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Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 10/13/13 (panels)

What is the relationship between art and reality — among the dreamer, the dream, and the dreamed? Magritte gives us one viewpoint, Snuffy Smith another.

Snuffy reveals how the artist not only creates a work but selects its audience, source of his reputation and claims to authenticity. He is his own best example: once a mere usurper in Barney Google’s strip, he now asserts his own membership in the very elites who read his Sunday “throwaway panels” in their expansive flatlander newspapers or on high-falutin’ electronic devices. With a delicate hanky-dab at his nose, he rises — refined and redefined, “Snuffy” no more!

Judge Parker, 10/13/13 (panel)

Boy, this lady sure hates hats, doesn’t she?

Beetle Bailey, 10/13/13

You know, there are plenty of attractive and willing human partners around, like Sarge’s Sgt. Louise Lugg, Beetle’s Miss Buxley, and Killer’s groupies, but it’s all surrogates with these guys: robots, trees, and again with Beetle’s beloved pillow here. I’m just saying that’s kind of messed up.

Mary Worth, 10/13/13 (panel)

We had to wait a long time to see Mary’s head impaled on a fish, but I think we can all agree it was worth it.

Mutts, 10/13/13

Mooch ignores the comics’ prohibition of “FLICK” to imply that Earl has sex with his own parasites.

— Uncle Lumpy

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Apartment 3-G, 10/12/13

Every long-running drama has a character I call “the Dann”, after Dann Florek of TV’s Law and Order. The Dann’s role is to say or do anything — heedless of consistency, motivation, and common sense — that will advance the plot. Depending on where the writers want to go, it could be: “You know I’ve got your back.” / “I’ll have your badge for this!” / “I stand up for my detectives!” / “The Chief of D’s wants you gone!”, or for that matter, “There’s a funny noise in this room!” / “Who cut the cheese?”, or “Friendship is magic!” Sometimes the writers roll dice or play drinking games to decide what to make him do. It’s a tough gig being the Dann.

“Friendship is magic, dirtbag!”

Pity then poor Marty, Lu Ann’s art student and current Dann-doyenne of Apartment 3-G. Since May, this little whirlwind has gone from oppositional/defiant with the Governor of New York, hyper-vigilant and protective of her sad-sack father Cole, in denial about Cole’s PTSD–alcohol–head trauma–substance abuse–depression–chronic pain–being really stupid issues, intrigued/repelled by “bad girl” Tori, enraged that her Dad concealed his brain tumor from her, bingeing with Tori on booze and smokes, to simultaneously contemptuous of her father and furious with Lu Ann because of, um, the reasons? Oh yeah, and somewhere in there she dyed her hair.

But have all her Dann-ite exertions moved the plot of Apartment 3-G forward even one narrative inch? No, they have not: day after day, it’s still just two people standing in a room talking. I can’t even believe I’m saying this, but I wish Tommie would come back and liven things up.

Funky Winkerbean, 10/12/13

“You may have cheated death, honey, but remain irremediably ignorant! Ha ha!”
“Lady’s got a point, Funky! Hu-yuck, Hu-yuck!”
And there’s your smirk, Josh — the perfect Funky Winkerbean!

Judge Parker, 10/12/13

Parkers are so accustomed to unearned cash they have a private slang for talking about it.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 10/12/13

Rex suspects some of those old Polaroids may have survived the bathhouse fire. Depending on her next move, Becka could be enjoying a long vacation and a big raise, or sharing a shallow grave with Buck. Tread lightly, Becka!

Hey, Josh is taking a week off and I’ll be here through Sunday the 20th. Drop me a line at uncle.lumpy@comcast.net if the site starts misbehaving. Enjoy!

Ooh, Becka. Oh, Becka! Beckabeckabeckabeckabecka!

— Uncle Lumpy

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B.C., 8/13/13

Prehistoric or not, it’s time to catch up when Prince Valiant beats you to a technology joke by two years.

Crankshaft, 8/13/13

“And by ‘great practice’ we mean ‘pointless and expensive truck rolls that put us at risk, endanger the public safety, and have had no effect on the frequency or recklessness of your life-threatening behavior.'”

“As part of your award, your family and the Montgomery County Court have arranged a special honorary bunk for you at, um, ‘Firehouse Manor’, where you’ll be on special honorary permanent assignment under the “Honorary Heroes” program, Ohio Revised Code (ORC) 5122.01(B). Your new Captain will give you additional orders on your arrival. Be sure to take all the vitamins she gives you so you can perform all your special honorary duties! Been great knowing you, gramps!”

Dick Tracy, 8/13/13

Dick Tracy‘s new creative team has been referencing, recapping, and extending old characters and plots all the way from the strip’s 1930’s origins through the Moon Madness of the 1970’s. Today’s second panel recaps the final episode before the team took over from Dick Locher in 2011: in it, Mordred tries to kill Dick Tracy in an abandoned granary but is eaten alive by rats before he can seal the deal.

So what happens now? Does the strip move forward from the present moment, with new villains to overcome and crimes to solve? Or does it start recapping the recaps themselves in an ever-tightening spiral until Dick Tracy shrinks to a single image, of a solitary rat nibbling on the last morsel of a villain, every day forever?

Heathcliff, 8/13/13

Heathcliff Moves On, Part XLIV: By car, scooter, balloon, elephant, and now by cannon, a cat’s gotta travel.

BOOM, I’m outta here — apparently, I’ve been selected for some sort of honorary program, and I don’t want to be late for my initiation! Josh returns Wednesday morning with more of the rich, savory comic goodness you’ve come to expect from the Comics Curmudgeon. Thanks!

–Uncle Lumpy