What’s the matter, Hi? Are you afraid of the possibilities
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Hi and Lois, 6/7/25
Years ago, I was doing some PT for a few weeks, and at one of my sessions there was an older guy there who was rehabbing a knee injury, and his therapist was (gently) berating him because he kept going back and playing in his softball league despite the fact that she hadn’t cleared him for it. He was agreeing with her in a kind of hangdog way — he knew it was bad for his knee, but it seemed clear to me that his softball team was a big part of his social circle and missing games meant missing an important part of his life. I felt bad for him at the time, though I might need to revise that now that I know that a big part of senior sports is getting together and pissing in groups.
Rex Morgan, M.D., 6/7/25
Oh, man, remember the shitty motel where Truck had to isolate for days due to a viral respiratory infection in the spring of 2020 that somehow turned out to not be COVID? And then he wrote a song about it that went (the good kind of) viral? Well, it turns out his bastard maybe-son is staying there now, and there’s no way he doesn’t know that whole backstory, so now I’m assuming he’s documenting this entire journey-to-find-his-father for TikTok clout.
Mother Goose and Grimm, 6/7/25
You ever think about the fact that, before he became a real boy, Pinocchio’s flesh was all wood? You ever think about how creatures that eat or peck or chew on wood would do a real number on Pinocchio, if he encountered them? You ever think about how Pinocchio wasn’t technically in the Wizard of Oz, but we could put him there, through the magic of cartooning?
77 replies to “What’s the matter, Hi? Are you afraid of the possibilities”
MW: Not only is Belle transforming into a Junji Ito character, she’s also faster than Usain Bolt.
RMMD:
“You’ve inspired me to verse, ‘son.’ I’m gonna do a song called ‘I Ain’t Got No Issue with My Issue‘ !”
Wary Morth:
Bats can teleport as well?!? She’s a keeper!
Wrecks Moregone:
Check your pocket for your wallet and credit card afterwards, Lorry.
MG & G:
“My puckish creator Geppetto named me after a North American cultivar with clusters of short, spiky twigs (Latin name Quercus palustris) and after the innermost and second-smallest of the Galilean moons of Jupiter. Give up? — ‘Pin Oak’ ‘Io’ !”
RMMD: “Can I get a hug?” Most pickpockets don’t to the research necessary to come up with a great backstory.
RMMD: “I think you know the place.” “Sure do. That’s where I would have impregnated Varla!”
Hi & Lois : who is that? Is that the coach of the other team for the minor league baseball Hi is coaching? What’s the context here?
(Seriously, Hi & Lois is the strip that I’m the most worried has secretly become AI slop, and this bizarre contrivance for a joke is fueling my suspicions)************
Luann : if the irony of a book that’s 50 % the same exact copy-pasted image of a crudely-drawn dragonfly because the artist couldn’t be assed to redraw it EVEN ONCE being about the importance of putting effort in everything you do is intentional, then Bravo, Evansii.
Though it’s probably unintentional.
************
Mother Goose & Grimm : You ever think about how Wizard of Oz is often treated as a Classic Fairy Tale(tm), when it’s really closer to a series of Fantasy novels (same as Alice in Wonderland and Gulliver’s Travel)?
*aYou ever think about how Pinocchio is treated as a Classic Fairy Tale(tm), even though it was created in the 19th century by an italian journalist AS A JOKE for a “Check out this messed-up fairy tale I found” column?*b*a : which makes me wonder why The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings is never given the same treatment*b : which makes me wonder why The Princess Bride is never given the same treatmentH&L: Actually, in every league there’s a bathroom break between innings. It’s called getting up and walking from the dugout to the bathroom.
H&L: Just look at how much Hi enjoys that punchline. Ha! Old guys peeing. Do you think he has ever read Marvin? I get he would love Marvin.
RMMD: “Unfortunately it looks like my arms have stopped working. Yup, just went all numb and flopped down on the table. Dangdest thing…”
MW: I really wish Brigman had included the panels where Belle did a somersault from a standing position, vaulting over the table as her body flipped through a full rotation with apron, hair, and necklace all staying perfectly adjusted, sailing above Wilbur and Dawn to end up squarely in front of the door. I’m seeing lots of swooping action lines—the kind you have to use a French curve to get right—and an exploding star of excitement as she makes a perfect landing to block the exit. No doubt she wanted to, but Moy probably nixed the idea to focus on the interior tensions of the plot. Oh, well.
MW: 1. Scream for help.
2. Get a picture of that face. It’ll be
important for the trial.
3. Commit to getting in shape, because
HOW THE HELL DID SHE BEAT YOU
TO THE DOOR?
DtM: Kids have in-laws?
RMMD: Poor fatherless dude can’t afford The Glenwood Hilton or The Glenwood Ritz-Carlton.
@Anonymous: Yeah, Wizard of Oz was written because Baum felt that Grimm’s fairy tales were… too grim.
Despite his books are arguably even darker at times.
From Scarecrow snapping the necks of countless crows that the Witch sent to attack them, The Tin Man’s backstory of his axe being cursed and lopping off his body parts one-by-one, and especially Glinda putting an immortality spell over Oz so that no-one can age or die. So one later book had the protagonists interrogating someone who was eaten by a dragon and was a chewed up pile of flesh, a SENTIENT chewed up pile of flesh who seemed pretty blasé about it. The Tin Man’s original human body parts sewn together like some sort of Frankenstein’s monster like monstrosity, among other examples.
But also, I love those books! :3
H&L: Genuinely cannot tell if Hi is supposed to be laughing in that second panel or delivering dialogue that was mistakenly left out of the panel and no one noticed and/or could be bothered to fix it
DtM: Last week I made a joke about child marriage in Family Circus. I was relying on the absurdity of such a thing to provide the humor; but seriously, how does this strip make any sense unless Margaret and Dennis actually are married? An adult’s in-laws are their kid’s grandparents or aunts and uncles.
H&L: This is literally the first and only time I’ve seen Hi laugh, and it’s about old men peeing.
MW:
Incoherent Plot Police Officer 1: Maybe they’re not home.
Incoherent Plot Police Officer 2: That sounds… incoherent to me, keep ringing that doorbell.
H and L:
“Why are you wearing a red baseball cap instead of our team’s blue cap, anyway?”
“Hi, I’m weighing the possibility of going as Ohio State coach Ryan Day for Halloween this year! — whattaya think?”
MW: Dawnie and Wilbur tangled each other up allowing Bats to slalom around them. Or scared out of their minds father and daughter forgot the layout of their own place. Or there is a missing key frame. It is on the floor along with the scene where they figure out the food is poisoned.
DT: Evil twin? Other dimensional version ?
RMMD: cue Wanda to return and see truck hugging this guy. Turns out she’s related! Next week RMMD genealogist at large.
Mary Worth Missing Final Panels: Which would you like to be the actual doorbell ringer?
@Anonymous: Hi coaches Ditto’s Little League team, so that’s presumably the coach of the other team, who we’ll never see again because the writers lack object permanence with any characters beyond the family, the Thurstons, Foofram, Sunbeam, and Chip’s bandmates. Which has been happening for long before LLMs were a thing.
I am a Hi and Lois Art Defender–not only will, say, Blondie never do a long shot of the house, it’ll never even show characters head and shoulders like today, let alone reversing the angle between panels–but nobody told the colorist that Ditto’s team has blue caps but red jerseys. Though there’s another strip in my archives with red hats. Maybe they got a cease and desist from the Mud Hens.
“I’ve been playing in the senior league.”
“What’s that like?”
“Pretty nice, actually. Our baseball field is in the traditional diamond shape, unlike this one. You ever wonder why there’s just a sort-of-circular blob here at third base? Also, we pee ourselves after every inning. I think you’d like it.”
@Baja Gaijin: I’m going with the monkey riding the ostriche. Or is that Doug riding on Limu Emu trying to sell insurance door-to-door…?
@Baja Gaijin:
Pure genius.
RMMD — “I’m staying at the Glenwood Motel. Contact me there.” With what, a telegram? Doesn’t maybeTruckJunior doesn’t have a cell phone?
Dustin: Panel one is dang cheeky for a family newspaper. But I do look forward to Helen reminding Ed “I wore a bikini like that when I was her age”.
@Veronica: Are you the same person as Veronica!?
So, HtH is doing mermaid erotica, and Slylock Fox is doing Tentacle Porn. It must be Bernice Halper Fan Service day.
Oh? Bernice and Shannon just finished their fish/insect vore graphic novel? What is the world coming to?
H&L – I thought the graybeard was Thirsty after going on a longer-than-usual bender.
Dustin – Dustdad wants to do his daughter, doesn’t he? Did he just send her a dick pic?
Rex Morgan MILF Diver – From the resemblance, isn’t it more likely that Junior is Rex’s scion? Or are his sideburns intended to throw us off the trail?
CS – Lillian is a loathsome hag.
MG&G – Peters has been watching old Match Game reruns. Now do Cleopatra and her asp!
Don Abundio, translated:
“I brought some of my favorite records for us to listen to”
“Cool!”
“I just hope it’s not a bunch of old sea shanties!”
[On record: “FEELINGS, NOTHING MORE THAN FEELINGS!”]
“… On the other hand, there’s a lot to be said for a good sea shanty…”
@richardf8: And morcock69 is still missing.
Blondie-“When you first get to camp don’t go to the showers,” Elmo’s elderly neighbor down the street says.
Hagar the Horrible-Lucky Eddie sleeps with the mermaids.
RMMD-I’m convinced that this guy is a gigolo who sees Truck as a potential client.
RMMD-The first hug will be free after that Truck has to pay.
MW-Just toss Belle to the side.
FC-I figured the diamond ring would have been pulled out of something other than PJ’s mouth.
MW: Maybe Wilbur could, I dunno, raise his voice a little? This is *his* house, and Belle is a guest. It’s not her place to decide who can and can’t visit. Even if we ignore the maybe-trying-to-kill-your-entre-family thing, this is just rude. And Wilbur is just spineless.
@Banana Jr. 6000: He showed more anger towards Libby, than he does Belle here…
I guess in Moy’s mind, with Libby it”s “okay” because she’s a cat. Belle is a human woman and Moy probably doesn’t want Wilbur to come off seeming like a Misogynist/Incel by harming her or ordering her around.
(despite he has perfectly valid reasons for protecting himself and his daughter in his own home)
@Charterstoned: #11
…a necessary sacrifice of visual art to narrative as this riveting tale is limited to a finite number of panels. Moy *assumes* we will “fill in” the missing action – that’s how much she respects her readers.
[trying not to choke on my coffee at the last seven words…]
Comfort Food:
1. CURTIS: Mac and do cheese sandwich on white bread, moistened with mayo, is the perfect gut buster to put a boy to sleep. And here id go wake up my tastes buds with yellow mustard.
2. MW: new residents at Charterstone should be given a choice– do you want your doorbell to ring Ding Dong, Ding-a-Ling, or the less exciting TwinKie buzz?
LUANN: Bern actually found interacting with a kid more fun than han reading.
BB: with a work attitude like that, Beetle won’t last more than 30 days in the rigorous USArmy
FRAZZ: Getting lost is my most fun way to explore.
JUMP START: And the problem with an indelible marker is…?
PHANTOM: But for your efforts to avoid OMM’s vision, Mountain City would now be destroyed and KJ to would be a guerilla who refused to come home a be #22. Let’s hope the path of “Fate” has Already been permanently changed.
R.MMD:
“You’re nothin’ but a sperm donor
Absent all the time
“You’re nothin’ but a sperm donor
No support, not a dime
“You ain’t no good
And you ain’t no dad o’ mine.”
@Baja Gaijin: #20
Hahaha!!! Wilbur would certainly welcome the giant sandwich! I’d love to see Belle open the door and be devoured by the shark. But the monkey riding the ostrich perfectly captures the idiocy of this story.
@Daisy: Well… after what Xunise did to that sandwich, Wilbur would be a very very brave man.
MW: look at Belle grin enticingly. Read a great Proverb a couple days ago, “To do evil is like sport to the fool.”. 10:23
@The Rambling Otter:
I dunno, on one hand, Wilbur is enough of a slob to not care he’s having someone else’s sloppy seconds, on the other hand, Wilbur is self-centered enough to be upset and refuse anything that’s not fresh and specially-made for him, whether it’s a sandwich or a woman (to say nothing of both combined).
MW missing panel:
[Poof!]
“Dad where did she go?”
[Poof!]
“Eek! She’s a witch!”
RMMD: Oh man…what if this is a big con to get blackmail/internet clout/whatever, orchestrated by our favorite ne’er-do-well Rene Belluso?
….Trick question, it will still be boring and stupid.
MW: Our guess is that it’s Belle on the other side of the door, because she’s so darn lightning fast.
MG&G: Considering how long the original Collodi material has been in the public domain, it’s surprising that no one has a Pinocchio body horror story before now.
C’shaft: I know Batiuk reverse-engineers his strips to justify the lame punchline, but this may be the first time he reversed-engineered the entire week for this one stupid joke.
Dustin: “Also, you’re a disgusting creep with a patriarchal presumption of ownership of my person who is incapable of looking at a woman without objectifying her.”
Luann: Bernice reveals her secret ambition to make a ton of money in the young adult genre fiction market and then use her massive wealth to promote her virulent transphobia.
MT: “Clods”? What are you, a Regency-era countess berating her servants?
MW: Just wait her out, Wilbur, it looks like she’s going to succumb to that Joker venom any moment now.
Phantom: “Just so long as you remember your fate is to spend your life in a jungle cave carrying on your family’s colonialist vigilante legacy.”
Pluggers think casual acquaintances want a detailed answer to the question “How are you feeling?”
Mother Goose and Grimm-And that’s why should wear protection.
Hi and Lois-“I have Ed Crankshaft for a teammate. How do you think it is?”
The only thing that one cannot do between innings is play baseball you stupid man.
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: His mom is making him clean up his room in the basement.
Hi and Lois: Who is this beloved (“beloved”?) new character? Hi’s dad? Thirsty’s dad? Why does the stench of cheap scotch, stale cigar smoke and piss emanate from him right off the screen? I don’t care, he is me, I am not sticking around to hear any answers!
Rex Morgan, M.D.: The newly discovered father and son embrace. Cody, in the clinch, checks for a wallet. Truck checks for a kidney. The readers check for a plot. No one finds anything.
H&L – Hey – yesterday I got a double – my teammates were in awe when I pulled off both a dump and a piss….
RMMD – We’ll always have cheap motels….
MG&G – All will be well when the wizard dips him in creosote….
Adios Amigos, DJ.
Mary Worth: I dunno, Wilbur. If I were you, I’d just let Belle continue to block the closet door. She seems content.
Pluggers: When you’re asked how you’re feeling, and you start organizing a list of answers to that question, you’re an egotistical jerk.
MW: remember Stelles penpal revealed by retired FBI agent to be a scam artist– Arther? Mary used that app to find Belle’s true identity.
Commenting takes me now only three times as long. Though I’ve had this phone two months now, it still keeps adding words and changing words. We are currently in no danger from artificial intelligence.
@erdmann: #45: Where were you? Back in the 70s there was already a Pinocchio based p0rno film. “It’s not his nose that grows!” read the ads.
@TheDiva: #43: Only if Rene Belluso is running the DNA lab that Cody is so eager to use.
SF: A welcome return to when the strip was funny and relatable and not lazy lamp shading and breaking the fourth wall.
GT panel 4: “…and hello, I’m Marty’s tongue! It’s time for Milford baseball!”
Crankshaft – Oh, please. Lillian is just phoning it in. She made more of an effort when she ruined her sister’s life.
FC – This doesn’t add up. They went over those floors (I don’t see any carpets) with a fine tooth comb and didn’t find the diamond, yet PJ picked it right up. Either that, or PJ has had the diamond in his mouth the entire time, which is unlikely. In any case, Thel is so relieved that she won’t have to get into her happy juice stash.
Frazz – Add getting lost to the list of things Frazz is smug about.
Rex Morgan – Oh, come on. No way is Truck a hugger.
The buried lede is that Cody is so distracted that he’s stretched his arm beyond normal, disclosing that he’s actually a member of the Legion of Super Heroes.
9CL – If Big Pharma ever runs out of mares for hormones for HRT, it looks like Edda has an excess supply of hormones.
@Bob Tice: Ahem. That’s THE Ohio State.
@Baja Gaijin: I vote for the bear. I hope he’s hungry.
@31 The Rambling Otter: Having read your synopsis of the Oz series, I’m surprised no hack Hollywood director made it into a low-budget series of movies released a week before Halloween.
@46 TheDiva: on Mark Trail: Who’s the guy with the big spiky beard? Why hasn’t Mark punched it off?
@57 Guillermo el chiclero: Rene Belluso is Cody. Oops, did I forget a spoiler alert?
RMMD: Is the Glenwood Motel the only place in town to stay? There’s a small town in Texas on Interstate 10, Winnie, midway between Houston and Beaumont. It’s a podunk but even it has four or five major chain motels right at the interstate exit. Maybe the Glenwood Motel is the only place in town where room service offers hookers and drugs.
RMMD: Cody needs those DNA results pronto. He’ll get a big discount on the rates at the Glenwood Motel if he can prove he’s related to Truck.
No DNA test needed. Of course he’s not Truck’s son, he has a real name and wasn’t called “Car” or “Jeep” or “Dodge Caravan”. Either way, good on him for realizing Truck is the kind of man who would be familiar with a run-down motel in town.
DT: Oh, good, we’re setting out that Lovejoy and The Mysterious Informant Who Looks Like Lovejoy And Gave Lovejoy’s Address aren’t the same person quite early. I was very afraid that we’d have Dick investigating Lovejoy for weeks before this was presented as a shocking reveal.
MW: People are asking how Bats got to the door before Wilbur and Dawn. Given that her body langage has now gone from “homicidal lunatic in a bad thriller who has dropped the act” to “eldritch abomination in a human suit who has dropped the act”, I think it’s pretty clear she just slipped through the Forbidden Dimensions.
Peanuts: When I was a kid, I was fascinated by the occasional Peanuts running gag of a paper being pushed onto someone’s face and their nose pushing through and holding it in place, to the point where I experimentally proved that, even if you cut a slot for the nose first, it still doesn’t work. I guess it’s more plausible with a beak, except Woodstock’s beak looks as blunt as the other characters’ noses.
Pluggers: One of the fun things about being on the autistic spectrum is having to learn from first principles that phatic communication (what Terry Pratchett called “the noises that mean ‘I am human and so are you'”) isn’t actually intended for the exchange of information and, for example, when someone says “How are you?” they just expect the response “Fine, thanks. Yourself?” Pluggers, on the other hand, know that, they just don’t care.
@65 Horace Broon: on Pluggers: In other words, Pluggers are disease-ridden inconsiderate bags of ignorant fat.
@23 Charterstoned: You got it! It’s the Limu Emu…and Doug!
@38 Daisy: Yeah, ol’ Wilbie would be all over that sandwich like Belle on a Wilbie. [shudder] What a horrible mental image.
Pluggers have the WORST pickup lines ever. As if butch Plugger lady’s gonna get femme Plugger lady into bed with that opening line.
Dagwood’s new disappointment.
@The Rambling Otter: @Banana Jr. 6000: Dawn could sucker punch Belle then Wibur could slap a sleeper hold on her. Problem solved
DT: We’re either getting an Evil Twin plot, or the return of master villain Waxyface, the man who can take on anyone’s identity. Either way, I may take several weeks’ vacation from this strip.
FG: This little game has been going on in Castle Syk for years. Old Flash does something naughty — Queen Azura t0rtures Old Flash within an inch of his life. He never gets tired of it!
(note to Team Earth: DO NOT SPLIT UP. Splitting up is ALWAYS a terrible idea. Just ask Velma and Daphne.)
Zits Spanish to English
Mother Goose and Grimm: I don’t know what kind of hardware-store fight club Pinocchio is into, but he’s clearly lying about random animals doing that to him. It’s as plain as the nose on his face!
I suppose telling a lie might make Pinocchio’s nose grow back. I’m not sure if the rest of him has any way to heal, or if he’s stuck damaged forever. Think he feels the pain from it? His quest to become a real boy becoming urgent since it’s the only way he can find some relief, either through finally healing or the sweet release of death? He should never have squished that cricket, which are related to termites.
@I’m Not Cthulhu, But I Play Him On TV: Protein gets out protein!
Hi and Lois – Obviously it’s due to enlarged prostate pushing on bladders, but there is also the “7th Inning stench” for defecation. Luckily, Hi and Lois did this joke and left that out, while Marvin would have published that in family newspapers across the country.
Rex Morgan, MD – Glenwood would be the sort of city to have an old law banning musicians from being able to sleep in their nicer hotels in the city center, and sending them to shady motels on the other side of the tracks and city border.
Mother Goose and Grimm – I feel like 90% of Mother Good and Grimm fairy tale jokes are simply ideas collected by dumpster diving at Dreamworks studio for rejected Shrek ideas.