Slenderwilbur will haunt your nightmares
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Mary Worth, 6/8/25
Many of our most beloved deranged Mary Worth storylines end abruptly, with antagonists just straight up driving off a cliff or whatever, but I’m sorry, there is a lot to take in just in this single strip. The bell by which the Westons were saved was rung by … Belle’s brother? Who has tracked her down somehow because he suspects she’s off her meds, probably because she failed to check in with him? And also (and sorry, but this is much more important), he’s literally just a taller version of Wilbur? Like she spotted Wilbur across a TGIFridays in Tampa and thought, “Oh my goodness, he looks just like my beloved brother … but more squooshed! I’m gonna FUCK HIS BRAINS OUT AND MURDER ANYONE OR ANYTHING WHO COMPETES WITH HIM FOR MY ATTENTION!” Because that’s wild, possibly the wildest proposition this strip has ever asked me to buy in the 20+ years I’ve been reading it. And it’s clearly not the first time something like this has happened! “I’m sorry about this, shorter me!” Avery says. “I hope I came in time … there are no visible corpses, so I’m assuming I did, but sincere apologies if not!”
Mother Goose and Grimm, 6/8/25
The joke here is whatever, but I want to point out that it’s weird that Grimm is in the corner there watching this breakup go down. It’s a long-established aspect of this strip that it alternates between jokes involving the well-established cast of characters and sub-Far Side one-off gags. Feels like some new executive in charge of the syndicate sent down a note like “In order to reinforce Mother Goose and Grimm’s brand identity and lay the groundwork for future merchandising initiatives, every strip needs to feature one of the two beloved title characters, who casual readers definitely know by name and can identify.”
Panel from The Lockhorns, 6/8/25
Funniest thing here is that this is, I assume, their own house. Not sure if Leroy is very drunk or very sleepy — or, more cruel and therefore more likely, if he’s doing a bit and Loretta refuses to even give him the satisfaction of acknowledging that he’s doing a bit.
126 replies to “Slenderwilbur will haunt your nightmares”
MW:
I’ll say this for Belle — she makes great eye contact.
Slylock Fox-Slylock feed Max to the snake.
MW-“Do you know how many apartments I’ve gone to before finding you? There is this one old woman who I think is worse than you. She wouldn’t let me leave until I ate her muffins.”
MW-“I have always depended upon the kindness of strangers.”
FC-“I looked for you in the closet and I found one of my uncles.”
MW:
This mentally-challenged guest Belle
Has turned both their lives into hell
So what will negate
A poison-filled fate?
A Wilbur clone, dressed like a swell!
Avery has certainly done his homework: Never share life-and-death information right away – keep it to yourself until you can just show up and surprise them! Pure Hilarity – Pure Wilbur!
L’horns: Since that window has no means of being opened, I assume they’re staying in the upper floor of a hotel room or, more likely, a sanitarium.
MW: but, Belle, you forgot your toothbrush! Here, Avery, to before you go refresh yourself with a savory bowl of vegan seafood chowder.”
MG and G:
“How long of a stay will you have wherever it is you’re going?”
“That’s kind of a personal question. I guess my reflexive response would be to say ‘I myself don’t know,’ but since I refer to a specific, as opposed to a non-specific, person pronomially, it won’t be indefinite!”
BROKE: Pronouns in bio
WOKE: Pronouns in domestic dramas
MW: Considering that Guy LaFleur once acted as a bail surety for his son (and was infamously charged with giving inconsistent testimony regarding his son’s compliance with curfew), he is a very appropriate source for this week’s quote.
@Hibbleton:
#5 LOCKHORNS: What with drones, even hotel rooms on the 8th floor need curtains!
Wary Morth:
It was Mary, of course, who took the basic elementary step of Googling Bats and discovered that she’s a missing psychopathic possible (and very much wannabe) murderer, so she contacted Big Brother, who sad supposed to be Watching You but obviously had other things to watch instead.
Also, having discovered this, Mary made no attempt to warn her “friend” Wilby Hon and his daughter, who could for so she knew be already dead and turned into a stew. But she will be there all next week to soak up the credit.
Mary is stone cold, man.
Mary Worth :
a) This is getting out of hand! Now there are TWO of them!
b) Wilbur ” OH MY GOD! That man is my exact double!… Oh wait, look over there, that dog has a puffy tail!” *Wilbur proceeds to chase after said dog, giggling to himself*
MW:: “Belle, you’re off your meds, aren’t you? Well, that just pockets my square.”
Wrecks Moregone:
“Wanda, is it all right if I come out of the closet? You don’t mind, do you?”
MW: One look at those eyes and Avery knows Belle hasn’t taken her thyroid medicine.
“Dad, I think it is obvious the Belle was attracted to you because of her meds-off mania and her sublimated incestuous desire to fuck someone like her brother”
“Listen Dawn, I know myself, so I assumed her attraction was the result of some fucked-up reason. But what can you say, beggars can’t be choosers!”
@Ukranazi Stepan: *was supposed to be watching you, not sad.
Wary Morth:
Big Brother: “You can keep her luggage as compensation for any inconvenience!”
MGG: Is this drama unfolding outdoors during a purple sunset, or is it happening in the corridor of an apartment with bright green carpet?
MW: I was expecting to be disappointed by the resolution of this storyline but I didn’t expect it to completely absolve not only Wilbur (because he’s never going to learn his lesson) but Belle too. Are we supposed to find her mental illness comical because she didn’t kill anyone? Obviously she’s sick enough to want to sleep with a guy who looks like a “fun size” version of her brother but to try to kill Willa and Dawn?
It’s a good thing Dawn is as stupid as her father.
Mary Worth: Wait, so that’s how her eyes look when she’s off her medication? Then we have to assume that when she’s actually on them, her pupils disappear completely. Speaking of which, Belle does look kind of like an adult version of Little Orphan Annie — the only question is which balding man in her life, Wilbur or her brother, will be the first to go full Daddy Warbucks.
The Lockhorns: Leroy has been dressing in front of an uncovered window since he and Loretta moved into the house. Which means it’s not just their constant fighting that’s kept their next-door neighbors from being able to sell their place after 20 desperate years of trying.
MW: Mouth agape, Dawn looks at Avery and then looks at Wilbur and then looks at Belle. Belle shrugs her shoulders and says; “Incest is best.”
Some times ago, Estelle dreamed about baby versions of Wilbur. Then Dawn dreamed about turning into a female version of Wilbur. Let us not forget Wilbur as a superhero or even Wilbur as a fish. And today, we have the smarter, more beautiful version of Wilbur. The cynics among you might think this is the result of a long-running strip running on fumes and obsessively returning to a fan-favourite character to diminishing returns. But true Worth-heads know better! Moy is simply preparing the ground for “Wilbur into the Wilburverse”, presenting all the alternate Wilburs converging to fight a greater foe! I guess it will be alternate universe Aldo
MW: I have to agree with @Ukranazi Stepan. There’s got to be some backstage Mary Meddling™ here beyond the weak “have you talked about your feelings” we’ve been shown, and Mary will show up next week to explain all to Wilbur and Dawn.
Well, assuming that the two of them – no longer alarmed by the predator in their midst – don’t wander back into the kitchen and absent-mindedly eat the vegan seafood chowder.
MW:
“My long-time goal was to get a pithy saying in the Sunday quote box in this strip. For a while there, I was skating on thin ice trying to make that happen, but I knew that if I were persistent, eventually, I’d net a place. Now, at the risk of sounding puckish, I have to say that it’s better to be in the Sunday quote box than in the penalty box!”
— Guy Lafleur
Mary Worth: So, is this story over? No, Wilbur and Dawn spend all week discussing this until Dawn finally breaks down and tells Wilbur about Dirk.
Moy wrote this whole story as a vehicle for Dawn to explain Dirk to Wilbur.
L’horns: Either Leroy is super cheap or they’re still totally in love. Just saying, what other long-married couple still sleeps together in a college dorm bed?
Leroy received a curse that was the opposite of Coppola’s Dracula. God gave him immortal life but he had to spend it with his hated wife. The soul was not involved in the curse, since he already didn’t have one
MW: I’m sorry, I know this strip is idiotic and that giving it any major analysis is just playing into Moy’s attempts to generate outrage clicks, but I can’t not do it. There is literally no point to introducing Belle’s brother Not!Wilbur at the end of this plot line. It doesn’t in any way clarify her actions. It doesn’t make the audience think, “Oh, she’s crazy crazy” because we’ve been thinking that since the poisoned tea, if not the defaced photograph. The only reason it exists is for us all to realize we’ve been clowned by Moy’s ever-increasing Wilbur obsession.
Also, Not!Wilbur implies that Belle has repeatedly done murder or at least some sort of criminal mischief when off her meds, which raises a number of questions. a) If she can’t be trusted to take them, why isn’t she in some sort of facility? b) At the very least, why isn’t her “best brother ever” making sure she takes them? c) Shouldn’t she have been suffering clear withdrawal from what must be a heavy dose of anti-psychotics either in her first week at the Westons’ or back in Cancun? How the hell did Wilbur miss that? This plot is one big terrible reference to Fatal Attraction anyway, so why not have her claim that her vomiting and other symptoms are a pregnancy? That would have given an actual reason for Wilbur to keep her around for weeks and remain in denial of her awfulness! d) Why did it take Not!Wilbur three plus weeks to track Belle down? Do you expect me to believe this woman controls her own finances? Do you expect me to believe she isn’t constantly online, posting her poisoned dishes on Instagram? e) How, in the year of our Lord 2025, are people still doing “crazies are dangerous killers” plots, as if the mentally ill aren’t vastly more likely to be victims of crime rather than perpetrators? f) Not!Wilbur isn’t going to stick around and make sure no murders were committed? Not going to offer to talk to police? g) Are we even going to get any follow-up on any of this, or will Monday be a new plot entirely, and screw the people who don’t get the Sunday strips? h) Wilbur is too stupid to realize that Belle was committing pseudo-incest with him, but Dawn isn’t. Is she going to gouge out her eyes, Oedipus-style?
This is so unbelievably stupid. I first started reading Mary Worth during the Wilbur/Libby feud. That was also unbelievably stupid, but at the very least the characters had the vague semblance of real human beings. Wilbur threatened Estelle’s cat, Estelle broke up with him. Wilbur had to admit that he’d been awful to get her back, and tried to get along with Libby. Each time he acted like a self-centered moron, he suffered some form of consequences and backlash. Comparing that (dumb and bad) plot to this one is like night and day. Karen’s truly phoning it in. You wouldn’t think it would be possible to phone in a crazed murderess plot, but there you go.
Wake me up when something not completely idiotic happens in this strip (so, never, probably).
MW: Okay, I vote this entire strip transitions away from “Mary Worth at Charterstone” to “Belle on the Loose.” Way more exciting. Instead of Mary’s Meddlin’ Muffins signaling a week on the sofa and glacial movement in the plot, it can be Belle Goes Off Her Meds Again and Somehow Gets Out. Everyone is in danger! People are all wide-eyed terror, all the time, literally running for their lives! Hapless brother Avery, as Josh has pointed out, would play the Wilbur equivalent, the doofus who keeps leaving the doors open and allowing chaos to ensue. Think of the crazy story ideas that could result from this shift in focus! We’d need to find the psychiatrist equivalent of Dr. Ed Harding.
Of course, @Sid, Agent to the Animal Stars! Would have to totally revamp his contracts, as all of his clients in this retooled strip would always be in mortal danger. On the other hand, they haven’t actually been out of danger in boring Santa Royale, what with the patient loss rate at ANIMAL HOSPITAL, Wilbur, and Wilbur.
Just a thought.
MW: I am vomit
MW:
“You’re here, Big Brother! — now, where’s the Holding Company?”
@Sequitur: Dawn did try to explain the whole Dirk thing to Wilbur but completely downplayed everything that happened so Father of the Year gave her a dose of gaslighting about how she shouldn’t have to remember anything unpleasant.
MW: Even Chad Wilbur (Chilbur), much like superhero Wilbur, is still balding. Are balding schlubs Moy’s kink?
MW: “Avery, wait! What’s your mother’s name?”
MW: Belle’s been taking SOMEBODY’S meds; those teeny, tiny pupils didn’t happen by themselves.
RMMD: “Long-lost son” will be a relief compared to “Decided to come out for Pride Month.” Don’t tell me they both aren’t going through Wanda’s head.
H&L: I’ve always thought that Chip’s hair represented adolescent ennui, but apparently, I was overthinking it. It’s congenital.
Oh, and you can STITCH UP a stuffed toy.
@Lauralot: I heard something about how Wilbur has some similarities to Moy’s husband and that very thought terrifies me to the point where I hope it’s a rumor.
MW: I used to think Karen Moy was directing all the action, playing Mary Worth, but not any more. In fact, I think It’s just possible that June Brigman is now driving the strip, drawing herself in the role of Avery, and that Belle is June’s portrayal of Karen Moy with her off-the-wall crazy plots for “Mary Worth”—which, I think, means the roles of the readers of this strip are being played by Wilbur and Dawn.
I need more coffee.
@Needless Exposition: Well, time to vomit up my entire digestive tract.
MW: So far, Moy’s updating of Poe’s William Wilson feels a bit rushed as she fails to flesh out the Avery character, i. e. Wilbur’s good side.
MW: Belle wept, for there were no more Averies to boink.
Judging from the generic artwork on the wall, I think Leroy and Loretta are in a hotel room. This would explain the window/mirror mix-up, but raises WAY more questions than I’m willing to pursue.
MW: how will Mary get a victory lap out of this?
No Leroy, you’re not a vampire…
…but you suck anyway
…but you’re a soulless monster anyway
…but you drain my soul anyway
…but you are a walking metaphor for a Victorian conception of sexuality and marriage that discomforts the bourgeois Middle Class anyway
@Lauralot: Also, how are we to interpret Belle’s trip to Cancun now? She supposedly had a job, must have arranged her own travel (actually twice now), and couldn’t have had her brother with her then. Not that Wilbur or Karen Moy noticed any of this, but it’s yet another hole in this asinine plot.
@Professor Well Actually: Mary could have googled Belle – Dawn did mention Belle’s full name to her – and found she was on the loose, then notified the contact number of Belle’s location. Why she didn’t let Wilbur and Dawn know is another matter…
@Professor Well Actually: “I talked to both of those genetic dead ends so I deserve to eat at a shitty restaurant and let Jeff pretend he has any sense of heterosexuality left.”
@Arabella: I would believe in one of the Charterstone pets running a Google search over Mary who thinks that email is some sort of witchcraft.
[Me reading today’s “Mary Worth”]: That explains so much and yet so little
MW — Plenty of mudges have commented on the stupidity of the “frater ex machina” plot and I totally agree, but check out the American Gothic homage in the penultimate panel. . .
MW – Isn’t that heartwarming! Belle has a fraternal Wilbie doppelbänger….
MG&G – You’re sleeping with that impersonation pronoun next door, and you don’t deny it it… you doesn’t deny it…well you know what you did…er, does. Oh – fuck you…I know that’s just what you want…er, wants…just fuck off….
Shlockhorns – Everybody is gaslighting everyone these days, so it’s very hard to know anything other than a huge gas bill is coming due….
Adios Amigos, DJ.
Mary Worth: Wilbur, curious, nibbles the vegan seafood chowder before washing it down the kitchen sink. “Hmm, as I suspected, tastes like Borax. But is that sprinkles of Depakote I detect?”
Mary Worth. Dawn (relieved, and delighted at this crazy turn of events): “Wait. Avery, since you’re here, come on in. We were just sitting down to dinner.”
Avery: “Heh-heh-heh, I don’t think so. Bye!”
3-4 months from now Dawn and Avery are dating.
Mary Worth: “You always were the best big brother! Not like those other ones. They got what they deserved!”
Don Abundio, translated:
“The firebombing should begin soon”
“What are you talking about? Are you insane?”
“Just come with me if you want to survive”
MW: It is presumed that Dawn turned vegan as a way of making up for a storyline in which vegans were treated as absurd strawmen. So I’m going to guess in about a year, we’ll get a storyline revealing one of the Mary Worth regulars is neurodivergent and takes medication to manage their symptoms. My guess is it will be Wilbur himself, in an attempt to justify his complete lack of social skills (even though, as Elon Musk demonstrates, neurological disorders are no excuse for being an asshole).
L’horns: Leroy has just seen Sinners and is fantasizing about a world where he can transform Loretta into his obedient thrall, or at least keep her from entering his home without being invited.
MG&G – Oh, c’mon, you only hooked up with her in the first place because you wanted to see her genitives!
MW: Reunited, Belle and her psychopathic brother, Avery, can continue their multi-state homicide spree.
@Adam Menendez: In fairness to Avery, he probably didn’t have Wilbur’s contact information, but only Belle’s, and probably only used the latter to ask where she was staying so he could go get her.
@Lauralot:
My first reaction was, “So a visibly homicidal mentally ill person who just attempted to POISON two people is just going to walk away as soon as her brother shows up, with no resistance whatsoever?” OK, clearly this is an incest thing, but most people (anecdotal evidence coming) who refuse to take their meds put up at least a little fight against being removed and medicated.
@TheDiva: Handwaving Wilbur’s asshole nature by saying that he’s autistic would be almost as offensive as Autism Speaks…and it would totally be something that Moy would do.
Mary Worth: I’m pretty sure “the existence of Two Wilbur Westons” is one of the lesser-knows signs of the apocalypse in the Book of Revelation. If not, it should be.
MW – “Avery Batsfrey?” said Wilbur quizzically. “Isn’t that kind of… lacking in wordplay?”
“Maybe, but get a load of my middle name,” Avery replied. “It’s Deus Ex Machina.”
Don Abundio, take 2:
“Everyone at these parties is so shallow”
“So what do you think you are? Deep?”
“I’ll show you how deep I can be”
@Lauralot: THANK YOU. I knew there was going to be an absurd deus ex machina at the door, but I was expecting a couple police saying, “Thank God we arrived just in time, we’ve been after the Clog-B-Gone Killer for months!” That would have been ridiculous and raised a lot of questions, but it wouldn’t have been as laptop-hurling infuriating as Wilbur’s very own Herbert Powell coming in and leading Belle away while saying, “Sorry, she’s off her meds.” It’s got all the problematic and weirdly Freudian overtones of Psycho without the excuse of being a product of its time, or having the skillful direction of Alfred Hitchcock and Anthony Perkins’ unsettling and iconic performance to carry it through.
So, what the ever loving hell is going on in Mary Worth? A hard-core Watsonian would posit that Wilbur, being a made man in Mary’s operation, is protected by her and can get away with just about anything (except, of course, disloyalty) without consequences. Fixers will “mysteriously” show up to help. If one is of a Doyalist bent, one could speculate that Karen Moy has someone near and dear to her that she’s patterned Wilbur after, and while she’s not completely blind to this person’s many many faults, she can’t bear to see anything truly bad happen to him. Even if the bad things are the logical result of the scenario she put her character into and the actions she had him take.
MW:
Mary watched from a discreet distance as Belle departed in the custody of her brother, Avery, and then approached Wilbur and Dawn. The two were still distraught.
“I’m glad I could help,” Mary said gently, offering a plate of cheddar-garlic-onion-and-prune muffins, with salmon squares on the side. “It isn’t easy being subjected to psychotic behavior, even when it isn’t intentional.”
“How did you help?” Dawn demanded. “When Dad blew you off, you just backed away and let that maniac almost KILL us!”
“Yes, and now you think those muffins and salmon squares are going to make everything okay?” Wilbur added angrily. “I made a mistake in befriending Belle, I admit, and thank God everything turned out, but I don’t see you having anything to do with the outcome!” He took a muffin and downed it hungrily, then sheepishly smiled and said, “I didn’t have dinner.”
Mary smiled indulgently. “As Guy Lefleur once said, ‘When trouble comes, it’s your family that supports you.'”
“What’s your point?” Dawn asked. She was hungry but still determined not to take anything from Mary’s plate of snacks.
“I feel that I’m part of YOUR family, Dawn, and you and Wilbur are part of mine. We’re all in this together. That’s why, when I got that letter addressed to “Ask Wendy” I was able to put two and two together. I realized that MY family was in danger, so I quickly made some muffins and salmon squares, and here I am to support you.”
“Letter?” Wilbur repeated, a note of jealousy in his voice. “What letter?”
Mary withdrew a piece of paper from inside her bra. The paper had softened with perspiration, and as Mary noiselessly unfolded it, Wilbur and Dawn exchanged a significant glance. “I’ll read it to you,” Mary offered.
“Dear Wendy,
I’m worried about my insane, psychotic sister who has gotten out of the house and plans to kill some schlub she met in Cancun. I haven’t seen her in weeks, and just today I discovered that she had left her meds which keep her just stable enough not to kill. And I mean, just barely. To be honest, I’m not sure she should be living at home, but A Place for Mom doesn’t take sisters, especially when they’re proven homicidal maniacs, so we’ve kept her here in spite of her issues. I did get a postcard from her from some place in California called Santa Royale, and she mentions a guy named Wilbur Weston and his daughter, Dawn, who supposedly live in a condominium called Charterstone. I suppose I could have used the interweb to find them, before it’s too late, but then I thought, hey, I’ll Ask Wendy! I should mention that the postcard was a mailer advertisement for the condo, and it had a picture of some old lady on it but the eyes were poked out with an ice pick, and that made me wonder if I should be concerned. What do you think I should do? Signed, Worried Brother.”
“Wow!” Dawn breathed. “Did you write an answer?”
Mary smiled indulgently. “Not right away, dear. I thought about it for a few weeks, though, because these things must be handled delicately. Then I decided to get in touch with Worried Brother, but of course that takes time when there’s no identifying information to work with. When that didn’t pan out, I just figured it would be a good idea to post an answer, and hey, presto! The situation has been resolved.”
Wilbur, his mouth full of another muffin, gave voice to his professional curiosity. “What did you write?” he mumbled.
“I simply said, ‘If you’re talking about a young woman who never blinks, and whose multi-colored hair looks like it was chewed off, she’s at Charterstone right now. You should come get her before she eats Wilbur’s goldfish and kills my tenants. I think she’s gone off.”
“But–but she tried to eat Willa over two weeks ago!” Wilbur exclaimed.
Mary smiled indulgently. “These things move slowly, Wilbur. Avery had a few things to wrap up before he could come to Santa Royale.”
Dawn nodded. “Well, that explains it. It’s hard to drop everything and leave, I guess.”
Mary held out the plate of muffins, and Dawn took one. “That’s right, dear, I think you’ll enjoy these. Heh heh.”
@38 Lauralot: Are you a sea cucumber? On the Internet, no one knows you’re a sea cucumber.
MW: Wilbur is thinking, “Is that how I could look if I exercised a little and went easy on the Pinwheel cookies? I mean, I’m not going to do any of that, but would it be theoretically possible?”
MG&G: It’s possible that this scene is taking place in Mother Goose’s house. Like, the strip isn’t bringing in the revenue it used to, so now she has to rent out rooms to make ends meet. My and I are just a couple of her tenants. And now, they’re probably moving out, so Mother Goose (who has no kids that I know of) will have to find someone else to take their place. It’s all such a hassle. Goddammit, can’t people just go back to reading the newspaper again?
‘horns: I think it’s funny that, even if Leroy decided right then and there to jump out that window, he wouldn’t fit.
Mary Worth: Don’t come a-knockin’ if the Uber’s a-rockin’ (with disturbing incestuous boinkin’).
MARY WORTH: Wilbur (a minute later): “You know, Dawn…I’m really going to miss Belle. Especially the part where she had sex with me.”
MARY WORTH (2): Ok, I know the rest of you were surprised by these revelation, but if you had read your cheesy teen horror novels from the 90’s like you were supposed to, you would have been able to roll with the punches like I did (like seriously, I could have sworn that half of the Fear Street or Point Horror books I’ve read ended exactly like this, with a Deus Ex Familia coming out of the woodwork to gently escort the unstable antagonist back to “the clinic” or wherever.)
MW: One-Armed Jim had a relationship with Dawn because she looked just like his dead sister. Belle had a relationship with Wilbur because he looked just like her living brother.
Karen Moy has issues, man.
@Astroboy: Dawn and Wilbur should take one of those genetic testing kits to not only find more doppelgängers but to find out which chromosome they’re missing.
C’shaft: The only thing good about today’s strip is that it’s a Sunday installment, which makes me hope we’ll be spared several weeks of Mopey Pete and Mindy proudly defending their token acknowledgement of Pride Month in an arc that includes exactly zero queer people.
JP: Aren’t you moving, Sophie? Shouldn’t you be employing a transoceanic shipping service rather than trying to cram everything into your softside?
RMMD: Truck, you’re what, sixty, sixty-five? You’ve admitted to multiple marriages in addition to being a musician famous enough to tour regularly, with everything that implies. If Wanda hasn’t figured out you’ve likely got children and might possibly even have one or two you’re unaware of, then her skull is serving no purpose beyond being a support structure for her beehive.
@Lauralot:
To be fair, Wilbur is used to women holding their temples in distress and running off to the bathroom to purge after copulating with him, so he probably couldn’t tell anything is unusual there.
MG&G: Judging by his expression, Grimm was added to this panel to indicate My farted.
MW: What.
Of course MY is possessive! She’s completely dependent on their partner who has the only articulate arm and hand between the two of them. How will she eat or bathe herself? How will she call for assistance or operate the doorknob to leave the house, as he’s about to do?
She was the love of his life, but now I is sentencing her to a slow death. Improbable as it may be, Grimm’s presence here for this scene is appropriate, as it’s very grim indeed.
@2+2=7: Also, there was an episode of “The Proud Family” where Suga Mama (the cool sassy grandmother) was dating a man her own age, and they genuinely fell in love, got engaged, and were just about to get married when orderlies showed up crashing the wedding, saying that this man was mentally ill and had escaped from his retirement home (he believed it was still the 1940’s) and they had to take him back cancelling the wedding.
While that guy wasn’t dangerous, I believe it still (maybe) fits the scenario.
MW – Deus Ex Slenderwilbur
9CL: Eyeroll and a sign. Water, water, water. Edda in a an impossible position just to show her legs. Her expectation is to have her daughter sit on her legs so that she can neck with Amos under water. Bonus: Wouldn’t a diving board be farther from the water than the length of a human trunk?
MARY WORTH: I do think people are taking Belle’s suggestion that this is here brother way too literally. This is “Big Brother” here to take back to “the funny tee-hee farm” where they inject her with “happy juice” that makes her feel all warm and fuzzy inside as the soft voices tell her that way is peace and slavery is freedom….
Just saying that Belle has obviously lied about a lot of her background, so her words might need to be taken with a grain of salt. She probably also has a “cousin” who she’s just taking “dance lessons” from (“Today we’re learning the ‘horizontal mambo!'”)
@Needless Exposition: Although “Belle as Author insert” explains a lot.
I’m all in for The Further Adventures of Wilbur and Won’tbur.
Who will have sex with Belle?
Who will be brutally murdered?
Who will fall off a cruise ship and survive?
Who will keep their bad comb over for life?
Who will be elected to the Schlub Hall of Fame?
Who will annoy readers for decades to come?
Wilbur or Won’tbur?
Ugh. Pronouns in Mother Goose and Grimm. Why do comics have to get political?
@But What Do I Know?: And that’s the Dick Tracy mystery solved, isn’t it?
@richardf8: It would make for some good tongue in cheek humor if Moy is finally losing what little marbles she had by making up all these Wilbur centric stories.
@Baja Gaijin: Close! A starfish.
MW-And so they were saved by oh let*s say Bizarro Wilbur.
@Ukranazi Stepan:
Perhaps she was told not to approach the woman or the residence herself. Further, the police and the medical staff may be outside the building.
Tomorrow will tell.
MW: if Skinny Wilbur believes Belle is dangerous when off her meds why wouldn’t he get police involved?
MW: Moy really missed the opportunity to name Not!Wilbur “Gallant.”
@Charterstoned: Excellent writing. I will say I absolutely love your Perry Mason’s.
@89 Roxanne Lucille Jones: “Tomorrow will tell.” I seriously doubt it. Mary’ll be blathering by the pool about a new resident while Toby imbibes alcoholic Potato-Ade by the tall tumbler.
The brother ex machina is just one of many Ass Pulls that has been pulled off to absolve the actions of the Charterstone cast. After all, Belle not facing any consequences means that Wilbur doesn’t have to face any consequences for starting this whole mess in the first place.
@Tabby Lavalamp: Whatever Wilbie, Wilbie; The future’s not ours to see….
@2+2=7: You better get in touch with the people, big brother – and make them understand. Cuz I can make shit out of it….
This is the best Mary Worth has been since Aldo Kelrast.
I like SlenderWilbur’s laid back energy about the people his sister nearly murdered…”I hope I came in time…don’t eat anything, mmkay?”
DT: Bold choice getting the closest thing you have to a suspect to help search his own building.
HtH: Every time they do a Lady Godiva strip, I complain that the whole point of the Lady Godiva story is that she wasn’t a habitual nudist; she asked her husband to lower the taxes he was setting on the townspeople, and he challenged her to ride through the town naked because he thought she wouldn’t do it. I guess they are including the tax-protestor aspect now, so at least that’s something.
FC: “Mommy! You’ve overrun your allotted time for paying attention to people who aren’t me by nearly seventeen seconds!”
MW: Avery Batsfry? Did his parents, who are the same people who chose to call their daughter “Belle Batsfry”, choose the name because it sounds like “aviary”? She’s got bats in her bellfry, but he’s got a birdhouse in his soul.
Two hours later, Wilbur suddenly says “I wonder if Belle’s employers at Megacorp know about her issues?” Dawn sighs, and prepares to explain it to him again.
Popeye: It’s always tricky when someone’s doing a strip about an interest of theirs (which I’m pretty sure wrestling is to Milholland) to make sure it’s comprehensible to someone who doesn’t share it (see Gearhead Gertie for an example of failure). So I’m happy to say I don’t know anything about wrestling, but I recognise two out of three parody names. I suspect “Big Saddy” is a deeper cut outside the UK, though.
RMMD: Truck’s got some thinking to do, so he’s heading out to sit on his thinking bench. That’s next week’s entire run of strips sorted, I guess.
REX MORGAN M.D.: Truck: “No Wanda you misunderstand. That’s just…er…well…um…one of my fuckbuddies and we were just arranging our next Grindr date. (Phew, I think I got myself out of that one)”
REX MORGAN M.D. (2): You know, half the time I suspect this strip exists just to make me appreciate the utter insanity (literally, as we’ve recently seen) of Mary Worth plots. (“Hey kids, did you want all the baffling incomprehensible character motivations of a Karen Moy joint, but flattered by the giant Slab of Mild-Mannered Rockabilly to be rendered into gray, dull mush?”)
Truck didn’t wants to keep his newfound son a secret from Wanda for now (Wanda is really taking her relationship red flags with a side of ketchup, ain’t she?) So naturally he has this easily-to-overhear discussion (complete with public hug) at her place of business (well…it would be easy to overhear if Wanda wasn’t kept busy serving Toby Cameron’s grayscale figurines that suddenly appeared in her normally empty diner.) And, despite already letting Wanda know that he’s been married multiple times, he can’t tell her one of these unions produced a child because…I guess it would be a huge scandal if a “popular” musician with “throngs” of fans engaged in (gasp) fornication (and to be fair it certainly is shockingin the schlubby world of Rex Morgan M.D. where “Meatloaf Mondays” are about the level of stimulation these people can handle.)
@wesccov:
Brooke just mails it in repeating the same themes over and over again. It was either this or a badly drawn cat spread out over multiple panels
@Anonymous: Here, Puff, Puff, Puff!
Germans refer to this entity as “der Vilburganger.”
9CL: Regular readers know that holding Edda’s legs down is an impossible task.
Got a chuckle from today’s Crankshaft, but am wondering just how many imported goods a pizza joint buys?
MW: I guess it’s part of the Slenderman mythos that he can shapeshift into terrifying forms, but I never imagined anything like this.
Love love love love love that silent look between Dawn and Wilbur in panel 4. They’re just as baffled as we are!
Why is My upset? I is leaving You, not leaving My.
I posted twice this morning but it never appeared. This is a test of the Emergency Posting System.
I’m getting a Senor Wences vibe from that penultimate Mary Worth panel.
“Let’s go home now.”
“S’okaaay.”
“Back to Orlando.”
“S’awriiight.”
@Little Blue Bicycle: Oh good, now I can point out that if NotWilbur and Wilbur are half-brothers, perhaps due to their randy father, Dad not only favored NotWilbur but Wilbur has been involved for weeks with his unmedicated half-sister. Which is another reason why Wilbur shouldn’t be alive.
Slylock Fox: I guessed the answer correctly, and then some.
“Weigh Slylock. Have Slylock pick up the snake and then step on the scale. Take the reading. Try to get the snake off Slylock before circulatory arrest occurs. Or not; time to find out who your real friends are.”
Luann: I liked this one. Actually setting something up helps; it wouldn’t merit a chuckle if it were a single panel (looking at you, Family Circus) or the characters didn’t have any discernable personalities (Hi & Lois, also FC).
Gasoline Alley: Are all the funny people in Gasoline Alley just off-panel? If only they were characters.
Okay, with facit in hand, I see we just have to take the “Mental illness: Causes, symptoms, treatments and stigmas” subject and put it on the high shelf out of Mary Worth‘s reach. Boy, there’s so many subjects here we might be better off digging a pit for the comic strip to stay down in. . .
MW – This is one of the drawbacks of ridiculously on-the-nose character names: What if you have to introduce a relative who has the same last name? They could at least have given Belle some brothers with wacky nicknames like “Baseball” Batsfrey or “Vampire” Batsfrey. Dick Tracy, for one, knows how to do this kind of thing!
All Avery Batsfrey would be good for is hosting a TV special called “A Very Batsfrey Christmas.”
@ValdVin: This indeed is pretty good (gasp) but the characters Hi and Lois do too have personalities! Lois is an anxious perfectionist, Hi is crippled by well-earned feelings of inadequacy, Thirsty’s appearance of bluffly benevolent alcoholism covers up his inconsideration for anything but his own appetites, Irma is perpetually bitter because see under Thirsty, Chip is an actually benevolent lump who is going to have intimacy issues his whole life because of his repressed knowledge that Thirsty is his real father, Ditto is an incipient manosphere crypto bro, Dot is an intellectual bully who resents that Ditto is in more strips than her even though she’s smarter, Trixie is watching, watching, quietly observing, waiting for the day that she can pour all this suffering into an epic summation of the human drama, coming soon to Archive Of Our Own dot org.
BTW, today was a great day for Dark Hi And Lois enjoyers.
Say what you will, Belle brought huge tracts of land to Charterstone, and Wilbur’s “life”. I hope the popularity of the Belle Batsfrey (we really should have anticipated psychiatric meds being involved) story arc prompts Brigman to bring more super-hero style female character art to the strip. If you know what I mean.
@Bob Tice: I’ll say this for Belle — she makes great eye contact.
So did Moe Howard. Nyuk, nyuk, nyuk.
MW: The Apron Theft Gang plays the long game, but they’ve made off with another kitchen garment!
@Lauralot:
MW: Laura, thanks for compiling all the weirdness. In my decades of work often with people who are mentally troubled, I’ve never seen anyone on or off meds whoacted like Belle .
That may be the point, Belle is just a laughable caricature. Note how many more comments and clicks to the strip got than when it does a serious arc
GA: Are there really parts of the United States where religious institutions compete in a “funny sign” contest? How did all these backwoods Voltaires end up in the clergy? Or does the Diocese pass on quips authored by professional joke-writers? And how does this levity go over with the more Apocolyptic sects?
”’The bells of Hell go ting-a-ling-a-ling/For you but not for me.’ See you here on Sunday, on in Tartarus later.”
@Bob Tice: Belle gives new meaning to the term “beady little eyes.”
MW: next, Dawn begins having the hots for Avery.
We’ve got Ohio and Michigan spending Sundays commenting on coming comics. Any other Big Ten school showing the value of their degrees?
FG: “Fate” is interrupted. Let Phantom knows it’s possible .
@Activist: I mean I know I’m giving Moy’s stupid attempts to gain attention more mental energy than they deserve, and I know this is far from the first offensive portrayal of mental illness and it will be far from the last, but still. Still.
Yes, there are people whose mental instability can lead to homicide or death by negligence. Andrea Yates and Romechia Simms come to mind. But literally no one who came across either of those women in the midst of their psychosis would have thought they were normal, reasonable people. Neither of them could have successfully gotten themselves to Cancun or California or wherever. The only reason death occurred in those cases was either due to having no support system (Simms) or being neglected by the people who were supposed to be caretakers (Yates).
It isn’t until today (attempted fish killing/obviously poisoned food) that Belle has been anything other than passive-aggressive outwardly for at least three weeks. Even in the midst of this obvious mental break happening now, she was still making excuses regarding Willa, which is not how someone acts in a state of psychosis. Yates called the police and confessed after her murders. Simms also made no attempt at concealment. Meanwhile, Belle has been trying since Day One, when she was far more lucid, to commit murder, and has been concealing her actions the entire time. That is not the behavior of someone who is out of touch with reality. She acted with foresight and malice. But now she’s behaving like a Looney Tunes depiction of insanity, and we find out she’s off her meds, whatever they are, and that makes it all okay I guess? Ridiculous. Offensive.
I’m not sure why I expected any better from the strip that gave us “women’s shelters are crime dens to be avoided at all costs,” but there you go.
MW: next, Dawn begins having the hots for Avery.
We’ve got Ohio and Michigan spending Sundays commenting on coming comics. Any other Big Ten school showing the value of their degrees? I went to Iowa
FG: “Fate” is interrupted. Let Phantom knows it’s possible .
Mary Worth: I have absolutely no reaction to this beyond WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK