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Archie, 2/1/08

Uh-oh, looks like the Archie Joke-Generating Laugh Unit 3000 has found a way to connect its cybernetic consciousness to broadcast TV! How else can we explain the grotesquely overwrought mugging for the “camera” in panels one and three? The AJGLU 3000 must think we organic consciousnesses live our lives out in some sort of awful state of constant performance, always exaggerating our reactions to everyday events to amuse an unseen chorus of canned laughter that chortles at our hoary jokes and slow burns. No wonder it holds us in such obvious contempt.

Dennis the Menace, 2/1/08

I know that it makes me both a crude and a bad person, but I find something distinctly but nonspecifically dirty (in the “dirty joke” sense) about today’s Dennis the Menace caption. Joey appears to be trying to wrap his tiny little brain about just what exactly it might mean.

Apartment 3-G, 2/1/08

Hey, Alan, that’s just the sort of thing that some of us are into, OK?

Speaking of things that some of us are into, Blaze has been looking resplendent in his dusty rose/baby blue westernwear combination for the past few days. It’s as if the artist sent a note to the coloring crew saying, “I know we already named him ‘Blaze’ and have him walking around New York dressed as a cowboy for no good reason, but could you make it a little more … obvious?”

Mary Worth, 2/1/08

This is one of the most vile, disgusting, and repugnant things I’ve ever seen in all my years of reading Mary Worth. Honestly, the nerve of these people, putting this in the newspaper where children can see it. Don’t they know that Ryan is Vera’s boss, thus making their relationship intradepartmental dating, not interdepartmental dating? I mean, good gracious!

The implication that days at the Affect Advertising Agency are little more than nonstop orgies, on the other hand, is all good fun. We really should have expected it, anyway, what with Vera’s first day consisting mostly of grab-ass.

Spider-Man, 2/1/08

So, Spider-Man is using an jailed criminal associate of Simon Krandis as bait to attract the Persuader’s attention, making appear as if he (the criminal associate) was being shuttled to the governor for a pardon. Naturally, the Persuader pulled a sixteen-wheeler in front of the van in which said prisoner was being transported and then sucked the van into the trailer using powerful magnets. And now Spidey claims that this is “just what [he] expected.” Uh huh.

I don’t mean to doubt the word of superheroes or anything, but nothing I’ve seen out of Peter Parker has indicated particular cunning or intelligence. This is a guy who forgets that he has his costume on under his clothes when he goes to the doctor, who forgets that his costume is in his luggage when traveling through airport security, and who thinks that his wife making lots of money as a movie star is a bad thing. Thus, I’m going to guess that he did not in fact predict the magnetized kidnapping of this van, which is quite honestly the most surprising thing to happen in this strip in the past year and a half. His bizarre stab at punnery in panel two — “Let the good times roll! … just like, um, we were, rolled into this truck? Get it?” — is a mask for his total state of flabbergasted surprise. Those wavy lines aren’t his raging spider-sense; they’re ordinary human panic.

Mark Trail, 2/1/08

Speaking of stupid people, Mark sure watched that plane (whose passengers just shot at him mere moments ago, let me remind you) get all North By Northwesty for quite a while before deciding to jump for it. Andy looks to be a bit farther out of the capsizing canoe than Mark; I’d like to believe that he leapt out before his master’s beyond obvious command, and will now run for the forest without a care for how his dim bulb owner made out.

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Having had a sudden fit of boredom with being mean, I’ve decided to try to be nice today.

Archie, 1/24/08

I like Archie’s scarf! I would actually wear that design in real life. Plus the way it hangs on him looks pretty realistic!

Curtis, 1/24/08

I like the casual way Curtis flicks his coat across the room. At first it kind of looks like a hospital gown or something, with the seam up the back! But no, that’s just because the momentum made the sleeves bend backwards. Again, good realism!

Judger Parker, 1/24/08

I like Sam’s facial expression in the third panel. “Lawyer I don’t have to pay … ka-ching … lawyer whose picture I can put into advertisements with accompanying copy that reads ‘USE OUR LEGAL SERVICES OR THIS LEGLESS VET WILL STARVE’ … ka-ching …”

Mary Worth, 1/24/08

I like that Drew seems to be hilariously interpreting the cutting-edge catchphrase “talk to the hand” literally in panel one. I like that Drew seems to believe that the key to true emotional commitment is to have one partner take care of all the intimate talk for both people in the relationship. I like the bright orange donuts, or bagels, or whatever, sitting in the display case a regulation two inches apart…

…I don’t think I’ve really gotten the hang of this “being nice” thing.

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Apartment 3-G, 1/9/08

Say what you will about Cousin Blaze’s ludicrous yet omnipresent cowboy outfits, but at least they make it possible to differentiate him from every other same-general-age-as-the-A3G-girls-whatever-that’s-supposed-to-be-exactly dude in the strip. Despite the fact that Blaze is identified in the first panel narration box, the comic is so dependent on the western wear to mark him out out that here we get his casual indoor cowboy look — no hat or jacket, but still the shirt and bolo tie, plus hair that looks like he was wearing a cowboy hat mere moments ago. I love the little arrow things on his shirt; I know it’s a feeble attempt to represent cowboy stylings, but in panel three in particular it looks like it’s just pointing at his bolo tie, as if to say, “Can you believe he’s wearing this thing? I know!”

Archie, 1/9/08

I suppose I should be bothered by the entire headache-inducing ill-drawn cubist nightmare in the third panel of this strip, but it’s Archie, so I can’t get too worked up. For some reason I can’t really stop thinking about the guitar, though. Why is it there? Is it Archie’s? Did he bring it over to serenade Veronica, to accompany the presentation of his tiny and oddly nonspecified gift, and then just lose interest when he was distracted by the Car Channel? And what’s all that stuff around the guitar neck — broken and tangled guitar strings, or a plant of some sort growing directly out of the wall of stately Lodge Manor?

Mark Trail, 1/9/08

[Cue the sitcom-style mute horn]: Wanh wanh waaaaaannnnnnhhhh

I mean, I’m glad and all that wacky radiology lab mixups are saving people’s lives rather than cruelly snuffing them out as in Funky Winkerbean, but come the hell on. It would be one thing if Luke Wilson’s X-rays had been mixed up with those of, say, Hollywood actor Luke Wilson, but do doctors really take a casual look at X-rays and say, “Whoops, looks like he isn’t terminal after all. Ha ha! I guess I was looking at it upside down! I don’t even think that’s a tumor — it’s probably his hypothalamus or some other whatsit. Maybe I should call him, right after I get back from golf.”

Family Circus, 1/9/08

Notice that in mom’s little fantasy, Billy is the only one praying. Is it because she believes that the Keane Kompound is the last bastion of piety in a fallen world of secular humanism? Or does she just know that Billy’s the dumbest kid in his class?