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For Better or For Worse, 6/27/2008

OK, after a full week of this, we get it: Michael’s a brat and Elly’s overwhelmed. But how on earth do those other comic moms do it? Let’s go see!

Curtis, 6/27/2008

Oh, you do not mess with Diane Wilkins — Curtis knows it, Greg knows it, and I’m willing to bet God knows it. I give author Ray Billingsley a lot of richly-deserved grief, but his characters act like people. Who doesn’t know — and secretly fear — a force of nature like Diane?

Funky Winkerbean, 6/27/2008

Linda Lopez-Bushka is quieter, but no less effective. Jinx has been thwarting Bull’s incompetent attempts to bond, so Mom shows them both how it’s done. And engineers a pleasant summer in a quiet house with the soaps on and her feet up.

Crankshaft, 6/27/2008

With this strip, Crankshaft finally reaches the lower limit of what can reasonably be called “wordplay.” Jeff Murdoch there is Ed Crankshaft’s son-in-law, an ineffective, self-pitying drudge who hates his vicious harridan of a mother, yet is moving her into his home, possibly because it’s the only way he can cause her pain. It’s true: Ed Crankshaft is the comic relief in this strip.

Gah, I can’t close the week on that note! Let’s see some bonus panels!

Family Circus, 6/27/2008

Yes, Billy, and “LAME” is an adjective. But look how the tyke’s melon head has grown, and the mouth with it! A few months more and its blackness will consume the entire frame, matching the artwork to the captions at last.

Judge Parker, 6/27/2008

Judge P. comes back after eighteen months and promptly leaves on vacation. Who does this guy think he is — Josh?

— Uncle Lumpy

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Beetle Bailey, 6/24/2008

Otto’s prayer: “Let me be anything — or nothing — but not Marmaduke.”

The Phantom, 6/24/2008

Disoriented and blinded by fear, Diana prepares to shoot her husband.

B.C., 6/24/2008

Wait — what?

Funky Winkerbean, 6/24/2008

Canton, Akron — next up on Boondoggles of Northeast Ohio: the Tod Engine Heritage Park — a Mechanical and Materials Engineering Landmark!

Mary Worth, 6/24/2008

Apparently, mere public humiliation doesn’t satisfy Dr. Jeff — and like everybody in this strip, he’s decided to just phone it in.

Crankshaft, 6/24/2008

Trash and Pain — the Crankshaft Family Album.

— Uncle Lumpy

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Apartment 3-G, 6/21/2008

Aw, we’ve been unfair to poor Tommie, portraying her as the wallflower of the A3-G pack just because — well, because she’s so gawdawful boring. The facts give us the lie: Tommie has been getting more “action” than LuAnn and Margo combined! Behold:

Apartment 3-G, 9/11/2006, 2/3/2007, 12/4/2007

In the short span of two years, Tommie’s been kissed four times, by three different guys. You parents may want to keep your kids away from the funnies until they’re a bit older. The kids, I mean.

Crankshaft, 6/20/2008, 6/21/2008

And while we’re making amends, how about a kind word for Ed Crankshaft? I mean, sure, he’s squandered two weeks of our goodwill and attention on joke-shaped utterances that would shame the AGLU-2000, and yes, I mean before the upgrade. But c’mon — look how easily Warylook McSeatpartner there manipulates him into shutting the hell up: trade seats, buy him a Pabst®, rattle on about fictitious grandchildren, and watch the old coot tune out and drift off.

That smile in the last panel is the real heartbreaker — Ed’s not really a mean guy, he’s just trying to cover up his incomprehension of and insecurity with anything beyond the familiar routines of his many years. So let us speak no more of “Ed Crankshaft — asshole” and find a warm place in our hearts for “Ed Crankshaft — pathetic asshole.”

Mark Trail, 6/21/2008

Oh, where to begin? Well, “Moss Green”, for starters — Elrod’s apparently started cribbing names from the Dick Tracy archives. Then there’s the postmodern twist that it’s Kelly Welly’s vaunted “unpredictability” that utterly preordains every single panel we’ll see in the next month. But my favorite is Cherry cinching up that diamond hitch all by her ownself. That’s a tough knot for two people to get right, so when Cherry goes all “Help me, Mark!” in the rainy woods some night a month from now, I for one will not be buying it.

— Uncle Lumpy

PS Luann — Hey TJ — Help is on the way! Four days until The Kiss!