not realizing it’s full of bees, now angry. [chef’s kiss]
Luann: Luann’s shift was exhausting? Seriously? She wipes tables for a living. A barely trained monkey could do her job, probably better and with a lot less brainless chatter.
BB:
Why does Zero have buck teeth, anyway? — doesn’t the Army have a good dental program?
BB: If you ever take the Channel Tunnel from France or Belgium, you see special signs at check-in warning you not to take old artillery shells on board the train – veterans and other tourists dig them up from WWI battlefields and try to take them home, not realising that the shells are often still live and could explode. What I’m saying is – if there’s anything important to tell Zero, say it now because he might not be around much longer.
“You know Mary, this whole Belle affair was crazy! She burst into my life and made a big scene before she dramatically disappeared. I guess I got my own Aldo, eheh!”
“Wilbur, I served with Aldo Kelrast. I knew Aldo Kelrast. Aldo Kelrast was a
friendnemesis of mine. Wilbur, you got no Aldo Kelrast!”MW:
“Let’s head for a karaoke joint and do something Harry Belafonte-inspired about Belle, evoking his 1956 chartbuster!”
“Um, what exactly did you have in mind, Wilbur?”
” ‘Dra-no, Dra-no
Avery comes and she’s gotta go home ‘ .”
GA: Wait, I (sort of) called it?
What im indeed
Luann: Wait, so they hired her just to wipe tables and clean the windows? No other duties?
I know, I know, It’s Luann, and she only has Inner Beauty, but, for hours…?
BB: Coming off the rifle range in basic training, the chant to the DI was “No brass, no ammo.” So where is zero picking up all that brass?
“He’s collecting SHELLS?!?! I’m SHOCKED!”
“Just because we never see fight, there is no reason to give me pun-based PTSD!”
MW: Even Mary is getting bored with Wilbur’s shenanigans. She hands him her smallest coffee cup. “Sorry, no refills.”
MW: “Hazard”? That’s Wilbur’s euphemism for the Jerry Springer episode he just lived? That’s all we’re going to say about attempted murder, incest, and mental illness? “Hazard”?
Frazz: I know this strip is trying to be a psuedo-extension of Calvin and Hobbes, but it really shouldn’t write punchlines people have to look up to get. This strip isn’t nearly charming or intellectual enough to get away with that.
CS: Today’s strip brought to by: Jumble! America’s most beloved and popular word puzzle! Play online, in the app, or in your newspaper! And, by: the Winnipeg Blue Bombers! The Banjo Bowl is coming September 6! Get your tickets today!
MW: Wilbur isn’t dejected because of Belle, but only because he suddenly realized that the muffins on the plate in front of him are made of wax and are only decorative.
BB: Ha, it’s funny because we always assumed the Zero was Gomer Pyle when instead he’s, well, that other “Gomer Pyle”.
HJ: Really disappointed that the punchline of this strip wasn’t “Where is Jamaal, Herb? WHERE THE FUCK IS JAMAAL??’
MW: “I’m heartbroken that things with Belle didn’t work out…” /Mary stares, raises one eyebrow ever so slightly/ ” …oh, and that she, um, turned out to be a hazard to my life?” /Mary sets down her tea and starts massaging her temples/
MW:
“I should have known she’d bid me farewell
There’s a stressin’ to be learned from this; and I learned it, Mary, well
Now I know she’s not the only varlet in the sea
If I ever sneer her name again, it’s all the same to me
“And I think it’s gonna be all trite
Yes, the curse is over now
This mourning one is whining like a dread blubber ball
“Shrew never cared for secrets I’d confide
To her, I’m just a cormorant
Somethin’ for her chide
Always stunning and preparing; that’s the life she lived
Swollen minutes of her crime were all she had to give
“And I think it’s gonna be all trite
Yes, the curse is over now
This mourning one is whining like a dread blubber ball
“This story’s thin, but crass
There’s muffins to befall
I’ve got my strife to live
And I don’t need her at all
The droller, grosser guy she hooked is nearly at wit’s end
I bought my hiccoughs with my tears
That’s all; I’m gonna mend
“And I think it’s gonna be all trite
Yes, the curse is over now
This mourning one is whining like a dread blubber ball
“Whoa, oh
“I think it’s gonna be all trite
Yes, the curse is over now
This mourning one is whining like a dread blubber ball.”
MW: Looks like Mary and Wilbur are both lefties. That doesn’t explain any of this.
@Banana Jr. 6000: “Hazard”? That’s Wilbur’s euphemism for the Jerry Springer episode he just lived? That’s all we’re going to say about attempted murder, incest, and mental illness? “Hazard”?
Also, note that he only mentioned the hazard to his own life. Dawn only gets referenced in her apology to him.
I hope someday Mary finds out what Avery looks like and just becomes unbelievably furious about the much more interesting conversation she could have been having/advice she could have been giving.
DtM: George makes a mental note not to watch Mae West movies when Dennis is around.
I’m mildly… well, “alarmed” isn’t quite the right word, because it’s Beetle Bailey, so let’s go with “bemused,” that Killer — a Private in the Army who has presumably seen these things before and whose name, literal or not, is Killer — has to ask what it is that Zero is “arranging over there.” What do you think they are, my guy? Metal bottles? Strangely unsettling musical instruments? Condoms for variously-sized Transformers? It’s that last one, isn’t it?
BB:
He sells sea shells on his shore leave.
No. Wait a minute. That’s not it.
FC: Dolly continues. She shows Jeffy a two; “And this is the Douche.”
@Banana Jr. 6000:
Frazz: I know this strip is trying to be a psuedo-extension of Calvin and Hobbes, but it really shouldn’t write punchlines people have to look up to get. This strip isn’t nearly charming or intellectual enough to get away with that.
Well, I know who Antoine de Saint-Exupéry was, and I’m really confused as to why Caufield is acting like comparing his plans for the summer to an aviator who very famously went missing, presumed dead, is a GOOD thing
(I mean, it is for US, no more Caufield, but…too far?)****************
On Luann : the problem is that Luann is claiming that the reason she’s all groggy and sleepy and yawning is that her shift was “exhausting”, but that simply isn’t true; she’s not EXHAUSTED, she’s TIRED. Her job isn’t demanding physically, it’s demanding on TIME. She’s tired because she came home after midnight, then got up (assuming she even went to bed) at 5 am. She’s pretending her job is hard (for sympathy? From a guy who works full-time in the medical field!?) rather than just admitting she doesn’t know how to adjust to having a job at night during the weekends.
Ah, Josh, you missed an opportunity for your post title: “Doom, Gloom, and People Awkwardly Staring in the Same Direction”
MW: It’s very likely that Wilbur doesn’t actually know Belle aside from her name and her willingness to have sex with him…and even the latter is questionable considering her mental state. He doesn’t even care about whether or not it was actually her brother who showed up. Nope; it’s all about Wilbur being sad because he’s not getting laid.
Herb and Jamaal: Eh, joke’s on the yuppie customer: he’s slowly asphyxiating himself with that high-neck collar. He’ll never live long enough to leave a bad review on Yelp!
@I’m Not Cthulhu, But I Play Him On TV:
I thought it went “Doom, Gloom, Up in his room, vanishes INSTANTLY, becauseofmagiclittlefishwhogranthiseverywish FOR IN REALITY”
@Pozzo: It is Wilbur, after all. It take three muffins just to get him out of bed.
BB: Unless Camp Swampy has a beachfront (and if it did, wouldn’t it be called Camp Sandy?), these are the only shells Zero has ever seen. Your POV tends to be narrow when you’ve spent your entire life in the same place.
(as I suspect he was abandoned there as a baby)
MW: Say it, Wilbur: “I’m a moron. I have no sense. I shouldn’t be allowed out without a minder.” Own it, you’ll feel much better.
@Charterstoned:
Now I can’t stop thinking about the fact that I’m right-handed but always hold my coffee cup in my left. D-d-doesn’t everybody? Am I some kind of freak?
@pugfuggly: Wilbur is the main character and the only character in his universe. Dawn is just an extension of himself who is only useful for being an organ bank and the emotional equivalent of a wife.
Mary Worth: “I mean, how am I supposed to live, like some ordinary schlub with a girlfriend who doesn’t want to murder him?” “Oh, Wilbur. You did just fine with Iri — okay, I hear it now…”
@Anonymous: Hmmm…don’t know that one. Maybe if I heard Wilbur do it at karaoke…
@Needless Exposition: I thought Mary was the emotional equivalent of a wife. Or is she the emotional equivalent of a mother?
Mary Worth: Four muffins are loaded with Prozac. One has fast-acting cyanide, and a delightful almond taste. There’s only one way Wilbur is leaving here, and that’s out of Mary’s hair.
@Ettorre: Mary’s the mother because she has to tell Wilbur what to do to barely function. Dawn is the wife because she doesn’t argue with Wilbur and goes out on “dates” with him. Both of them coddle him endlessly.
BB — It took me awhile to figure out what those objects were–my first reaction was that they were Zero’s bong collection. . .
MW — “She’s getting the help she needs. At a farm upstate, where she can run and play all day with the other manic-depressives. . .”
Luann – Because this strip is so unfunny, I find it hard to believe that “everyone had a big laugh,” even off panel.
“Don’t be sad about this girl who was willing to sleep with you. By the way, tell me more about her brother, Avery”
“I’d rather not, Mary”
“Come on, there must something interesting about it”
“Please don’t incest… insist!”
@Charterstoned: Not gonna stop him from scarfing them down anyway. Hey, it was charming when Stan Laurel did it!
RMMD:
“If you would like Truck and Truck Jr. to have a rollicking jam session, Press 1! If you would like to see Truck’s finger suddenly act up again and him go mope on his special park bench, Press 2!”
[Presses 1]
“You have pressed 2!”
No, I didn’t!
“I’m almost positive you did!”
JP: I had a bad feeling about this latest ‘quirky’ character, and now I know why. That flaming, Lucille Ball-esque hair. She’s either going to be a *hilarious* comic bumbler or she’s a hitherto unseen member of the Duncan family (remember Judge DangerDoofus and Lil’ Dunk?) and when she finds out that Sophie is THE Sophie Parker-Spencer-Driver, well, they’ll be on a collision course with *wackiness*!
MW:
“I know she nearly killed me and on several occasions my daughter with a painful poisoning. Then she tried to eat my pet fish alive, but the real tragedy is that I’m no longer getting regular sex” -Father of the year Wilbur.
MW: Wilbur is REALLY gross today. REALLY gross.
@pugfuggly: Soylent Jamal? Is that the implication? Brilliant!
@Baja Gaijin: Outstanding.
@I’m Not Cthulhu, But I Play Him On TV: For some reason I thought he was a minister, then I remembered that there is already another minister character in the strip.
@LTJpezcore1: This whole storyline has made Wilbur a self centered narcissist who will willingly let his daughter be killed so that he can get laid by a woman he doesn’t know and is likely unable to consent. And yet Moy is viciously insisting that he’s the victim rather than the instigator.
H&J: Sweeney Herb but instead of pies the townsfolk get tacos
MW – I really love how Wilbur is making this about him, and not his traumatized daughter and mentally ill ex-lover.
I think Wilbur could have watched the crucifixion and spent the next day with Mary complaining about sunburn and chafing.
H&J – Herb, I don’t know if this is true… I can’t tell for sure… Maybe it’s me, but… If you’re going to blatantly stretch a one-panel gag to multiple panels, I kind of admire your decision to go for four when three would have been plenty.
@Needless Exposition: The only time that I’ll embrace him being the Victim is when he’s on the autopsy table after he pisses off the wrong guy.
Like in Seinfeld, George Constanza taking the last magazine at the airport, then when a guy (who is a convicted murderer) said that he wanted it, George laughs at him. Then later ends up trapped in the airplane bathroom with the guy (Who may or may not have actually killed him, it’s vague)
Don Abundio, translated:
“I never heard a famous actor sneeze before”
“Observe!”
“Are you allergic to dust?”
“No…”
“It’s for a role!”
[Newspaper: VARIETY / Juan S. Perfil to Play Voice of Sneezy in Direct-to-Streaming Snow White Sequel!]
Sure, repeat customers are good for business, but even Mary has to realize that Wilbur ends up sitting on her couch in front of a plate of I Can’t Believe They’re Not Muffins™ so often that maybe the problem is him and his choices and it’s time for him to see if it’s not too late to join a monastery.
MW – Wilbur is on auto-pilot describing his heartbreak – something that applies to many woman, and a fish – while his focus is on that plate of muffins.
@The Rambling Otter: There have been theories that the Seinfeld series finale was the four main characters actually dying and their odd trial where literally every person whose lives they ruined testified against them, after their plane which was crashing (a different plane ride from the previous example I mentioned) “safely landed after all” was actually their final Judgement.
It’s kind of deep for a show about nothing ;-)
@Hibbleton: And, as we can see, the next card up will be the tree.
Fun fact: New Ulm, Minnesota – a heavily German community – does not have Third Street because the residents couldn’t pronounce it correctly and it came out “Turd Street.”
JP: I know they’re jetlagged and surprised by the accommodations plan they never bothered to read, but “it’s clean” really shouldn’t be something that shocks you about a rental
GT: Last we saw, Sears was schooling Keri that you can’t just on-and-off being friends based on your teammate not wanting to see you friendly with an opponent. So they’ve gone to friends leading into romance with about as much development and sense as the artwork’s insanely-oversize earrings that appear on Keri between P1 and P2.
@Needless Exposition: It’s like the story is concealing the truth from Mary, to protect Wilbur from facing any consequences. Even if that consequence is merely having to face Mary’s disgust.
Normally, if the audience knows something a character doesn’t, the character will learn it at some point, and react to it. You’d expect Dawn to be the person who gives Mary the unvarnished truth about what happened with Belle (attempted murder, implied incest, mental illness, dependence on medication, requiring adult supervision). But she’s so oblivious and subservient that she also whitewashed Wilbur’s behavior to Mary. This is setting up a story where Mary finally learns the actual truth and is PISSED. But that’s not going to happen to the noble, saintly, too-good-for-this-world Wilbur Weston.
On top of that, Mary is supposed to be plugged in to all the goings-on at Charterstone. Wilbur knocking on his own apartment door would have been seen or heard by someone. Especially in this age of ubiquitous video cameras.
H&J-“Odd. I’ve been using Health Inspector meat.”
Beetle Bailey-“Let’s stay on Zero’s good side.”
Six Chix-And then out of nowhere someone hurled a joke at her.
MW-Mary doesn’t want to let on that there is no brother and that Belle has “disappeared”.
FC-“There is no Jack only Joker.”
@Anonymous #25: To be fair, Luann just took on this schedule and additional hours, which takes some time to adjust to. I would joke that Luann’s not tired at all; Phil’s just really boring. But so is Luann, which is why I think they work well together.
BB: I’ve always hated the portrayal of Zero as farm boy stupid. I’m sure he knows how to operate heavy equipment and keep it in good repair. He probably knows something about animal husbandry. He has to understand the farm markets. He probably understood sex far earlier than anyone else in the platoon and he understands the importance of hard work.
OK, let’s see . . . Zero has a M830 120×570mm high explosive anti-tank multi purpose shell and a .50 Browning Machine Gun shell, both scrounged from the tank range; an M795 155 mm shell from the artillery range; what appears to be the remains of a fin-stabilized air-launched rocket, maybe from some cross training with the close air support boys; a classic 5.56×45mm NATO round from his rifle; and a bottle-shaped casing, likely from some sort of anti-personnel mine. Once again, Beetle Bailey shows it is a fact-based comic about modern military life.
MW – So far in this visit, Wilbur has chosen not to look Mary in the eye. Either he’s afraid of the judgmental look Mary will throw his way, or he believes he’ll turn to stone if he does.
@Bob Tice: Very nice! the Drano people should use that as a song in an ad.
Beetle Bailey -The only thing keeping Zero from a more gruesome collection is that Camp Swampy will never be deployed to the front of any war.
Herb and Jamaal – Given the customer’s hesitant nature, he will be too chicken to actually give a negative review of the restaurant, or call the health department.
Mary Worth – Unfortunately, Belle’s brother is going to be contacting Wilbur soon with some terrible news. Belle has been saving some of Wilbur’s hair, toenails, etc, and he had them DNA tested. It turns out Wilbur is their brother, dropped off at an orphanage when the strict parents caught him at age two with his chubby baby arm deep in a jar of mayonnaise, and they knew the gypsy’s curse had been fulfilled.
Except it was one of those ironically worded curses, and separating Wilbur drove his fraternal twin Belle crazy, which drove an manic search for her lost brother.
Also, there is the incest. Yeah, this whole thing is a Greek tragedy in all the worst ways.
@Needless Exposition: that Belle may not be mentally competent to consent is not something that can be laid at Wilbur’s feet, as she seemed relatively compos mentis, if a little intense, up to the last couple of weeks.
Everything else, though–if I were Mary I would be asking Wilbur what was wrong with him. Seriously, how do you not even mention the fact that this psycho was also a threat to your daughter’s life in your monologue about how hard done by you are? Also, why are you heartbroken by this turn of events? What positive character traits did Belle demonstrate besides “paid attention to you?” Was she a fantastic lay?
The annoying thing is that if Wilbur were presented to us as a George Costanza-like figure, a total schlub who brings his misfortunes on himself but probably doesn’t deserve for things to go as wrong as they do for him, he might actually get some audience sympathy. Instead, Moy presents him to us as a good guy with endearing quirks who just somehow has bad things happen to him and experiences no real consequences for his poor life decisions, and so the audience despises him.
BB: Dad used to keep the casing from a 2-inch shell of some sort on his desk as a pencil holder. It’s now on the desk in my study as a pencil holder.
H&J/Dustin: Same topic, two different lousy jokes.
9CL: ew.
@CanuckDownSouth:
…as the artwork’s insanely-oversize earrings that appear on Keri between P1 and P2.
I believe those are not earrings but representative of the noise in her head (and why she can’t hear her friend’s words).
@Hibbleton: Spiderman: My Spidey sense is tingling!
Keri: My boring sense is tingling!
With Newspaper Spiderman, there was no difference.
@Tom: “as she seemed relatively compos mentis, if a little intense, up to the last couple of weeks.”
Her medication probably wore off by that point.
Mary Worth seems to be baking muffins every day.
A standard muffin tin holds twelve muffins.
Some days, but not every day, she has a guest over to for a couple of muffins and a meddle. During these visits, we see the guest have, maybe, two muffins. So, on average, I’d guess out of a dozen muffins per day, at most, half are consumed by Mary and her victims, um, guests.
That leaves at least six muffins per day left unconsumed. More than 2000 wasted muffins per year.
So, what happens to all those leftover muffins? Is it like Seinfeld, where she tries to pawn them off on homeless shelters and tourists?
Because, I gotta tell you, if we got a storyline of Mary and Tobey hauling large trash bags full of stale muffins into the local soup kitchens, I’d finally pony up for the Comics Kingdom sub and might even spring for the “buy a print” option.
@Philip:Yeah, this whole thing is a Greek tragedy in all the worst ways.
So, that explains the doves yesterday. They weren’t the Doves o’ Love at all, but Sid’s special “Greek Chorus o’ Doves” doing their interpretive Dance of Doom. It’s all beginning to make sense. The only thing that DOESN’T fly is why @Sid, Agent to the Animal Stars! has been keeping the Chorus quiet. Great Zeus! He could be making a fortune with those things–they’re way more useful in the serious strips than the Doves o’ Love are.
MW: I hate nearly everything about this, but high on the list is how Avery has never bothered to touch base with the people his sister’s cray-cray endangered. How did she get away from him? How did he find her? Is this the first time this has happened? How can she be getting “the help she needs” if she’s able to escape her primary caretaker long enough to travel all the way across the country and stay there for a significant time? What, exactly, is her deal? A halfway decent person would have hung around long enough to explain this stuff–but then again, a halfway decent person would have been mildly curious about it rather than moping about how he’s no longer getting sexytimes. I think Wilbur and Avery’s similarities run more than skin deep.
Six Chix – It’s Tuesday Chick’s arch-nemesis, Minor Inconvenience Man! Bitten by a radioactive minor inconvenience, he now has the proportionate strength of a minor inconvenience!
@Banana Jr. 6000: I kind of want to see Belle get the Wide Sargasso Sea treatment, revealing that her “madness” is the result of neglect, exploitation and abuse from her family and significant others. Also I want to see her burn down Charterstone or at least the Weston’s condo.
@The Quiet Man: re: JP: Red is from Wisconsin, so this is the last time we’ll see her sober.
GT: I made a joke last week about Keri’s enormous novelty earrings, but it appears that the artist really DOES mean for her to constantly wear enormous novelty earrings. I say “artist” rather than Barajas because he doesn’t have any of the other characters say “Keri….what’s up with the stupid earrings?”
9CL: At first I thought Edda had been shrunk down to midget-size by Dr. Cyclops, then realized I was looking at one of the twins in the lap of her hulking fiancé. All these couples really ARE interchangeable.
Tomorrow we may get Juliette snogging with her wimpy Professor husband, then Thursday Gran fooling around with her mummified Nazi, and on Friday one of their Pilgrim Maiden ancestors porking Wampanoag Chief Massasoit.
C’shaft: “When Crankshaft’s not around, people should be asking, ‘Where’s Crankshaft?'”–Tom Batiuk, apparently.
Dustin: “Tell you what, next week I’ll make ‘long pork’ tacos, and I can guarantee you won’t complain about the results. Now, what should we watch tonight? I have Silence of the Lambs, Sweeney Todd, a documentary on the Donner Party…
GT: I’m not sure if Keri wearing big earrings that say “RAD” is some kind of retro fashion statement or Rachel Merrill just being that out of touch with current trends.
JP: Okay, points for naming the cat “Frejya.” This mythology geek approves.
@pugfuggly: Yes, today’s Mary Worth definitely demands a reminder that Wilbur writes an advice column.
Blondie today is a strip about a character telling (not showing) someone else about a video of yet someone else watching a video.
What, Dagwood couldn’t find the famous Pet Rock Cam feed?
BG&SS: Do the animals talk in front of the humans?
FC: Putting Dolly in as the dealer will guarantee to not raise police suspicion. But she will be the first blackjack dealer ever to go bankrupt.
H&L: The Strivemores show up every so often to remind us that the Flagstons don’t have dissolute drunks’ dumps ruining house values on both sides of them.
BB – He sells M-3 shells to third world poor….
H&J – It’s squab taco Tuesday….
MW – Grateful Heartbroken Hazard Help Brother Seeks D-Cup Damsel – Object Crazy Good Time….
Adios Amigos, DJ.
“Recently, your Taco Tuesdays taste a little Greek. Because this is a pita, not a taco shell. Also, your flan is baklava. Blink twice if you owe the Greek mafia money.”
@ValdVin: Re H&L – Although today it looks like the Strivemores occupy both the front and one side of the Flagstons’ property. How long before their bank forecloses on the Thurston home and they surround the Flagstons on three sides, preparing to crush them in a pincer maneuver?
MW: I know we will never have closure regarding the defaced picture of Wilbur and Dawn, but will we ever know what happened to Belle’s luggage now that she’s been abruptly removed from Wilbur’s apartment? I can’t help but wonder about it. There could be some interesting items stashed away in those suitcases, besides lingerie and what-not to titillate Wilbie. There could be vials of cyanide and botulinum toxin, martial arts weapons like num-chuks and morning stars, piano wire, a dead bunny, etc.
@Needless Exposition: My biggest fear is that this is going to somehow turn into a quest to find Belle to find true love for Wilbur.
Not that it’ll work, but it will be substantially worse than anything that has ever appeared in this strip…
@Schroduck: You might say he’s about to be ground Zero.
Beetle Bailey: To be really funny, this needs an extra panel where it turns out the “shells” that Zero collects are actually live ammo and get accidentally set off. Preferably with a great many fatalities.
Herb And Jamaal: I’m not gonna pretend a strip where Herb and Jamaal actually have a customer for once instead of just standing having nonsensical conversations is a response to me mocking the comic for that in a comment several weeks ago. But it’d be really funny if it was.
Mary Worth: I really should’ve known that Moy’s conclusion about the Belle Saga was that Wilbur was the only real victim and deserves all the sympathy. Check back in next week when a building burns down and kills hundreds but the comic spends a month on Wilbur processing his grief over how a bit of ash from the fire wafted onto his sandwich while he was eating several miles away.
@TheDiva: I couldn’t figure out if Keri’s earbuds were leaking music out and RAD was part of the lyrics.
@Peanut Gallery: Then the Strivemores’ property would abut the Thurstons’ aforementioned eyesore. The Flagstons serve as a useful visual buffer.
Gil Thorp: I can’t remember if Keri is Trans or Non-Binary.
I know the comic is trying to be “with the times” but you need to take baby steps first.
Like when producing an animated film, Disney’s employees actually have to know how to draw before they get to the musical numbers.
Take for example Glen Keane, he is a very good artist. If he took over his Dad’s comic then he wouldn’t need to constantly recycle the older ones.
The joke is obviously that normal people collect sea-shells. But, isn’t collecting the casings from different types of spent ammunition a thing that people actually do? That’s a real hobby, but the comics page wants you to know that you should be ashamed of it.
@Sequitur: I’m extremely late on this, but thank you! The only thing I remember posting here was that joke art of Les Moore surrounded by other comics page women fawning over him, but hey, if it made that much of an impact, I won’t complain.
They call it his shell collection because he’d get in trouble if the brass knew he was making bongs out of military surplus.
But anyway, Wilbur man. Just an absolute trash bag of a person.
@TheDiva: Next cat I get, I’m naming her Fur Elise.
Would fit better if I had any sort of background towards classical music.
@Weaselboy: Or Wilbur turns into a pillar of salt, or gets a bill for assault. Either one is fine.
@TheDiva: That’s another fascinating way this story could go. But the underlying problem with the story is that Belle is a prop. She’s not a person we’re supposed to care about in any way. She’s a plot device who showed up so Wilbur could get his little heart broken again, so the strip could throw him another pity party. She’s a Lost Lenore. (SEE ALSO: Moore, Lisa.)
Compare this to Aldo Kelrast. Despite all his faults, Aldo was treated with some dignity – much more than Belle has gotten. The main cast went to his funeral, was genuinely remorseful about his death, and wondered if they contributed to it. Wilbur doesn’t care about Belle, other than shoving her into the girlfriend-shaped hole he perceives in his life. He even says Avery “seems to be taking care of her,” suggesting he can’t even be bothered to confirm this.
Flash Gordon: I stopped reading 9 Chickweed Lane for damn good reasons, but I admit I’m a little curious how Edda wound up on Mongo.
@Tom: If anything, whether or not Belle consented is up in the air. The truth is that Wilbur got attached (by the groin) to a woman who he doesn’t actually know. Her need for adult supervision suggests that she’s not a big deal at the generically named MegaCorp like Wilbur was told. We don’t even know much about Belle herself except her name, that she’s from Florida, has an ambiguous relationship with her brother, and that she has some unnamed mental illness. Then again, we mostly focused on Dopey Dawnie and discovered that when she’s not trying to put her hands in a new man’s pants, she’s got the mentality of a six year old obsessed with her dad.
MW-I’m sure Belle is being taken care of by top men. (cue a shot of a crate being pushed through a massive warehouse)
@Dr. Larry Erhardt: An irate reader punched her in the jaw and BANG ZOOM, not unlike Alice Kramden suddenly appearing on the Moon.
@Banana Jr. 6000: Ironically, Wilbur’s earlier words about Belle being “just a fling” were right. We know more about the woman from the dating app that Wilbur conned a free dinner out of before she made out with the waiter and the woman with the French bulldog (who may or may not have been Moy herself) than we did about Belle.
@Needless Exposition: I mean, it makes sense that a narcissist wouldn’t recognize that in himself, the real question is whether Mary will..
@Nobody: ‘Soylent Jamaal’? Way too specific. ‘Nutritious protein wafer of suspicious origin’, please.
@Ken: It’s a shame that we don’t get to see more of that advice column. I imagine that diversions into his own personal life make up 90% of it, at least.
Mary Worth – Has it ever been established that Wilbur and Dawn actually found out about the poisoning attempts? I can’t figure out if Wilbur’s “hazard” remark is referring to the poisoning or Belle’s insane threatening just before Avery ex machina arrived.
This story is a big, smelly heap of unresolved “plot” points. Oh, well, the main thing is that it’s all about Wilbur, and Mary enables it.
Between Friends – Yeah, no one will ever check and make sure that the world knows about it.
I quit following this at the end of the Benoit story but somehow got sucked into it again. I find the blonde friend very annoying, but I still wanted to know what happens with her job.
FC – “Jeffy Keane is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being I’ve ever known in my life.”
Frazz – I’m hoping for the Amelia Earhart model.
JP – “Wow, this place is clean.” What is something no one has ever said when they visit my house?
Seriously, what a dumb thing to say. Maybe it’s jet lag.
9CL – Ye gods, that last panel.
Breaking Cat News – If rabbits are so wonderful, she can take the ones in my yard. They have eaten every freaking flower Mr. Jive planted, including portulaca, which they never touched before. They even ate our basil. They better watch it – maybe we should spread the word about the chipmunk killing spree a few years ago.
Speed Bump – Is that Melody Mare? (The one speaking, not the butt.)
Herb and Jamaal: He should be less worried that customers are complaining that he switched his taco meat from beef to poultry, and more worried that they can’t tell the difference. “Is this carne asada? Barbacoa? Suadero? Lengua? Pollo? Chicken tinga? Huitlacoche? Or maybe some Impossible Burger chunks with a dash of hot sauce? The point is, I don’t know — and for that type of gastronomic confusion, I could have gone to Taco Bell!”
@Baja Gaijin: The perfect finale.
@pugfuggly: Unfortunately Wilbur has taken over as the main character and Mary’s role is reduced to doing all of Wilbur’s adult responsibilities for him so that he can harass women and sing karaoke with his daughter-wife.
@Baja Gaijin: Luann needs to eat right and exercise. She might have more energy.
@Bob Tice: Why does Zero have buck teeth, anyway?
__________________________
What’s her face from “Safe Havens” mutated him into a rabbit. Army regs made him trim his ears.
@Needless Exposition: I’m beginning to think Belle has some kind of intellectual problem where she’s mentally a child. We know she’s under adult supervision. We’ve also seen her be impulsive, destructive, jealous, and unable to control her anger.
@Baja Gaijin: Yep, that wraps it up well.
@Old School Allie Cat: Wilbur: “Well, that’s three hours I’ll never get back.”
Is Herb serving up Jamaal’s prized chicken as tacos?
HERB & JAMAAL:
“Apu, will you stop selling tainted meat in your store?”
“No…. I mean, Yes…. I mean, Uh-oh!”
–THE SIMPSONS
@Banana Jr. 6000: If she’s mentally a child, that makes Wilbur more of a skeeze. Usually I joke about Ian being the ephebophilic one but considering that the strip is revolving around Wilbur, he’s assimilating the other residents.
Come to think of it, this current storyline could easily be tweaked to have it be about Ian and Toby dealing with a Fatal Attraction type situation with an old friend of Toby’s and it would probably be a lot more interesting by virtue of not including Wilbur and Dawn. Not that Toby is a Rhodes scholar considering all she does is drink wine out of the box and finger paint.
@Dr. Larry Erhardt: #98
yes!! And…if any man can be immune to (9CL) Edda’s narcissistic “charms” it’s Flash. He will never be her thrall.
@Banana Jr. 6000: Exactly–any insight into Belle, however clumsy, would have been preferable to the absolute indifference with which she’s been handled. The psychiatrist scene in Psycho has been criticized as overlong and dramatically unnecessary, and not without cause, but at least it offers some context for Norman’s behavior and sets up “Mother’s” chilling final monologue. I’m sure any attempt by Moy to explain Belle’s mental illness would be laughable, even insulting, but I would take that over two weeks of insisting Wilbur is the most wronged party in all of this.
@The Rambling Otter: #95
I love that!
@Needless Exposition: Yeah, this story just gets worse the more you look into it. If only Mary could be bothered.
@Daisy: Ah, but due to time travel, Edda somehow is also the Witch Queen Azura . . . .
@Voshkod: Azura dresses far more modestly than the women of 9CL. For one thing, we’ve never seen her in leopard-print underwear.
@pugfuggly: Still brilliant.
@Needless Exposition: #114:
“all she does is drink wine out of the box and fingerpaint”
Hey, she also makes horsey sculptures. That should count for something.
My apologies to the Herb and Jamaal folks for misspelling the latter’s name in an earlier post.
Crank: “Do you think we should save this massive stack of at least a weeks’ worth of newspapers for Dad? And if not, what the hell are we saving them for?”
Curtis: Seeing Barry needling Greg about the health risks of coffee makes me realise there’s a running gag I don’t remember seeing for a while. Did Billingsly quietly decide that Greg has given up smoking?
DT: Okay, this is the clearest shot we’ve had of Lovejoy’s dad, and um … if you’re doing a story about how two members of the same family, generations apart, look exactly alike, maybe other members of the family shouldn’t?
FC: “And that means I get all your chips! If you don’t have any chips, I’ll take other snacks!”
MW: “While I’m glad everyone continues to never hold me to account for anything ever, it sucks that I’m not having sex any more. Oh, and that the woman I was having it with was dangerous and almost killed my fish and daughter, I guess.” Normally I put lines like this in a character’s mouth and my point is that this is what they’d say if the writer wasn’t in denial about how terrible they are. In this case, however, it’s barely even a paraphrase of what he’s actually saying.
I know Karen Moy is one of those creators who is aware that this blog comprises a fair chunk of the non-casual audience — she once let Josh know that Mary Worth merch is available — and I can’t help wondering if she keeps doing this because Wilbur nonsense guarantees ‘Mudges will talk about the strip. And I think she still thinks we see him as a lovable loser we make affectionate fun of. No. That ship has very much sailed, and then he fell off it and let everyone believe he was dead. He’s a loatheable loser and we wish everyone had been right.
RMMD: This sure is continuing to be a conversation! And it won’t get any more interesting if and when they do get round to dueting on some of Truck’s old songs, because it’s a visual medium!
@Ukulele Ike: You’ve never seen it, but I suspect she flashed Flash at some point.
INNOCENT
Ok, I post becore reading all the strips, let alone all the other comments. But I do read them after expressing myself (speak before listening, lest my Insight is not unique)
FRAZZ: Ah, author of The Little Prince, in which the kid dies.
GA: Slim learns the expense of a Free Gift.
JS: either Darren is too awe struck to play well, or his hero scares him straight. We’ll know but Friday.
@Guillermo el Chiclero: I felt like I wasn’t the only person who thought that Toby was under qualified in teaching college students art. She would have been better off teaching her intellectual equals in kindergarten but of course Santa Royale has no children under the age of twenty and she wanted to do a hot for teacher story for Toby since Ian already had one.
Wonder what Helen is doing now. Probably depressed over the fact that Ian dumped her for being too old for him. She and Toby can always try to be friends when Ian dumps Toby for being too old so he can start dating Dawn.
PHANTOM: We just got snarked. So it’s open season on the strip.
S4th: dangers of imagination. And Ted and Bettina aren’t biologically related
TG: strip missing. Has TG ended again?
@Voshkod: My too-subtle implication was that Azura wears no underpants at all.
If I was a gorgeous, nigh-omnipotent Witch Queen with my own castle, kingdom, hordes of minions, and naturally curly hair, *I* certainly wouldn’t. “You got a problem, General Tahl? Eat memory potion.”
@I speak Jive:
#104. FRAZZ: Jive, for Amelia Earhart model, check current arc in MANDRAKE.
@The Rambling Otter:
Is there a collection anywhere of all the Family Circus comics? It would be something to know which exact comic is getting reused every day, and what they did to modernize it.
@Activist: I should really double check posts because I thought you said Marmaduke and was insinuating that Amelia Earhart looked like a dog. Woof!
MW – Wilber: Dawn says Belle’s brother looks like me, but I don’t see it.
@The Rambling Otter:
Is there a collection anywhere of all the Family Circus comics? It would be something to know which exact comic is getting reused every day, and what they did to modernize it.
Sorry, technical difficulties
@Austria:
You drew that?
I had it as my computer wallpaper for months.
Thanks for the high art.
@Activist:
#129. PHANTOM: Forget the snark. We’ve got to take this one on the chin. See today’s blog by author for photos and explanation of drawings of the WW II crash site. And Mr. DePaul identifies three mysteries in story, not just two.
@Baja Gaijin: Agreed!!
So Bianca is imagining herself as Krazy Kat. She better hope her imagination doesn’t go too far ’cause that brick is going to hurt. Ignatz Mouse does not fool around,
@Ukulele Ike: Sir, this is a family newspaper comic blog!
MW: The past several days of strips, and who knows how many days ahead, make no sense unless Wilbur actually knew that Belle tried to physically harm himself and Dawn. But he and Dawn don’t know that and they haven’t even found the defaced photo, as far as we’ve been shown. Why am I pointing this out to you, the people who are already very well aware of this? Because you are the people who care. And I am so grateful to you. *sniff* It’s not like I can gabble about MW to RL friends and relatives. And my cats have informed me that they are done with listening also because I’m driving them crazy.
@Activist: That is the first time I have ever read Mandrake. My knowledge of the strip is mostly limited to the MAD magazine parody in the 1960s (repeated references to “Mandrake gestures hypnotically.”).
I do know that it’s been around for a long time. I wondered if these are reruns of old strips, but the mentions of computers and twenty-first century technology indicate that it’s current. I saw only a couple of weeks of the story, but I thought that the story doesn’t have the drama it could have, simply because it’s current. Maybe I’m missing something – was the flight 29 years ago meant to recreate Amelia Earhart’s flight in the 1930s? Using 1930s aircraft and technology would be much more dramatic and dangerous than I thought.
H&J: That “taco” appears to be a chicken pot pie with a few greens on the side, so yes, I can believe that the meat is a little “fowl” in the punning sense. Herb and Jamaal have a loyal customer in Mr. C but if they pull this switcheroo on a critic or just a rando who does Yelp reviews they’re the ones who are cooked.
MW: Man, that’s a lot of muffins to wash down Wilbur’s sorrow. If they’ve got bran in them I see Dawn borrowing the neighbors’ bathroom for a few days.
What dreadful sin did Mary Worth commit in a past lifetime that she now is compelled to spend her
“golden” years sitting on a couch listening to abject losers talk about their dumb feelings? Presumably something political?
9CL: If you want to read something that sounds like the pillow talk between two serial killers boy have you come to the right place.
C-Shaft: Anyone who may have been naïve enough to believe Pam and Jeff would be up to something more interesting than Crankshaft and Chris are has been painfully disabused of that notion.
GT: Keri Thorp continues to have a deep dread about not being the center of attention for five minutes, the idiotically large onomatopoeia earrings being only one manifestation of that fear.
JP: Weird that Sophie is startled by the cat but not by Leah’s hair being 3’’ shorter than it was in yesterday’s strip.
MT: Between the wink and the “saw what you did there”, Jules draws attention to the dad pun in two ways, which is five too many.
MG&G: This is an obvious setup to something like “then I backed up and hit her again.” Mother Goose looks disappointed that Hiram didn’t commit some kind of vehicular mayhem.
Phantom: I don’t remember hearing about this family before, so maybe they’re the ones coming in late.
Ziggy: Ask your doctor if a friend in need is a friend indeed and a friend who’ll tease is better.
@Voshkod: Still trying to figure out how Schkrade got away with letting Queen Azura moon all us family newspaper readers…
@TheDiva:
I kind of want to see Belle get the Wide Sargasso Sea treatment
Excellent reference! and I’m all for it.
GA: So here’s the thing. In Iowa and probably elsewhere, deer hunters are legally allowed to leave parts of deer carcasses off the road (not on roads or road edges or in creeks or lakes) because scavengers clean up carcasses, often very quickly. Possums, raccoons, skunks, bald eagles, and many others often join in. Broken eggs would be a scavenger feast. But knowing Slim, he was probably dumb enough to dump his eggs right in the middle of the road he was driving on.
MW: You know, we might be looking at this all wrong. Maybe Wilbur and Dawn have a history of defacing pictures. Wilbur’s dresser could have pictures of Estelle, Fabiana, Iris, Mary, Libby—all with their faces slashed. Dawn’s mirror could have all sorts of photos tucked into the frame—Jared, Dirk, Wilbur, Mary—all with their faces slashed. Maybe in the Weston household, defacing portraits is no big deal. It would explain a lot. Especially if they had multiple photos of Mary.
@Artist formerly known as Ben: re: Phantom: If they’re late, it’s not because they spent too much time packing.
“What are we bringing, dear? Family photos? Our wedding rings? Passports? Drinking water and a month’s supply of pemmican?”
”Just put my bowling ball in a carryall, hon.”
@Poteet: Libby was an attempt to sell the feline audience on Mary Worth but appears to have been too little, too late.
@TheDiva: I like the way you think! And when she burns down Charterstone, I want to see her dancing in the yard with waving arms while Wilbur weeps like a freezing steer.
@rosa: In his mind, and according to his dating profile, Wilbur looks like Zak.
@Artist formerly known as Ben: Libby is too good for the brain dead cast of Mary Worth. Her only flaw is that she couldn’t give Mary toxoplasmosis but that’s because Dr. Jeff is allergic to pussy(cats).
Crankshaft – Crankshaft lost his chance at the big leagues because he couldn’t read his own name on the pitching roster. Now he’s so literate that he does the Jumble. Sure.
He’s never been shown to do word puzzles of any kind. If he did, he would try to fit a ten letter malaprop into the five spaces provided.
I’d like to know what city puts out a week’s worth of newspapers like that stack. I don’t think the New York Times carries the Jumble. My local newspaper, like many, prints only three days a week.
@I speak Jive: There was a successful attempt a decade ago to recreate the trip around the equator by Amelia Rose Earhart (no relation) in a modern and thoroughly equipped Pilatus.
In the late 1990’s, Linda Finch planned on an attempt in one of the last flyable Lockheed Electras.
Mary Worth:
There once was a lady named Belle
Who pleasured me exceeding well
But I found out too soon
She’s crazy as a loon
Then Wilbur-clone came, now all’s well
Speaking as an Infantry vet, Zero would have no access to…well, most of those. He’s not keeping them as trophies to those he killed, no. Death itself is God for Zero.
His name got 100× more chilling, no?
MW: So is nobody in this strip going to mention that Belle’s brother looked almost exactly like Wilbur?!? Then what even was the point of that particular plot twist? There’s still a few days to rectify it, but if it doesn’t get brought up by the end of this conversation then I’m adding that BS to the strip’s TV Tropes page under “They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot” (not that the plot was ever all that good though.)
@Ukulele Ike:
Well, figuring demographics here, I’m guessing the percentage who minded getting mooned by Azura at, shall we say, minimal?
From a look at things, it’s like two more sentences before Herb asks for ‘help in the back.’
@Schroduck: I volunteered at a county hazardous waste collection about 25 years ago.
An old farmer brought in a bunch of boxes which turned out to be 40-some years old dynamite.
The sheriff came over.
The boxes were starting to crystallize.
Help was summoned
The previous year, the sheriff and I uncovered a couple of hundred boxes of arsenic used in the Depression to kill grasshoppers.
Those farmers sure kept some lethal stuff.
@Anonymous: LUANN: the problem is that Luann is claiming that the reason she’s all groggy and sleepy and yawning is that her shift was “exhausting”, but that simply isn’t true; she’s not EXHAUSTED, she’s TIRED. Her job isn’t demanding physically, it’s demanding on TIME.
I’m not gonna criticize the Evans’s writing here, since it’s completely in-character for Luann to think “exhausted” is just another way of saying “tired.” She’s been a lazy, incurious dimwit for years so of course she never bothered to master the subtleties of the English language (although that’s a pretty massive character flaw considering Luann is an aspiring writer). For a really fun time, ask her to describe the difference between strategy and tactics.
@Bryan: The only one who said anything about them looking similar was Dawn but because Wilbur has a bloated opinion about himself and doesn’t listen to Dawn, he didn’t believe it and it was never brought up again.