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Apartment 3-G, 10/20/10

Three years ago Lu Ann’s sassy cousin Ruby arrived in New York with some bags that needed carrying, a coquettish smile, and a wildly age-inappropriate set of hair ribbons. Today we meet Tommie’s Aunt Iris, hauling in her own luggage and showing more personality in three panels than Tommie has in the last year and a half. Apartment 3-G’s long-term plan of replacing its core cast members with their older and dowdier yet spunkier relatives is proceeding apace.

Family Circus, 10/20/10

This is the second time this week we’ve been treated to the sad and hilarious sight of a Keane Kid’s brain shutting down as a defensive measure to prevent too much knowledge from seeping in. At least Billy’s mind has been overwhelmed by genuine book-learning, unlike Jeffy, whose feeble mind can’t even deal with basic cable.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 10/20/10

Actually, Li’l Tater is presumably refusing to participate in cannibalism, based on a hilarious misunderstanding of the relationship between his name and the potatoes thrust before him. The confusion will eventually be cleared up, but this virtuous impulse will once again become a problem when he’s old enough to attend Hootin’ Holler’s most cherished annual ritual, the Fricasseein’ of the Revenooers.

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Beetle Bailey, 10/17/10

Sunday Beetle Baileys are notorious for being flabby and shapeless, with an absence of rhythm that guarantees that any possible fun is sucked out of it, but today’s is pretty much one of the worst I’ve seen. I’m not buying the idea that Beetle, who typically can’t even be bothered to push his hat out of his face, has suddenly developed a love for American Revolution trivia. And the weird ritualistic baseball/”surrender” exchange has so little payoff — one would expect that Beetle would use Sarge’s surrender to get out of work, or beatings, somehow — that Sarge is absolutely right to look as bored as he does. About all this strip has going for it is the reminder that Miss Buxley’s little black dress is actually a little red dress, colored black for the demands of the black-and-white daily strips that we increasingly often see colorized.

Family Circus, 10/17/10

Look, Jeffy, here in America we watch TV five hours a day. If you can’t hack it, maybe you should go to Communist Russia, where they’ll let you read books or some garbage like that.

My Cage, 10/17/10

This is getting a bit self-indulgent, but I did want to make sure that Curmudgeon readers who got shout-outs here and who rely on the no-Sunday Strips Houston Chronicle for their comics got to see their names in lights. What I want to know is, why no animal-style names for us? I dare you to come up with an animal-pun version of “Fruhlinger.”

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Family Circus, 10/9/10

Thanks to the many faithful readers who took time out of their busy weekends to email me the great news that millions of dollars are going to be spent creating a Family Circus movie. (The comments on that story I linked to are actually pretty great, my favorites being “Hell yeah! This means The Lockhorns can’t be far behind! Team Loretta!” and “Who asked for this? Ida Know. Who wants to see it? Not me.”) Apparently the strip is already moving into the edgier subject matter that Hollywood demands, with Dolly coming to the conclusion that her only way out of the Keane Kompound is as a child bride.

Crankshaft, 10/9/10

If the endless “Pam and Jeff reminisce about the violence Crankshaft has done to the English language” strips had to end — and, really, they could have kept at it for as long as comic strips continue to exist as a medium, as far as I’m concerned — then this is a pretty good way to wrap it up. Our two protagonists, having briefly rediscovered the emotion that normal humans call “happiness,” cringe in terror as they realize that Crankshaft’s soul, having been rejected by both God and Satan, has returned to his mortal form.

Beetle Bailey, 10/9/10

Honestly, there really ought to be someone employed at Walker-Browne Amalgamated Humor Industries LLC whose sole job is to pose this question before the day’s Beetle Bailey is sent to papers. “Is this somebody’s idea of a joke? I mean, would any of our readers recognize this is a joke, or something resembling a joke? We are still doing strips with jokes in them, right?”

Mary Worth, 10/9/10

“Some people at the hospital use another word for her! Or, wait, ‘war criminal’ is really two words, isn’t it?”

Adrian sure is setting Mary up to hate and fear this “outspoken” “type A” lady. One can only imagine what sort of terrible description of Mary she’s been giving to Jill. I’m starting to guess that she’s doing the meddling biddy equivalent of putting a couple of bugs in a jar and shaking it up.

Spider-Man, 10/9/10

“Oh, right, because I’m a terrible actress. God, this play is going to flop! The boos will be deafening!”

Apartment 3-G, 10/9/10

WHAT HAPPENS NEXT: Six to eight weeks worth of plotlines in which Tommie is not deemed interesting enough to appear.