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Pluggers, 10/21/26

Man, I don’t know, this one is pretty grim even for Pluggers. Like, my elementary school was in Buffalo, NY — a place I hold in a great deal of affection, but it’s not what you’d call one of the more prosperous places in America — and the building has been converted into condos. Other people might find the site of their old school now occupied by a strip mall, or a parking lot, or the town dump, something reflecting continued local economic activity of some sort. But where pluggers grew up and went to school? They’re just tearing it all down and leaving nothing behind. Letting the whole area revert to prairie and evacuating the residents. This place is not a place of honor. No highly esteemed deed is commemorated here.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 10/21/26

We’re on day three of Augie lowering Summer’s expectations about what his book getting optioned might mean. Today’s topic: What if, against all odds, they do make a movie or a TV show out of your book, and it sucks? Totally a thing that could happen! I mean, lots of movies and TV shows are pretty bad, when you think about it. And, be honest with yourself: is your book even any good in the first place? Maybe just cash those little checks when they come in and be thankful!

Dick Tracy, 10/21/26

“Well, let’s see, I’m wearing an all-white uniform and an old-timey nurse’s cap, and carrying the patriarch of the house around, so, uh, I’m gonna let you take a second to come to some conclusions for yourself about what exactly my role is, detective.”

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Dick Tracy, 10/14/26

Dick Tracy has a new artist, longtime Tracy superfan Howie Noel, and I am here to report that, in this house, we are now Howie Noel superfans, as this week has reliably delivered panel after panel of real fucked-up shit, which I mean in the most complimentary possible sense. A detective with a neanderthal-level brow ridge and free-flowing beads of sweat. A weird pinheaded nurse in an archaic outfit. A tiny man the size of a ventriloquist’s dummy, or possibly just an actual ventriloquist’s dummy that the nurse is operating. The tiny man/dummy has unpleasantly long fingernails, by the way. A+ all around!

Mary Worth, 10/14/26

OK, so, Toby is still crashing out over the entirely not real Ian/Mary rumors, but let’s look on the bright side for her: artistically, she’s moved on from her “hideous grey animal-shaped blobs” period to her “mawkish painted animal figurines” period, which should be more marketable if nothing else.

Beetle Bailey, 10/14/26

Look, I know that General Halftrack’s coffee tastes can’t possibly be what anyone would call sophisticated, but I refuse to believe that even the most skilled practitioner could make anything in that circa 1975 Mr. Coffee machine that would live up to the name “barista.”

Hi and Lois, 10/14/26

Oh, so Chip isn’t competent to babysit when Hi’s just trying to get some work done at the office, but he’s perfectly capable of doing so when Lois is horny, huh? Interesting. Interesting.

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Dennis the Menace, 10/5/26

Part of being a sophisticated textual critic such as myself is that you have to be able to distinguish between “something I dislike” and “something that is executed poorly.” So, for instance, you know that on principle I dislike the “Dennis insults his mother’s cooking” Dennis the Menace panels. But if you’re going to do it, having Dennis stare ahead, dead-eyed and drooling, and saying “This tastes like shit, mom, it tastes like food that’s just been lying around until it goes bad” is a pretty good execution.

Dick Tracy, 10/5/26

Big news, everyone! A new Dick Tracy storyline is starting today, and the very first strip is a guy falling down the stairs and dying! Or at least I assume? He actually looks pretty much the same in the air as he does on the ground, so maybe he’s fine and just shaped like that.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 10/5/26

For too long, the Baby Boomers and retro-hipster Gen Xers of Glenwood have only been able to express their toxic nostalgia through dedication to roots country music. But soon they’ll also be able to enjoy older films that have been largely forgotten by the mainstream cineaste community for presumably good reason, thanks to Mae Mae’s carefully invested movie earnings and/or Glenwood’s rock-bottom real estate prices!

Crankshaft, 10/5/26

“As a matter of fact, some prescription medications, especially generics, are manufactured in China. It’s somewhat more common, however, for the chemical raw materials to be produced in China while the drug formulation happens in India. Just another facet of our globalized era, where different countries with different prevailing labor costs and specific know-how end up specializing in different segments of the supply chain. I know that’s not a ‘punchline’ per se but I thought you might find it interesting!”