Post Content

Slylock Fox, 5/5/10

Boy, Slylock sure is grim this week. First it’s animals getting maimed in car wrecks, now it’s “which of these adorable beasties is closest to death”? The short lifespan of the opossum actually fits in nicely with the little story being told, too. The villain of whatever petty mystery Officer Turtle is trying to solve isn’t the accusatory raccoon, the terrified beaver, or the obviously stoned bear. No, that angry opossum did it, because when death is always hovering right over your shoulder, you do some crazy things just to feel alive. What’re you gonna do, copper, throw me in jail for life? Doesn’t matter to me, I was never going to get to see my kids grow up anyway.

Mark Trail, 5/5/10

With Cherry abandoning him to gussy herself up, Mark has been left with Doc and Rusty, truly the dregs of the Lost Forest social scene. The final panel illustrates why Rusty won’t be allowed out in the barn: his hideous visage will panic the horses.

Dennis the Menace, 5/5/10

Those terrifyingly thin ankles indicate that Dennis has managed to induce a serious eating disorder in his mother with his little bathroom pep talks. Menacing factor: +1.

Post Content

Hi and Lois, 4/23/10

Comics aren’t just casual fun entertainment; they can also help you grapple with everyday but still painful life dilemmas. For instance, what if your son, who you love very much and who you only want to help succeed in life and be happy, turns out to be a terrible, miserable failure? Worse, what if he’s unable to recognize his own incompetence, and runs to you, his loving, nurturing parent, for the emotional affirmation that he’s learned to expect from you? How do you react? Hi and Lois doesn’t claim to have the answers, but Hi’s frozen, heartbroken expression in the final panel at least assures you that, if you’ve ever found yourself face to embarrassing face with your useless hump of an offspring, you’re not alone.

Dennis the Menace, 4/23/10

Making sex-themed jokes about cartoon kids is a little discomfort-making even for me, but then I’m not the one who used as the punchline for my child-populated comic a Las Vegas marketing slogan carefully constructed to evoke images of binge drinking and strip clubs, am I? Anyway, the most icky thing about this comic is the contrast between how pleased Margaret looks and how angry Dennis is at the thought that the smooching news might get out. Looks like he’s gearing up to be Dennis the emotional menace, am I right?

B.C., 4/23/10

Totally not at all discomfort-making or squicky to me at all is this apparent depiction of one reptile paying another for some kind of emotiono-sexual service. It’s like he’s a dominatrix, but with cuddling? And also he’s a turtle? Anyway, it’s all good clean fun!

Post Content

Beetle Bailey, 4/1/10

It’s frankly time to confront the crucial question that I’ve been avoiding for the entire history of this blog, namely: What kind of terrifying man-beast is Beetle Bailey’s Cookie? At first glance, his character design may appear to be nothing more than “Sarge in a chef’s outfit”; thus, it would seem advisable to keep the two characters from sharing panel space so as to not call attention to this fact, but remorseless narrative logic impels Walker-Browne Amalgamated Humor Industries LLC to create scenarios in which notorious binger Sarge heads down to Cookie’s mess hall, for food. Anyway, seeing the two of them together leads one to contemplate the differences between them, the primary one being the hair. Specifically, the … shoulder hair? I’m a pretty hairy dude, I’m not going to lie to you, but last I checked I didn’t have two big tufts of, ugh, flesh-colored hair concentrated on my shoulders, up there at the top of my otherwise smooth, hairless arms. Nobody does, in fact, because that’s not generally how hair grows on humans, which brings us back to our initial question about Cookie, who is some kind of horrible abomination, gross, and thanks, Walker-Browne AHI LLC, for writing a gag that literally forces us to contemplate this freak’s body hair, and the places where it does and does not grow.

And what about his ears? His bizarrely plump ears? Eaaaaauuurrghhh.

Funky Winkerbean, 4/1/10

Naturally, there is only so much room for happiness in the soul-crushing Funkyverse, which means that anyone’s even modest triumph must displace the proud achievements of others in a terrible zero-sum game. The supply of misery, of course, is infinite.

Dennis the Menace, 4/1/10

In a particularly non-menacing display, Dennis plays on April Fools’ Days joke on Mr. Wilson that involves not vandalizing his car. Those brake lines better be cut, kid.