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Pluggers, 12/18/18

This is something you don’t usually hear me say, but I like the cut of this elder she-plugger’s jib! I particularly like that you can tell that her grandchildren left literally minutes ago and she’s already wining out. Is she going to bother picking up any of their junk before getting blotto? She sure isn’t! Is she worried about drinking red wine while wearing white pants? She gives not a single solitary shit! This ecstatically drunk grandma is definitely one of my top ten pluggers of the year!

Mary Worth, 12/18/18

It’s going to be fun seeing how close Mary can get to the question she actually wants an answer to — “So, are you guys still fucking on the regular or what?” — without coming out and saying it. In the meantime, I’m just going to enjoy the incredibly tiny plate that muffin is sitting on in panel two. You don’t expect Mary to just hand over a muffin without a plate, do you? She’s not an animal.

Crankshaft, 12/18/18

They say consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, but I’ve never claimed to be anything other than petty and small, so I’ll say this: it drives me crazy that the Funkyverse contains both weirdly named psuedobrands like “McArnold’s” but also actual brands like Amazon. It forces me to conclude that Amazon paid to be mentioned in the strip, or, more likely, that McDonald’s paid not to be mentioned.

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Blondie, 12/12/18

I believe that Dagwood is a true food fetishist, in the sense that he doesn’t just enjoy the act of consuming food in and of itself, but has so centered it in his personality that he’s developed various paraphilias around it. So yeah, he’s gonna want some elaborate role play with his Christmastime pizza delivery, but here’s the thing: sex workers generally charge more as their clients’ tastes get more exotic, and this scenario is no different. You want someone to come down your chimney with pizza (not a euphemism, this is literally what Dagwood wants, this is what he’s been thinking about all day, ever since he spotted the pizza delivery guy in his Santa suit last night and wrote down the number on his car), you’ve gotta pay come-down-your-chimney-with-pizza money.

Crankshaft, 12/12/18

Speaking of people who won’t be coming down your chimney, the “joke” of the current Crankshaft arc is that Crankshaft was running late and didn’t have time to change out of the costume from his mall Santa gig before arriving at his bowling night, which, fine, but … the beard? Surely he could just take off the beard? I was thinking maybe he had affixed it to his face with spirit gum but that seems like far more commitment than Crankshaft has ever put into anything that wasn’t spiting his fellow man.

Mother Goose and Grimm, 12/12/18

Now, I’m not an artist or a scientist but I was kind of curious about what was going on from an anatomical perspective in that stall and this is what I came up with:

So you heard it here first, kids: pencils shit standing up!

Funky Winkerbean, 12/12/18

Ahhh, I love Holly’s mom’s expression of slowly dawning disappointment! That’s the face of a woman who just minutes ago thought, incorrectly, that she was about to get laid.

Pluggers, 12/12/18

You’re a plugger if there’s absolutely no way you’ll be able to complete your list of menial tasks before you drop dead.

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Mary Worth, 12/2/18

Just about every time I sit in for Josh on the Comics Curmudgeon, something amazing seems to happen in Mary Worth: a shootout, say, or a beloved character’s return from the dead, a dramatic drowning rescue, or a smoky tropical seduction. This time, Mary adopted a cat!

But what a cat! Libby is a scrappy, female Snake Plissken of a feline with biohazard dander and a “don’t shed on me” attitude. Watch her drive Dr. Jeff, starved and weeping, from his paramour’s apartment! Thrill as she snacks on the roast her “mistress” offers boxed to go! Gasp as she dares to live by her own code — in the immortal words of Wayne Dyer, “Whatever has to be done, it’s always my choice!” MEOW, bitches!

Crankshaft, 12/2/18

See this just plain doesn’t make any sense right here. We expect digestive ructions, elementary reading ability, and hours spent hogging the john from a selfish old creep like Crankshaft himself, not dainty, beleagured Pam. Just change the final speech balloon to “This’ll cover me through …” and show the Sunday Crankshaft draped neatly over that towel bar where it belongs.

Judge Parker, 12/2/18

OK, work with me a little here. Judge Parker is the side-hustle of Sally Forth author Francesco Marciuliano and Phantom daily artist Mike Manley, and um … it kinda shows? So why not make things easy for everybody by dropping the zany, well-etched characters of Sally Forth into those gorgeous Phantom backdrops of Bangalla, New York, and Tibet, and just calling the result Judge Parker? Easy peasy!

Here, Hilary returns to the Skull Cave to confront Sally about Ted’s capture during his failed rescue of Faye from terrorist Ralph’s Bronx warehouse lair. Sally tries to distract her with loot from the Treasure Room, but Hilary has already sent faithful Duncan to steal her father’s jet, pick up Nona in Lhasa, and join her to save the day!

See, it’s working already! Bonus: Alan, Randy, and Sam are recast as Ted’s ineffective, rarely-seen brothers.

Oh my gosh has this been a fun week. Special thanks to team Mary Worth, Carl the Turtle, Libby the Hell-Cat, and you, faithful reader! Josh will be back Monday to kick off the glorious “Mary dumps her cat and/or boyfriend” arc, and I’ll see you next time around.

— Uncle Lumpy