Wednesday quick takes
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Blondie, 10/28/26
Don’t really feel like engaging with the “joke” here, but I do want to point out that at some point in the past week the Bumsteads rearranged the TV table so at least one of them can now see the screen while seated normally. Dagwood still seems to be having trouble, though, if that lean is any indication. You can move the TV even closer, Dagwood! That’s what the wheels are for!
Dustin, 10/28/26
I feel duty bound to acknowledge when one of those comics characters I truly loathe does something praiseworthy. For instance, today I’m pleased by the fact that Dustin’s dad has decided to meekly await death rather than putting any effort into staying alive.
Dennis the Menace, 10/28/26
By iron-clad comics visual law, this guy’s red nose indicates that he’s pretty drunk right now, on the job, presumably in the middle of the day. And who can blame him, when the children who should be his primary customers are wandering in off the street and asking shit like this?
58 replies to “Wednesday quick takes”
MW: “Yeah…I realize that! Didn’t stop me from spreading it, though!”
DtM: “My fucking retirement fund, unless you stop asking questions and actually buy something.”
Dustin: Ed’s doctor is just Ed with a chin implant.
Blondie:
They’ve been sending rockets up into space since the 1950s, so for portions of eight decades now. Where has this guy been?
Dustin:
“Actually, Ed, I’m more concerned about your wife than I am about you. Does she have to look at you on a regular basis in this state of undress?”
Pluggers: Isn’t this one solid week in a row that pluggers are old, demented, and physically decrepit?
Dennis the Menace:
“Sure, kid. Check out this can of instant water. All you have to do is add water and stir!”
MW: Tomorrow it will be a bound and gagged Dawn with electrodes attached to her nipples being interrogated by Mary.
DTM: I was about to comment that Superman on the shelf there has a horrifically broken humerus, until I realized that there’s no S on the chest insignia. Rather, there’s a C, possibly for Calcium Deficiency Man. But on closer inspection, the shopkeeper’s arms are equally mangled. So this is just a world where the majority of the population suffers from arm-rickets, I suppose.
Blondie: It’s the “tiny” part Dagwood is upset about. Holds up a tube of caulking: “I think I can fit a steak in here.”
MW-“Wilbur, have you ever heard the story of a man named Fredo?”
MW-“That was a false rumor?”
Blondie Fun fact: there was an orbital launch happening somewhere in the world virtually every day this year! Just love the idea that these two are just glued to their special space news channel, revelling at each new rocket sent up without any diminishing shock or awe.
MW – I like to think that we’ll see Mary confronting a new person, ratted out by the previous person, for a few days. Maybe Saturday, we can also watch the police as they find the elaborately mutilated bodies of Charterstone residents in the exact same order. It’s a coin flip as to whether Mary spares the goldfish.
Dennis the Menace:
I guess this is supposed to be some sort of commentary about these dang kids today and their electronic video game computers, back in my day we played with toys that required imagination, video games are communist, etc., etc. But the art doesn’t show anything that is obviously a video game—the boxes are much thicker than a typical game box—and quite a few things that are definitely just normal toys. Sorry, Dennis, your little bit that no child would ever do has been foiled by the reuse of a panel from the 1970s!
@Lauralot: Yes, Dustindad’s doctor has exactly the same book that Dustindad does, which makes his constant body shaming
pretty stupidexactly what I would expect from this strip.Curtis:
Does onion repel vampires like garlic does?
We’ll find out!
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Zits:
Double, double, toil and trouble,
Fire burn and Jeremy bubble…
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Wary Morth:
“Wilbur, can I ask you something? Why do you leave your door open so any psychopathic meddler could waltz in and begin emotionally destroying you?”
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Wary Morth:
“Wilbur, can I ask you something?”
“I suppose so, since you’re obviously capable of opening your mouth and vibrating air through your larynx to talk.”
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Wary Morth:
“It’s all Dusk’s fault! And she also raced me to the door when Bats Bellefry came at us with a knife! She’s no daughter of mine! So do with her as you choose!”
BB: Seems like Camp Swampy has been getting more than its fair share of extreme weather lately. Last Friday the camp was wrecked by lightning and tornadoes, the previous Sunday there was rain with tornado and flood warnings, and today a torrential downpour has ruined Buxley Wednesday. Maybe this is the push Congress needs to do something about global warming.
Blondie: Wait, shouldn’t Dagwood’s knees be about 3/4 down his legs? It just doesn’t look right for them to be in the normal human location.
Pluggers are still obsessively rewatching the 2004 Janet Jackson Super Bowl wardrobe malfunction. They just sit there all day, every day pressing replay.
Dustin gives us a passive-aggressive spectacles war. Ed put his glasses back on, but not his shirt, so that the doctor would know he was deliberately making him gaze on his naked form. The doctor pushed his own glasses so far down that he can’t see a thing.
Ph: Wow. Just wow. We’re seriously supposed to take at face value Schmelon Schmusk thinking that turning off the phone turned off the AI? He’s *that* big of an idiot? Schmelon must be the figurehead for the actual Big Bad, the one who doesn’t feel the need to parade around in a stupid alien mask.
CS: Y’know… I’m not going to get into any argument with anyone here about who’s right and who’s wrong, but if Batty thinks this kind of po-faced messaging is going to have *any* impact whatsoever, either on his side or the other, then he’s an even bigger moron than I thought. It’s this kind of thing that when I see it, it *really* pisses me off (along with all the *other* things to be pissed off about in this day and age)…
RMMD: ‘Between my future incel of a son and future queer of a daughter, I’m *never* gonna get that grandchild!’
RMMD2: Why Buck, what a punchable face you have!
The only interesting thing about Dustin’s dad going to the doctor is the fact that the doctor resembles him except for the majestic chin. We can see that chinless freak humiliated by a real man! Just die, Dustin’s dad, you’ll never know the thrill of folding a bed sheet!
“They just sent another rocket into space! In other news, Khrushchëv and Kennedy spoke on the phone in an attempt to reduce tensions between the superpowers, the civil war in Congo raged on, and yet another CIA attempt to kill Fidel Castro ended in failure.”
MW- “I realize that” , meaning you DID think it was true at some point. If you never believed it, you’d say “I KNEW that” If Mary is paying attention at all, she should be mentally crossing off Wilbur’s name from the muffin list.
Thanks for all the kind thoughts for my mother-in-law’s passing. She was a very kind and generous woman before the cognitive decline took her filter and led her down some unpleasant internet rabbit holes, so we have a lot of good memories of her that outweigh the final rough patch. She had a large family and many friends, and it was great to see how loved she was in life.
Dustin: Knowing Dustdad, he probably hasn’t put any thought into life insurance or long-term care arrangements, so this is just one more way he plans to stick it to his family before he goes.
DtM: “Runs on imagination” sounds like something that should be a slogan for Lego or something similar, possibly something old enough to be sold at this vintage toy shop Dennis somehow wandered into.
@TheDiva: Sorry, I just found out about that from your reply. My sympathies.
Blondie:
I’m somewhat confused by how much pure white is in today’s strip. Dagwood’s chair? White. Dagwood’s shoes? White. Blondie’s shoes? Also white. The TV stand? You guessed it, white. An attempt to evoke the high-tech, sterile cleanliness of the coming space age? Or the work of an underpaid colorist who just couldn’t be bothered today? You decide.
“No. I’ll tell ya what I do have, though: a stop-sign model-building kit, an ‘Uwu’-brand box of shapes, a floating model car, a box of 20 of something, a radio, ‘Ferdinand,’ a wonky frog, a wonky Superhero action figure, a wonky old-fashioned cassette player, a wonky Cylon, a box of crackers, a cash register, another wonky old-fashioned cassette player, a normal non-floating car, one half of a set of walkie-talkies, Blobs!, a yield-sign model-building kit, and a model DeLorean. Any of those strike yer fancy, kid?” [[takes a pull from a flash with a skull-and-crossbones on it]] “Now scram. Uwon here’s got a date with the break room, a bottle of kerosene, and a whole lotta matches.”
I know that’s just Blondie’s chair showing through the gap between Dagwood’s arm and body, but in the last panel, it looks like he’s holding a corndog.
Dustin: I am nearly certain they’ve made this exact joke before, but I’m not going to bother hunting through the Dustin archives to prove it.
I really wish Dennis the Menace could show us how the rest of this interaction plays out. Disgruntled but still duty bound to help the little brat, the shopkeeper brings out various kinds of toys, trying and failing to present just the right tchotchke for Dennis. “Mmm, this is almost okay but do you have anything about baseball?” “This is almost good but can you find one that’s cooler?” After what feels like a lifetime of purgatorial labor, the shopkeeper finally presents just the right gewgaw to Dennis who declares it perfect. Satisfied, the man asks Dennis for the amount due. Dennis looks the man squarely in the eyes and in a deadpan voice declares, “Oh I ain’t got no money.” Before turning on his heels to leave. If the man wasn’t drunk before he certainly will be after he finishes chugging his “emergency” bottle of scotch.
C’shaft: So, you’re going to play this one note all week, aren’t you?
DT: Looks like Howie couldn’t remember where exactly on the gender spectrum the DA fell, and decided to hedge his bets.
JP: Has Neddy ever been checked out for major depressive disorder? She does this every time life throws her a curveball; she might need to get on some medication.
MW: Wilbur’s taking a note from Putnam in The Crucible, hoping to get Mary’s sweet corner condo after she’s kicked out of Charterstone in disgrace.
Hi and Lois; Chip knows how to use profanity but his idea of a rock band is emulating Josie and the Pussycats?
Blondie: Wow, they just launched another rocket into space! That marks 7,440 launches in the past 70 years! I think this whole “rocket” thing might just, heh heh, TAKE OFF!
Dustin: Here’s a sentence no-one’s ever said before: I love that Dustin’s dad is naked. There’s no reason to take your clothes off just to pick up some lab results, but why not humiliate him in every way possible at the same time?
Well, I guess we finally have confirmation that Dennis is a Boomer’s soul trapped in the body of a five year-old by some dark spell. Supernaturally menacing!
Moralising about kids today being deprived of imagination while using a child to expound the most trite opinion possible: the Boomer paradox
@Anonymous: Synchronicity!
DTM: Has the writer even met a child in 2026? The things they want to play with for some inexplicable reason are “slime” and “squishy toys”
Blondie: Actually, the secret to understanding this comic is panel 2: “the future is starting to feel like real-life science fiction”. Surely it’s “the present day”, right? Well, what if Dagwood’s TV is showing events years in the future? It’s still the 1930s, Blondie is still a flapper, Dagwood is still a dissolute ether addict, but he alone knows that one day, the Soviets will launch something called “Sputnik”, and he can’t believe his eyes.
The comics today gave us a glimpse of Dustin’s dad’s nipple, and the angry mob will be convening at noon. I have a few torches and a couple of extra pitchforks for anyone who needs them.
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Ha ha! It’s always funnier when Dennis just gives voice to his Boomer writer’s complaints about life this century!
So Curtis is now a goth vampire? It seems a little late to be jumping on the Twilight craze since the last movie came out 15 years ago.
“Blondie” is so old that it is just now starting to register rocket launches (from the 1950s) and science fiction where astronauts eat pills and tube food (from the 1960s). Come on, get updated at least to the 1970s and Paul R. Ehrlich-inspired science fiction! You know that Dagwood would get a taste of Soylent Green!
MW “I *realize* the rumours were false – I mean, I did as soon as I saw the party and was told about the planning meetups you’d had with Ian. That’s why I babbled about them to you, I was freaked out. ImsorryIdon’tknowwhyIfellfortheminthefirstplace – please don’t hurt me! My fish depends on me, see? Have mercy!”
@TheDiva: Oh, so sorry to hear about her passing.
“So you think I should get my affairs in order? I need to record a series of videos for my children to watch at different milestones in their life! Even from beyond the grave, they need to know I am disappointed in them!”
@Anonymous: Yeah, there are a lot of screen games and *some* toys come with online app add-ons (do not get me started about the direction LEGO is going…) but *tons* of hands-on things. They all want big squishy bao buns with faces this month…
“Your numbers are not great. You blood pressure is 130/70”
“I thought it was fine for my age”
“Yes, but it hurts my synesthesia”
DtM: Well yes, actually, we do. There are several toy cars and superhero action figures right here. Even some of these electronic-like things could be radios, which used to have story and adventure shows, back in the day when this artwork was created. In fact, the very idea of having a clerk behind the counter to wait on you and receive your question is at least two generations out of date. What I’m saying is that your attempted punchline is less of a “cute things kids might say” and more “boomer griping about childhood today.” So please return homeward and hang out at the home of your retired neighbor who hates you.
“Do you have anything that runs on imagination?”
“Actually, we have something that contains not even a trace of imagination! Are you interested in a legacy strip?”
“Yeah, well I’m going to get a second opinion from a real doctor, not an Easter Island mo?ai who attended medical school in Grenada!”
Dustin: Only two types of doctors will talk to you in that state of undress: A dermatologist checking skin moles or an oncologist looking for swollen lymph nodes. This being Dustin, the rare third case of the doctor being a pervert is probably the reason.
“Imagination, child? Oh, yes, we have items that run on imagination, belief, awe, and terror. Toys that will raise your soul to the heights of Paradise and the depths of the Abyss. Toys of wonder and delight and shock and depravity. Are you ready, child? Truly ready? Then I present you with this . . . fidget spinner. Now get the fuck out of my store.”
Blondie: Has Blondie broken her neck trying to watch TV? I know we call strips that outlive their creators “zombies,” but I didn’t realize things had gotten so literal.
Dennis the Menace: The inscrutable nonsense adorning the boxes in this store alarms me. Is that the Yellow Sign, mark of Hastur’s avatar, The King in Yellow? I mean, it’s purple, but that could be just another coloring error!
DTM just makes me want to watch that imagination episode of SpongeBob which was actually funny.
The SpongeBob SquarePants imagination episode “Idiot Box” (Season 3, Episode 44b), which originally aired on March 1, 2002.
@TheDiva:
That cognitive decline is rough on the family. I hope you will remember the pre-rabbit hole days with love, comfort, and warmth!
Dennis just walked into a Stephen King story. This guy is about to sell him an antique wind up monkey toy.
DT: “Sorry, kid, I only sell products that defy imagination. Look at these boxes. Squiggly lines, tiny squares, a triangle… I’ve asked my boss what we actually sell, but all he ever does is giggle and hang up on me.”
Dagwood might just pivot from playing solitaire when the boss isn’t looking to compulsively checking his SpaceX stock. Not as great a use of time, but given his credulity, he’ll be taking out a loan to buy that “flying” car next