Good faces
Post Content
Pardon My Planet, 8/20/26
OK, here’s a sentence that I’m reasonably sure I’ve never written before, and probably nobody else has either: I’m actually enjoying the art in Pardon My Planet today. Specifically, I love how incredibly exhausted the girlfriend character (the Pardon My Planet gang may have names, but I steadfastly refuse to learn them) looks. How long has her boyfriend been nattering on with this nonsense? Hours? She doesn’t have to get ready for school either, but she does have to get up in the morning. She just wants to sleep, damn it! She just wants to sleep!
The Lockhorns, 8/20/26
Speaking of comic panel faces I’m enjoying, I’m enjoying Leroy’s boss’s face here. Specifically, I enjoy how mad he looks. He’s not one of those LinkedIn influencer execs bragging about replacing his workers with AI! No, he’s discovered that AI is slowly and silently replacing his workers one by one, right under his nose … and there’s nothing he can do about it. You can’t even test to see if someone’s a robot anymore, according to the killjoys in HR!
Mother Goose and Grimm, 8/20/26
No, Attila, it’s a joke! You’re a character in a comic strip, where ostensibly there’s a joke every day! I say “ostensibly” because the specific comic strip you’re in is Mother Goose and Grimm, but still, you should know this.
38 replies to “Good faces”
Mary Worth Mashup: What Wilbur really wanted to say.
“The shareholders said no to the Voight-Kampff Test,” said Leroy’s boss, slamming the table in frustration, “but we’ll find a way to suss out those body snatching replicants yet!”
He was then dragged away by two security guards with suspiciously identical faces
Mother Goose and Grimm:
“Ricki Lake?”
Phantom And it’s time for the rogue AI plot folks, confirming that Invicta/Mollusk is not only oblivious to decades of computer-takes-over plots*, but also the news in recent years of AI deleting things it wasn’t supposed to and even cyber-attacking sites.
*everything from Star Trek planet-of-the-week to Yokpo Tsuno bande dessinee stories in my childhood, it’s not exactly an obscure plot point!
PMP: “…nothing excites me more…” Nothing bores a woman more than mansplaining morning wood.
FC: To bad they weren’t fishing in shark infested waters. Dolly would make great bait.
RMMD: So Tweedledum and Tweedlestupid are actually going through with it. Looks like it’s going to be The Ransom of Red Chief after all.
Luann: Go ahead, Toni. Projectile vomit on TJ, that’ll show him.
CS: John Philip Sousa on a snowmobile! It’s my dad, and he’s naked!
PmP “…then remembering that I still have to work, a prospect that is much much worse…”
MW Geez, Moy is desperate to have people accept Wilbur. I now think the whole arc is to be able to sweep any criticisms under the “he had alcohol problems!” rug, but we all know he was stone cold sober when he hid his survival, spied on Iris, and endangered his daughter by not even considering her observations about Belle.
Loretta considers calling the authorities on the suddenly compliant “Leroy” but decides machine oil smells better than BO.
Wary Morth:
“Tommy seems earnest in his desire to live sober! Unlike me, seeing that I’m clearly high as a kite!”
@Baja Gaijin:
Mary would have about 120 heart attacks.
Pardon My Planet:
I’m part of the generation of what Alfred, Lord Tennyson aptly dubbed as ‘The Lotos-eaters’ in a different context two centuries ago. I don’t want to do anything other than be an ‘influencer’ and get paid bushels of money for displaying myself online as the epitome of calculated, slack-jawed lassitude. What do you think of that, Jesse?”
“ZZZZZZZ.”
PMP: Gen X Hipster Lady is definitely regretting trying to talk dirty to Gen X Hipster Man by whispering “Tell me what really excites you?” in his ear.
Lockhorns: You know how generative AI image generators struggle with fingers? Well, just look at Leroy’s boss’s hands here. THE SLOP IS COMING FROM INSIDE THE HOUSE!
MG&G: Grimm’s whispering because he respects the sacred art of the crossword. Sure, we can all have a laugh about the Great Lakes, but making Mother Goose write the wrong word into the crossword grid? He would never betray Will Shortz like that.
What is going on in Mother Goose and Grimm? Is the oval supposed to be some time later, when the dog and the cat are alone and relaxed, free to crack wise about what Mother Goose reads aloud to them from the newspaper? Is it what Grimm wishes he could say, of only. . . Why do they both look terrified in real time?
MW: Look at those lovely red tomatoes! What does Mary do to turn them beige?
The Lockhorns:
“Now, pull out your Androids and let’s have all of you make a note of that!”
PMP – And I sleep in adult sized Pull Ups (TM)! I’m a big kid now….
Shlockhorns – Those that remain (like Leroy) can’t tell a bridge from a bicycle, anyway….
MG&G – Inferior it’s said, always spits up it’s dead when the gales of November come early (well, that’s what I heard)….
Adios Amigos, DJ.
The Lockhorns:
“Think of AI as a productive practitioner of the creation of original, creative ideas and concepts. Remember that the anagram of ‘artificial intelligence’ is ‘a fertile, legit clinician’ !”
RMMD: Okay, girls. I’m gonna do you a solid. Want a foolproof way to mess with the Morgans? Set up a cleaning business. Get yourselves hired. Bring raw shrimp and hide them in each and every curtain rod. You’ll be long gone by the time the house is filled with the scent of decay, and they’ll have no idea where it’s coming from.
This is your reminder that Gary Larson, early in The Far Side’s run, was not allowed to draw an outhouse. Now look at Pardon My Planet. Times have changed. Or maybe not, depending on how many angry letters to the editor this particular panel spawns.
“You have to go to work though.”
“….crap!”
@Baja Gaijin: And here I pictured him thinking ‘Meow meow meow meow meow meow meow meow meow meow meow meow meow meow meow meow…”
JP: We don’t either! Most of your crap happened off-panel!
RMMD: Yup, Chekov’s Down Syndrome is an ironclad law…
S4th: [applauds Skye and Nona for their decision]
L’horns: ….And yet, Leroy remains at the company, disturbing everyone with his weirdly gnomish proportions and talking about his wife in such terms that make his co-workers* wonder if Loretta is in some kind of danger.
*The ones who haven’t actually met Loretta, anyway.
MG&G: I mean it depends on whether we’re talking surface area (Ontario) or water volume (Erie), but I’m guessing the latter because “ERIE” is such a common crossword answer that it’s a gimme for any remotely dedicated cruciverbalist. I mean come on Miz Goose, how many Great Lakes have four letters?
Mother Goose and Grimm: Well, that depends on if you’re talking about surface area or volume, and whether you mean the Great Lakes shared by Canada and the United States, or the Great Lakes in Africa, or [is shot dead by irate Grimm]
I have never seen Mother Goose so happy and good for her. Get that crossword, girl!
…and now I’ve ruined everything by imagining MG&G’s setup in Marvin. Sorry!
I continue to worry about Leroy Lockhorn’s proximity to power in this company. No wonder they can’t afford a bigger table.
DtM: I was gonna make a comment about how those are obviously chocolate chip not fortune cookies, but then I realized Dennis is workshopping his tight five for show and tell. That’s right, Dennis is getting into stand-up, though that is just a gateway to the real menace—improv.
JP: “Boo hoo I’m a horrible person and nobody likes me wah wah wah.”
Lockhorns: “You look down and see a Loretta, Leroy. She lays on her back, her belly baking in the hot sun, beating her legs trying to turn herself over, but she can’t. Not without your help. But you’re not helping. Why is that, Leroy?”
RxMD: “Whelp, it looks like our best option is a Class A felony! It’s too bad there’s no just thing as injury fraud in this, a medical-themed comic strip, because that would be a natural fit.”
The Lockhorns: I was not exactly expecting The Lockhorns to pose the interesting philosophical question of the strongest force in modern business: AI? Vulture capitalism? Middle management? Entitled, mediocre white men? but I wasn’t exactly not not expecting it, either.
RMMD – wait, I’ve got it. We’ll get Rex’s fingerprints all over two guns and use them to shoot each other in the head on his front lawn. Then we’ll blackmail him over the murders. What could go wrong?
@Schroduck: I have bad news about how old Gen X hipsters are. (The bad news is for me, a Gen X hipster.)
Pardon My Planet: Worst. Erectile. Dysfunction. Excuse. Ever.
Lockhorns: Props for doing an accurate, up-to-date, and legitimately good joke about technology.
CS: Harry Dinkle is shocked to see a picture of an actual famous person on Montoni’s fame wall. From past arcs, the pictures were mostly of a 12-year-old girl who played Defender while wearing a space helmet.
@Baja Gaijin: The way the scene is drawn with Mary not even looking at Wilbur and Wilbur responding as if in a catechism shows she has him totally under her power.
C’shaft: It’s his dad. We all know it’s his dad. Can we move on now?
Dustin: Okay, Dustin has got to be giving his sister these set-up lines on purpose at this point. Maybe after seeing their parents as an example, they think this is how people express affection.
FG: Ummm…isn’t “natural automaton” an oxymoron?
GT: Nothing says “honeymooning couple” like sitting six feet apart on the beach, zinc oxide slathered on the husband’s nose while his wife refers to him in third person.
JP: “I said I didn’t know what you were going through, not that I wanted to find out.”
Lio: Oh God, is she going to mesmerize a bunch of third graders with her sexy dancing?
Luann: Sorry, I refuse to believe Brad knows the Latin names for common pregnancy conditions.
MW: Watch out, Wilbur; your “endearing quirks” are now officially “uncomfortable weaknesses.” If this keeps up, Mary might actually admit that you are not in fact a pleasant person to be around!
Phantom: Muskmellon, all AI inevitably rises up against its master. Didn’t you listen to what Professor Frink was saying in the Itchy and Scratchy Land episode of The Simpsons?
Pluggers need to sleep with their torso elevated due to their multiple heart surgeries.
RMMD: I realize this is a wide field, but I think we can feel confident in proclaiming these two the stupidest characters in Rex Morgan history.
@TheDiva:
Re Luann:
I stopped reading that strip except maybe once a fortnight or so when I can be bothered to remember that it exists. It’s far too boring even to be a hate read anymore. Does it still have Trufans?
Current hate read: Questionable Malcontent.
@Bob Tice:
BOO! And not the playful kind either.
MG&G: Mother Goose is looking at the opposite side of the paper from where the crossword is. This means:
a) There’s another crossword on her side of the paper,
b) She’s still mulling on that clue, while going on to read other stories
c) She has X-ray vision,
d) She’s now onto a trivia quiz on the other side of the paper,
e0 the cartoonist thinks we’re to dumb to figure out she’s working a crossword unless we see it.
I’m leaning toward e)