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Crock, 4/2/08

Readers, help me out here: is “hike” some kind of dialectical term for “urinate” or “defecate”? That would be the only way this strip would make any kind of sense, but I can’t seem to find any evidence that the word is ever used in that way. The real tragedy here is that for once Crock came up with a halfway funny joke (admittedly one that’s both gross and cruel, but I never claimed to be highbrow) only to have it bowdlerized.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 4/2/08

Apparently June, seething with contempt for her husband as usual, agrees with faithful reader indrifan’s COTW runner-up comment from last week. “Play health inspector!” Ha! And “Andy will need all the help he can get” (subtext: and you sure aren’t going to provide it). Rex would be hurt, if he cared at all what June thought.

Dennis the Menace, 4/2/08

SWEET MERCIFUL CRAP WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED TO DENNIS’S RIGHT HAND? I think that somebody, knowing that Dennis’s ADD-addled mind is unable to properly weigh long-term advantage against short-term gain, has been telling him stories about the “finger fairy,” then casually leaving a chisel where he could get at it.

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Archie, 3/25/08

Kudos to the AJGLU 3000 for not forcing the narrative in the first panel. The mere sight of the “Help Wanted” sign in Pop’s window is much subtler than what I’d have expected, which would have been Jughead staring at the “Help Wanted” sign while a light bulb (possibly hamburger shaped) went off over his head. Kudos too to our bleeping funny-bot for recognizing that the search for employment isn’t some smooth operation of soulless economic actors, but is rather layered with sarcasm and class-based resentment. Either that, or the AJGLU 3000 really thinks that hamburgers are a valid form of payment.

Crankshaft, 3/25/08

Crankshaft’s daughter and son-in-law are discussing the fact that their son — who is in his late teens or early 20s, and who I’m pretty sure is gainfully employed in some capacity — has decided to move into his own place. Naturally, their bleak, ashen faces in panel two make it look like he’s decided to sign up to be a suicide bomber — naturally, because this is the Funkiverse, where every little seemingly innocent decision has some kind of tragic downside, even if you can’t see it just yet.

Apartment 3-G, 3/25/08

When Margo hears “monastery,” she’s naturally anxious that her man might have done something terrible, like taking a vow of chastity or, worse, poverty. Obedience she could probably live with.

Mary Worth, 3/25/08

As young Mary prepares to fake her way through grace, we learn that her upbringing wasn’t just materially deprived — it was also spiritually empty! I know I should have long given up hope for this flashback sequence, but I admit to being excited to see just what life-changing event Mary is going to experience. Will she begin to speak in tongues, with “tongues” here meaning “bland platitudes”? Or will Cathy’s family’s prayer invoke the Holy Virgin Mary, and young Miss Worth will suddenly be filled with a new sense of her own power, as only she will be intercede for us at the hour of our death?

Dennis the Menace, 3/25/08

Ha ha! Dennis’s “field trip” is going to involve a lead pipe, a burlap sack, and a fast-moving river.

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Zits, 3/11/08

Today’s Zits disturbed and horrified me — not, I hasten to add, because there’s something wrong with a woman of a certain age (or any age, for that matter) dancing around in such a fashion as to cause her bosoms to jiggle and sway. No, my gripe is in how said breasts are depicted. The rightmost Connie is depicted frozen in a moment in time and leaning back, presumably as she dances to the music; in a world governed by the laws of physics as I understand them, her breasts should themselves be at the top of their gentle arc, perhaps raised up a bit from the rest of her chest. Instead, they appear to be wriggling around as she stands motionless, as if they were the tentacles around the mouth-parts of Cthulu, an illusion made all the more real by the fact that there seem to be six of them. If I saw such a thing on the front of any human female, let alone my mother, I too would beg for hysterical blindness.

Cathy, 3/11/08

Speaking of nameless horrors, there’s something unsettling about today’s Cathy, and not in the usual way, either. What exactly does Irving mean by “a person like you”? And why is Cathy standing in front of some kind of inky black portal in the final panel? “I know! That’s why I can’t go back!” she proclaims, terrified of the unspoken but no doubt awful fate that awaits her at the demonic so-called “gym”. But it doesn’t matter that she refuses to go — the darkness is looming behind her, threatening to swallow her up.

For Better Or For Worse, 3/11/08

Man, check out Liz’s face in that final panel. She looks pretty pleased with herself, doesn’t she? Remember, fellas: Nothing can bring a woman to orgasm faster than explaining carefully, with careful attention to the grammatical case of your relative pronouns, that you respect and value and her autonomy.

Meanwhile, Anthony is driving ever closer to the secluded clearing where he disposes of the bodies.

Dennis the Menace, 3/11/08

This may seem on the surface to be more run-of-the-mill submenacing, but what if by “I beat the sun up again” Dennis means not “I woke up before sunrise” but “I bested the sun in hand-to-hand combat”? You have to admit that if an eight-year-old kid managed to pummel our sun, which is 800,000 miles in diameter and has surface temperature of 9 million degrees, into submission, that would be pretty menacing — both because it would be a bad-ass achievement in and of itself and because it would send our planet’s temperature plunging close to absolute zero, killing all life on its surface. Henry and Alice will barely have time to bestir themselves before the very atmosphere freezes solid!

Herb and Jamaal, 3/11/08

I have to admit that I find the little puff of smoke hovering over the toaster in the first two panels of this strip totally adorable! It’s like the toaster is angry! Possibly because it has to just sit there and listen to this ancient, horrible joke.

Crankshaft, 3/11/08

Ha ha, the old lady slipped on the ice, probably seriously injuring herself! Man, I can’t wait to see how this barrel of laughs develops.