Archive: Crankshaft

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Archie, 5/28/26

I think it’s very funny that Jughead is first forbidden from playing the drums in … his room, I suppose? … and then decides that the next good place to do it is in the living room right next to where his father is trying to read the paper. I don’t like the idea of Jughead as a musician generally — it requires dedication and the motivation to practice your craft, something that I simply don’t think is in line with his character — but I do appreciate that move.

Crankshaft, 5/28/26

Hey, remember last week when I said Crankshaft was going so far up its own narrative ass that it was at risk for tearing the fabric of the Funkyverse apart? Well, it’s happening. It’s happening! Ed’s about to get vaporized by a blast wave of Hawking radiation and I think that’s swell.

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Mary Worth, 5/23/26

I’ve given it a bit of thought and I’ve come to the conclusion that “The condo board agreed we can create a supplemental food supply for residents!” is the most insane way to say that you’ve gotten approval to plant a vegetable garden. “Our wise board recognizes that the Strait of Hormuz crisis will merely accelerate the ongoing collapse of our civilization, dependent as it is on cheap fuel to connect far-flung producers and consumers,” Mary says. “Soon we’ll require local sources of calories for those lucky enough to be inside the Charterstone walls. All hail the board!

Rex Morgan, M.D., 5/23/26

“And the attention’s never going to waver! I’ve already developed a new business plan that assumes that every day from now on will see as many customers as today, and I’ve taken out a massive loan to fund it.”

Crankshaft, 5/23/26

“Just imagine if I had tried building a strip around some old dipshits hanging around a diner talking in terrible puns to one another. Can you imagine how unreadable that would be?”

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Mother Goose and Grimm, 5/21/26

OK, I guess I respect the Mother Goose and Grimm entries where the strip remembers that part of its remit is doing riffs on fairytales, and I guess I count the public domain monsters that Universal Studios has been intermittently trying to turn into a “Dark Universe” franchise for more than a decade as being in the same ballpark as fairytale characters, but nothing about this works. Like having Dracula (I mean that could be any vampire, I guess, but you get it) ask this question makes sense superficially but honestly I feel like it raises more questions than it answers. Is he mad about this or is that just his face? Why are they hanging out together in the first place? And his question is legitimate! And it doesn’t get a good answer! And is that just a regular human lady waitress, like does she work at a lunch counter specifically for monsters or does she just have blood on tap for the regulars? And why isn’t Frankenstein’s monster doing the “Me take cup blood!”-type diction? And why does Dracula say “why” when he clearly should be saying “vhy?”

Crankshaft, 5/21/26

Sorry I got so worked up there, but since I’m already worked up, I might as well break my silence on the fact that Crankshaft has descended into endless interviews with transparent authorial self-insert character “Batton Thomas.” Normally I’d let this indulgence slide without comment but now they’re showing “Batton’s” characters from his “Three O’Clock High” strip like Harry Dinkle, who has already migrated to the current iteration of Crankshaft! We’re in danger of tearing through the walls of the Funkyverse, and I think the time-travelling janitor who arranged for Summer Moore to save humanity needs to pop through a portal here and execute everyone involved Terminator-style before it’s too late.

The Phantom, 5/21/26

Hey, remember Chatu, the infamous Python, the Phantom’s other big antagonist, the one who isn’t Eric Sahara, the infamous Nomad? Well, Chatu has just been kind of chilling in this cage since 2009 or so but, like the Nomad, it seems like he’s about to re-enter the story. Maybe we’ll get a Nomad/Python teamup that will be strong enough to defeat the Phantom once and for all! Or maybe they’ll just realize that the Ghost Who Walks takes up way too much of their mental energy and they’ll simply go do some low-level crimes that won’t attract his attention and leave him be.

Curtis, 5/21/26

A thing that I really love about Curtis is that it’s a strip that’s not afraid to get a little weird with it. The kids gave their teacher a cake for the last day of school, but whoops, the box is full of rats! Lots and lots of rats! What an amusingly odd scenario.