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Mark Trail, 10/5/13

Whoa you guys, Mark is using high technology to defeat his enemies. And by “high technology” I mean “a cell phone that appears to have a seven- or eight-inch screen.” That counts, for this strip! Hiding an enormous tablet-slab might be slightly trickier than stashing away a smaller phone would’ve been, though.

The tragedy of today’s Mark Trail is the terrible coloring job. Mark appears to be wearing a charming western jacket with arrows embroidered on it. Do you expect me to believe that the whole thing is just a dull brown? For shame, King Features colorists! We want to see Mark’s jauntiest outfit ever in all its glory!

Beetle Bailey, 10/5/13

Normally, if a beloved long-running family comic strip that runs in thousands of newspapers had a character openly arranging an orgy, you might think that was kind of noteworthy, you know? But now my attitude is “Well, at least all of the women he’s planning on having sex with are biological life forms and not crudely anthropomorphic robots,” so well played, Beetle Bailey!

Shoe, 10/5/13

This bird-lady and her bird-husband went on a second honeymoon and, despite her husband’s advanced years, they were able to have all the intercourse they wanted, thanks to modern pharmaceutical science.

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Momma, 9/30/13

To “render” a judgment just means “to pronounce, declare, or state the decision of the court in a particular case.” Which doesn’t seem like it’d be very rewarding for someone like Momma, who isn’t a lawyer and doesn’t even live in Washington, D.C., so you can understand why she looks so world-weary as she explains this in panel two. (Is that sheet of paper she’s looking at a Supreme Court verdict he’s going to have to render soon?) But since they’ve heard her rendering judgements for the Court for most of their lives, Francis and MaryLou probably just assume that she’s the one literally laying down the law on America. After all, if there’s one thing reading this strip for years has taught us about these two, it’s that they’ve very dumb.

Beetle Bailey, 9/30/13

Super excited that Beetle Bailey has decided to discard any pretense of offering gentle military-themed humor and is now all about sex with robots and the characters’ crippling alcoholism. General Halftrack’s booze problem used to be limited to weekends, but now it’s spread to pretty much any day of the week as his downward spiral into substance abuse gathers speed!

Crankshaft, 9/30/13

“It’s homicidal rage! Really, he’s a complete monster!”

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Mary Worth, 9/29/13

OH MY GOD YES YES YES TOMMY THE TWEAKER’S COMING BACK, EVERYBODY! Tommy was the very first great Mary Worth character I got to cover in this blog’s history. He referred to drugs as “stuff” and smoked weed where Mary could smell it and dreamed of having his very own meth lab and tried to sell meth to some college kid but the meth didn’t work and an angry mob smacked him around but the cops rescued him and then he thought-ballooned hilariously. Later, he went to jail and found Jesus by reading a tiny, tiny bible. Obviously hilarious hijinks are in store for us now that our rotating-door prison system has dumped this hardened criminal back on the streets of Santa Rosa after a mere nine years in stir. Iris is right to push Wilbur out of her life right now! He’s already terribly addicted to delicious sammiches, so who even knows what’d happen if he got hold of the hard stuff.

Panel from Slylock Fox, 9/29/13

Oh, isn’t this cute! A bunch of anthropomorphic animals sitting around telling stories about how humans treated one another, in the Before Time. Isn’t it funny how humans had this thing called presumption of innocence? That they didn’t just throw you in a jail cell forever because some fox decided you were guilty? Might explain a lot about why they aren’t in charge anymore. Animals, they don’t worry about niceties. Animals get things done.

Beetle Bailey, 9/29/13

Oh my god, look at Zero’s face in the next to last panel, the sinister glint in his eyes as he imagines enveloping the enemy, cutting off all means of retreat, and methodically pounding them to bits with artillery. Their attempts to surrender are met only with sinister laughter. Testimony about this moment will feature heavily in his war crimes trial.