He’ll get that meth lab yet, I believe in him
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The Phantom, 5/4/26
President Goranda is, according to the extremely detailed Phantom wiki I just discovered, the leader of Ivory Lana, the country that was the setting of the storyline that just wrapped up, and, look, I get that it’s fun to be like, “Wow! There’s our friend! He’s on TV!” but if your friend is literally a president, he’s going to be on the news a fair amount. That’s like one of a president’s main jobs! So no need to get all worked up about it, is what I’m saying.
Mary Worth, 5/4/26
Oh hell yes it’s a Tommy storyline, everybody! A storyline where Tommy is sad! I don’t think we have to ask why he’s sad — the main driver of negative emotions in the Mary Worth universe is romantic failure, so I assume his onion ring fiancee just dumped him. The more fun question is how he’ll react. Will he turn to weed? Pills? Crack cocaine?
Our lord and savior Jesus Christ? I am very excited to find out!
Herb and Jamaal, 5/4/26
If you’re wondering “Which comics did a ‘May The Fourth Be With You’ joke today,” one of the answers is obviously that the dork-ass nerds over at Intelligent Life did it, which I’m not even going to bother showing you because you could’ve guessed that in advance. But if you’re wondering “Which comics did a ‘May The Fourth Be With You’ joke today and somehow managed to completely fuck up the phrasing in baffling ways,” then the possibly also not surprising answer is Herb and Jamaal, apparently.
Beetle Bailey, 5/4/26
OK, fine, newspaper comics are fundamentally an art form by and for old people at this point, but I still think that doing a strip whose punchline is “Everyone younger than 45 is literally an alien to me” is a little on the nose.
74 replies to “He’ll get that meth lab yet, I believe in him”
My money’s on Tommy and “Trixie” running into each other and bonding over their woes and long hair.
MW: Online romance, Tommy! What could go wrong?
Meanwhile at the Beedie apartment:
Tommy, alias “John Long”, alias Trixie: “I should have stayed on at the pig butchering scam centre! At least I had food and a job!”
Toby: “That’s why I make sure I’m never lonely! I have the parrots to talk to! What about you, Mary?”
Mary: “I have you parrots to talk to, too! Wait, did I say that out loud?”
BB: “I guess I could beat them into a mass of barely recognized fleshy pulp, but what even is the color of their blood? Are they toxic to us? Will it cause an intergalactic incident?”
Wrecks Moregone:
Ten minutes later Lonnie tries to climb in through Mae Mae’s window to blackmail her, mistakes the room, and is bashed over the noggin by Mud with a water jug.
Whatever is that pink light that’s reflecting off both Mae Mae’s and Mud’s faces, including grin underneath? Is Mud holding a torch between them, pointing up?
BB: That’s not what “green recruits” are.
Sarge’s problem with the new recruits is that they’re all naked.
JP … oh, forget whether you’re bad parents or friends, we’re stuck thinking that you’ve got the dumbest “sneaky way to get a message” tradecraft. A Little Orphan Annie decoder ring would have made more sense at this point. Actually, if April dug her CIA credentials out of a box of Crackerjacks, that would explain a lot.
DT Speaking of dumb, Tracy *really* went with doctored images of the imagined disguises of April 22, not a range of options, just… yeah, the *only* thing Doubleup would try is an anime biker get up, and BB wouldn’t be caught dead wandering Neo-Chicago in anything other than a barbershop quartet outfit. Sure. Right. Luckily the police didn’t have any imagination for Mumbles so put a hat on his pic making the ‘disguise’ photo vaguely recognizable *and* that he was the one going out!
Ph: “I happen to know he was just mentioned in the chronicles of the skull cave” What an oddly phrased sentence. Did you mean that you were just reading about it? Because you can just say that.
MW: Speaking of oddly phrased sentences, having two transitional phrases beginning your sentence just makes it confusing. Like, it almost sounds like you’re saying that Tommy is speaking of loneliness? Maybe he’s at his Camus literary discussion group.
H&J: Sorry, I’ve only ever seen the Turkish version of Star Wars. That is the catchphrase, right?”
BB: Ooops, looks like those nuclear experiments at Camp Swampy have finally caught up with them. Well, if you can’t beat them, have them join you! That’s the phrase, right?
BB Sarge, if you’ve dealt with all those generations, you are decades past mandatory retirement age. Let the Pentagon know about their mistake and take your pension.
Today’s strip contains deep Beetle Bailey lore. Sarge has been alive since the 1960s at least (canonically, he was a WWII vet), so he has had to train and shape several generations of recruits, each with its own culture, all turned into pieces in the American tapestry. He embodies the eternal Sergeant, forever ready to serve the USA. But on this 250th anniversary, Sarge feels he cannot perform his duty anymore, he cannot make Americans of these aliens, they are too different. I expected Shoe to go full nativist first, but I am not surprised it is Beetle Bailey
GA: Meh. At least Scancarelli wasn’t dumped by a cheerleader in the pharmacy.
MW: Or is that Tommy’s mom? I mean, it’s hard to tell them apart.
The USA is readying for war, the meat grinder demands fresh blood, so the Army was forced to lower its standards to increase its recruitment rate. That they are aliens is not a problem, but they surely do not meet the minimum height requirements!
Monty: Why is it that a cartoon animal wearing a thong is somehow more obscene than when that animal just walks around naked?
Of course it is autoresponse! Regular church folks know all the rituals and repeat them like trained monkeys, but do not feel them in any deep sense, so that they cannot distinguish a mild joke from the celebration of the Last Supper. That’s savage ravaging of organised religion, kudos!
Phantom: And this President was the one who dissed Schmelon Schmusk 2-3 storylines ago, was he not?
JP: ‘… but since we’ve joined the Movementarians our lives are so much better! We invite you to join us on the spaceship to Blisstonia! Nana nana nana Lee-derrr!!!’
My last name is “Weiner” so I can give advice: No one will ever take “Tommy Beedie” seriously. Go with “Tom.”
Makes sense that the Phantom would use a standing desk to stay swole.
The Phantom:
Lord knows this strip gives a lot of opportunity, but still, no reason to kink-shame.
Ph: Why does our hero look like he’s checking reservations at a particularly fashionable cave-lit restaurant? Of course he can’t watch the president on television, he’s got dinner prep!
H&J: A few years ago, the Catholic Church retranslated the liturgy and changed “And also with you” to “And with your spirit”. Now every time I go to a wedding or funeral, I stumble over the words and briefly the world feels strange and alien. Almost as strange and alien as it feels when I read “Hey, Rev, you made it by today!” printed in the newspaper as if we should all know what it means.
Looking ahead at the May schedule for Mary Worth: Tomorrow: Tommy cries out for help. May 11: Tommy goes on a men’s encounter with Ian, Wilbur and Carlos Alora. May 18: Tommy dies during the naked drum circle. May 25: Mary and Toby return to the spa for another self-congratulatory getaway.
Also The Phantom: Wait, who writes the Chronicles of Skull Cave, and where do they get their information? If it’s not Mr. Walker himself, is the cave not just sentient, but omnipotent? Do they keep a series of Woruba monks imprisoned in a back chamber, ceaselessly reading the papers from around Africa and using parchment and quill pens to transcribe relevant tidbits for the Phantom’s daily security briefing? It’s…it’s that, isn’t it.
Blondie Wow, Mary Worth’s self-congratulatory victory lap for doing nothing has managed to annoy other comic strips this time!
Beatniks, hippies, punks and goths. All subcultures not especially aligned with the military’s ethos of obedience and conformity.
Then, they throw in ‘Gen Xers*’, as ostensibly the whole generation is comprised of undesirable and irregular schmoes. Actually, I suppose that checks out.
*Hat tip to all Gen X folks named Jennifer and the amazing puns they’ve created with their name and ‘generation’.
The Ghost Who Influences — Chronicles of the Skull Cave is trending! Especially their new app Only Phantoms — what can Mr. Walker do for you today?
MW –After a long weekend with Mary, Toby had run through her limited conversation topics and was forced to repeat herself in an effort to fill the gaping maw of silence. Little did she suspect that the Vortex of Clumsy Transition would settle on Tommy
Herb and Jamaal, translated: “On May the fourth I’ll be with you” => “May the fourth, I’ll be with you” => “The fourth, I’ll be with you” => “The Lord be with you.” “Thank you, Rev. Croom, but we’re Pentecostals, we don’t use liturgy.”
@I’m Not Cthulhu, But I Play Him On TV: That’s the part we’re supposed to wonder about before they plop down a mundane explanation – the Phantoms write the Chronicles, it’s sometimes shown in the strip. So, is it “I wrote it myself during an amnesiac phase”, “the guy’s actually waayyy older than he looks and my dad wrote about his youth”, or “there’s a Bandar prophecy about Ivory Lana and i’m jealous of the elders my ancestor got the work with because *this* one isn’t Nostradamus-vague but gave specific details of his name, date of birth and the assassination that will kill him in 8 days if we don’t do something”. But like a guy in an alien mask, somehow they’ll make it less interesting than it first appears.
@Ettorre: Side eye, but also every preacher knows shouting out “The Lord be with you!” is how you get people’s attention so you can start the potluck dinner after church.
The Phantom: What kind of smug-ass response is that, Walker? “I happen to know Goranda was mentioned in the Chronicles of the Skull Cave, a thing that I write. Me, The Phantom!”
MW: Oh, good, I wasn’t the only one who briefly thought Tommy was the escaped John “Trixie” Long.
But Not Cthulhu, I think you’re being overly optimistic with the timeline — even the relatively-brief Harv and Trixie story took over two months.
@pugfuggly: I suspect the odd phrasing of just mentioned in the chronicles” is because The Phantom is about to go into a flashback, where we see a young Goranda’s adventure with the current Phantom’s predecessor.
Herb and Jamaal:
While the phrase “the Lord be with you” (Dominus vobiscum in Latin) is used by a variety of Christian denominations, it is most closely associated with Roman Catholicism. The response, Et cum spiritu tuo, is traditionally rendered in English as “and also with you”, which is the version used by Reverend Croom’s unseen parishioner. However, in 2011 the Vatican changed the official translation to “and with your spirit” to more accurately reflect the original Latin. From this evidence I am forced to conclude that Reverend Croom is running a reactionary Sedevacantist church that regards the Second Vatican Council and all subsequent innovations as heretical.
OMG TOBY! You’re still talking about Dick Cravat?!? Is life with Ian that tedious that you can carry this single topic of conversation through an entire spa day through to the next morning?!?! Both of you know Wilbur Wilkins! Surely even when he’s not being the central character he’s getting his head stuck in a vase or something!
***
Beatniks? Beatniks? Snorkle is, at his possible oldest, a Gen Xer himself because… yeah, that tracks (but weird lumping an entire generation in with lifestyle choices). He might have come across a hippy or two which would be weird because nobody in the US would have been drafted since he was old enough to join the army, but beatniks? I don’t dig it, daddy-o.
I hope Toby remembers to take the cucumber slices off her eyes before she drives home.
Phantom:
“Say, what’s to eat for Devil and me, honey? — I’m ready for a Duran Duran dinner.”
“A ‘Duran Duran’ dinner?!?”
“Yep. I’m hungry, like the wolf!”
@Tabby Lavalamp: Also, I remain convinced that there were more beatniks in the comic strips than in San Francisco.
MW:
It stands to reason that Mary would have brought her purple cowl to Claremont. Otherwise, her streak of having worn it for 853 consecutive days would have been interrupted.
MW:
Thesis: David Crosby wrote “Almost Cut My Hair” in frustration after seeing Tommy Beedie’s tonsorial mess. Discuss.
Beetle – I kinda like the idea that being a Gen Xer is just a lifestyle choice, or possibly a Halloween costume, and if you get tired of it you can switch to something else. I’m contemplating a move to lumberjack, myself.
H&J – “On May the fourth, I’ll be with you.” “And also with you, Padre!” That’s right, the Reverend Shroom will be with himself. Because wherever you go, there you are. Man, these are some good shrooms.
BB: Sarge starting his list with beatniks makes sense because Beetle joined up in the 1950’s.
DT: Sam is showing the MCU can do basic police work. – knocking on doors and showing pictures. Why is he mad though? It gets him out of the office and gives him an excuse to hit his favorite delis. If he hits 6 a day he’ll kill off almost a whole week.
JP: a few years ago this plot development would have channeled the story in a few directions. In the era of deep fakes Ann and Neddy want to do a very careful look at this video and so keep Bogdan tied up for the coming 5 days.
MW: Thank you everyone for explaining that this is not “Trixie” but someone who looks very much like him. Is Mary going to help him shrug off this latest heartache?
RMMD: are they under a sodium street lamp? Is that why there is a color tint change.
Will Evil Ned Flanders try to blackmail Lorna? Will Lorna turn the tables on him by revealing his plot?! Will the public turn on them both thinking it is a publicity stunt?
Slylock: Maybe the guy was doing radio astronomy?!
Don Abundio, translated:
“Did we get everything we need from the store?”
“Vodka… tomato juice… tequila… limes…”
“We’re all set! We should be thoroughly crocked by the time he catches up with us…”
MW:
Tommy is sort of the “Mongo” from Blazing Saddles of “Mary Worth.” In equal parts laconic and dimwitted, he just sort of glacially proceeds through life like a gelatinous lump, a doppelganger of Ernest Borgnine’s “Marty.”
So, do the Chronicles of Skull Cave write themselves? Is it a magical book of some kind? You’d think if the Phantom had magic they wouldn’t need to run a bizarre cult to perpetuate the myth of an ageless crimefighter who never dies and remains unchanged through the centuries when they could just have the real thing…
Apparently Sarge is that rarest of breeds: a comic strip character aware of his whole history and his unchanging, unaging nature through the decades.
(Huh, when I started thinking about this comment I didn’t realize about the connection between the two comments… and considering this is the same Phantom as when the strip debuted nearly a century ago, one could argue that they really do have the real thing…)
MW: This is the fastest wrap-up Mary Worth has done in, what, at least a decade? I have to assume Moy had originally planned some epic plot with John Long and the rescue of all the others in the scam center, but then realized she didn’t care.
BB – “Come on, Snorkel! They’re green! Like plants! Put ’em down as cannon fodder.”
RMMD: Fergus/Mud is a big guy and he has experience as an asshole. Lonnie might be cruisin for a bruisin.
@Treetown: Yes, Mary is going to help Tommy shrug off his latest heartbreak, just like the last three (four?) times it’s happened. Because, as we all know, 20-something men are always happy to take dating advice from 60-something women.
Beetle Bailey-Just sneeze on the new recruits, Sarge. I’m sure your Earth germs will get rid of them.
MW-Got to love those long pauses in Mary and Toby’s conversations. “Several hours later the next day Toby responds to what Mary said the day before.”
FC-Jeffy is offering himself up as a sacrifice to himself.
Is it my imagination or does the rev./padre in Herb and Jamal look quite a bit like Bozo the Clown?
Secondarily, why would Kit and Diana wear any clothes at all in Skull Cave? Nobody gets in (well, except that statuesque blonde that The Phantom roofied after spit roasting her with Guran), it’s probably pleasantly cool in contrast to the moist, muggy, Bangalla jungle, and it has that blood-warm waterfall they periodically shower in. Why bother with clothing that’s almost certainly irritating and unnecessary in that climate?
I’m sorry, but Sarge should be a Gen Xer himself. These Camp Swampy folks don’t age, huh?
@Schroduck: My Episcopal church does “and also with you” most of the time, but subs in the older “and with thy spirit” during more solemn times like Lent. It keeps the regulars on their toes, if nothing else.
Oh, man, today’s Beetle Bailey answers so many questions. For years, we’ve pondered about Camp Swampy. Why do they wear uniforms from different time periods? Why don’t they fight in wars? Why hasn’t the Pentagon closed the damn place? But today, it’s all answered. Camp Swampy is controlled by the same folks who control Area 51, where the aliens are stored, and the personnel are all subjects of the Philadelphia Experiment, sent back in time during various DoD tests. Sarge and Beetle, from Korea. The General, from World War II. Lt. Fuzz, the post-Vietnam army, while Lt. Flap came right out of Saigon. Otto, of course, is the end-result of some gene splicing MK/ULTRA crap. Call Scully and Mulder, we got us an X-File here.
MW: Hey, a person of color, in Mary Worth? Oh wait, she’s in a servile role. OK, never mind, carry on.
FG: Flash, that was a kinder, gentler Ming you met, before the nasty divorce. I heard the first wife really took him to the cleaners. After that, no more Mr. Nice Guy.
And where are all the Kent State anniversary punch lines, hmmm? No nostalgia for the days you had to call in the National Guard to get citizens shot to death?
Arlo & Janis – He didn’t even have to praise her matchless beauty. Brooke, this is how to do it.
I love A & J.
Pluggers – Even less dignified: chasing his toupee down the street.
JP – Randy got himself shaved and cleaned up for his Amway recruitment pitch.
@Bob Tice: Tommy just pawn in game of life.
MW: “The Beedie apartment”? So, did we forget that Iris married her hot video game entrepreneur boy toy, and presumably moved in to his tech bro mansion with him? Or did Zac not learn his lesson and ended up falling off a cliff while trying to take a selfie, casting Iris back into single mom territory?
Phantom: The librarian in me is wondering how all the information in the Chronicles of Skull Cave is indexed. I mean, obviously anyone who is still updating via quill and ink pot hasn’t gotten around to getting the whole thing digitized, but does it include cross-references? Who updates the bibliography–does the Ghost Who Walks have to do that after his nightly journaling session, or is there an archivist among the Bandar? The fact that I’m asking these questions in a plot that started with a terrorist getting sprung from prison by an alien shows how much hope I have for the payoff of that premise.
@Ukulele Ike: I was planning to mention that anniversary. Tonight I will observe it by watching a video of “Ohio,” like I do every May 4.
@Ukulele Ike: #58: I’m surprised Tom Batiuk, an actual Kent alum who placed several of his strip’s characters there on that fateful day hasn’t.
Dustin: Sure, there’s wars, gas prices are skyrocketing, individual rights are being sledgehammered, data centers are eradicating the advances made in climate restoration, AI is making people stupider by the minute and Mr. Beast has his own line of snacks, but the real problem is your adult son exploring creative interests.
JP: So did Randy shave, or did they record this message first and a few months later think, “You know, maybe we should get your dad up to speed as well…”
Pluggers have never been dignified in any circumstances, ever.
BB: Sarge, while you’re going through the litany of assorted American counter culture types, I’m surprised you didn’t mention 1950s greasers, considering you have one in your platoon. His name’s Rocky, remember?
Phantom: The Chronicles of the Skull Cave are prophecies?
(I’m picturing a long cryptic wall of inscribed wording that lists events from the past, present and future)
I wonder if he read up to “Kit became the next Phantom and not Heloise, because girls are icky!”
Heathcliff: I know it’s Star Wars Day and all but there’s something really unsettling that out of the thousands of characters Heathcliff has made friends with Jabba the Hutt.
MW: “Here’s your check, Mrs. Worth.”
“She doesn’t look like us. Do you know her?”
“That’s Carla Alora, our caretaker’s daughter.”
“Is she legal? Should I call ICE?”
“Toby are you the reason the lawn remains unmowed.”
“I happen to know that my next bowel movement will be astounding and will be mentioned in the Chronicles of Skull Cave’s Bathroom.”
@Guillermo el chiclero: Typically Batuik move to exploit the shooting, of course. But I’ve found most Kent Staters really hate that their Alma mater is nationally recognized for precisely that one thing. Nobody says “It’s the one place east of the Mississippi for the immersion study of the Latin decadent poets!”
@Guillermo el chiclero: Zoot Suiters! The single most hilarious U.S. subculture of the last century. Snorkel was just a raw recruit when he and his pals were beating THOSE guys to a pulp.
If Sarge has trained or was a beatnik or hippie, he should long be enjoying that pension.
@Ettorre: The sad thing is these aliens were told at the recruiting station that enlistment in the Army would guarantee them a path to citizenship (and work skills in demand by the private sector).
Boy, are they in for a surprise in two years.
The Phantom: Love how Phantom is actually agreeing with Josh about Goranda being on television all the time. “Honey, I’m doing superhero stuff right now, I got better things to do than see if the CNN camera guy got a decent angle of Goranda’s ass.”
Mary Worth: Legit took me a solid minute to realize this is supposed to be Tommy and not “Trixie”. The artisr REALLY needs to work on their character design diversity.
To illustrate;
Also Mary Worth: PLOT TWIST; Trixie was actually the real Tommy, and this crying dude is an imposter who sold him to a call center scammer to steal his life! He just got the word from his boss that Tom-Trix escaped and knows that the wronged Beedie is on his way to claim a bloody revenge…
Beetle Bailey: Think the backstory here is that Earth has been conquered by alien invaders Half Life 2-style and Sarge immediately turned quisling, selling out his fellow humans and offering advice to the younger aliens on hunting people, resulting in Camp Swampy’s conversion into a occupation base. Their first mission, naturally, will be executing the notorious anti-citizen known as Beetle Bailey, preferably in front of his sister and her family.
BB: Indis Vindicta glances over at today’s Beetle Bailey and has second thoughts. Should he maybe have gone more old school for his alien costume? The green skin/antennae look does have a certain swingin’ bachelor pad panache.
MW: Featuring Tommy right after wrapping up a storyline where a Tommy lookalike was seemingly imprisoned and doing hog butchery against his will is confusing in either an avant-garde way or an inept way, depending on how much benefit of the doubt you’re inclined to give.
BB: Sarge was transferred to the Space Force recently and is having a hard time adjusting. Also, he’s unaware that the Space Force is a thing.
MW: Tommy is back?! Oh, this will be delightful.