Looming holiday cheer
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Dennis the Menace, 12/17/25
[when you get caught in the middle of what’s very explicitly a mock torture session, like you’re literally condemning this snowman to die in agony, you went through the trouble of putting a frowny face on him and everything, and you want to distract your parents from your sadism with a little darndest thing saying] “Just, uh, burnin’ some calories! Ha ha!”
The Lockhorns, 12/17/25
One of the things The Lockhorns does well is make it very subtly clear from their facial expressions how much the various one-off ancillary characters are regretting their decision to interact with Leroy or Loretta. This guy, for instance? Does not want to be there at all, and they’re not hitting you over the head with it, but you can tell.
Blondie, 12/17/25
I love how surprised the saleswoman seems in panel two. “Wait, people are buying our novelty mugs ironically? This changes … everything!”
78 replies to “Looming holiday cheer”
Mary Worth Mashups: Any of these missing final panels make today’s strip more entertaining?
DtM:
Check out how the snowman’s left arm is actually reaching outside the frame. He’s, like, doing the opposite of the cartoon character in the A-ha video “Take on Me.” He’s trying to escape into our reality rather than trying to pull us in so that we end up getting squirted by Dennis.
Anyone here own a top hat? Or seen one? Ever? Yet the Mitchells own one. Look at Henry’s pose, right there. THAT, friends, is the asshole who thought it was cool to dress as Mr. Peanut for Halloween, every year, from 1987-2002
DtM: This is how kids learn about the world around them. The snowman melts; Joey doesn’t.
“I just started here this morning, so Loretta is…who? Guess your wife? Shopper, huh? No, there’s nothing in this mug. There’s never anything in this mug.”
DtM:
“I sure am glad we stopped at one kid,” muse Mr. and Mrs. Mitchell.
Blondie-Then Dithers will gag Dagwood by shoving the mug into his mouth.
Dennis the Menace-“This guy owes me money.”
MW-Don’t learn to talk from Mary Worth.
FC-“Even a coffin?” “Nah. We’re just going to leave her beside the curb for pickup.”
Lockhorns-“Oh god how I hate my wife and our sham of a marriage.”
The saleswoman in Blondie suddenly regards the”World’s Goodest Employee” mug she was gifted with dark, new eyes.
Lockhorns: “and I guess you know what a ‘Little Leroy’ is.”
Blondie: The overly literal clerk discreetly puts the ball gag back under the counter.
“That’s not really a gag gift, is it?”
CS: Ah, so we finally learn where this is going with the reveal of Chekov’s cat.
JP: Please let this go in the direction of FBOFW when April decided to ‘sail the boat’. No Farley to come to the rescue this time!
Luann: And yesterday we all thought they were actually going to go through with it. Nope, suddenly they are too tired and are just going to settle for awkward, fully-clothed ‘cuddling’.
MW: And where do we think Sunny picked up *that* little phrase, hmmm?
@Baja Gaijin: One should have been Sunny dropping the AC unit on him.
Dennis finds one of Calvin’s snowmen in his front yard. “Not in my strip, kid!”
@10 The Quiet Man: Patience.
MW: This is glorious. My only regret is that Toby isn’t smart enough to trick Ian into thinking Sunny learned that term of endearment from the television.
Just what exactly, is the weapon Dennis is murdering the snowman with? I assume it is powered by a battery.
MW: Sunny rules! Can we PLEASE introduce him to Wilbur soon?
RMMD: “And what are YOU and your not-rich-or-famous husband doing for Christmas?” Summer can’t spell “condescending, ” but she sure can be it.
DtM: The snowman ‘s coal smile turned upside down as soon as he realized who his creator was.
H&L: C’mon, Foofram, there are only three guys standing in front of you. Hi is a known wimp and Thirsty is in a perpetual stupor. It was obviously Angry Goatee Guy.
BLONDIE: Dagwood won’t be laughing when he opens his “World’s Sexiest Husband ” mug on Christmas morning.
DtM: Mr. Mitchell is worrieed that Dennis is wasting the battery power of his cordless hairdryer (it takes FOREVER to charge that thing.) Meanwhile, Mrs. Mitchell is worried that this might be awakening something in her.
DtM Really puts into perspective the skill of Bill Waterson to turn a scene of Calvin engaging in some snowman torture into childhood whimsy instead of … whatever this is.
Lhs Jesus, are there multiple Lorettas running around? Do they only live for a day, like some humanoid may fly? Suddenly the Lockhorns’ dark view of life makes a lot more sense.
Blondie “Because he’s a terrible boss, and I’m not afraid to tell him! Don’t worry, he won’t fire me, probably just kick me really hard in the butt and physically throw me out of the room by my shirt collar! This is all very normal!”
Missed opportunity for a Snowman Ozempic joke. Maybe in seven-eight years
Dagwood might wanna visit the local adult shoppe if he wants a true gag gift.
Hmmm, Uncle Lumpy? I seem to have angered the content filter gods….
Was it my gratuitous use of the word “butt”?
Dick Tracy: Catman’s hat ears aren’t as cute as a real cat’s ears.
Pluggers: On the tips of plugger tongues is remnants of the last candy bar they snarfed, except for that cat plugger. He has fur from the last time he licked himself–not saying where he licked. Let your imagination…on second thought, ignore the first thought.
MW: THIS. IS. AWESOME.
You just know that Leroy has made the same joke every single Loretta for the past two
weeksWomenbeshoppings, and his coworkers / neighbors / occasionally-encountered Salvation Army Santas are over it. He doesn’t even bother to hit a new person every Loretta– Mug Guy heard this same “joke” last WednesLoretta, and he must seriously thinking about either a) asking for a transfer or b) giving up coffee until at least New Year’s Loretta.It today’s performance of Heathcliff the role of Santa Claus will be played by Sigmund Freud.
BF: No…..don’t take that sweater, it makes you look fatter….no, no, not that one either. In Paris? Are you kidding? No….look, just maybe get your boyfriend to take you shopping in France, huh?
I don’t see any identifiable punctuation, any expression change by the store clerk in the panels nor do I see any bold or italic words in the bubbles.
Blondie: It’s not a joke. The manufacturer only produced one of those mugs, and you’d better believe they won’t sell it to unless you provide exhaustive audited evidence of the relative superiority of your boss compared to every single other boss on the planet.
DtM:
Mr. and Mrs. Mitchell’s reaction to Dennis’ tomfoolery is decidedly Frosty.
DtM — Dennis is dropping more Frosties than the local Wendy’s. . .
But seriously, wouldn’t spraying water on the snowman in freezing temperatures form a layer of ice and make him *more* resistant to melting?
Lockhounds — Hey, give them credit for at least getting the calendar right. . .
DtM:
“Hi, kids, it’s Slylock Fox! — can you count how many little squirts there are in today’s ‘Dennis the Menace’ installment?”
DtM – Dennis Mitchell – Agent of ICE….
Shlockhorns – Just 8 more Shlockhorns ‘til Xmas – a Shlockhorn is a what I call a comic strip that consistently shits the bed….
Blondie – Have you got one with World’s Best Boobs….
Adios Amigos, DJ.
Blondie- The whole scenario is so stupid, the extra playing the sales lady had to get so drugged up she can’t blink.
Blondie: “Ha-ha, next you’ll tell me you’re buying this ceramic Christmas tree as a gag because you’re actually Jewish! But you’re not Jewish, right?”
[Smug Anakin smile]
“You’re not Jewish, right?”
MW Since Sunny hasn’t been around Ian’s colleagues’ commentary during take-your-pet-to-work-day yet, I have the disturbing thought that he learned the phrase from Toby “talking dirty” to Ian in the bedroom
Is that supposed to be a blowdryer that Dennis is wielding? Where’s the cord? I took it for a water pistol at first, especially given all those drops that are spraying ONTO the snowman. If the goal is to coat the damn thing in ice so that it’s rock-solid and immoveable — and it’s smack in the middle of the path to/from the front door — I guess that’s pretty menacing. On the other hand, the “burning calories” crack now makes NO sense. Or wait, maybe that refers to the effort ol’ Dad will have to go to to shift the iceman out of the way? Nah. Why do I go to so much work before just admitting it’s a Gag Fail?
Two tortures today in the comics: the snowman in Dennis the Menace and the joke in The Lockhorns.
@Baja Gaijin:
The way things are progressing – endings 1 and 2 are plausibly canon!
Weapon of mass liquification. Takes notes RRN
DtM:
“I see the cross, slightly puzzled expressions on your faces, Mom and Dad — but since Comet 3I/Atlas is about to plunge into Earth’s atmosphere and destroy all of life as we know it, what difference does it make if I take out this snowman, anyway?”
Dennis the Menace: At first, I thought Dennis had a cordless hair dryer, but then I realized that’s not a thing. Not a thing I’ve seen, anyway.
Someone gave the mean little towhead a heat gun! Why does Dennis even know what a niche tool like this is? Planning on doing a little desoldering later, kid?
DT: So the deputy just happens to lug around his complete catman suit with him all the time? Before they went out on their latest sortie, did DT and him go to his car and pick up his kit? How long did DT have to wait for him to put on his gear? How are they going to explain DT having a masked vigilante helping him?
MW: This is great! Clearly most of the damage (torn playbill, guano in the shoe) are actually Toby’s secret work. She taught Sunny “pompous axx” and the parrot is a quick mimic.
RMMD: Meanwhile the line at the check-in/check-out window has ground to a halt, and many people are just leaving throwing their paper work on the floor. Rex and June are in the back room wondering why it is so slow today. Must be the weather and time of year – yeah, that’s the ticket.
JP: Charlotte is great! Finally the snarky sassy character that this strip needs to pull itself out of the morass. That last frame shows that Charlotte is heeding every word of caution that Neddy is saying (wink wink).
We joke about how Dennis isn’t really a menace, but I didn’t think they’d read our criticism and have him jump straight to psychopath. Here are some words I never thought I’d say — can we pull back a wee bit on the menacing in Dennis the Menace, please?
Future MW punch lines:
“Arggghh! That infernal beast left his droppings in my ear!”
“Argghhh, call the doctor, that infernal menace bit my wee wee!”
“Arggghhh, put down that gun you winged menace!”
“Arrgghhh, call our lawyer Toby, that flying fiend called ICE on me! I’m still on my student visa!”
“Arrgghhh, guards, help me, that prattling parrot has put a hit out on me.”
“Sunny, darling, more wine?”
@Baja Gaijin:
They all are but I didn’t expect the third. It’s a thing of beauty.
Wary Morth:
“Pompous Axx” is what Toby calls Ian behind his back, right? When? Not while talking to Mary, and she has no other friends, so…..to herself? To a phone sex site?
FC: Why on earth would Billy be reading this from a sheet of paper? Did Grandma give him written instructions?
“Here. I don’t want a box of Kotex like last year.”
@A Grave Mind:
My school drama department used to have one, but I don’t think I ever saw it worn by anyone in any play ever.
MW: Ian in a rage takes an axe and aims to split Sunny in two. Toby screams and grabs his shoulder from behind upon which Ian turns and buries the axe in her head. He then carries her lifeless body to the laundry room where he hurriedly seals her body in the wall. Afterwards, Sunny is nowhere to be seen….to be continued.
And I’d bet that Neddy has experience with moving her hips with a horse.
CS: Pam, your cat doesn’t look well. Its lossy. You need to get that cat to a vet, or to a graphic designer. Try exporting it to .PNG and see if that helps.
@Hibbleton: A Tales from the Crypt version of MW? Love it!
@Ukranazi Stepan: I think the implication is that she’s venting to the bird all day about the horrors of living with Ian.
@Lauralot: I’m going with Baja Gaijin’s third mashup – Toby’s “venting” when she’s with Carlos Al(l)orca. The alternative is that Toby, or Mary, called Ian a pompous ass repeatedly during their chat.
Blondie: The store clerk looks like she emigrated from the Goofy universe.
DtM: Stealing Calvin’s dark snowman bit? Menace level: about the same as those decals of him pissing on a Ford logo.
L’horns: And a “Leroy” is what we call “a joke that you have to explain because it isn’t funny.”
Dennis’ hairdryer (?) looks way more like a pistol. The lack of a cord doesn’t help. Menace level: to the moon.
Bold of Dagwood to assume everyone will be intelligent and observant enough to get the irony of the gag and courageous enough to point it out, or that Dithers won’t carry that mug around with him unironically all the time even if he knows it’s not what Dagwood really thinks. I don’t think he’s thought this “gag” through.
@pugfuggly: I’d say Calvin torturing his snowmen was never childhood whimsy and was never portrayed as anything other than exactly what it was, given the kind of kid Calvin is/was. With Dennis the Slightly Mildly Menacing, though, it doesn’t quite work.
Lockhorns: Unlike many other interactions with NPCs, this one appears to be at Leroy’s workplace, rather than a stranger who shows up, somehow, in their home.
GT proves that in a visual storytelling medium nothing is more powerful than my imagination, wondering how the ball got from the triple-teamed Rimsha for Isis’ layup attempt.
Zits: My age range is closer to Pluggers that to Jeremy. Is there some kind of social code teens have which Jeremy could be in danger of victims by driving to Sara’s, unannounced?
C’shaft: Pam’s only getting around to decorating the house now? Must be a hardcore high church type who insists on giving Advent its space.
DT: Driving a 1970s sedan with a plainclothes cop riding shotgun really clashes with the whole costumed vigilante vibe.
Dustin: The real ChatGPT would have told the kid to off himself. And given that he lives in the Dustin universe, could you blame it?
JP: Hey Charlotte, are you familiar with the life of Cole Porter?
Luann: “Besides, if I had a family or personal baggage I would cease to be your idealized trophy wife.”
MW: It’s true, Ian is a pompous axx! You tell ’em, Sunny!
Also, I love how a bunch of comments are convinced that Dennis is wielding a hairdryer even as they acknowledge that it looks nothing like one, it doesn’t have an attached cord, and it seems to be shooting something visible at the snowman. Trying to convince themselves of something other than the awful truth, or trying to convince themselves that the gag makes a modicum of sense?
Blondie:
I dunno, Josh, that curvy line in panel three just makes it look like the saleswoman is doing some casual echolocating à la Ecco the Dolphin.
(Google it, kids).
Blondie: All other gifts at the party will be a “World’s Best Employee” mug. The entire Dithers staff and management hav a refreshing honesty with their gag gifts.
MW:
Toby: “Hey, stop yelling at an angry creature who’s stupid enough to pick a fight with a mirror!”
Ian: “My University Excellence Award is destroyed!”
Toby: “I was talking to the bird.”
FC: Grandma’s Plugger-aged; have you kids thought about buying her a “shoulder massager”?
@ValdVin: Autocorrect failed me: “violating”, not “victims”
CLEARLY none of you has ever melted a snowman with an impact wrench. Pfff. Nerds.
GT- Airball! Airball! Airball!
The Lockhorns: “I hear ya, man. Now, let’s pull these shirts off over our black leotards, and get back to miming!”
Dennis the Menace: “Whew, he’s just murdering a snowman. When we bought him that hair dryer, I thought it would end up in our bathtub one night after we made him eat peas!”
Blondie: “He’s employed me for years despite my laziness and incompetence — so, no, he’s actually a very, very stupid boss!”
Pluggers: The symptoms of being a plugger and having a stroke are apparently very similar. If you think you may be a plugger, see your doctor immediately!
@ValdVin: GT: The magical incantation of nursery rhymes. Always works.
@A Grave Mind: True, but I grew up in greater Miami. I didn’t even see a snowman until I was 35.
Dennis the Menace: Calvin was the ultimate menace in comics, but unless most other comics attempting that Shtick (Dennis, U.K Dennis, Family Circus, Lio) I don’t believe that Bill Watterson ever drew attention to that for advertising purposes.
Calvin was simply… Calvin. Nothing else to it.
For those wondering what Dennis is using to melt the snowman, it’s an electric squirt gun filled with clear winter windshield washer fluid, good to -30F.
It’s the little details really. Any child might decide on a whim to destroy a snowman, but not every child will take the time to give the snowman a sad face indicating that he is alive and very much aware of his own quickly coming mortality. That’s what separates your average child from a future defendant at The Hague.
DtM: There was a printing error. “Just burnin’ some calories” was supposed to be Arlo’s line when Janis unexpectedly came home early and found him … by himself. That strip got pulled for obvious reasons, but the caption got misplaced. Dennis is actually supposed to be quoting McBain from the Simpsons, “Ice to see you.”
HOTC: Why does Drumline Elmo have stink lines?
9CL: This angry incel turns into your soulmate, Edda. For now, this other girl better protect herself.
@TheDiva: Luann: Keep in mind that she has an ex who tried to kill them, a brother with no boundaries, and an unspeakable niece. It’s probably a blessing to us all that we don’t get to see any more of her family or personal baggage.
@Blondie: I miss Ecco the Dolphin, it’s kind of funny that I assumed back in the day, that Sonic the Hedgehog wouldn’t survive past the 90’s.
Turns out he was the only Sega franchise that did. Ecco, Toejam and Earl, Ristar, Shining Force… all dead.
@Tom T.: Oh yeah, I forgot about Jonah and Shannon–probably because Shannon seems less like Toni’s niece and more like the child equivalent of a feral cat that belongs to nobody in the neighborhood but occasionally comes by houses to beg for food.
Blondie – The picture of Steve Carell on the other side of the mug was kind of a giveaway.
Don Abundio, translated:
“Here comes Lady Veronica in her little convertible”
“Lately she’s been imitating the antics of famous rock stars. I do hope she’s gotten that out of her system”
“No, boss”
“Looks like it’s Keith Moon this week!”
Leroy understands the golden rules of comedy: wait next to a large prop for someone to walk by, say something incomprehensible, then explain the joke, which is that you hate your wife. It’s how all the greats got started.
Moments before today’s panel in Dennis the Menace:
“There must have been some magic in that old top hat I found, Frosty, so turn it over before I turn you into a fuckin’ puddle. The Wizard of Id will pay some real money for it!”
@Morgan Wick: I’d say Calvin torturing his snowmen was never childhood whimsy and was never portrayed as anything other than exactly what it was, given the kind of kid Calvin is/was. With Dennis the Slightly Mildly Menacing, though, it doesn’t quite work.
Calvin’s violence towards snowfolks always felt cartoonishly silly. This scene looks….sadistic.