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I know I said I’d be back on Monday, but … but … I can’t keep away from the weekend’s comics! It’s a sickness.

Marvin, 11/27/10 and a panel from the Lockhorns, 11/28/10

For instance, had I skipped the weekend I would have missed the moment when Marvin and the Lockhorns stopped pussyfooting around and just owned up to their respective central premises. Marvin threw in a half-assed (see what I did there? I know I’ll be punished for it) pun to try to keep within the conventions of the comic strip form; that Lockhorns, true to the comic’s uncompromising commitment to authenticity, went someplace much, much darker.

Panel from Dick Tracy, 11/28/10

Meanwhile, only two weeks into my Sunday Dick Tracy reading, I’m already quickly falling in love with the Crimestoppers Notebook. Look at this diminutive balding Cubs fan, brazenly proclaiming to all and sundry that he’s planning on being home alone! Even the mysterious trench-coated bad guy has been reduced to open-mouthed shock at his openness on this subject.

Apartment 3-G, 11/28/10

Over in Apartment 3-G, Paul Linski prepares to bust his move. You can tell he has less than honorable intentions towards our Lu Ann because he uses crass abbreviations like “’cuz”. Ha ha, I can’t wait to learn what depraved sex act he’ll think Lu Ann’s request to “move her piano” represents!

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Apartment 3-G, 11/24/10

Whew, thank goodness everything worked out for the best! Crazy taser lady Mrs. Bloom gets someone to look after her cat when she’s in Florida for two weeks or whatever, and all she has to do is allow an enormous piano to be stationed in her tiny Manhattan apartment indefinitely. And also Tommie’s Aunt Iris is going to live there while she’s gone, and maybe stick around after she gets back, who knows, she said in a Sunday strip that she likes to “have adventures,” and once a freewheeling adventuresome free spirit is ensconced rent-free on your couch, they’re pretty much there for the duration, if you know what I mean.

Mark Trail, 11/24/10

I worked many years as a freelancer, and I have to say that if I had been recruited by a shadowy government operative for a dangerous undercover mission, one so important that I couldn’t even fill my own wife in on the details, I wouldn’t have called up any of my clients to blab about it on an unsecured phone line. Still, it’s narratively important for Bill Ellis to hear about all this so he can blurt out everything Mark says over the phone so that in turn Kelly Welly, Mark Trail’s greatest ever recurring character, can find out about it and show up and ruin everything/make everything awesome.

You can see why Kelly might want to get out of the office, anyway, what with Bill simultaneously holding back her journalistic career and invading her personal space. Sure, the two of them might have dated a couple of times, and he taught her some techniques (so different from Mark’s!), but Kelly is obviously ready to put that chapter behind her and go screw up the Customs Department’s most ill-conceived sting operation ever.

Beetle Bailey, 11/24/10

Hey, everybody, the revolution is here, at long last! Its first target is General Halftrack. The revolution is even more misguided than I had imagined.

Archie, 11/25/10

Jughead is afraid of accidentally getting something of use out of his education; I, meanwhile, am fucking terrified of the grinning be-hatted hot dog monster that’s waving cheerily at him from the TV.

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Apartment 3-G, 11/19/10

This is something like day six of Tommie’s new concert piano being the source of Apartment 3-G’s drama without said piano actually appearing, and I’m beginning to think that the strip’s artist (who, remember, is not the same person at the strip’s writer) is unwilling or unable to draw one and desperately hoping that the story’s focus will shift to something more up his alley. “The doorbell’s ringing! Maybe it’ll be a handsome sandy-haired man wearing a suit jacket and no tie!”

Blondie, 11/19/10

I think we all pretty much assumed that Dagwood’s porn preferences would include something delicious and edible, but even I didn’t anticipate anything quite this unsettlingly depraved.

Gil Thorp, 11/19/10

“Hey, don’t worry, beardy third-string coach nobody cares about! Coach Kaz’ll keep ’em focused! With my windswept hairdo and totally rad and extreme Ray-Ban sunglasses, these kids know I’m cool — and they’ll respect me because of it!”

Ziggy, 11/19/10

Wow, Ziggy sure is on a tear of stiffing waiters on tips. I’m not sure what ethnicity this guy is supposed to be so that we can make a culturally specific joke about how he’s going to assault Ziggy for his cheapness. Is he French? Do they serve meatloaf at French restaurants?

Shoe, 11/19/10

OH GOD DON’T THINK ABOUT WHY THE MORTICIAN IS A VULTURE DON’T THINK ABOUT IT