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Spider-Man, 2/20/06

What the exclamation point Peter Parker is uttering in panel three ought to mean: “Whoa! My wife is making enough money to support both of us and doesn’t want me to work! Now I can dedicate myself to fighting crime full-time without worrying about money — or, better yet, dedicate myself to watching TV and drinking expensive hooch full-time without worrying about money!”

What the exclamation point Peter Parker is uttering in panel three almost certainly is actually supposed to mean: “Oh, no, I’m too macho to handle any woman taking care of me blah blah blah stupid pointless boring wrong-headed crap.”

I know I’ve harped on this before, but seriously, dude: With great power comes great responsibility. And with a rich wife comes zero responsibility. So get with the program!

(I will step back from my Spidey-hating long enough to acknowledge being pleased by panel one: Peter hangs up on his boss so vigorously, the phone glows!)

Apartment 3-G, 2/20/06

Yeah, I realize that the disheveled hair is just comics visual shorthand for Having A Rough Week, presumably meant to ease any illiterate Apartment 3-G fans into the storyline’s events. But wouldn’t it be great if Margo’s normally perfectly primped bun got unwound during some kind of peacock-wrangling episode gone horribly awry? I know that I can only ever see that in my mind, but is it wrong to try to see it in my mind again and again?

Blondie 2/20/06

I don’t really have much specific to say about this. I just wanted to record here for posterity the moment when Blondie went completely insane.

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Awwwww, who knew that Margo had feelings too? She’s capable of love and sadness and loneliness and all that good stuff? If you prick her, does she not bleed? Or perhaps bleed, and then sue?

Margo’s tear is sort of suspicious, though. It looks like the one cried by that majestic Indian in that anti-litter ad from the ’70s, which is to say that it looks like it came out of a bottle. Maybe in her raging Margocentricism she’s convinced that Tommie or Lu Ann or her evil client or FBI Pete or whoever will see her crying and will soften their heart and open up to her — and that’s when she’ll go for the jugular.

Seriously, people, don’t let your guard down with Margo. She will fuck you up.

At least Margo’s tear looks like it might be transparent liquid of some kind. Over in Judge Parker, “Work It Like A Claw And Call Me” Randy appears to have been interrupted by his ex-fiancée while he was in the middle of a relaxing bath in a pool of mercury:

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The Phantom, 1/17/06

Apparently the Phantom people have been carefully studying Spider-Man, their arch-rival in the daily-adventure-soap-opera-comic space. The latter strip has over the past few months completely abandoned traditional superhero fare, with its crime-fighting and excitement and such, in favor of tedious domestic drama that serves mainly to illustrate the incompetence and overall unlikeability of its protagonist, and that’s clearly a star to which the Phantom ought to hitch its wagon post haste. I’m sure all loyal readers of this feature join me in looking forward to seeing what the next few weeks have in store for the Ghost-Who-If-Pressed-Probably-Couldn’t-Tell-You-How-Old-His-Kids-Are. Potential highlights:

• Bedtime stories read out of rows of identical leather-bound books, full of thrilling tales of Phantom’s past, which the kids will listen to for 45 seconds before picking up the PlayStation controls.
• Groundings at gunpoint.
• “You are not going out dressed like that, young lady.” “Why not, dad? I mean, everyone can see your package in your outfit! That’s a double standard! I hate you!”
• The children accidentally walking in on Mr. and Mrs. Walker, and their trauma subsequently mollified by the timely application of “Bandar medicine.”

Eventually, of course, the Big Purple Guy will realize that his half-assed attempts to be involved in the lives of his offspring will never get any more assed, and will go back to punching out villains and ne’er-do-wells, leaving the kids once again to the care of his wife — or, since his wife is apparently some kind of UN bigwig, to the care of the nannies or jungle tribespeople or feral cats or whoever the hell’s been raising them. Then they won’t surface again until it comes time for the Phantom to pass the job onto his son, who in his absence has become a graphics designer.

Anyway, what’s intriguing about this particular strip is the look of confusion and interrobanged betrayal on the look of cone-hatted pygmy sidekick Guran in panel three. My guess is that Guran is hurt because the Phantom’s sudden overdue interest in his biological offspring will cut into their own relationship, which can best be expressed by the following analogy, in standard SAT format:

Guran:The Phantom::Arnold:Mr. Drummond

The fact that Guran is an adult does not invalidate this analogy. It is a well-known fact that Emmanuel Lewis was 32 years old during the first season of Webster.

Meanwhile, in Apartment 3-G, we get a full sense of the mettle of Margo’s mega-evil bride client, Nina Blake. We all knew she was Margo’s rival in sheer bitchosity, but today we get to behold awesome power of her killing grip!

Work it like a claw, Nina … and for God’s sake, don’t anybody call her Randy.