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Mary Worth, 7/28/09

Oh, for … are you telling me that Delilah isn’t even going to be allowed to enjoy some revenge flirting, never mind revenge sex, before having her nose rubbed in the festering singularity of human degradation that’s at Charley’s core, obscured by his smooth moves and his chest hair and his stripey shirt? Delilah is clearly not used to seeing the female form in anything less than a jumpsuit (she turns the lights off when she showers, obviously) and has been brought to the brink of vomiting by whatever piece of specialized artwork Charley has hanging in his foyer. This masterpiece is kind of hard to see, but let’s zoom in for a closer look:

My God, it appears to be a female human wearing a one-piece bathing suit! Do you expect us to believe that depraved monsters walk among us who actually collect “that sort of thing”? What do we pay taxes for if not to ensure that these sex-demons are rounded up, chemically castrated, and interned behind barbed wire in pervert camps out in Montana somewhere? Won’t somebody think of the children?

Oh yeah, the children! Charley can hang up repulsive cheesecake shots (and, worse, decadent modern art like the painting in panel two) because his love pad is a no-kids zone, which obviously makes him an inhuman devil-thing! Remember, kids are for “other people” — specifically, people who don’t live in an all-adult condo community like Charterstone, where children are specifically forbidden in rules laid down by the board. Hmm, you know, there’s another character in this strip who was married but apparently lives a childfree lifestyle … doesn’t seem the worse for it … older lady … doesn’t have her character assassinated … can’t quite place her …

Wait, I’m s sorry, I was letting my mind drift from the core message of this strip, which that Charley is a child-hating sex criminal with terrible taste in art, and that Delilah will soon enough be running away from his wall-mounted centerfolds and back to her lonely, empty apartment, where at least her virginal eyes are shielded from such horror. Let’s take another look at that painting so we can condemn it further, shall we?

You know, now that I’m looking at it again, it seems that the lampshade is almost the exact same flesh tone as the model in Charley’s awful picture. Maybe that’s what’s got Delilah so worked up — it’s part of Charley’s “ladies I have skinned” collection. “Kids are for other people, Delilah! Sure, there are kid specialists, but there just isn’t enough raw material in your average child to make a nice lamp or even a book binding. Frankly, I don’t have the patience to capture enough to meet my needs!”

Gil Thorp, 7/28/09

Hey, Gil Thorp, you know how excited I was when I realized you’d be bringing back beloved characters from the past? Well, I’d appreciate it if they weren’t from before December of 2004, when I started reading this strip. Fortunately, faithful reader dannymo has the story, which, in a nutshell, is that Marty DeJong led Milford’s baseball team to the last championship anyone can remember, but ruined his arm in the process, leading him angry and brooding and hungry for fiery revenge against Coach Thorp. I predict Gil will somehow get him to coach the hobo little league, completely displacing Ted Pearse, who will respond by burning Gil’s house to the ground.

Marmaduke, 7/28/09

I’m a little concerned about precisely what vaguely spherical head-sized object Mrs. Hitler has in that sack; I worry that it is, in fact, a severed human head, and this is part of some plan of hers to teach her unruly dog a modicum of manners. “Look, he’s got to understand that human heads are not toys! It’s the only way he’ll learn!”