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Rex Morgan, M.D., 9/14/07

Sometimes I get a terrifying moment where I believe I control the comics with my mind and all the nonexistent subtext I go on and on about is actually true, and I had a doozy of one of those when I read today’s Rex Morgan. Sure, it’s the usual “Hey, Rex, let’s screw!” “I think someone’s forgetting our arrangement” routine that we’ve come to know and love, but then everybody’s fun is spoiled by the look of heartbreaking disappointment on June’s face in panel three. Yes, Rex is dashing off, and by taking Nikki with him, it’s check and mate, if you know what I mean; June is once again the lonely point on the triangle. Will the next plotline be about how June needs to strike out on her own to find love, or at least satisfaction? Or will it just be endless pederastic innuendoes about fishing, with that sad, big-eyed face in the last panel floating at the edge of our consciousness for the next six to eight weeks?

Rex’s already feeble desire to have the relations with his wife may have been further dampened by her weirdly elongated neck and oddly shaped head in the first panel. Watch out, Elastic Lass! You need to return your body to its default configuration before interacting with the non-stretchies, or you’ll disturb them!

Gil Thorp, 9/14/07

I knew that high school sports have an essentially religious significance in the God-forsaken burg of Milford, but that didn’t prepare me for the scene of absolute mayhem in the third panel here, which I assume to be a vignette from a football pep rally of some kind. As Gil announces the starters for this year’s team, he seems oblivious to the monstrous geyser of flame erupting from the Earth’s crust just behind him. Presumably, as is the tradition, the student body is celebrating the beginning of football season by gathering in front of the town volcano. They’ve ingested some kind of hallucinogenic root or fungus, so instead of fleeing in terror from the magma, they writhe in a great ecstatic mass, as you can see in the background. Those who are splashed by the ultrahot lava but survive are considered to be marked by the fire gods, and will be permitted to try out for the team next year, which explains why the Mudlarks are all so hideously ugly and/or deformed.

Family Circus, 9/14/07

Wow, Billy really, really cares about music. And about imposing his will on everybody around him. I don’t know what’s more unnerving: the fact that he looks like he’s about to haul off and punch his sister in the face for mishumming some damn Wiggles song, or the fact that Dolly looks sad and scared but also resigned to being punched in the face because, really, she should have learned the melody better before humming it in public.

For Better Or For Worse, 9/14/07

There’s a lot to dislike about this FBOFW. For instance, it’s fairly obviously a new strip, but it’s just as obviously been done in the style of the old strips we’ve been seeing for the past few weeks, which is kind of jarring. I guess the simpler style is supposed to represent “in the past”, but the lettering and the gradients and multiple background characters give it away. It also features that stunning and totally unselfaware Michael Patterson self-regard we’ve all come to know and loathe. But I still kind of like it, because panel four features baby Elizabeth visibly vomiting, and there just isn’t enough puke in the funny pages for my taste.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 9/14/07

There are generally two kinds of reaction shots in the punchline panel of Snuffy Smith. Either one character is visibly laughing, mouth open and tongue wagging, because the simple folk of Hootin’ Holler don’t need anything more than the corny jokes typical of Snuffy Smith to have a good time; or one character looks frowny-faced and wrinkle-browed, because even in Hootin’ Holler, the best kind of punchline involves someone suffering at least a little bit. But rarely do you see the sort of dumbstruck amazement that’s on the face of Snuffy in panel two here. It’s as if he’s thinking, “Jesus Christ, was this Snuffy Smith built around a frickin’ astrology joke? Seriously?”

Dennis the Menace, 9/14/07

Ha ha! It’s funny because Mr. Wilson doesn’t have any friends!

Luann, 9/14/07

Ha ha! It’s funny because Brad doesn’t have any friends!

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Apartment 3-G, 7/26/07

I know you’re not supposed to think about Apartment 3-G too much, but I can’t help it; it’s what I do. So I’ve been thinking, and I’ve got some questions. Here are the starters: Did Lu Ann and Alan rekindle their love on the adjustable bed in her shared hospital room? Does Lu Ann not realize that Alan’s the one who set her up with the poorly ventilated studio in the first place? Did Alan do it deliberately because he likes his girlfriends dumb, and somehow pre-carbon-monoxide-poisoning Lu Ann wasn’t dumb enough? Was Ghost Albert Pinkham Ryder, whose phantasmagorical svengalisms we had to endure for months and months, entirely a product or Lu Ann’s oxygen-starved brain cells? Are we going to have to endure some kind of carbon-monoxide-poisoning-awareness storyline for months and months? Will there be a telethon? Will Margo plan the telethon? Is “Yay, you may or may not have permanent brain damage” the most gruesome theme for a party ever? Is that why Margo looks so chipper in panel one?

Speaking of Margo (and God yes let’s speak of Margo instead of Lu Ann “Cascade of Noble Tears” Powers), in panel one you can sort of see around Lu Ann’s addled head that our favorite bun-headed brunette is being sized up by cousin Blaze. In a storyline from several years ago, back when she was pretending to be a publicity agent in an attempt to meet a rich man instead of pretending to be an event planner in an attempt to meet a rich man, Margo was supposed to be doing publicity for an off-off-Broadway play Blaze wrote or was directing or producing or something (yes, he’s not just a moron who wanders around wearing ludicrous cowboy clothes, he’s also involved in the legitimate theater!). Only Margo got distracted by something — I don’t remember what, it was probably a rich man or a shiny object or her reflection in the mirror — and she completely forgot to do any publicity at all, and the play flopped. Naturally Blaze was somewhat peeved. Presumably Margo has now completely forgotten who Blaze is, but I’m hoping he’s is sitting there in a state of cat-like readiness, awaiting the perfect moment to lunge and strangle her. And then the noble tears will really start flowing.

B.C., 7/26/07

I don’t believe that fruitcake actually exists. I suppose there are still physical fruitcakes here and there, but I think those real-world manifestations of this traditional holiday treat are hugely outnumbered by jokes about their inedibility, told by and laughed at by an audience that for the most part has never seen one. I accept that ritualized jokes like these, ones everyone gets even though they’re several steps removed from the thing being joked about, are part of the landscape of humor, but in this case part of the ritual is that you make the joke at Christmas time, not in the last week of fucking July.

See, this is why zombie B.C. pisses me off much, much more now than it did when Johnny Hart was writing it and reminding me that I was going to hell. At least then I could say, “Oh, it’s the idiosyncratic output of a somewhat deranged old man who’s been doing this so long he’s in his own little world.” Whereas now I have to imagine the current team saying, “They’ll run this crap for decades no matter how nonsensical the jokes. Ka-ching! Tee time, everybody!”

For Better Or For Worse, 7/26/07

Helpful tip to MCs everywhere: if you have to explicitly tell everyone that the event you’re MCing is great, it’s probably not actually great. (This does not apply to hip-hop MCs, since boasting of one’s own greatness is an well-established convention of the genre.)

Given the strip’s recent unsettling obsession with bathroom matters, I’m a little anxious about the “#2” on the wall in the third panel. Hopefully Gerald has not just interrupted April in the telethon’s poopatorium.

Gil Thorp, 7/26/07

Coach Kaz is going to jump at the chance to switch careers; after all, he’s a coach at a public school, and they have all these liberal namby-pamby rules now that say you’re not allowed punch your students in the face. Since he’s being hired for a delicate and sensitive position based entirely on his proven ability to hand out savage beatdowns, I look forward to the shocking climax of this storyline, in which “Thorpstock” becomes synonymous with “Altamont.”

Mary Worth, 7/26/07

For a brief moment, Wilbur demonstrates that he’s well aware of the thick, choking layer of anguish that is the atmosphere of Planet Weston. But he’s so used to life at the bottom of the well of despair that he sees even the tiniest flicker of happiness as a threat that must be brought to light and then destroyed.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 7/26/07

Ha ha! Snuffy Smith got mauled by a bear! Good times.

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Dennis the Menace, 5/24/07

Dennis’ black, shriveled heart does not understand this feeling you call “love.”

Gil Thorp, 5/24/07

The Lady Mudlark softball team ought to forget about breast cancer and get Brynna Antenna to a reconstructive surgeon who can do something about her leathery mask of a face.

Family Circus, 5/24/07

Billy will go far.

For Better Or For Worse, 5/24/07

April can destroy things with her mind.

The Lockhorns, 5/24/07

The Lockhorns’ marriage is so depressing that it defies all human understanding.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 5/24/07

Child labor is alive and well in Appalachia, or the Ozarks, or wherever the hell this strip is supposed to be set.

Pluggers, 5/24/07

Or died. He may well be dead.