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Mary Worth, 11/14/22

I have to say that I’m proud of our girl Iris here: the fact that she was almost dragged to her death by the weight of her hunky boyfriend’s rippling muscles is intrinsically far more interesting than the fact that she later accepted his marriage proposal, and she’s right to lead with it. I’ll even allow her to imply that the big story was her own potential doom, which seemed a lot less likely thank Zak’s, if only because it’ll rattle Mary’s cage a little. “That’s right, Mary, I’m out there getting that high you can only get by staring your own mortality in the face. What’s the closest you’ve ever come to meeting your maker lately? Letting Dr. Jeff steer the boat when he’s had two Michelob Ultras?”

Dennis the Menace, 11/14/22

This is definitely one of the grimmest panels Dennis the Menace has ever done. Every night Mr. Wilson has one nightmare, the same one that also occupies his every waking moment. Keep pulling on whatever you’ve wrapped around his neck, Dennis, and put him out his misery.

Dustin, 11/14/12

A fun fact about Dustin, the newspaper comic strip about the conflicts between feckless young people and their older family members who genuinely despite them, is that it’s one of the newer comics in the syndicated world and yet was also launched in 2010, which I regret to inform you was a full 12 years ago at this point. Now, in 2010, would a storyline about a young person trying out this new “blogging” business make sense? Sure, barely. Does it now, in the year of our lord 2022? Let me assure you that it very much does not. As America’s #1 newspaper comics blogger, I am uniquely positioned to deliver this sad news.

Pluggers, 11/14/12

ME [in a room full of high-powered Hollywood executives/perverts]: Gentlemen, it’s been more than 20 years since we made history with American Pie, the story of a teenage boy who fucks a pie. America’s gotten a lot weirder since then. So what if, for our next move… [I advance the PowerPoint slide deck to reveal “PLUGGERS: THE MOVIE: A BEAR FUCKS AN ICE CREAM CONE”] [the Hollywood perverts shower me with $100 bills]

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Mary Worth, 11/11/22

“Nah, babe. Even the prospect of our tragic death can only shake us out of the boring ruts of our usual routine for a day or so. That’s why we’ve got to plan our upcoming wedding … it’s just out of the ordinary enough to make us feel like everything isn’t undifferentiated sameness with no beginning or end. And after the wedding? Well, we’ll just have to come up with something else, hopefully not suicide.”

Dennis the Menace, 11/11/22

I dunno man, I feel like it’s a bad sign that Mr. Wilson hasn’t even bothered to tape over that window or anything. Just left a big jagged hole! Like he’s given up on everything! I hope the UPS man isn’t delivering something he’s going to use to harm his neighbors, or himself.

Pardon My Planet, 11/11/22

A new addition to the list of Things You Can Just Put In A Newspaper Comic Now Where God And Everyone Can See It: a blowup sex doll. Congrats, Pardon My Planet!

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Dennis the Menace, 11/4/22

I actually think it’s more or less fine to do a syndicated newspaper strip that takes place in some kind of permanent 1950s boomer childhood fantasy world, especially for legacy strips that were born in that era anyway. I do feel like if you’re going to have a 1950s housewife tending to a rascally little tyke in overalls who’s allowed to roam the suburban neighborhood freely with a slingshot, the price you pay is that you can’t have said tyke mouth off about “the supply chain” or whatever. It’s too stale to be actually topical but topical enough that Dennis definitely shouldn’t be talking about it, which puts it in an uncanny valley spot that’s ironically pretty menacing, just not the kind of menacing I like.

The Lockhorns, 11/4/22

Meanwhile, because I contain multitudes, I love it when The Lockhorns get vaguely contemporary. Leroy losing all his money in a crypto scam? Yes, yes I say, give me more of this. The Lockhorns are Millennials after all, so it adds up.

Dustin, 11/4/22

Speaking of topical matters, I did a piece in 2020 about the initial wave of the COVID pandemic and the comics, but didn’t broach the subject that maybe I should’ve: what if a comic character actually died of COVID? I think possibly the funniest possible way for Dustin to dramatically stop publishing would’ve been to have its unloved title character die of wild-type COVID in April 2020, unmourned by his family or his temp agency. Sadly, in late 2022, this is probably just a cold, or at worst an Omicron infection that he’s vaccinated against and will get over, but fingers crossed that he’s maybe got that mutant flu/RSV hybrid that’s going around and we’ll be freed from this strip’s nonsense.

Funky Winkerbean, 11/4/22

Very sad that Summer has chosen a book topic that will require her to interview all her dad’s insufferable old friends, but I suppose the big reveal that the town’s mailman was violating federal law and everyone’s privacy for decades will at least result in a flurry of local sales interest.

Shoe, 11/4/22

I love it when the TV announces that regular programming has been pre-empted for some undisclosed reason and also refuses to tell me what it’s been replaced by, a normal occurrence that happens in real life all the time. Anyway, do you think today’s strip falls into the distressingly frequent Shoe category of “It’s fucked up that they have birds doing this joke”? Discuss.