SURPRISE!!!!!!! (if you are as dumb as Toby)
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Mary Worth, 10/18/26
Oh, wow, as predicted by literally everybody, Mary and Ian weren’t engaged in a sexual relationship after all; they were simply spending lots of time together because Ian is simply too dumb to know how to make a reservation at a restaurant or an all-inclusive resort, both of which I assume have both phone numbers and websites, and he was deliriously grateful that Mary was able to help out. Why, they even had a big laugh together about how ill-equipped Ian is to successfully complete even the most basic of everyday life tasks. The best thing about this big reveal is that Wilbur, Dawn, Saul, Eve, and … I think that’s Tommy? … are all party invitees, which means that the exact same people who eagerly spread the gossip about Ian and Mary also presumably knew that Ian and Mary were planning a surprise party for Toby together. It also means that Toby has no actual friends, because I don’t think she’s ever hung out with any of these people on a non-Charterstone-pool-party basis.
Dustin, 10/18/26
Now, I know most of us think about Dustin as “that unlikeable dipshit who’s marginally less unlikeable than his father.” But he has some layers to him that you might not expect! For instance, did you know he’s also haunted by thoughts of death, and how he’ll be remembered after it in this world and what he’ll experience in the next?
Hi and Lois, 10/18/26
Speaking of the afterlife, can you imagine risking eternal damnation just to watch a Jaguars-Texans game? Seems not worth it, to me. On the other hand, given that the pews here are full of random comic and cartoon characters, Hi is probably having some kind of hallucinatory experience, which makes the fact that he’s making sure to keep up on Jags-Texans action even more pathetic.
Mother Goose and Grimm, 10/18/26
We’re all familiar with Pinocchio, of course, the beloved wooden puppet who came to life. Can you imagine if Pinocchio were real, and worried about venereal disease? Probably in that context he’d think about termites, right? Termites that would eat his wooden penis? Anyway, that’s not a puppet lady who he’s ogling, so I personally think he should learn more about the human body and the various organisms that make up its extended biome before he goes around trying to have sex with us.
38 replies to “SURPRISE!!!!!!! (if you are as dumb as Toby)”
JP: [Arrested Development voiceover] The next day she left again…
RMMD: I swear Beatty is just tracing all the women from his clip art file. Look at panel 6 and tell me that with just a different coloring she couldn’t be whatsherface from the clinic? Look at panel 9 and tell me that removing the glasses she couldn’t be MaeMae? And just to mix it up, AugieDoggyDaddy in panel 7 looks like a tracing of Bruce Wayne circa 1951.
Special to Ukelele Ike: Regardless of whether it’s your birthday or not, I’m currently reading volume 6 of ‘The Bellybuttons’ and I want to thank you for the recommendation. I want to slap some sense into every single character, but there’s been something that’s made me laugh out loud several times in every issue! I’m hooked!
Okay, this is obviously before Pinocchio became a real boy, meaning he’s way too young to be in a bar. But who’s going to card a puppet?
Eek!-“But he’s my brother.”
Hi and Lois-Hirm? Hi’s name is short for Hiram?
Hi and Lois-“Uh oh! This must be serious she never uses my full name.”
MW-“Oh my god! Mary I can understand but you’re also cheating on me with Wilbur!”
Slylock Fox-Slylock is wrong. Those are the only type of trees the artist can draw.
MG&G: [Insert “Lie to me some more!” NSFW image here]
H&L: The NFL Sunday ticket, which is the only way to watch out-of-market games, costs $400 per and Hi going to get his money’s worth even if this particular game is broadcast nationally.
MW:
“And here’s a toast to abject stupidity and vicious rumor-mongering!”
H&L: The Flagstons go to the same church as Snuffy Smith? Huh, I had no idea they were Snake Handlers.
Dustin: I’m going to give Dustin a hint of what his life after death will look like: “The consensus of the Wikipedia community is that Dustin (comic strip) does not meet notability standards and will be deleted.”
MW: I know couples who treat their wedding date as their anniversary, and those who choose their first date, or even the first time they had sex. But “Our anniversary is when I started stalking you” is next level.
MG&G: What’s really sad is I bet after drawing that, the artist leaned back, admired his work and said “Hoo mama, that’s one sexy lady!”
MG and G:
“I’d offer to buy her a drink with my native currency, but I’m not sure she’d take any wooden nickels!”
MW Toby cried happy tears, although not for the reason Ian supposed At last she had Ascended – no longer would she have to deal with the consequences of her choices. She was truly one of Mary’s Elect, she could not even publicly stumble with an ill-timed confrontation with her husband – from now on, somehow she would be prevented from doing so.
MG&G: “The Erotic Adventures of Pinocchio” had the tag line “It’s not just his nose that grows!”
H and L:
Hi and Lois is kind of an antimatter Father Knows Best. Maybe Father Knows Worst.
FG Good thing Brazor’s moles had helped run the monthly evacuation drills for ages. “I can set the detonator timer for 15 minutes,” he mused, “after all, the worst result in the last half-year has been 12 minutes to get everyone out”
Phantom Although I am sure they’re intended with the gravity of “don’t watch the tape” from The Ring, all of these deep shadows and panel frame cutoffs hiding the eyes remind me of the farcical potted plants and bits of furniture for naked gags in the Austin Powers movies
MW:
“What’s this, Ian?”
“A demonstrative pronoun. But that’s not important now.”
MW: So are the Charterstone residents so thoroughly brain dead that they didn’t realize Ian and Mary spending time together might be related to the party they were all invited to, or do they think the party is a mere excuse for Ian and Mary to spend time together? I’d like it to be the second one, if only so we’d finally have a story line that isn’t entirely dictated by stupidity, but this is Mary Worth, after all.
All I can think about, outside of the incredibly odd romantic pairing of Ian and Toby, is who is going to take care of the parrots while they vacation in Maui.
So, does this mean the lady who spread all the rumors to begin with, who disappeared from the story the instant the rumors reached Toby, won’t be Learning a Valuable Lesson? I suppose it does make sense to some extent for this to be is where things were headed all along, so this isn’t as clear-cut as when what seemed to be a buildup to a storyline about human trafficking pivoted to “well, I guess all the money I sent to the guy who catfished me is lost in the ether, I just need to spend more time with my family”, but still, I do wonder if Moy has developed a problem with committing to storylines.
OK, I can talk about the Simpsons, I hope?
The Simpsons, absolutely. B@tman,* maybe. But there is no way Snuffy Smith would wind up in the Flagstons’ neighborhood. The cops would shoot him on sight. He would shoot everyone on sight. It just can’t happen.
*looks like that character gets spam filtered
H&L – Hi, put the phone away. The kid in the next row swapped the sheet music for the processional for Iron Butterfly’s “In-a-Gadda-Da-Vida.” It’s gonna be great!
RMMD – Beatty’s valiant battle against dramatic tension and compelling storytelling continues apace.
MW – You’d think they’d have invited some members of Toby’s local artists’ group. They call themselves the “Kringeworthy Kitsch Kollective.”
MW – Is Dawn beginning to lose her hair?
Mary Worth, 10/18/26; Is that some kind of female athletic cup Mary is holding up FOR ALL TO SEE in the last panel?
B**man has battled demons, immortal men, and the worst abominations mankind can’t even imagine.
And even helped Wonder Woman out by going to literal Hades and fighting monsters there.
He knows there is no God.
@Lauralot: or they all weren’t invited until the very last minute, so didn’t know until hours before? That would also explain Mary’s help, as presumably Go Where Mary Tells You is written into the Charterstone condo contract.
H&L- Lois is going to be even more pissed when she finds out Hi is only watching the game because some betting site convinced him to bet 10 large on the game
MW+ should have had a message at the end:
If you were surprised by this ending, please re-read all the previous elder scam stories.
Props to the Hi and Lois artist for leaving room for Maggie among the Simpsons, and for remembering that B@tman is Protestant despite Bruce Wayne famously being Greek Orthodox from his mother’s side of the family.
MW: …it was love at first sight…and trust me, waiting for you to come of age was the longest six years of my life.”
@richardf8: Whereas his father is listening to the game through headphones and is about to jump up yelling “IT’S GOOD!”
Phantom: They were this close to getting Devil kebabs for dessert….
H&L: Hi is hallucinating after Lois whacked him on the head with a frying pan after insinuating she doesn’t know where London is or what time zones are.
Lisa Simpson converted to Buddhism decades ago.
The easiest type of person to catch off guard with a surprise party is one who doesn’t have any friends. I think my nana had that embroidered on a pillow.
Pluggers have been idiots since they were children.
Zits: We had electronics in the 90s!!! You’d think this comic that has been running since 1996 would know more about that decade.
Snuffy Smith has to leave Hootin’ Holler and travel who knows how far* just to go to Church.
*Depending on where Hootin Holler is located, and the location of Hi and Lois’s city.
Heck, even B**man doesn’t bother to go to a church in Gotham. Maybe he was in the area at the time and needed an emergency prayer.
@Anonymous:
The Global Positioning System (GPS) was officially approved and started by the U.S. Department of Defense in December 1973, with the first prototype satellite launched in 1978.
GA:
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