She needs to “duck” more so she doesn’t hit her head on things
Post Content
Mary Worth, 1/12/25
This Mary Worth storyline is sadly all too realistic in its depiction of emotional abuse and manipulation. But it’s extremely unrealistic in its depiction of someone who isn’t wearing her usual corrective lenses. I’m sorry, if Dawn’s vision is so bad that she’s just squirting ketchup all over the table in a vague attempt to season her fries, I refuse to believe she has any ability to see anything other than vague colors or shapes, or has any idea where she is or who she’s even talking to. I was also going to say that the transition that got us to “Duckgirl” isn’t realistic either, but I guess I need to keep in mind that Dirk is extremely stupid, so I’ll allow it for now.
Daddy Daze, 1/12/25
I swear that I am usually capable of processing a deliberate incongruity in the fictional world of a comic strip as a “joke,” but my least favorite instance of this is when an animal or some other entity that shouldn’t be able to read or write at all can, but is bad at it (probably the canonical version is the Far Side “CAT FUD” panel). That’s why I kind of approve of this strip, in which the Daddy Daze baby, who we are meant to understand is capable of advanced cognition that he communicates in a series of “ba”s, appears to have produced a professional-quality pamphlet, and hasn’t just handed over a piece of paper with squiggles all over it. Of course, you all know my theory that the baby is just a baby and the Daddy Daze daddy is insane, but nothing we see here precludes the possibility that the daddy produced the pamphlet himself in some kind of fugue state.
Hi and Lois, 1/12/25
Do you ever feel envious of Trixie, who lives outside the world of adult responsibilities and even childhood fears and enjoys a simple existence with her best friend, the light of the Sun itself? Well, it turns out that actually she perceives all sources of light and heat as separate conscious and jealous entities, and is constantly caught in their complex web of social relations as they jockey for status. Sounds real stressful, honestly, so maybe we should rethink our attitudes about her life.
Shoe, 1/12/25
I was about to make fun of Shoe for saying you can’t make money on the Internet, but then I remembered that he’s a newspaper editor, so he probably knows from pretty hard experience about not making money on the Internet.
144 replies to “She needs to “duck” more so she doesn’t hit her head on things”
Has Shoe’s desk always been a trashcan? I guess it’s easier to balance on a tree branch than a real desk would be, but it gives the strip a different vibe, and I’m not sure I approve.
MW-Watch it, Dawn. Dirk’ll report you to school management.
RMMD-Have you considered giving women a try?
It’s a shame The Worthy Awards aren’t around anymore. Because P4: “If it looks like a duck….” would be a strong contender for Panel of the Year.
Dirk’s sudden shift into violent, red-faced rage in the penultimate panel is best read in a “death metal” growl!
MW – As usual, Moy couldn’t be bothered to come up with a plausible causation for a character’s actions, in this case Dawn not being able to wear her contacts.
In real life, if BOTH of Dawn’s eyes were THAT infected for MULTIPLE days, she would have high-tailed it to the doctor by now and started a course of antibiotics. And learned to wash after she wipes.
Then again, Dawn IS incredibly stupid…
MW: Once again, how is a vision problem that bad corrected with contact lenses? There must be an audible squeak every time she blinks.
I would’ve imagined Broke In Butte’s question would be more appropriately addressed to Ask Wendy.
Shoe: Dear Broke,
There are plenty of ways to make money on the internet. For example, if your butte is already broken-in, might I suggest starting an OnlyFans account?
JP: Sure enough, Sam goes straight to Alan’s house for a week or two of “I can’t be-lieve you did this!” and “I’m… I’m sorry.” It’s the biggest waste of everyone’s time possible (especially the readers), so naturally Marciuliano is all over it with a drunkenly slurred battle roar and a belly flop. Oh well. At least we might get some more wacky retconning to tide us over.
Luann: I had to look this up, but sure enough there was once a use of the verb “crown” that meant to beat someone over the head. Pretty obscure usage, but let’s go with that over my interpretation of this threat which involved something more… anatomically challenging. (Then again, who knows? The Evanses are into some really weird shit.)
MW: given that Dawn is legally blind how important is it that Dirk is gorgeous?
MW: yes and how much longer can this keep on, given that there’s a serious problem here and Dawn appears to be unhappy about it?
@jroggs:
Luann: I had to look this up, but sure enough there was once a use of the verb “crown” that meant to beat someone over the head.
Pretty common usage in the Three Stooges shorts
SHOE could have suggested saving on overhead by mooching off a neighbor’s wi-fi, since that’s apparently what he’s doing. Unless he has some kind of treethernet.
MW: Since Jared was mentioned early on, I half expect him to gallop to Dawn’s rescue. But what, realistically, is he going to do; squirt ketchup in Dirk’s face and run?
RMMD: Get out there, Summer! Messrs. Brees, Skwash and Campe await you!
MW: I’ll assume Dawn squirts ketchup on the table due to nervous clumsiness from fear of her abusive boyfriend. It’s the only thing that makes sense other than she’s “white cane” blind.
H&L: No snark today. I really like this one. Maybe it’s this cold winter morning affecting my mood. I like the realistic detail of Hi using a log carrier, and the panel where he’s joyfully reaching down to pick up his little baby is really sweet, as is the contentment the two show in setting by the fire.
Alright, enough of this sappy sentimentality. Back to my usual cold, black-hearted snark.
This Mary Worth storyline is sadly all too realistic in its depiction of emotional abuse and manipulation
Um, sir, I believe you are confused. If Mary Worth has taught us anything, it is that these behaviors are “endearing quirks.”
@astroboy: The entire Weston clan is “unlucky at love”, demonstrated many times over. Sad.
Shoe: ‘Start an OnlyFans. Not only will you make money on the internet, but you’ll learn the real meaning of “Broke in Butte”.’
@Tom:
Disturbing, isn’t it? If Moy & Co wanted to help people they would make this series a PSA on how to help people stuck in toxic relationships. But they don’t, so they won’t. [I hope I’m wrong.]
RMMD: Tell me more! Tell me more!
RMMD: Summer is perimenopausal which in some cases can greatly reduce sex drive. No problem. Doctor Rex can prescribe topical estrogen which will help with that and reduce dangerous UTIs.
Ha, ha, just kidding. What ever Summer’s underlying issue is it won’t be resolved medically.
MW Maybe Dirk slipped something into Dawn’s drink and she’s about to pass out, or at least be more amenable to going to his apartment for a “good time.”
Rex Morgan, MILF Diver – I first wondered if Summer realized that women have no obligation to change their names. Then it was revealed that her last name is Knight, something I never knew nor cared about. Here’s hoping she meets a guy whose last name is Fuckfest.
I am familiar with the CAT FUD Far Side cartoon, but I never knew – and still don’t – what Cat Fud is or what the spelling-challenged dog meant it to say. So after Josh referenced it, I did what any logical person would do and googled Cat Fud. There are Reddit pages on that topic with people saying they didn’t know what it was until their 10-year-old niece explained it to them.
So I didn’t feel so stupid anymore for not knowing, but I still don’t know what Cat Fud means. A little help here?
MW: Dirk tells Dawn to go sit in the car while he finishes his lunch in peace and not to waste gas playing the radio. She complies.
Not snark just sad reality of serial abusers.
H&L: Trixie Flagston, infrared radiation junkie.
MW: Did Dawn drive herself there?
JP: So Sam went to Alan’s house right after meeting with Yelich, which means Sam and Yelich’s breakfast lasted all day long, since it’s dark now. Hope they left a nice tip.
MW: Dawn no doubt blames herself for upsetting Dirk and hopes he will forgive her. Because, you know, he’s so dreamy.
CS: I imagine that the only reason that somebody who just needs some kind of income would not want a job where you work for an hour in the morning and an hour in the afternoon and then spend the rest of the day drinking coffee and reading the sports page would be prolonged exposure to Crankshaft.
MW: For as much as Brigman likes to recycle art and draw house pets in physically impossible yoga poses, she is quite skilled at depicting facial expressions. And seeing accurate depictions of fear, stress, and upset on Dawn’s face throughout this is making it flat out uncomfortable to witness.
Duckgirl is the worst spoof of Babygirl. He’ll make her crawl on the floor and eat a bag of breadcrumbs
MW: Duckgirl.
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: At the risk of missing your sarcasm, the simple explanation is that the dog is trying to lure the cat into the dryer with the words “cat food.”
Today’s Mary Worth confuses me.
As Dirk says to Dawn “Get your problem fixed” by which I interpreted that Dirk was concerned about her stumbling around blindly, THEN comes the next panel where he declares that he has complete control over her.
Mary Worth: Dirk is a past version of Wilbur, somehow flung forward from the past.
Thanks. And no sarcasm there – I really was that clueless.
Mary Worth: So, before turning physically violent (wait a week), Dirk is warming his victim up with the emotional abuse of calling her “Nerdgirl,” “Stevie Wonder,” and “Duckgirl”? Well I guess we can see where his warped personality is coming from. He’s frustrated: he’d like to be clever, but. . .
H&L: Hi has amassed pile of uncovered logs in the middle of winter, and imagines starting a fire by lighting them directly with no kindling.
Today’s comic is Trixie’s hallucination while dying by hypothermic exposure.
MW: Wow, that escalated quickly. Dirk apparently seems to be operating on the scammer model where you deliberately include obvious red flags so only complete morons who you can easily string along are roped in, only in this case, he’s gone almost straight from negging to “I control you!” without even trying to do all of the usual abuser prep work, which only someone with literally no spine whatsoever would accept.
Ahahahah, it’s funny because Dawn is in an abusive relationship! Wait a minute, that’s not funny, that’s horrifying! Are you crazy Moy, you cannot make Mary Worth suddenly realistic and depressing?!?!
MW – I refuse to believe she has any ability to see anything other than vague colors or shapes,
This is actually a pretty good description of my uncorrected vision. I, nonetheless, would by this time have squirted that entire bottle of ketchup, full force, at the vague flesh colored blob from which the vitriol was emanating.
Dawn is a doormat part (there really needs to be a cardinal number for Aleph Prime to count this high).
Shoe: Today’s comic dedicated to the influencer community on TikTok.
MW – “The one who cares the least is obviously constipated, cuz they don’t give a shit.”
DD – It makes me think of that party gag where they put a baby doll and a diaper on a platter, fill the diaper with bean dip and use it as a buffet table centerpiece – hilarious….
H&L – Burn baby burn – Flagstone to inferno – burn baby burn – burn the mother down….
Shoe – I’m about to lose my Tic-Toc gig. How can I serve my Chinese overlords now….
Adios Amigos, DJ.
H&L: I’ve come to accept Trixie sitting alone all day in the damaging ultraviolet rays of the sun. However, the thought of her crawling around near a roaring fire with no fire screen is a little unnerving to me.
@Hibbleton: As jroggs said, archaic. Of course I remember that usage too, but that Tiffany should be using it is an example of how badly they write. Of course their target audience probably remembers the Three Stooges as shorts that ran between the newsreels and the feature at the movie theater.
Blondie: I guess depending on your inclinations. This is either the worst or best booty call ever.
DD: The brochure just says “ba ba ba” all over it, and Daddy is interpreting it, like he does the kid’s speech. So he has learned to write, but only the first two letters of the alphabet, which is still pretty good.
MW: If she shot ketchup all over him, and then said she mistook him for a basket of fries, and called him Mr. Potato Head, this would be a lot more effective in a worm-turning way. But we all know Dawn’s worm is never going to turn. It’s going to take Mary’s platitudinous counsel to get Dawn out of this one. Dawn is at something of a disadvantage in this relationship, because she’s the one who went all Tex Avery cartoon wolf over Dirk the Bowler.
But when WILBUR is abusive to his girlfriends (and girlfriend’s cat) and stalks them… that’s “endearing quirks“
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: I only vaguely remember the cartoon, but my recollection is that the dog was labeling something lethal to cats “Cat Food” in an effort to off the cat.
MW: Assuming the quote is about a two person relationship, it should be the “less” or “lesser.”
That is all.
Don Abundio, translated:
“Ah, this is idyllic!”
“Now I understand why you wished you could be a tree, Polonio”
“Yeah, I guess so…”
“But I really never thought about the hammock part of it!”
mary worth – no one has asked how dirk is affording all these dates when he only works PART TIME at the mall . you would have thought the roast beef platters would have broke the bank two weeks ago
From yesterday:
Guillermo el chiclero
January 11th, 2025 at 10:38 am Reply
GT: Sweat from her wrestling practice, my ass. Wouldn’t she have showered before going home? By the looks of that whitish goo I’d say Keri was giving her boyfriend a handjob in the car.
**
Reminds me of the penguin whose car was acting up so he took it to a mechanic, who said it would be about an hour to diagnose the problem. The penguin went across the street to a diner and came back in an hour. The mechanic said, “Looks like you blew a seal.”
“No,” said the penguin. “That’s just mayonnaise.”
Slylock: First seductively blowing a harmonica Cassandra and then how to draw a sex doll cowgirl, Weber is really feeling it today.
Curtis: I always believed that the animals on Noah’s Ark were just normal animals that had no exceptional awareness or ability and had to be captured to be put onto the Ark. Is this story with the chimps actually supposed to be a metaphor for persons of color? I know that would be incredibly racially offensive but what other explanation is there for what he is talking about?
@richardf8: Thanks. Maybe this is a reflection of where my mind is all the time, but all I could think of was that it was supposed to be CAT PUD.
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: A lot of Far Side jokes can be this to people, I cite the infamous “Cow Tools” joke as the peak of incomprehensibility.
Also, to quote a Simpsons joke, where Homer finds a Far Side Calendar, flipping through the pages.
“I don’t get it. I don’t get it. I don’t get it. Hahahahaha…. I don’t get it.”
Shoe should have just replied “Feet pics”, but then I realised that they are birds, so I don’t know whether there is a market for “claws pics”
@Anonymous: Classic Animaniacs did a Noah’s Ark cartoon, a very overlooked gag, is where Buster and Babs Bunny from Tiny Toons show up on the ark and say their introductory catchphrase.
Buster: I’m Buster Bunny
Babs: I’m Babs Bunny
Both: No relation!
Noah: I should hope not… this is a kid’s show!
The overlooked part is that I only recently realized, that beloved childhood cartoon characters Buster and Babs Bunny are not only officially put into a Sex/Incest joke, but the fact it’s confirmed that they came to the ark to get it on.
MW: My guess is that this arch ends with Mary saving Dawn from this abusive relationship while at the same time making sure Dawn understands that this actually is her fault.
“Mary, my abusive boyfriend keeps calling me ‘duckgirl’!”
“Dawn, I know it’s weird, but sometimes you need to accomodate the desires of your partners, even if you think they are bizzarre or not very masculine”
“What has this to do with being a ‘duckgirl’?”
“Oh ‘duck’! Sorry, I thought you said ‘dickg…'[BANNED for lewdness and/or transphobia]”
No joke, if Wilbur comes home and kicks Dirk’s ass, we will forgive him a lot. Like, a lot!
MW: Dirk, please don’t be mean to Dawn. That’s our job.
RMMD: I got it!! They’re gonna name Summer’s soon-to-be-adopted Pet “Smoke”!! “Summer and Smoke”!!! That’s genius, Mr. B! We have some premium Gray clients available now for your selection.
I know you said “don’t call us, we’ll call you” – but I hope all is forgiven about the unacceptable fruit baskets….
MW: Wilbur walking back from the airport, wearing a sombrero, arms loaded with luggage, clumsily bumps into Dirk knocking him in front of a city bus is probably the only solution to this story line that doesn’t require real insight.
@Giant Pondering Otter: Oh, Animaniacs has done much worse, like the “fingerprints” joke.
MW: I want to sympathize with Dawn in this situation, but she’s gotten herself into so many dysfunctional relationships that I have to believe the common factor is her. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me seventeen times or eighteen times in spectacular fashion, the shame has been on me for a while now.
Daze: I’m not 100% convinced that there even is a baby. Or any of the other characters, for that matter.
H&L: There’s no Hi like competent Hi. Usually, I’m like, “I don’t know what Los sees in him.” But today … today I see it.
Shoe: Shoe is written for the rapidly-dwindling audience that still considers the internet a fad. Once the last member of that audience finally, finally dies of extreme old age, Shoe will only continue for another 10 or 15 years. Meanwhile, Curtis will continue to comfort those who still consider rap music a fad. And Snuffy Smith will do so for … electricity, I guess? Do they have electricity?
“I’ll do what I please and you’ll do what I say”. Mary felt a sudden disturbance in the force: someone was breaking into her turf!
@Hibbleton: Of course not! That’s what diner meatloaf and the novelty hit of roots country C-listers are for!
@richardf8: I’ve heard myopia described as seeing the world in extremely low resolution, which is a pretty accurate description of my experience: things are recognizable but very vague and lacking in detail. There are a lot of things I can’t do without corrective lenses (drive a car, read or watch anything more than a few inches from my face, perform delicate surgery*), but the only people I know who might randomly stumble into objects need a cane and a service dog.
*To be fair, I can’t perform delicate surgery with corrective lenses, but that’s more of a skill issue.
H&L: To Hell with Sunbeam! You know where he is right now, Trixie? Down in the southern hemisphere, shining on some trampy Australian baby and leaving you in the cold and dark. Fireplace may be less exciting, but he’s steadfast.
MW: The problem here isn’t the depiction of an abusive partner (which is rather good), but Mary Worth’s allergy to subtlety. Dirk, the abuser, must be abusive at all times in order to let people know that he is terrible, without exhibiting any of the more appealing behaviors that might manipulate Dawn into staying with him. The only way that this is possible is if Dawn has the self-esteem of a tube worm and is just grateful for any kind of….you know, never mind, it still works.
“The one who loves the least controls the relationship.”
That should be “the one who loves less,” unless you’re talking about polyamory…
DADDY DAZE: I noticed that no one is complementing the daddy here for his display of parental “competence”. Why…he’s even studying through a “how to raise your baby” guid and everything! (“Tip #1: Leave delicious choking hazards for your proverbial infant in easy-to-access places….”)
C’shaft: What, you just want the school board to announce a solution without parental input? That will just result in a lot of angry parents loudly complaining to the board and anyone else who will listen, negative press coverage, and being forced to walk back the decision and send the whole thing to committee anyway. At least this way you get to the tedious bureaucracy part quickly.
Dustin: Funny how the writers only seem to empathize with Dustin when he’s complaining about things they hate.
Luann: Clan Evans would absolutely ask a sexual assault victim what they were wearing.
RMMD: No, it sounds like something out of a fantasy novel. (Keeping one’s maiden name is, of course, far too radical for this strip.)
June Brigman is a capable artist who has to work on a daily strip deadline but I believe if she can afford the time she will put more effort into a panel and truly shine if the subject is something that truly interests or amuses her. This is why Dawn squirting ketchup onto the table is one of the best images we’ve seen from Mary Worth in months.
***
Broke in Butte is struggling to find a good job with decent pay so he’s reaching out for ideas. It was a mistake to contact the out-of-touch legacy media, as Shoe clearly demonstrates, but it could have been worse. At least he’s not a crypto bro.
Mary Worth: Okay, so Dirk is indeed supposed to be an abusive piece of shit and Moy isn’t portraying his treatment of Dawn as good or anything. Genuinely scary that it took this long to become clear, but whatever, now we can get to mocking Moy’s hyper-neutered idea of what domestic abuse is like rather than her warped ultra-conservative sense of morality.
Daddy Daze: Why is the baby approaching his father from behind with an evil smile? Is he planning to jam a knife into the guy’s back while he’s distracted reading?
Hi And Lois: Yet more proof that the writers of Hi And Lois don’t know infants are and think them to be some breed of cat or perhaps even iguana.
Shoe: Oh man, this one absolutely REEKS of “the writer found out that OnlyFans exists and they are fucking seething about it but totally not in a pathetic jealous way I swear”. Soon we’ll probably escalate to Shoe spending Sunday strips screaming about women these days being whores and harlots because they’ll sell naked pictures online but won’t send him any for free nor sleep with him even though he’s a famous comic- uh, newspaper writer.
Mary Worth: There’s a scene in 50 Shades of Grey where the couple is negotiating a contract detailing their dominant / submissive relationship, and he says something like “The submissive must eat healthy foods regularly and take care of herself” (which is about as close to “sexy dialogue” as that ridiculous movie ever gets). And you think, “who is this guy to tell her what to do with her life?,” but then you also think, “although her character as written is kind of an idiot-baby in the form of Dakota Johnson, so maybe she actually needs that kind of instruction.” And that’s kind of what’s going on here. This guy Dirk is a horrible d-bag, but Dawn obviously needs corrective lenses and has trouble with contacts — she probably should consider LASIK. I mean, it’s not as if she’s done such a great job of living life with just herself and Mary Worth in charge; maybe it’s time for someone else to take the wheel.
Hi and Lois: Trixie is fascinated by things that give off light and heat? Just wait until she encounters an incandescent bulb! (Just kidding, that will never happen in her lifetime.) (Speaking of things that shouldn’t happen, Hi, please don’t let your baby crawl around right in front of an open fireplace while you’re setting a fire, you crazy neglectful idiot dad!)
Shoe: The internet is simultaneously the greatest productivity aid and the greatest time-waster in human history. But the comments sections make it all worthwhile!
MW: The server comes to the table. “Excuse me, I couldn’t help but overhear. Why did you call this woman Duckgirl?” “Glad you asked! It’s from the saying that begins, ‘If it looks like a duck…’. I wasn’t referring to her per se, but to the appropriateness of my previous demeaning nickname for her.” “Oh. Thank you for clearing that up; it was going to nag at me all day. Please enjoy the rest of your meal.”
“For *#£! sake Dawn, get your problem fixed!” Heartbreaking: The Worst Person You Know Just Made A Great Point”
@richardf8: Hey now, let’s give the target audience some credit. Maybe they remember the Stooges from when Officer Joe Bolton ran them on Saturday mornings, hunched up 3 inches away from 12-inch screen of their B&W Admiral TV set with heaping bowls of Kellogg’s Sugar Smacks balanced on their laps.
@Ettorre:
[Picutres ultimate schlub Wilbur attempting to ‘kick Dirk’s ass’]
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHA! [Deep breath] AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
[Composes themselves] Wait, you were serious?!
BWAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! [pounds table with tears flowing]
@TheDiva: Re: Mary Worth: To be fair, Moy kinda has to drop the subtlety so we don’t look at Dirk and then conclude “Oh it’s just Wilbur* with muscles.”
Incidentally, the thing that is getting to me with this storyline is that Dawn is doing all this debasement for a guy she just met. Like even when women like Estelle are nagged (I mean “convinced”) to go back to Wilbur it’s usually due to a remembrance of “fun times” throughout the years. Dawn has none of that history and is putting up with this simply because Dirk has a nice ass (even with his head completely up it.)
*Or one of Dawn’s other loser boyfriends.
Well the first appearance of today’s Mary Worth brainyquote in the Internet Archive is in 1989, Weathering the Storm, by Dan Clark, “America’s leading high school speaker” (and according to his wikipedia article, later a contribution to the Chicken Soup for the Soul series). This appears in a chapter that is presented, in the book somehow, as seventy-five “quotable quotes” under the banner of “thoughts on the business of life by Doug Davis,” none of them with the slightest attribution. A good few of which are to be found with brainyattributions but no proper citations in the Forbes scrapbook of thoughts on the business of life, which is a real turducken of misattribution and outright plagiarism, and someone should kick Clark in the nuts for it. However this quote isn’t from the scrapbook. And none of the rest of the paragraph seems to show up anywhere, except insofar as “break free of these chains we call love” is ganked from Erasure’s 1988 hit “Chains of Love.” So my guess is that Clark made this up and slipped it into a collection of quotable quotes, kind of like Borges putting the fake imaginary being A Bao A Qu in among the real imaginary beings of The book of imaginary beings? Except infinitely crappier?
@The Quiet Man: Although, now that I think about it, if Dawn is now ‘Duckgirl’, does that make Wilbur ‘Duckman’?
Maybe he can confuse Dirk into submission with acidly delivered observations about the modern world.
HI & LOIS: Um…guys? Have you ever considered that Trixie is just a budding pyro? (“Aww, this scene is giving me the ‘warm & fuzzies’! Or maybe that’s just Trixie playing with matches again.”)
Mary Wormtounge: Dawn isn’t just squirting ketchup on the table. She’s performing her famous Joe Gould impersonation. Dirk could call her Professor Seagull if he wasn’t so stupid.
Daddy Days: The brochure is just squiggles. Count Screwloose interprets them the same way he deceivers his infant’s constant babbling “Bas.”
@Ettorre:
Agree. It’s so sad that I’m actually hoping that Mary will swoop in and save the day.
FC – Billy prints his name in the snow with a stick.
Sure.
Frazz – The insufferable little shit is critical of pedantry. No one can accuse him of self awareness.
Rex Morgan – Let’s just skip to the part where Summer’s new boyfriend likes roots country. It’ll still be boring, but we will miss the ultra boring lead up.
Mary Worth – This is really heavy handed, but I do like the penultimate panel. It’s reminiscent of I’ll report you to school management.
Hi and Lois writers, I thought you had been ignoring my letters about how nobody in the strip can be allowed to feel lasting joy, but you redeemed yourself at the last moment! Well done!
@Banana Jr. 6000: #63: Oh, Animaniacs has done much worse, like the “fingerprints” joke.
Or the Roger Ebert/popcorn butter joke. Of course, Ebert did slag them first, so it was clearly a case of revenge.
@The Quiet Man: You get it all backward, because you don’t get the character. Wilbur is not a pencil pusher who is scared of conflict, he is not Dustin’s dad or Hi. Wilbur is a very angry, very drunk middle-aged white man with a passion for boxing and the delusion of being a tough, manly man. He will never be an elegant fighter with martial art training, but he is a mean brawling bastard who will never give up from a fight no matter how many punches he gets. By the end of the fight both he and his opponent will be covered in blood, but he will be the last man standing because of his endless experience in suffering pain and a stubborn determination to never back down from a stupid decision. “Why don’t just give up?!?!?!” Wilbur, spitting a couple of teeth: “I didn’t hear no bell!”
MW: I assume Dirk will lead Dawn and the rest of his family of broken and compliant women on a murder spree.
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX:
You’ve gotta tell ’em! Soylent Cat Fud is people! We’ve gotta stop ’em somehow!
I hope my students don’t figure out that presenting me with a poorly-attributed proverbial quote is like scattering grain in front of a vampire.
@BigTed: #74: Trixie is fascinated by things that give off light and heat? Just wait until she encounters an incandescent bulb! (Just kidding, that will never happen in her lifetime.)
What? How old is Trixie, 50 or 60? I’m sure she’s already encountered an incandescent bulb.
@Giant Pondering Otter: Is that the one where Gary Larson said he also didn’t get it – that it seemed funny to him at the time but then he couldn’t figure out why?
This is like Elaine going to the New Yorker and asking about a cartoon (to the guy who played Mr. Bentley on the Jefferson’s).
@TheDiva:
Ah, but they already did.
There was a high school strip where Tiffany was in the bathroom with her friend, complaining about the endless sexually harassment she was getting from Les, asking why he doesn’t take “no” for an answer, when Crystal (her “friend”) pointedly looked and Tiffany and her outfit and suggested “Maybe because he keeps seeing ‘yes'” (See, get it? Before Stef existed, Tiffany played the role of the “Slutty” Cheerleader who Had It Coming! She’s a “bad girl” who doesn’t deserve agent nor consent in the Evansverse! Ha ha ha?)
RMMD: “I thought about marrying Mortimer Eve, but that guy is such a douche.”
FG: Hot Witch Queen is a day drinker! I knew she was the right Mongovian girl for me.
JP: ”I figured it best if I came right over after the breakfast meeting, but instead I drove around in circles for eleven hours since, as you can see, it’s dark out now.”
BF: I need to give up the Sunday strip. If that image of monkey-grin Blonde Friend in the Carmen/can-can outfit pops up on my screen one more time I’ll vomit eggs Benedict all over the breakfast nook.
MW: Dawn needs to take a deep breath and calm the fuck down. The first few days of any 24/7 total power exchange are difficult for the prospective kajira, but if Dirk is the seasoned Gorean I believe him to be, she’s in good hands and she should thus embrace her new existence rather than fight it. Becoming adept at a few submissive poses and positions that he tells her are pleasing to him will be a good start. I’d recommend the Inspection Pose as her first lesson, but it’s really up to Karen Moy’s vision for where this is all going.
@Ettorre: You raise an interesting scenario, but I still don’t see it. If this were Keith Bellend, maybe, but not our favorite non-up-nostril showing schlub.
Wilbur probably fancies himself a tough guy thanks to his feline abuse and affinity for watching boxing greatest hits compilations on VHS (and have we already forgotten ‘Wilburman’?), but he strikes me as the ‘mouth writes checks his body can’t cash’ sort who if he ever did get into a real (and I mean REAL) fight with someone who actually has muscle and probably a good foot and a half in height on him, he’d be Beetle-Bailey’d on the sidewalk before you could say ‘endearing quirks’.
Given the Weston’s apparent serious vision problems, all Dirk would really have to do is land one good, glasses-breaking punch right to Wilbur’s face, then just stand back as Wilbur stumbles into traffic swinging wildly at whatever big mass he can make out.
[Huge SUV comes roaring down the street}
Wilbur: HA! Coming back for more eh? Bring it on you big baboon!
SQUISH!! [or should I say SPLOOF?]
@Ettorre: The counterpoint to that (besides Wilbur being unable to even intimidate a cat) is Wilbur’s comically neglectful parenting style, as detailed here: https://joshreads.com/2016/05/not-paying-attention/ (or even in this very storyline where once again Wilbur peaces out for an extended “work trip”/vacation, leaving Dawn all alone for the holidays.)
@The Quiet Man: I don’t think we are meant to understand Dirk as physically fit. He’s drawn as bulky, but all young males in Mary Worth are depicted the same, even Jared or Wilbur himself. Hell, Tommy is depicted as bulkier than most and he had his body broken by lifting a heavy box. The Worthverse obeys moral logic, so physical strength is a function of moral worth
@2+2=7: That’s because, according to the narrative, Dawn was not really in danger while now she is
RMMD: “Summer? I barely know ‘er!” — anonymous mathematician
Dawn is yet another example of how we so often recreate our parents’ marriages. I’m sure at some point in their courtship, Wilbur sprayed ketchup everywhere (probably while wearing his glasses). Dawn’s elegant mother’s skin turned from alabaster to red as she haughtily declared “I’ll do what I please, and you’ll do what I say.” Cut to wedding bells.
@White Rabbit: The U.S. Department of Energy banned the manufacture and sale of most incandescent bulbs in August 2023, and they had been hard to find for years before that. I suppose Hi might have been buying them up and hoarding them all this time, but that seems more like a Pluggers thing.
@BigTed: @White Rabbit: But if your point is that Trixie is actually a 60-year-old AARP member who only looks like a baby (which I just got), then you’re absolutely right.
@Ukranazi Stepan: @jroggs: @Schroduck: @Tabby Lavalamp: Broke Butte Mountain?
@The Breathtaking Bonehead Brothers: I hope she marries Doug Fister.
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: I hope she marries Doug Fister.
But, enough with the Broke-in Butte jokes.
@2+2=7: LUANN: This is the same high school where Les would rough up younger students for their lunch money (also known by the legal term “strong-arm robbery”) right in front of faculty members with no consequences whatsoever.
Let’s just say the Evanses have a pretty backwards view of what’s acceptable conduct in modern society.
“Dear Shoe, how can I use my sexual fetishes to make money on the internet? Signed, Brooke, 9 Chick weed lane.” ” Get help, Brooke.”
@The Quiet Man: @The Quiet Man: Although, now that I think about it, if Dawn is now ‘Duckgirl’, does that make Wilbur ‘Duckman’?
________________________________
Is Mary Cornfed or the twin receptionists?
My favorite Butte joke came from Who’s the Boss. Probably the only Who’s the Boss joke that ever made me LOL.
Everyone is vacationing at some dude ranch in Wyoming for some reason, and Tony’s daughter Sam meets a hunky cowboy and takes off on a date without telling anyone.
Tony asks: “Has anybody seen my daughter?” And someone replies: “I saw her earlier, up on the butte. She was kissing some guy.”
Tony: “Some guy was kissing my daughter on the butte?”
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: @Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: Cat Food. Dog is trying to lure the cat into jumping into the dryer as a trap.
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: re Far Side: Maybe the dog should have spelled it Cat Fude, for clearer pronunciation.
I’ve always loved the “CAT FUD” strip due to a) the dog being able to write (albeit inaccurately); b) the cat being able to READ; c) the dog being strategically capable of fomenting a cat trap; and d) the dog’s muttered “Oh please….oh please.”
Along with the little boy desperately pushing at the door marked PULL under the “School for the Gifted” sign, it’s the only Far Side I remember offhand.
I also remember the two men standing under the enormous lighted neon marquee reading ILLITERATES’ CLUB, captioned “Say, buddy, can you direct me to the Illiterates’ Club?” but under further reflection that one appeared in a 1970s National Lampoon.
@Arabella: No, no….FUD was perfect.
@Her Father, John Darling: Any other strip, we’d know where this is going, but with Karen Moy who knows. She does subscribe to the men are always right school, but maybe she makes an exception for used car dealers.
DT: Apparently “Agent Boche” is classic Tracy villain Pruneface, but I’m not ruling out the possibility that this is a misspelling for “Agent Bosh” and it’s Costello’s author avatar.
HtH: I’m not even going to bother with the websearch for Viking food; we all know this is ahistorical, and anyway I’m more distracted by the sign in panel 1. Apparently, Lute wants to save money by getting hot dogs at a “half special today price”, but I think he should hold out for a day when they have a completely special today price.
JP: “Did you sneak Ann into town in your car so the cops wouldn’t see her arrive?” Does this mean “Did you drive Ann into town normally?” or “Did you smuggle Ann past the checkpoints that have been on every road for months by hiding her in the back seat under a blanket?” I mean, they’re both pretty stupid, but I kind of like to know just how stupid this story is getting, and the second one definitely has the edge.
MW, meta: I’m sorry, if Dawn’s vision is so bad that she’s just squirting ketchup all over the table in a vague attempt to season her fries, I refuse to believe she has any ability to see anything other than vague colors or shapes, or has any idea where she is or who she’s even talking to.
I genuinely can’t see anything other than vague colours and shapes without my glasses, and even I can get the red blur to hit the yellow blur when adding ketchup to my chips!
@Ukulele Ike: True, the cat was able to read and understand it and that’s what matters.
Fifty years ago today, Prince Valiant and his fellow knights were facing defeat by a barbaric horde, but in the real world Bud Grant’s Vikings yet again met defeat in Super Bowl IX. In other Viking news, Hagar’s wife was startled by a frog.
Heinz baby food faced a recall and Trixie made changes in Lois’s grocery shopping list.
While most newsreaders might have thought a Magnavox 25-inch color TV going for $550 was the latest in technology, it was revealed in the Heart of Juliet Jones that tech bros had their personal information.
@Little Blue Bicycle: I too have been wondering where this is going. Moy has featured her heroines falling for bad men and making a lucky escape before: there was Estelle’s catfisher, the doctor who told Dawn he was divorced when he meant he was totally thinking about it, and … um … Charley, who traumatised Delilah with his “art … of a kind” back in 2009. But yeah, she’s also got a habit of inadvertantly creating assholes she believes to be charming, if eccentric, good guys, like Jarrod, Keith Bellend, and, of course, Wilbur. (I know Wilbur predates her run, but she developed him into, well, that.)
I think the red eyes and flat-out “do what I say” indicates that this is the former. But a far clearer indicaton is that this storyline started with Mary telling Dawn not to rush into love. Dawn is therefore going against Mary’s advice in dating Dirkhead, so naturally it’s the worst decision she’s ever made.
REX MORGAN.M.D.: I don’t know what Bizarro-world we entered here, but this storyline obviously must be set in an alternate universe if having a dull and uninteresting life is a “problem” in this comic instead of an “aspiration goal.“
@Banana Jr. 6000: (During a discussion of the solar system)
“But, what about Uranus?”
“Good night, everybody!”
MW: “The one who loves the least…. wins.”
PV:. Future queen Ingrid is secretly seeing Maeve, right? And Maeve plans on manipulating her so that Maeve can indirectly rule Camelot. Right?
@Horace Broon: Viking food probably included sausages. The concept of “chop up everything from the kill we can’t roast or make into soup and stuff it into an intestine” most likely dates back to the Stone Age.
But the “hot dog” is the creation of Nathan Handwerker in 1890s Coney Island, when right-thinking Americans convinced themselves that German immigrants were trying to feed them processed dog. You can still enjoy a delicious frankfurter at the original “Nathan’s” today. Chili or sauerkraut?
(and NYC food junkie Calvin Trillin will attest that Nathan’s french fries (“chips” to you) are a local treasure)
MW: Christ, and I thought having their first date on Christmas Day was intense. How are they gonna up the ante next time? This is a pretty tough act to follow. Screaming and crying in public? Fisticuffs?
MW: “I’ll do what I please… and you’ll do what I say” is a pretty extreme line to break out on a second date. Most people save that for the second or third year of marriage. But Dawn did declare her love for him an hour or so into their first date so maybe these two just work fast.
Slylock Fox: The frog just spoke the truth about the harmonica while the bird blatantly lied by calling it a banjo. Slylock can save the Logic 101 mumbo-jumbo for another time; I think we can tell which witness is the truth-teller.
@Ukulele Ike: #114: No, no….FUD was perfect.
True, but I remembered it as KAT FUD.
@White Rabbit: That would have been overkill. CAT FUD was the chef’s kiss.
I’m sure someone here will look it up.
@Joe Blevins: In fairness to Dawn (words I can’t believe I’m typing), her role models for relationships throughout her life have been Wilbur, man-baby and cat abuser extraordinaire, and her mother, who flat out called Dawn ugly to her face. The only other person who seems to give her romantic advice is Mary, so Dawn never really had any chance at all.
Nerdgirl, Duckgirl, Stevie Wonder. Is Dirk just a wannabe Stan Lee who’s improvising names for his comic book’s superhero team, one neg at a time? It’d still be better than the creative process in Funky Winkerbean.
Mary Worth – Sad to report this, but what we’re seeing is an “It’s a Wonderful Life” scenario here, where we realize that Wilbur, in all his wretchedness, is the sewer in which all the negative energy drains, preventing others’ own toxic traits to lead them astray. Without a place for her dark feelings to go, Dawn has sought out a toxic man and is submitting and shaming herself to his will.
Daddy Daze – Daddy was too happy when the pediatrician said that Angus has graduated to his first solid foods, but instead “soft chopped vegetables and crackers” he extrapolated it chips and salsa, which Daddy himself spends his lonely nights eating (with mild salsa, because he’s just a Daddy prone to IBS after all).
Hi and Lois – We needn’ tworry about Trixie anthropomorphizing sunbeams and warm fire light, that is a stage of development she’ll pass through. They are basically imaginary friends. As long as they don’t start telling her to use a magnifying glass to burn things, or to stick Hi’s newspaper in the fire, then light up the curtains.
Shoe – Shoe is being gracious here, If you are sending physical letters to the editor from Montana to a newspaper in East Virginia, your Internet literacy is way too low to succeed there.
@Ukulele Ike: The “CAT FUD” panel is linked in the original post today.
MW-My eyesight is bad but there is no way I would miss french fries and put ketchup on the table.
@matt w: “JumpStart” also went wholesome father/daughter interaction today.
Luann-Freezing outside? I thought they were in San Diego.
@Scratchy Scrotum LXIX: Larson’s reasoning for the joke was that the tools weren’t supposed to resemble or mean anything, just… “If cows had tools, this is what they would look like”
But readers were confused trying to figure out what the tools literally were and what they did, especially as one vaguely resembled a hacksaw.
Dawn knows perfectly well the ketchup is not hitting the fries and is making a mess all over the table. She’s just sarcastically re-enacting what Dirk did in bed with her last night.
Either that or she’s writing HELP ME in ketchup, hoping the waiter will see it.
@Joshua K.:
The one-panel cartoon lacks a caption. A nice simple “Christ, what an asshole” would be appropriate. Might have gotten it placement in the New Yorker.
Cat Fud is just cat food, you big dummies.
MW: Dawn trying to take a bite out of the napkin dispenser, thinking it was her 100 percent all-beef burger, would have been a solid followup panel.
How did Dawn even get to the Restaurant? Hopefully she didn’t drive.
Although, perhaps like in Doctor Who, when Donna was trapped in the virtual reality simulation, but believed that she was living a perfectly normal life, until someone else pointed out that she never just walks to where she wants to go, she teleports.
MW: I’m not sure why Dirk found it necessary to unleash his fearsome mind-control power in panel 6, seeing as it’s Dawn we’re talking about. Save your batteries for someone with actual willpower, dude.
Peanuts: I’m a bit late to nitpick, but shouldn’t this have worked better for a Beethoven site gag?
Cat Fudd