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Archie, 9/30/09

I’m all in favor of comically over-exaggerated gestures, and thus I approve of Reggie facepalming in reaction to Jughead’s cheerfully open Jason Blairing. Still, I’m a little concerned about the massive wind-up he took on it. Note the shockwaves radiating from the beleaguered egotist’s face; that’s going to bruise, I’m afraid.

Crock, 9/30/09

Since I’m always quick to mock the syndicate colorists for blatantly ignoring in-strip coloring cues, I feel obliged to give them kudos for their work here. Grossie is being praised for her “new dress,” despite the fact that, in black and white, she’d appear to be wearing the exact same niqab-esque thing she always wears. At least the colorists have ensured that today she appears to be wearing a sort of hideous lilac shade instead of her usual unflattering safety orange.

Family Circus, 9/30/09

Well, it appears that we are going to be subjected to Jeffy’s intermittent pantslessness and naked ass more or less indefinitely. If only the monsters responsible would just let us know what their demands are so that we could agree to them immediately, no matter how humiliating!

Luann, 9/30/09

You know, say what you will about the Brad-Toni storyline in Luann, but at least when I encounter it I know what to feel (revulsion). I admit to having no idea what to make of the Elwood thing, which is … storytelling, of a kind, I suppose? Is “bafflement” sort of like “involvement”? I’m not even firm on how old the supposed millionaire is supposed to be; as originally introduced, I think he was supposed to be in high school with the other characters, but now he’s … not? Anyway, I can see two reasons why Elwood would allow the sixteen-year-old object of his misguided affections keep the big honkin’ diamond he wooed her with: either he really is as rich as all that, or it’s a tiny camera with a wireless transmitter and his long-running plan is finally coming to fruition.

Marmaduke, 9/30/09

“In related news, our dog is a terrible four-tongued demon-thing!”

I’ve posted about this before, but I’ve been receiving a flurry of emails about it, so: Yes, there’s a Marmaduke movie in the works. Yes, Fergie and Jeremy Piven are in the cast. Yes, it will be rated NC-17, for the most horrifying violence ever depicted on screen.

Marvin, 9/30/09

I’m not sure I approve of S&M overtones in strips involving babies, but if in the end Marvin gets punished, I guess I can’t complain too much.

Spider-Man, 9/30/09

Dear Spider-Man-reading public eagerly awaiting another instance in which this strip’s hero, who is ostensibly endowed with “spider-sense” that “tingles” at the approach of danger, is nevertheless bashed in the back of the head by an entirely non-super-powered adversary, such as a bowler-cap-wearing manservant or a brick: today is your lucky day.

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Hey, it’s the Comics Curmudgeon Fall Fundraiser — help keep this site strong and independent!

Click the banner above to contribute any amount — and receive your “What Would Margo Do?” bracelet with our thanks! Full details here.

9/23 Fundraiser update: Bracelets are now on the way for Day 2 contributions — FIRST CLASS, just like our generous readers! Thank you!

A plea: If you receive your bracelet today or tomorrow, would you please email a photo of it on your wrist to uncle.lumpy@comcast.net? If I get enough for a collage, I’ll post it Friday — as, I dunno, the “Wrists of Just Us” or something. Thanks!

Crock, 9/23/09

OK, I know this is two Crocks in a week and honestly I’m really sorry but Gaaah! this is the grimmest panel I’ve ever seen, and I read Cathy. The punchline here seems to be “Ha ha you are a slave”, or at best “Ha ha you are a slave so work harder.” It doesn’t look like the soldier is actually confused about his servitude, and if he is, it’s due no doubt to hallucinations from the sunstroke and heat exhaustion that will soon kill him.

Crock’s use of the doomed soldier’s name before his complete objectification and annihilation just twists the knife.

Archie, 9/23/09

I like Archie: it’s kinda sweet and old-timey. Plus, there’s visual madness in the reaction shots from the photograph and the giant Kool-Aid not-quite-emoticon on the CRT. The artists also deliver gratuitous Cammie cheesecake from time to time, and you can almost always tell they’re still trying. But not today, alas — c’mon, if the school paper were already in fact digital, then students couldn’t read it on their phones and you’d have a joke. As it is, you have, well, a perfectly sensible but unfunny editorial. And Doonesbury‘s pretty much got that niche locked up.

Curtis, 9/23/09

Technically speaking, there is a joke in today’s Curtis (“bigger dummy than the dummy”), but let’s watch poor Curtis labor mightily to set it up. Start with panel 1’s Herb and Jamaally intro, already reeking of flop sweat. Then: can’t say “toilet” in a family strip? OK, “down the plumbing!” Need a reference to sexual indiscretion, but it has to be G-rated? OK, how about trying to pick up a mannequin. Obligatory tech reference? YouTube! (What, Twitter’s busy?) Finally, exhausted, Curtis wrestles this steaming gelatinous mass to the finish, and Barry delivers the featherweight punchline. Same time tomorrow, Sisyphus.

Gil Thorp, 9/23/09

OK, this is Duncan Daley, capable but non-flashy Milford tackle (and counterpoint to Jamarr Gaddis, fast but tiny self-promoting wide receiver used to decoy defenders from stolid running back Robb Larue). Formerly a party animal with ready access to his lookalike brother’s ID, Duncan has matured into a focused, R.C.-sipping young adult, no doubt because of what his brother said.

So you don’t have to, faithful reader — so you don’t have to!

Operation H-Town update: Mary Worth, 9/23/09

Well, Officer Colleague has certainly learned a valuable lesson today, hasn’t he? Kids, don’t go calling people “under arrest” until they can no longer shoot at you.

OK OK OK! Detective Scott Hewlett lives to live another day! Check out his prospects at the fabulous Scott’s Drug Bust Pool spreadsheet, created by faithful reader 8th Man Fan. Want a piece of the action? Use the awesome Scott’s Drug Bust Pool Form. Contribute your winnings to the Comics Curmudgeon Fall Fundraiser! And thank you, faithful reader 8th Man Fan!

Margo Moments — a Fall Fundraiser special, part 3

Apartment 3-G (panels) — 12/21/2006, 1/11, 2/27, 4/17, 4/19, 4/26, 7/2, 7/3, 8/3/2007

What would Margo do? The streets of New York are littered with the bones of those who thought they knew! Contribute to The Comics Curmudgeon today, and avoid their fate! When you do, we’ll rush your “What Would Margo Do?” bracelet to you, so you can project the power of Margo — from your wrist, to your hand, to their throats!

— Uncle Lumpy

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Archie, 9/16/09

You know that scene towards the end of Stanley Kubrik’s version of the Shining, when everything’s going all crazy and Shelly Duvall is running screaming through the demon-haunted Overlook Hotel, and she suddenly turns and sees two figures in a side room, one in a tuxedo and one wearing some kind of bear suit? Apparently exactly who or what these people/ghosts/things are is discussed in detail in the novel (which I haven’t read), but their weird, jarring, unexplained appearance in the movie was unspeakably creepy to me.

Anyway, I think it’s pretty obvious why I’m bringing this up, which is because HOLY CRAP WHAT IN GOD’S NAME IS THAT GIANT SQUIRREL FURRY DOING LURKING BEHIND ARCHIE IN PANEL ONE? As if its unexplained presence weren’t unsettling enough, we also have to deal with those eyes peering silently out of its neck-hole, and the fact that it appears to be carrying a truncheon of some kind. Does this hell-monster exist only in Archie’s mind, lurking on the periphery of his subconscious? Is he savagely smacking his own skull in the hopes that the shock will drive the nightmarish vision back into the depths from which it came? It’s all so unsettling that I almost didn’t notice Betty’s t-shirt, which appears to depict a fork-tongued devil-cat. Jesus, this strip is terrifying.

Hi and Lois, 9/16/09

I really don’t watch a lot of TV, and I’m always hesitant to say that because I don’t want to be One Of Those People who smugly says, “You know, I don’t watch a lot of TV, which makes me better than you.” Really, I don’t! I mean, my mindless evening entertainment generally consists of reading and correcting Wikipedia articles about obscure European nobility and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episodes, which I in no way think of as being morally superior to, say, watching According To Jim. I only bring this up because I have no idea what Hi and Lois are on about as they stare numbly at their TV set and talk about “pop-up ads on TV.” What can this even mean? Like, do little ad-bubbles actually appear on screen in mid-show now, obscuring part of the programming you’re watching? When did that start? Why didn’t Americans, well known for their TV-loving ways, rise up in violent revolt against it?

But, casting that aside for the moment, the second panel of today’s Hi and Lois indicates that the Flagstons live in a Matrix-style computer simulacrum, and are probably themselves either poorly programmed AI constructs or Cheeto-encrusted gamers sitting in a dark room somewhere playing the most boring MMORPG imaginable. How their mysterious puppetmasters intend to monetize in-game ads aimed at infant avatars ought to be a troubling question for the venture capitalists providing the funding for this enterprise.

Gil Thorp, 9/16/09

Huzzah for the now annual scene of fiery anarchy that will apparently be heralding the arrival of football season each fall! Remember, it doesn’t matter if your team is terrible if you get to immolate half the town before any games are even played. Then you can blame the losses on the third-degree burns covering the bodies of most of the starters!