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Judge Parker, 1/26/08

So the big interview with No-Legged War Hero Mama’s Boy Works-For-Nothing Steve is over, and it’s becoming more and more obvious that Gloria likes what she sees! Likes it so much, in fact, that she’s got to close her eyes in the final panel, because if she has to look at that hot hunk of filial piety for even one more minute, she can’t be held responsible for her actions.

I do think it’s kind of curious that, since one of Steve’s major characteristics is that he lost his legs in Iraq, we’ve never actually gotten a good look at his prosthetics. Not that we should let his disability and define him and I’m sure most people with artificial legs actually wear pants that cover them up, but it almost seems that the artist has gone out of his way to arrange the panel composition such that his legs are just out of view. Could this be one of the problems of a comics strip that’s a collaboration between an artist and a writer — could the artist have gotten the scripts and cried “Argh! Prosthetic limbs! My greatest weakness!”

Popeye, 1/26/08

Popeye is in the midst of some completely uninteresting plot about Sweet Pea’s allowance, but I have to pose this question to those readers who are part of the nautical division of the Jungle Patrol: What the hell does “typical fat-armed sailor” mean? I always assumed that Popeye’s bizarre physique was a result of artistic whimsy and/or steroid abuse, but are we to understand that his pencil-thin biceps and unnaturally bulging forearms are somehow representative of his profession — and are also somehow related to the cheapness endemic to seamen? I’m obviously way behind on my sailor stereotyping.

Dick Tracy, 1/26/08

In our upcoming storyline, Dick Tracy will drop any pretense about being a frank cheerleader for fascism as Dick is ordered to go break up a local showing of “degenerate art.”

Marmaduke, 1/26/08

For “lost,” read “ate,” obviously.

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I know I said I was going to gloss over the strips that ran during my vacation, but, you know, I had to read them, at least the ones that have continuing storylines, if I didn’t want to be totally lost, and once I started reading them, well, some of them just were really calling out for the treatment and … I know, it’s a sickness. Anyway, here, quickly, are the high points of December 23 through January 1!

Judge Parker, 12/24/07

A very gratuitous Christmas came a day early for Abbey Spencer fans. I know that when most of you ladies have a sudden, drug-induced urge to paint your study, you want to slip into something more comfortable — like a halter top and a pair of Daisy Dukes so tight that you’re actually incapable of standing up straight.

Mary Worth, 12/24/07

Chester’s real owner apparently stole him away and, unbeknownst to Mary, replaced him with a plastic replica, if his weird sitting-in-midair position in panel one is any indication.

Spider-Man, 12/24/07

Peter Parker, meanwhile, got the best gift a boy could get: A trip to prison! Oh boy!

Christmas Day usually sees some variously awkward greetings shoehorned into different strips. My two favorites from 2007 were Dick Tracy, which heralded the birth of Our Savior with a scene of a collapsing building and an excitable workingman blathering about being pelted with corpses:

…and Gil Thorp, which proudly featured a set of cramped, noseless horrors that made last year’s Christmas card look museum-worthy:

For Better Or For Worse, 12/26/07

Meanwhile, Anthony has figured out a way to make little Francie accept her new mommy: force her to watch their bland, noodly sexual congress.

Gil Thorp, 12/28/07

Gil Thorp promises to break new dramatic ground in the new year by featuring a high school-aged student-athlete who is arrogant and unpleasant! (And yet how can we hate anyone who throws around put-downs like “climb down off your dinosaur”?)

Mark Trail, 12/29/07

A terminally ill Luke Wilson said, “Don’t waste your time, Trail,” by which he obviously means “Let’s not over-stimulate your readers with any kind of action or excitement when I can just tell them all what happened and then expire quietly.” No word yet on whether Mark will punch his corpse.

Panels from Apartment 3-G, 12/30/07

Margo added another bullet point to her résumé of personal destruction: enabler!

Panel from Judge Parker, 12/30/07

Sam proved, as if we need any more evidence, that he has no intention of having sex with his wife ever again.

For Better Or For Worse, 1/1/08

And, in the first moments of 2008, April took a good, long look at Gerald’s penis. She looks troubled by what she sees.

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Dick Tracy, 12/22/07

I’ve managed to go several weeks without mentioning Dick Tracy, and that’s because it’s been stupid and incomprehensible and insane. The meandering, pointless storyline has involved a maniac holding the governor hostage in an old haunted mansion at the end of a tunnel behind a painting; meanwhile, a wrecking crew has shown up to demolish the house the same day that a high-profile charity haunted house sleepover event involving local politicians is ostensibly in progress inside, and they refuse to obey the orders of the police. Today’s comic is worthy of mention, though, because it features the bad guy (or maybe the governor — I’m not entirely clear on this point) falling to his death, a mighty SPLATT ringing out as his organs are pulped inside his body cavity; then his corpse is mangled by a bulldozer, which the operator of said machine barely notices. I would bet money that this strip runs in at least one newspaper that pulled Zits last month because it used the word “sucks.”

Family Circus, 12/22/07

This sort of blasphemous sass that should definitely not bring a wry little smile to the lips of the mother of any ostensibly Christian household. Mommy needs to get out the crucifix and use it to bludgeon the devil out of her sinful son.

Judge Parker, 12/22/07

Hmm, pot brownies should really leave Abbey “inspired” to do little more than sit in the office and giggle about all the clashing color schemes she keeps coming up with. New theory: meth brownies.

Slylock Fox, 12/22/07

You know what America needs more of? Superheroes that pick up criminals by the scruff of the neck and then punch them in the face.