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Zits, 7/8/09

True story: I got braces at the age of twelve, and for the first few days the experience was so painful and disorienting that I couldn’t really eat anything more solid than well-boiled pasta. This is almost certainly typical, but nobody had really warned me about it in advance, so it sort of freaked me out, and I began to worry that I’d be spending the next two years eating things that didn’t require much chewing; thus, before my mother returned from work one evening, I staged my suicide in protest. It wasn’t a particularly elaborate simulation — a florid “Good bye, cruel world that I can no longer masticate properly” note and me sprawled dramatically on the couch — and my mom’s first reaction was laughter, which means either it was wholly unconvincing or other things I don’t care to think about.

Anyway, this is my way of saying that I may be biased here, but I don’t think Dennis is telling some hilarious anecdote in panel one. The way he’s pointing at his metal-caged mouth is particularly troubling to me, and I imagine he’s actually saying “I think you made it too tight! Oh, God, the pain is unbearable!” But, accustomed to having his feelings on the matter ignored, he just slouches off with a resigned “schormz,” knowing that the discomfort will subside just in time for his next appointment, when the cycle begins again.

Family Circus, 7/8/09

Wait, a vegetarian … and all that shaggy hair … my God, have the Keanes allowed a dirty hippie into their home? The animal cracker bit may indicate that his mind has been reduced to pudding by the demon reefer, but more likely he’s just making a joke (which is also entirely unacceptable in polite company, because it confuses the children). I also suspect that if he heard Jeffy referring to him as “Mr. Coverly” he’d say “Hey, call me Jack, little guy! My dad is Mr. Coverly.” Anyway, why would our family of upstanding patriots allow this sort of person to sit in their living room and eat their generic potato chips? I suspect that he’s a new neighbor, and the clan patriarch is giving him one last chance to renounce his hateful philosophy and get a job that requires a tie; failing that, his long-haired head will be put on a spike on the Keane Kompound’s walls, as a warning to others.

Beetle Bailey, 7/8/09

I was going to make a crack about illegal use of a work-related credit card here, but on the scale of corrupt Defense Department spending, this is probably as low as it gets, even if Beetle and Miss Buxley are eating at an establishment that makes waiters wear tuxedos to serve soup. Anyway, I’m guessing she’s paying because she thinks that this way he’ll have to put out. Good luck with that, sweetie!

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Judge Parker, 6/24/09

I know, I know: Judge Parker has been absolutely bonkers for the last month and I’ve been AWOL on it. To be honest, I’ve had a hard time coming to grips with just how I’m supposed to feel about the wacky tale of Sophie’s cheerleading coup, and the constellation of forces that are coming together to bring that about. I’ve been suspicious of her move to seize the cheerleading captaincy from the start, not least because of my experiences as a high school nerd and outcast. Because, when I was taunted and humiliated by socially elite members of the football team, I never dreamed of winning the quarterback’s position as a result of some complex calculus involving my heretofore undiscovered skills and my antagonists’ poor grades; I just wanted the football team to die, in a fire.

So anyway, I’ve been kind of hoping that Sophie would pull off some absurdist stunt at cheerleading tryouts that would completely undermine the legitimacy of cheerleading as an institution in the minds of her high school classmates. But instead now we are confronted with Sophie’s Long Study Hall Of Despair, when we learn that she really has wanted to cast off her lilac pantsuit all along and seize the mantle of Queen Bee of Whatever High. More to the point, she’ll presumably buck up after this little pep talk and manage to leap and twirl her way to improbable victory, with the support of her incredibly wealthy parents, two celebrities who are on her side because they want to purchase a horse from said wealthy parents for millions of dollars, and the school administration, proving that those nasty cheerleading moms are entirely correct in all their accusations.

Slylock Fox, 6/24/09

I’ve always assumed, based on the gross incompetence of most of his schemes, that Count Weirdly graduated dead last in his class at Mad Science Academy, and yet here he is at the controls of what appears to be a fully functional combination time machine/hover-bubble. Of course, I’d have a human factors engineer look at that control panel before he starts mass-manufacturing these for production — hope you enjoy your visits to the years 2, 9, 3, 27, 10, 6, 41, and 29, kids!

More troubling, though, is the sight of the Count and Slylock and Max laughing it up together as they voyage through time to snicker at a doomed race. Could their long-standing and constant animosity be a front for some deeper scheme or grift? Or did Weirdly first make a solo voyage to the past in order to change history and create a new timeline in which he and the detective team were best buds? It would be rather poignant if all he ever wanted in all his scheming was real friends.

The Lockhorns and Dilbert, 6/24/09

I couldn’t really tell you what these comics are supposed to mean, because Dilbert is using words I don’t understand and the Lockhorns is using phrases that I’m pretty sure the writer doesn’t understand, but I’m worried at the underlying implication, which is that the U.S. government, alarmed at declining tax revenues during the recession, is looking to audit high-earners and is targeting cartoonists. Faulty intelligence again, I’m afraid.

Beetle Bailey, 6/24/09

“Also, he shat himself, but I think that’s just because he was drunk.”

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Archie, 6/23/09

Here is a comedy tip for you: humor grounded in the specific is always funnier and more vivid than jokes about vague, abstract nouns. Thus, I would argue that the lame pun for which this strip is the ostensible vehicle is redeemed to a certain extent by the amusing notion that Archie, Jughead, and Nameless Car Pool Denizen #3 are not just going to some random teenage job, but have actually taken up careers as carnies, for some reason. More delightful still is the insane tableau in the second panel: Archie’s boss has clearly been beaten down by the realities of life as a wrangler of sullen teenagers and burnouts, buyer of giant stuffed pandas and a fryer grease in bulk, and briber of ride safety inspectors, but he still has enough of his belief that amusement park management might be insanely lucrative (no doubt developed over years of playing Roller Coaster Tycoon) that he decided to wear his tie covered with dollar signs to work. No doubt he’ll lose that faith altogether when he turns around to see one his fursuit characters, a giant squirrel thing not currently trademarked by any major media conglomerate, attempting to capture and kill a child, the crazed eyes of a serial killer gleaming madly out of the rodent’s grinning mouth.

Mark Trail, 6/23/09

Actually, Mark didn’t say anything of the kind, Cherry, as his only comments about the appearance and attractiveness of mammals involves the phrase “healthy, shiny coat.” Your transparent jealousy and shameless smoochery may in fact backfire, as the thing he most likes about country girls is that they find the intermittent sexual relations that are apparently a required aspect of marriage just as terrifying and unpleasant as he does.

Apartment 3-G, 6/23/09

All important information in this storyline is apparently going to be conveyed by having characters thrust newspapers at one another, so you may wonder why the voyage to India’s most blandly decorated hotel was even necessary at all. Obviously, though, without this trip we wouldn’t be graced with the hilariously offensive series of Margoisms that we’re going to get. “Dad, there are cows in the street! Everybody here is dirty, and nobody is white! They don’t take American money! The Indian food here is terrible!”

Beetle Bailey, 6/23/09

This is honestly one of the saddest and most poignant Beetle Baileys ever. It should probably be on the front page of the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network home page.