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Pardon My Planet, 12/22/24

One of my least favorite genres of “Images You Can Buy On A Poster Or T-Shirt” is “Two Dead Celebrities Dressed In Vaguely Rockabilly Outfits And One Is Giving The Other One A Tattoo And The Whole Thing Feels Vaguely And Unpleasantly Sexual.” I’ve seen this with Marilyn Monroe and Audrey Hepburn (on a giant poster hanging in the men’s room of a restaurant that seemed otherwise respectable) and Charlie Chaplin and Albert Einstein (on a t-shirt hanging on rack outside a store in Italy). This comic isn’t quite the same thing but I think we can agree it’s in the same general ballpark, and that ballpark is distasteful.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 12/22/24

No, I don’t buy this at all. A Christmas Carol is famously one of Dickens’s shortest books and Snuffy is a notoriously stunted and gnome-like man and was presumably even smaller as a child. I’m beginning to suspect he can’t tell different books apart, possibly because he’s illiterate.

Marvin, 12/22/24

Can you imagine feeling like you have to continue to live with Marvin, for you own safety and survival, and the thought of being separated from him sends you into a state of panic? Bleak stuff.

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Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 12/15/24

Geez, man, what kind of weird Slylock Fox-ass riddle-telling meteorologist do these Snuffy and Lukey listen to. “Frozen precipitation,” oh ho ho, you’ve really tricked all your listeners. Jerk. Oh, if King Croesus crosses the Halys River, a great empire will be destroyed, is that it? I guess I forgive these guys for living in a violent culture where civil society and independent information sources are regarded with suspicion and paranoia if this is the kind of shit they have to put up with.

Mark Trail, 12/15/24

Oh, not much to see here, just Mark and Cherry Trail urging you to go out and buy some GROW LIGHTS for your indoor “herb garden.” That’ll spice things up, will it??? This is clearly about DRUGS and you two should be ASHAMED.

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Mary Worth, 12/10/24

I guess (for once) Wilbur leaving town is providing us with an opportunity not to see what Wilbur gets up to outside of town but rather to see what happens in the Wilbur-shaped hole left behind. What happens is that Mary is going to make dinner for Dawn literally on her first night alone, which seems a little overprotective, but she might as well learn now that Dawn is now … [extremely dramatic music sting] … VEGAN???? Or, at least she “started a vegan diet,” which implies that she’s doing this as a weight loss thing or a “cleanse” or whatever rather than out of ethical concerns over animal welfare. I know, Dawn doing something wacky for self-interested reasons would be a real shocker. Anyway, Mary was last seen eating a nice salad herself, but presumably it was well-dusted by bacon bits and drenched in a creamy dressing. Could she create an even vaguely edible meal without such crutches? This will be her greatest challenge yet!

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 12/10/24

Speaking of vaguely edible meals, I do “Ha ha, it’s funny because the residents of Hootin’ Holler are crushingly poor!” riffs on this blog not because I think it’s actually funny, but because I find it fascinating that there’s a longstanding syndicated newspaper comic where that’s the background radiation of the worldbuilding (see for instance: patched curtains forming the “walls” within the Smifs’ one-room shack) but it isn’t usually directly addressed, because that would be depressing. But today’s strip, where Loweezy attempts to extend her family’s meager food supply for another day to stave off both boredom and starvation, is a little too on the nose.

Marvin, 12/10/24

“Wait a minute,” I said to myself as I said this. “Why would Jeff have a bunch of pictures of Marvin on his phone? He hates Marvin!” Based on his facial expression in panel three, he’s coming to the exact same realization.