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Curtis, 1/28/08

Continuing on my residual fumes of Curtis-directed niceness, I have to say that I find Chutney’s exaggerated body posture in panel two really adorable. Panel four, on the other hand, disturbs and horrifies me: Curtis’ mouth appears to be sliding around the side of his uncannily ovoid head! Perhaps his mind and heart have finally opened up to the possibility of smooches from Chutney, but his mouth still won’t have any of it and is trying to escape.

Gasoline Alley, 1/28/08

The current Gasoline Alley plot, involving people who have never appeared in the strip before, surreptitious phone camera photography, and numerous end-runs around the grievance procedure laid out in the collective bargaining agreement between the U.S. Postal Service and the American Postal Workers Union, is, as you might expect, meandering and dull. But I have to admit that I love love love the exchange in panel one today. Any and all questions lobbed at me that are even vaguely along the line of “You know what your trouble is?” will be met with “The system” — though ending not with some lily-livered question mark but a defiant exclamation point.

Mark Trail, 1/28/08

Mark Trail’s nemeses are in fact just flying around to get a better shot; the fact that Mark is severely overthinking their motivation just goes to show how dumb Mark Trail villains are. Mark’s contingency plan is of course foolproof, since any jurisdiction that would release a suspect with overwhelming evidence damning him as murderer based on outrageously unlikely hearsay from Mark would of course do the same if said outrageously unlikely hearsay was scrawled on a piece of paper attached to a dog that wandered into the police station.

Anyway, I’m mostly posting this because I wanted to share a couple funny graphics sent by faithful readers. First up is this note from faithful reader Daniel:

While my wife asked ‘What are you planning to do today?’ I came up with this. I think it’s the most productive ten minutes I’ve spent since getting laid off last week. I figured people could print this sign out, and place it in their car windows, or at least xerox a dozen fliers and post them in their neighborhood. People need to know the facts!

Ha ha, all fun and games — or so you think. But this note and pic, from faithful reader Gal Friday, will blow your mind!

As seen at Sundance!!! What does it mean?!

It means that folks on future Wes Anderson productions need to watch their backs, that’s what.

Mary Worth, 1/28/08

So it turns out that maybe Vera didn’t summon her ex-boyfriend to this hell cafe for the sole purpose of having her new boyfriend beat him up; rather, she’s just too lazy to make dates in separate restaurants with her various bits of emotional baggage. She also appears to have planned a two-plus hour lunch or something — I’m sure that goes over well with the head honchos at Disturbing Lack Of Affect Ad Agency. Anyway, Ryan’s bizarre way-too-early appearance, combined with his weird neck fondle in panel one, spells C-R-E-E-P-S-T-E-R to me. Or maybe V-A-M-P-I-R-E.

Of course, I’m less and less concerned about these boring humans and more and more interested in the bizarre series of identical bright orange donuts/bagels/round whatevers behind them. When we first saw these sweet (or possibly savory) treats, they at least had shelves to sit on. Today they appear to be simply glued to the back of the display case, or possibly nailed there.

Family Circus, 1/28/08

Dolly’s ultra-smug facial expression shows that she’s feeling that deep sense of self-satisfaction that only reinforcing traditional societal gender constructs can provide.

Pluggers, 1/28/08

I was going to accuse Pluggers of just slapping a new caption on art first drawn for a submission from faithful reader gh, but a quick trip to my archives revealed that said panel actually featured an entirely different drawing of an entirely different human-animal hybrid species, albeit one also featuring polka-dot boxers and obesity. Turns out that the Pluggers creative team just likes drawing huge-gutted furries in their underwear. Who are we to judge?

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Having had a sudden fit of boredom with being mean, I’ve decided to try to be nice today.

Archie, 1/24/08

I like Archie’s scarf! I would actually wear that design in real life. Plus the way it hangs on him looks pretty realistic!

Curtis, 1/24/08

I like the casual way Curtis flicks his coat across the room. At first it kind of looks like a hospital gown or something, with the seam up the back! But no, that’s just because the momentum made the sleeves bend backwards. Again, good realism!

Judger Parker, 1/24/08

I like Sam’s facial expression in the third panel. “Lawyer I don’t have to pay … ka-ching … lawyer whose picture I can put into advertisements with accompanying copy that reads ‘USE OUR LEGAL SERVICES OR THIS LEGLESS VET WILL STARVE’ … ka-ching …”

Mary Worth, 1/24/08

I like that Drew seems to be hilariously interpreting the cutting-edge catchphrase “talk to the hand” literally in panel one. I like that Drew seems to believe that the key to true emotional commitment is to have one partner take care of all the intimate talk for both people in the relationship. I like the bright orange donuts, or bagels, or whatever, sitting in the display case a regulation two inches apart…

…I don’t think I’ve really gotten the hang of this “being nice” thing.

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Curtis, 1/2/08

The Curtis annual Kwayzee Kwanzaa digression never disappoints. Never. This year, we have the tale of a master thief, who stole a water buffalo’s hide while she was bathing (did you know that water buffalos are people inside their hides? It’s true!), then married and impregnated her, only to earn the wrath of a two-headed poisonous snake by stealing its eggs. Really! And now the snake has done something awful to the buffalo lady, probably changed her unborn buffalo-human hybrid baby into some kind of three-way buffalo-human-two-headed-snake hybrid, and a valuable lesson will be learned, namely: don’t do mescaline, kids. I hate to say it, but the whole thing make Hanukkah look kind of boring. Did the Maccabees ever transform into animals, or marry animals, or anything? Can we get a deuterocanonical rewrite here?

Gil Thorp, 1/2/08

We saw last week that Andrew is exactly the sort of quick-witted sharpie who might actually recognize a double-entendre like “We’re not huge — but you don’t have to be if you’re talented” when he sees it, and might enjoy trying to slip it past an obviously hungover Marty Moon. We’ll be looking forward to hearing more ribald quips from this hatchet-faced wunderkind once he starts talking about “the Bucket.”

Marvin, 1/2/08

His medicine cabinet … and his bloodstream. Those heavy lids and eyebags indicate that Grandpa has been so doped up by the pharmaceutical-industrial complex that he can barely stand up straight. The saddest thing is that this strip is taking place at two in the afternoon, and he’s just managed to lift his head off of his drool-soaked pillow long enough to shamble into the bathroom and get another fix.

They’ll Do It Every Time, 1/2/08

If my record-keeping is on track, then “Bob Bennett” is actually faithful reader benro, who apparently goes to a doctor’s office frequented by vomiting fetishists. Bonus Scadutoism: “Woopee”.