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Apartment 3-G, 9/8/10

Makeover victim #1, revealed! Margo’s here and she’s, eh, not actively laughable. Still, this seems like it might be kind of overcompensation: Kat has reacted to Margo’s penchant for turtlenecks by forcing her to wear the exact opposite of a turtleneck, a dress with a top that’s as low as possible while maintaining a G rating. Margo might enjoy all the admiration her shoulders are getting now, but wait until she finds out that every single item in her remade wardrobe will be strapless, including her new collection of business casual tube tops and her winter coats.

Gil Thorp, 9/8/10

This week Gil Thorp has been very busy telegraphing the fall plot: it will be about Troubled Foster Kid Cody Exner! Gil had a life-changing conversation with Cody’s current foster mom yesterday, in which he learned that adults cannot remain in the foster care system indefinitely. This puts a crimp in his plan to find a foster family who will care for him so he can quit his job and drink full time.

In panel three, we see that the takeaway from the plot will be that foster kids are angry and violent — at least before they get some good, solid half-assed coaching from Gil Thorp. Cody will come around and be ready for adulthood by his 18th birthday, even though a few Mudlark teammates may be maimed in the process.

Dennis the Menace, 9/8/10

I was going to make some kind of distasteful “Dennis is a pimp” joke here before I was brought up short with horror at the faces of the little girls on either side of him. They’re a degree or two less cartoonish that the other children — could they be an attempt to represent two actual specific kids? — which only makes them that much more unsettling, in no small part because the more lifelike faces draw attention to their freakishly knobbly legs.

To distract yourself from this horror, consider the fact that Mr. Wilson is such a classic cartoon character that his face isn’t needed to establish presence in the scene, just his iconic gut.

Luann, 9/8/10

Hey, everyone, Dirk’s back, and the power of Christ compels you to like him! I’ve been ignoring him thus far this week, but I feel he earned a spot in this blog by treating Mrs. DeGroot like some sort of stalking-fun-killing vampire.

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Dennis the Menace, 8/25/10

It seems at last that Dennis has found something truly menacing to do: serve as a self-appointed eugenicist enforcer. “Miss, did you have authorization from the Central Hereditary Bureau to bear that child? I can tell by looking at you that your genome is suspect.”

Gil Thorp, 8/25/10

Gil Thorp has managed to find something duller than golf in real life or golf on TV: golf in the comics. Yes, I know we’ve been talking about golf in the strip all summer, but the last few … days, I guess (it seems like years) have been taken up by an actual single golf game. It’s been so boring that Torrey is well aware that most of the readership has dozed off, and is attempting to poke them to wake them up in the first panel. The person I really feel for is the behatted multi-chinned dude in the first panel. You can tell he’s all excited about his big Gil Thorp cameo! Wore his best Hawaiian shirt and everything! Too bad it’s in such a snooze-inducing strip.

Mary Worth, 8/25/10

Why is Mike surrounded by a halo of distress in panel two? Does he fear that his father is going to die of massive liver failure right there in front of him, and he’ll be responsible for disposing of the gin-soaked body? Or is he disgusted that the old man is satisfied to go to his grave without having tracked down Richie’s killer, thus becoming a failure at officially everything?

Pluggers, 8/25/10

Pluggers know that the chances of their working up the energy to have sex with one another will be improved if they can’t see each other.

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Dennis the Menace, 7/31/10

I suppose that it’s mildly menacing that Dennis refuses to join any sort of square, organized group like the Boy Scouts. More menacing still is Mr. Wilson’s even grumpier than usual expression. Now revealed to be the leader of a uniformed paramilitary organization, he plots to use his army of children to purge the neighborhood of “undesirable elements” (i.e., the Mitchells), once and for all.

Herb and Jamaal, 7/31/10

This strip is like a “Goofus and Gallant” cartoon explaining how to be on the down low. INCORRECT WAY TO DEAL WITH THE AFTERMATH OF A DRUNKEN 3 A.M. BOOTY CALL: “That phone call I made last night, that never happened, right? Eh?” CORRECT WAY: Pushing it deep, down into your unconscious mind, so that even you can’t remember it, except in your dreams.