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Dick Tracy, 2/15/16

Oh hey Dick Tracy is celebrating the U.S. re-establishing diplomatic relations with Cuba by having Dick travel to Cuba, to fight crime, with a Cuban detective and also a Russian! Anyway, today they’re all suddenly talking to Enormous Cuban Wolverine-Esque guy with little explanation, who has “Dirty Action Terminate Land For” written on his chest, which is definitely a thing that makes sense. Jokes on you, “DJ,” the U.S. has extradition treaties with both Panama and Bermuda.

Slylock Fox, 2/15/16

The animals may think they’re building a new, better world without us, but they’re fooling themselves. They’re pale shadows of us. Why else do they wear our clothes, live in our cities, mimic our forms of justice? The real losers (other than the billions of human beings who were mauled to death in the opening hours of the animapocalypse) were the ones living out in the wilderness. The foxes, the mice, the cats and dogs — they had spent time living in the cities, and when they Awoke, they were on familiar ground. They probably started driving the first day. But the giraffes and the other animals out away from humanity — they could talk now, and form abstract thoughts, but that doesn’t mean they understood the new world they were expected to participate in. Look at poor Jerry. He’s not even wearing clothes. They’ve just thrown a sheet over him. He doesn’t know he’s supposed to be ashamed.

Mark Trail, 2/15/16

Mark, you’ve been trapped in this cave for maybe 30 seconds and it’s way too soon to start touting the merits of “land shrimp.” You are far too eager about all this. “Hey guys, do you know that bat guano is nature’s chocolate? And let me tell you about ‘long pig!'”

Six Chix, 2/15/16

OH GOD THEY’RE MELTING THEMSELVES

THEIR LOWER JAWS ARE MELTING RIGHT AWAY AS THEY SCREAM ENDLESSLY

WHY DO THEY KEEP DRINKING

CAN’T THEY SEE THE MUTILATED CORPSES

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Dick Tracy, 2/1/16

The old Dick Tracy, by which I mean the relatively recent Dick Tracy of the ’00s as written and drawn by Dick Locher, was insanely violent. Villains were killed via fire, explosion, vicious dogs, mind erasure, bulldozer, suffocation or burns or however you die from falling head first into a smokestack, and, perhaps most memorably, via rats, lots and lots of hungry rats. Am I saying that I’m sad that the new creative team has for the most part toned down the carnage? Mostly no, but a little yes. And the little part of me that’s yes is particularly disappointed that this new storyline suddenly involves a cop who “does undercover work regarding music copyright infringement,” which sounds like the dorkiest form of undercover police work possible. “Hey, fellow teens, my names John Springstein — no relationship to Bruce, ha ha, because it’s spelled differently! Speaking of which, you guys know where I can illegally download some MP3s from Tunnel of Love?’ “Don’t worry,” one of the teens whispers to the others, “we can trust him. Only a real desperate character would wear that vest.”

Six Chix, 2/1/16

“Hey, that’s my phone! And that’s a pigeon and a rat, once one of the most common species in existence, now extinct after that supernova destroyed the Earth! Scientists decided not to bring any live specimens on the vast spaceship where we live now, which will carry our descendents to the Sirius system over the next several centuries. And since there are communications panels every ten meters or so in the corridors where we’ll spend the rest of our days, we don’t need phones anymore, either!”

Beetle Bailey, 2/1/16

You know who else saw from the top of a mountain that he could be king of the world but then rejected that power? Jesus Christ. Just something to think about. Not saying that Beetle Bailey is the Messiah, but, you know, not saying he isn’t, either.

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Mary Worth, 1/11/16

A good way to tell the difference between an actual human child and one or more small alien beings using a human-shaped meatsack as a disguise is the way they talk. For instance, do they start a sentence with the phrase “Being a kid” and end it with “window shopping”? Then they probably aren’t actually a kid. Anyway, it’s nice to see that Mary is going to reward Olive (or GleepGlorp 7, whoever) for giving a dollar to a homeless guy with an extravagant spending spree at New York’s finest, dowdiest boutiques.

Spider-Man, 1/11/16

Usually Newspaper Spider-Man is the dumbest guy in any given situation, but let’s give a shout-out to Namor, who has abandoned his plan to win his war against the surface dwellers by destroying New York with a nigh-unstoppable flying submarine, and instead will just be fighting a one-man battle against Spider-Man, which seems like a slightly less viable long-term strategy for conquest. In his favor, literally everyone assumes Spider-Man will lose.

Dick Tracy, 1/11/16

Ok, I know cute on-the-nose names are very much the core of Dick Tracy’s #brand, but “Spicy Condiment” is a bridge too God-damned far, my friends. How does it even relate to her character design? With her gleaming teeth, shouldn’t she be named “Minty Fresh” or something? This bothers me so much.