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Apartment 3-G, 9/19/08

I suppose that eventually the Apartment 3-G Terrible Downward Spiral Of Clean-Cut Middle-Class People Into Addiction storyline will cease to be transcendently awesome — presumably, right around the time that Ray’s squirrelly histrionics cause Alan to take a hard look at his life and straighten up and fly right and earn the love of a good woman and blah blah blah — but let’s enjoy the ride to its fullest while we can, OK? It’s actually sort of like drug abuse in that way: deep down, you know that you can’t sit in your room giggling over phrases like “Please! I hurt so bad!!” forever, but that doesn’t stop you from being taken up by the highs in the here and now. Perhaps even better than Ray’s sincere yet laughable description of the pangs of withdrawal in panel two is his expression in panel three: he seems to be thinking, “Hey! I know! I could reduce Alan to a powdered form and then smoke and/or snort him! All my problems would be solved!”

Hi and Lois, 9/19/08

The idea that innocent baby Trixie might look out the window and learn about the emotional pain and verbal abuse that lurks behind her suburb’s cheery facade is actually rather poignant; her look of wide-eyed horror in the final panel says volumes about what it’s like to discover that people who love each other can wound one another far more deeply than any strangers could. But bringing in the brother-sister metaphor just makes the whole thing creepy and weird. I like my domestic degradation without the unsettling incest overtones, thank you very much.

Sally Forth, 9/19/08

Watch out, Sally! She can quote the Last Starfighter, and she rests her fingers delicately on her collarbone, Ted-style! Also, it may be an optical illusion, but it appears that she might kind of have breasts? HOW CAN YOU COMPETE WITH THAT?

Beetle Bailey, 9/19/08

Oh, Freud would have a field day with this.

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Apartment 3-G, 9/18/08

Enjoy this moment of the Apartment 3-G Crazed Dopeheads On Parade storyline. We’re sliding through deliriously wonderful high camp right now, but we’ll no doubt end up in awful kitsch soon enough.

Beetle Bailey, 9/18/08

I find it kind of poignant that Otto is staring at the newspaper in the first panel, despite the fact that his thought balloon implies that he’s illiterate. I find it kind of confusing that he says “astrology forecast” instead of “horoscope.”

Gil Thorp, 9/18/08

“But then I noticed she was wearing some kind of terrifying vest-thing with a skull and crossbones on the front and a heart on the back! So now I’m just hiding behind these bushes until she goes away.”

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Herb and Jamaal, 9/16/08

Well hello there, Random Mustachioed Dude Who We’ve Never Once Seen Before In This Feature! The title characters are on a break from their usual hilariously nonspecific antics (Jamaal was available for his contractually obliged appearance in the second panel), so why not just wander in and thought balloon folksily about something or other? That sounds like good cartooning right there!

It’s possible that RMDWWNOSBITF is setting up some no-doubt fascinating story about adoption or something that is really dying to be told in this feature; such a narrative would obviously require a new character as a protagonist, since no one would want to disrupt the lives of the existing Herb and Jamaal crew, who operate like a well-oiled machine of hilarity. On the other hand, if this fellow is just going to show up one day, muse silently about this strange journey we call life, then wander off, never to be seen again, I will have gained a certain respect for this comic.

Mother Goose and Grimm and Monty, 9/16/08

Monty (a strip that I never talk about here, but for which I harbor a certain affection) and Mother Goose and Grimm have both decided to launch into a series of painfully unfunny Sopranos jokes this week. And, really, why not. It’s the 1.25th anniversary of the show going off the air this month, so it’s more topical now than ever.

Spider-Man, 9/16/08

This strip, with its endless television-watching, whining, flu infections, and wholly accidental plot resolutions, can sometimes be a little too intense for newspaper readers. That’s why it’s important for Spidey to take a break every couple of weeks or so and just recap the plot for nobody in particular. Whew, I feel calmer already!

Apartment 3-G, 9/16/08

Damn you, Alan, I’ve sat idly by long enough while you spiraled downward into dope-fueled madness. Today, though, you crossed the line. Why do you denigrate booze? What did sweet, sweet liquor ever do to you? Getting drunk is a lot more than “better than nothing,” OK? It’s how humans have been altering their consciousness long before you and your fancy narcotics came along. Hey, don’t you just drop the thought of getting drunk on the job because you think there might be drugs somewhere around there! Are you listening to me? Oh my God, he’s a monster!