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Crankshaft, 4/9/17

So, today’s Crankshaft only makes sense to people who understand all the weird nooks and crannies of the Funkyverse’s decades-long chrono-disjunctive narrative arcs, and, due to my many sins, I am one of those people, and as a punishment I guess I’m going to explain it to you? See, this takes place a decade in the past compared to Funky Winkerbean, and so Les is still hawking Fallen Star, his book about the murder of John Darling, who was the father of his soon-to-be-in-this-timeframe-dead wife’s biological son’s future wife. He spent years researching this book, which revealed that John Darling was killed by Plantman, as depicted in the final installment of the failed Funkyverse strip John Darling. The book was a financial failure! But Lillian, who has gone to this seminar on how to write a book only to encounter an author so unaccomplished that he held a book signing in the illegal bookstore she runs in her attic, is full of reassuring sentiments. Don’t worry, she says to Les: someday you’ll write something special, once your wife dies of cancer — like, I don’t know, the very book that appears in the first panel??? Anyway, the lesson here is that if you want literary success, you can’t write about just anyone dying, it has to be about someone you really love.

Funky Winkerbean, 4/9/17

Meanwhile, in the Funkypresent, it turns out Les is spending the energy he’s supposed to be channeling into yet another book about Lisa into primate-terminology-banter with his current, alive wife. C’mon, Les, the misery porn’s not going to write itself!

Mary Worth, 4/9/17

You know, the thought of going on a cruise has never really appealed to me, but the first couple panels here show me some of the charm. Who hasn’t wanted to yell at Florida from a safe distance away? “FUCK YOU, FLORIDA,” is what I’d shout. “YOU FUCKIN’ SUCK.”

Meanwhile, Toby is getting awful philosophical in the last panel. It’s true that you never know what tomorrow may bring! Maybe it’ll bring some guy out of his mind on nicotine withdrawal, just stabbing everyone who gets in his way on the no-cigs hell-cruise that destroyed his will to live! Who can say!

Shoe, 4/9/17

It turns out Roz, a major character in the long-running syndicated comic strip Shoe, is bisexual! This is an intriguing revelation, but it’s not an excuse for running a strip without a punchline of any sort?

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Mark Trail, 4/3/17

Oh, man these guys are dastardly criminals indeed! Not only are they callous about Billy having tasted hot lead, but they’re also defeating government facial recognition software, through the power of scowling! Sadly, their faces are now stuck that way. Their kidnapee is correct to just sort of stand around sadly in the background waiting for them to decide what to do with her even though nobody’s really paying attention to her. They’re stone cold loco!

Gil Thorp, 4/3/17

Whoops, it looks like basketball season and the tale of Aaron Aargard the Opioid Orphan have been wrapped up without us even finding out if the basketball teams went to the playdowns? Now we’re abruptly starting baseball season, which will apparently involve journalism shenanigans of some kind. Unless Dafne’s FOIA request was part of an investigation into whether a well-respected local jurist is keeping a bunch of hungry teens prisoner in her basement.

Crankshaft, 4/3/17

Lillian is about to find out that the only literary pursuit less lucrative than running a used bookstore in your garage is actually writing a book.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 4/3/17

I assume that, like many developing nations in Africa and Latin America, Hootin’ Holler routinely gets shipments of clothes donated by various charities. Apparently they just got a big box of sassy teal empowerment shirts from the late ’80s or early ’90s, along with a bunch of “BUFFALO BILLS SUPERBOWL XXVI CHAMPIONS” hoodies.

Hagar the Horrible, 4/3/17

Ha ha, it’s funny because Hagar and Lucky Eddie are going to be executed, for their many crimes!

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Beetle Bailey, 3/24/17

I can’t stop looking at that weird little gadget (?) propped awkwardly on Killer’s pillow in panel one. It’s like someone drawing this realized that “uh, probably military hospitals use, like, advanced medical technology now???” but wasn’t sure what exactly that might entail, so rather than just draw a groggy-soldier on a cot, they drew a groggy soldier on a cot with a cell-phone-sized black box hanging off the side of his pillow, like maybe it’s clipped on, I dunno. And it’s recording his … heartbeat or blood pressure, even though it’s not connected to him at all? Or his breathing? Maybe his breathing? All this high-tech business really gets in the way of a solid gag about how Killer’s “illness” is that he’d rather be on the beach, gambling and looking at tits.

Crankshaft, 3/24/17

Ha ha, yes, this is just another in an endless, soul-crushingly eternal series of “Crankshaft says the darndest things” gags, but wouldn’t it be great if some lady did give Ed a Trojan hearse for Christmas? Like, you know, a big black car with space in the back for a coffin, and Crankshaft accepts it thinking it’s an offering to the gods and brings it inside his walled fortress, but inside are dozens of hidden Achaean warriors, who emerge at night and wreak terrible destruction. I’d like to see this storyline depicted over a period of six to eight weeks, with particular focus on the lamentations.

Pluggers, 3/24/17

Welp, the bedroom eyes the she-plugger is flashing here seems to confirm something hinted at earlier: NCIS has such high ratings among the plugger set because it’s a Pavlovian sex trigger. Nobody actually watches it.