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Crock, 1/13/21

I was going to go all in on “Why is it funny that this woman is a blacksmith,” but we all know the reason why it’s supposed to be funny: blacksmithery is not a traditional feminine job so can you even imagine going on a date with a woman who would engage in it? What would you even call her? A blacksmithrix? Haw haw! Anyway, that’s stupid, so instead I’m going to focus on something actually puzzling: the assertion that weekends are “the busiest time for blacksmiths.” I guess that’s when most Renn Faires are? Are we dealing with a universe where blacksmiths are a vital part of the everyday economy, making horseshoes and tools and such, or are we in a more modern environment where mass manufactured goods are omnipresent and easy to get, and the only people who go to blacksmiths are weirdos who are obsessed with swords? This is the Crock worldbuilding background that I have a million times more in interest in than I do in Poulet’s love life.

Crankshaft, 1/13/21

Hey, remember how Crankshaft can only feel tiny glimmers of joy and he isn’t going to be able to feel them again until he gets his beloved garden catalog? Well, bad news! Extremely devastating news, actually! Side note: It’s gotta be fun to live in a world where even when you receive extremely devastating news, the ironclad laws of the universe dictate that you have to wade through terrible sub-puns in order to learn the details.

Family Circus, 1/13/21

“How come I can’t kill people with my mind, it’s not fair”

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Curtis, 12/23/20

Good news, everyone! Curtis’s parents are going to cure coronavirus!

Funky Winkerbean, 12/23/20

Good news, everyone! Thanks to the internet, you no longer have to worry about the whole Funky Winkerbean gang showing up outside your house uninvited!

Crock, 12/23/20

Good news, everyone! Women have finally invented a beer mug with a hidden microchip in it!

Mary Worth, 12/23/20

Good news, everyone! Tommy has gotten a part-time job as a school monitor! I’m not sure what a “school monitor” is — is it a euphemism for an in-school cop like “resource officer,” or maybe someone who’s supposed to kind of act like an in-school cop but doesn’t have any actual legal police authority? — but if there’s one thing I know about teens and/or tweens, it’s that if the guy who used to give cringe-y anti-drug talks to their class suddenly popped up as a vaguely defined authority figure without much actual authority, the cruelty and bullying would be relentless. Excited to see Tommy go into a downward emotional spiral that brings him back to the pill bottle/meth pipe!

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Gil Thorp, 12/10/20

Well, it looked like Gil’s little stunt — benching his feuding #1 and #2 QBs and putting his #3 QB in at the helm of a wacky offense — worked! It didn’t work in the sense that it brought the team a championship (they’re playing for conference runner up here in their last game) but it worked in the sense that it taught his fractious starters a lesson, a lesson they learned so well that neither of them has much interest in playing football at all anymore. I assume in panel three we’re meant to understand that they’re doing “No, after you” pantomime gestures down on the sideline that are so exaggerated that they can easily be interpreted by their wide-eyed classmates sitting up in the stands.

Pluggers, 12/10/20

Reed Hoover may have passed away more than a year ago, but his utter dominance of Pluggers will never end. Like longtime and recently retired artist Gary Brookins before him, new guy Rich McKee isn’t afraid to turn a cold eye on the pathetic, eager suggestions clogging the pluggermail@aol.com inbox and say sneeringly “Sorry, folks, none of you can hold a candle to Reed.” Then he selects one of Reed’s banked Pluggers pitches at random, which I assume he keeps in an ornate wooden box.

Crock, 12/10/20

I never think the jokes in Crock are any good, so it’s kind of a relief to see a strip where they didn’t bother to include one! Just a little vignette about an incompetent military officer and his men, who are about to murder him.