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Alice, 7/10/26

This is honestly a perfect Alice strip. The actual joke, while not groundbreaking or anything, definitely made me laugh, mostly because of the phrasing and specific number given. But then you have a jaunty “No soup for you!” caption, because … you ate too many pretzels and aren’t hungry, I guess? And then below that you have an even smaller label letting you know that this is a reference to a 31-year-old Seinfeld episode. 31 years old! Did you know that “The Soup Nazi” is as far from us in time today as the Dick Van Dyke Show was from Seinfeld? I didn’t until just now, when I did that math. Thanks a lot, Alice, I hope you liked your pretzels.

Dennis the Menace, 7/10/26

Martha’s facial expression here is honestly kind of upsetting. Can’t she just have one moment of peace to give thanks to the Lord without her husband going off on some furious diatribe about the neighbor kid? Just one little moment, just for one day?

Heathcliff, 7/10/26

I honestly can’t believe that Blondie, which never seems to have met a widely shared cultural moment it doesn’t like, hasn’t been doing a series of dumb on-the-nose bits about the World Cup. Like, sure, soccer is for Godless communists, but so are the Olympics, and Blondie absolutely loves doing dumb on-the-nose bits about that. I guess Heathcliff has to pick up the slack, but Heathcliff being Heathcliff, it’s doing a bit that’s whatever the opposite of on the nose is. A bit that’s missing the face entirely? Anyway, I like it.

Mary Worth, 7/10/26

I like how absolutely furious Tommy looks as he’s compelled to buy drugs to prove a point of some kind to Wilbur. Wilbur! Nobody ever has to prove anything to Wilbur! I’m beginning to think that Tommy may not be very bright.

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Mary Worth, 6/29/26

The very first Mary Worth plot covered on this blog introduced both Tommy in full drug lord mode and launched the Wilbur/Iris relationship, so it makes sense that Wilbur’s view of Tommy is filtered through the difficulties Tommy’s caused his mother. That’s not why he’s so upset, though (obviously Wilbur has caused Iris plenty of trouble on his own). No, the real issue is that if even Dawn isn’t writing Tommy off as a hopeless addict and loser, where does that leave Wilbur? He’ll be fighting Ian to avoid the “worst dude in Charterstone” title, and Ian agreed to not murder his wife’s parrot so he’s already got a head start! Anyway, I’m looking forward both to seeing Wilbur’s emotional meltdown and learning what “teen dance-offs” are.

Alice, 6/29/26

A while back we learned that Alice might be good at her job, actually, which I found somewhat destabilizing, but we didn’t learn what her job actually is. Today we find out that she’s apparently a teacher of some kind, which is funny because we’ve never, ever seen her teaching a class. Maybe she should be laid off, actually? Since she doesn’t have any students, and teaching them is her job?

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 6/29/26

Ha ha, yes, Snuffy, that is certainly one way to construe the gentleman’s statement! But for real, stealing chickens from your destitute neighbors is one thing, but you stole a car and you’re going to jail jail now.

Herb and Jamaal, 6/29/26

Oh, well, big news, Herb: when people say “affordability,” they are actually specifically discussing whether people can afford to pay for goods and services. People like you, for instance! So we’re all talking about the same thing here, it turns out.

Six Chix, 6/29/26

Yeah, if my dog started talking to me like this, I would be freaking the fuck out! This guy knows what’s up!

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Mary Worth, 6/3/26

Bad news, everyone: Tommy has managed to “seal the deal,” as they say in the sex-having community. He’s not like the other guys, as demonstrated by the fact that he refers to frozen yogurt as “fro-yo.” If he’d called it “frogurt,” he’d have a long, lonely night ahead of him.

Shoe, 6/3/26

Look, I complain a lot about how Shoe generally refuses to acknowledge that its characters are all birds, so I have to hand it to today’s strip: “Charles Squab” is a solid bird-themed pun. Unfortunately this scenario is out of date: the Perfesser, as the strip has repeatedly established and indeed makes clear today, does not have anywhere near the amount of assets that would justify in-person financial advice, and would have been pushed into checking his balances on squab.com, or squab.bird, or whatever the top-level domain in the Shoeniverse is.

Alice, 6/3/26

Why not look 70 at 70? Why not look however old Alice looks at whatever age Alice is? Have you ever given any thought to how old Alice looks, or is? I hadn’t, but now I can’t stop thinking about it, and whether those two numbers match up, and how you could even tell!

Gil Thorp, 6/3/26

COACH BABU: I can help Beth with the wedding.

GIL: Are you sure, Coach Babu?

COACH BABU: Only if I can plan the sangeet. Is there one?

GIL [nervously glances down at the convenient narration box explaining what a sangeet is, learns that it sounds fun and also inexpensive]: There is now!