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Crankshaft, 7/5/15

Sure, Ralph Meckler says he’s just an ordinary citizen fighting for the little guy’s right to drive on safer streets. But his campaign is in the pocket of the sausage restaurant industry. Do we really want our city government ignoring important environmental and zoning concerns and just rubber-stamping approvals of chain eateries that serve substandard biscuits? Mayor Kane: Leadership We Can Trust.

B.C., 7/5/15

Here is a sequence of words that has almost certainly never been constructed before but which I nevertheless believe to be meaningful and also true: these prehistoric ants appear to be Seventh-Day Adventists.

Panels from Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 7/5/15

OH MY GOD LOWEEZY IS GOING TO RAISE CORPSES FROM THEIR GRAVES USING FOUL BACKWOODS NECROMANTIC SORCERY

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Crankshaft, 6/22/15

Happy Monday, everybody! Remember how Crankshaft’s depressed old theater-owning friend hit a pothole and decided to run for mayor? Well apparently that wasn’t depressing enough for the Funkyverse, so here you go: road conditions in Centerville are so bad that that they’re literally paralyzing the populace. The current corrupt administration doesn’t care how many shattered spines serve as a testament to its administrative incompetence, which will make it extra poignant when Ralph inevitably loses.

Rex Morgan, 6/22/15

At last! Mrs. P. is seeing Sarah’s paintings! For the very first time! And … uh … no, wait…

I know this plotline has had a certain “making it up as we’re going along and also forgetting the details of what happened before, or maybe playing an elaborate game of Exquisite Corpse” quality about it, but I’m pretty sure this is the first time the narration box’s information has been immediately contradicted by dialogue. If this were an improv scene — and frankly I have no evidence that it isn’t — I’d be pretty disappointed.

B.C., 6/22/15

A legacy strip like B.C. has of course accumulated characters and running gags over the decades, and Apteryx, who always introduces himself with “I’m Apteryx, a wingless bird with hairy feathers,” has been around for literally as long as I can remember. Not any more, though, as he’s now dead, devoured in an orgy of violence by these hungry predators. RIP Apteryx, we’ll miss you!

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Curtis, 4/23/15

When you create a character who is as unlikeable as oh, say, Ed Crankshaft, from time to time you have to fake up some appealing qualities or history so the audience doesn’t come to its senses and give up on the strip entirely. So here comes “Backstabbin’ Bedwetter” Barry Wilkins — who can singlehandedly make you feel sorry for his brother Curtis — totin’ Teddy and talkin’ tough, ready for redemption.

There’s no precedent at all for Barry’s altruism — he was just as bored/disgusted by his brother’s romantic aspirations in Tuesday’s strip as he ever was, and nothing changed on Wednesday. There won’t be any consequences, either — Barry will be just as hateful as ever the next time we check in on him. It’s just time for a quick karma rinse-and-run.

I’ll take it all back if Michelle falls hopelessly in love with him.

Mary Worth, 4/23/15

NO NO NO TERRY DON’T DO IT YOU CAN NEVER GO BACK. Aw crud – gave it up, and for nothing.

A small irony here is that Terry Bryson was introduced to the strip as a privacy consultant who helped Toby Cameron understand how to defend herself against intrusions into her confidential personal and financial information, and that people shouldn’t be dopes. Well, Terry, you can kiss your own precious privacy goodbye. Dope.

B.C., 4/23/15

Oh boy — the long-awaited B.C./Crankshaft crossover.

Shoe, 4/23/15

I know Shoe is sort of the go-to strip for avian reproductive humor, but eww.

–Uncle Lumpy