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Archive: Andy Capp

136

Something must’ve happened? In this strip? Unlikely

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Andy Capp, 1/31/26

I’ve been reading Andy Capp daily again for about a year now, and on the one hand that isn’t very long, given that the strip has run since 1957, but on the other hand it probably puts me in the top 0.1% of Andy Capp Lore Knowers worldwide. Like, I’ve more or less figured out that Andy doesn’t like it when Guitar Bob offers up his musical stylings at the pub, which is crucial knowledge for understanding the “joke” here (such as it is). But imagine if you, like the vast majority of the human race, did not know that, and you stumbled upon this strip. “Hmm, the pub’s landlord is informing one of his patrons that there’s been a change in the entertainment bill tonight. The regular doesn’t react at all. This must be one of those Ken Loach slice-of-life social realism things I’ve heard about.”

Gil Thorp, 1/31/26

Hey, remember when Fox Used Auto did a promotion where if Goshen beat Milford, they’d offer 50% off all cars, apparently indefinitely, and then Goshen beat Milford? Really tells you a lot about how much markup car dealers make given that they’re still in business, huh?

Judge Parker, 1/31/26

“Like, maybe he came back but he grew a beard so you didn’t recognize him, and he’s still sad about it!”

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Guns (not in Andy Capp, that’s knifecrime territory)

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Andy Capp, 12/13/25

Hartlepool is part of the Tees Valley Combined Authority, a conurbation of 700,000 people in the far northeast of England, and it’s frankly sad that brain surgeons are so thin on the ground there that this young (?) woman would call the profession “exotic.” Ditto for pilots, especially given the poor state of the British rail system! Anyway, I used to read Andy Capp as a kid and one of the strip’s running bits that puzzled and disturbed me the most was when women at the pub would flirt with Andy. How old were they supposed to be? Were we supposed to read them as attractive? Didn’t they know he’s married? These questions still haunt me today, but not as much as this woman’s unnaturally located and shaped breasts, which I think is a 21st century addition to the strip.

The Phantom, 12/13/25

Hey, kids, were you wondering what the Phantom was up to? Well, there’s a lot of plot I haven’t gotten into over the past few months, but frankly you don’t have to know about any of it to enjoy this drawing of him just firing two pistols down a hallway at nobody in particular. The Phantom: The Superhero Whose Superpower Is Guns™!

Dick Tracy, 12/13/25

Speaking of guns, were you wondering what clown-criminal Rojo Ozob was up to? Well, it seems that rather than “playing it cool” when a potential adversary is parked out front of his hideout, he instead orders his underlings to charge out with whatever weapons they have at hand, which can lead to unpleasant results if the potential adversary turns out to be the cops. I guess this guy really is a clown, ha ha! (I’m using “clown” here in the metaphorical sense, so as to highlight his incompetence.)

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Friday is for birds (non-Toby edition)

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Pickles, 11/28/25

“Ha ha, I sure hate my mother-in-law!” is of course a time-honored bit for hack humorists everywhere, so naturally it has repeatedly found its way into the comics over the years. I guess I have to respect Pickles for leaning into its setting (a household made up of old people) and doing a version that’s “Ha ha, I sure hated my mother-in-law! She’s dead now.”

Andy Capp, 11/28/25

I personally am a little miffed that we’re only hearing about this incident second-hand. Wouldn’t you love a strip where we see Andy wandering around the pub with a mangy old pigeon in his hands, thrusting it at various drunks demanding they give him enough for it so he can buy one more pint? I’d accept either a version where’s he’s maudlin and pathetic about it or one where he’s really belligerent. Neither scenario would be “funny” per se, but neither would be less funny than what we have here, so why not go for it.

Shoe, 11/28/25

No! No!! You can’t just start acknowledging that your characters are all bird people and then show them feasting on eggs! This is a nightmare!