Post Content

Crock, 8/23/24

An interesting phenomenon in the daily comics is that often during the strip’s genesis, the creators come up with an odd conceit or bit that is genuinely funny at the time, but then the strip runs for literal decades and they want to do jokes that are not about that bit, using the characters and scenarios they’ve established that are based around the bit, which produces odd results. Shoe forgetting its characters are all birds is a prime example. Crock is in an even weirder boat, where Grossie and Maggot’s son Otis (whose name I could not for the life of me remember for the longest time, and Google was no help, and every once in a while I check out to see if ChatGPT can do the thing it claims it can do, and it told me his name was either “Mongoose” or “Qaddafi,” so no, it very much cannot do the thing it claims it can do) is best friends with a vulture. Indeed, the vulture is his only friend, which is why he’s excited to talk with him about what he’s learned about human reproduction. However, this joke, which would be mildly funny if it were part of a conversation between two normal human children, becomes profoundly weird when it’s part of a conversation between a normal human child and a talking vulture. Like, if you knew talking vultures existed, maybe you’d find the idea that storks delivered babies more plausible! On the flipside, if you were a talking vulture and you heard this story about storks, you might have some inside information on storks and their ways that could confirm or deny the details. Anyway, I’m dwelling on all this because the alternative is thinking about how not long before the action in this strip occurred, a vulture dad told his vulture son about vulture sex in great anatomical detail, and I’m not doing any research on vulture reproduction but I’m just going to go ahead and assume that the whole process is pretty gross.

Beetle Bailey, 8/23/24

Great, just great, I read this comic and immediately felt the absolutely 100% useless piece of information “Private Blips is a Swiftie” falling into place in my brain. Sorry, spare set of keys! I will never remember where you are now. That slot is taken.

Post Content

Mary Worth, 8/22/24

Oh, he’s listening, Estelle — he’s just horrified that you would think that, as a vet, he’d be OK with a zoo themed wedding. He has to deal with animals all day at work — do you think he wants to see all his human friends and family pretending to be animals, too? Plus he has issues with zoos on ethical grounds — putting wild creatures in cages is cruel! Maybe you two aren’t as simpatico as he thought!

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 8/22/24

I tease about Glenwood’s entertainment offerings but you know who really must be starved for fun? The poor citizens of Hootin’ Holler. There’s exactly one television in town and you have to bribe the parson to get a look at it, the only radio station anyone can get mostly broadcasts NASCAR races, and it even seems like the traditional arts of folk music have passed this community buy. That’s why Silas, the town’s only real capitalist, is trying out giving the people what they want: wacky vaudeville-style act-out bits, with props. Sure, it’s free now, but once he gets the customers hooked, they’ll be more than willing to pay a little extra for their daily chuckle!

Crock, 8/22/24

Hey guys, remember the Wise Sage, the beloved (?) Crock character who lives in a cave (??) in the desert? Well, turns out he’s very old and lives out his every moment in agony, yet still forever hopes to stave off death, for at least one more moment, because he fears what might come after. Fun!

Post Content

Mary Worth, 7/25/24

Hey, remember when Mary threw a surprise funeral for Wilbur’s fish? And lots of people Wilbur knew were there, and they all paid attention to Wilbur, and felt sorry for Wilbur? Wilbur sure remembers it! But now the era of paying attention to Wilbur is over, and all he has left to console himself with are his sad thoughts and his one alive fish. But what if … there were a way … with the resources he has at hand … to reproduce those heady, bygone days when all eyes and sympathy were on Wilbur? Wilbur is 100% going to Munchausen syndrome by proxy that fish, is what I’m saying.

Beetle Bailey, 7/25/24

I actually really enjoy the contrast between Sarge and Lt. Fuzz in the second panel here. Fuzz, an effete military bureaucrat, is pecking away at his laptop, indistinguishable from a middle manager at any civilian white-collar business. Meanwhile, Sarge, the masculine shaper of warriors, has only a single piece of paper on his desk, presumably containing a list of soldiers ranked by how thoroughly he has broken their spirits in preparation for the task of rebuilding them as dedicated killing machines.

Crock, 7/25/24

Algeria has huge oil and gas reserves; but the grinding colonial war there has disrupted production, and the people back home are now suffering through a fuel crisis while these two, who are supposed to be crushing the rebels and restoring the spoils of empire to the metropole, crack wise about farts from the safety of their fortified compound. Sad!