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FoxTrot, 3/21/10

Earlier this evening King Features had only released those color comics with names beginning “A” through “C”. It looked like I would be forced to serve up Crock to you fine folks again, and I felt shame. The mighty Houston Chronicle eventually came to my rescue, but in my early panic I steeled myself, went out, and bought a newspaper. Well, The San Francisco Chronicle, but you know what I mean. And there, in pale ink on flimsy translucent pulp, was Steve Jobs’s vision of the comics’ future. Along with proof positive that Jason Fox does not read newspaper Spider-Man.

Crankshaft, 3/21/10

Other than that, sad to say, the Sunday funnies are mostly a cavalcade of misery, alienation, and spite — and that’s leaving out Crock. Here’s mom Lillian rejecting son Jeff’s umpteenth feeble, doomed attempt to win her favor. Hey, Jeff — I bet your pharmacist will swap that talking pillbox for something that will shut the old pill up for good.

Family Circus, 3/21/10

Of course, the “Greatest Generation” has no monopoly on shabby disregard for the feelings of loved ones. Here, Bil’s simple dream of family harmony — lovingly documented in his cartoons for more than half a century — is revealed as a hollow sham. But take heart — I hear that in a week or two, they’ll be ignoring him in favor of comics on their shiny new iPads!

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 3/21/10

Dysfunction abounds even in the bucolic Eden of Hootin’ Holler. In panel 5, Loweezy lets it slip that her fragile romantic life with husband Snuffy is held together by porn almost as much as moonshine.

Heh, heh — Grampy!

— Uncle Lumpy

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Apartment 3-G, 3/18/10

I’m sure your first cynical reaction upon seeing a mugger on modern planet Earth refer to someone as a “witch” was that this is a comics-page-friendly stand-in for a more common contemporary unpleasantry identical except for the first letter. Consider, though, the ruffian’s oddly anachronistic cowl. Isn’t it at least possible that he is in fact a medieval peasant, rudely thrust, via some natural or man-made temporal anomaly, into present-day Manhattan? To a man who’s grown up in a rigidly patriarchal society, a woman such as Bobbie — brash, forward, apparently unattached, laughing in the face of death — might seem like a terrifying sorceress. Also, our man probably knows no trade other than subsistence agriculture, and his lack of any skills that would be economically useful in the 21st century explains his turn to crime. In short, Bobbie is probably actually just being threatened with a crudely made dagger, or, at worst, an early flintlock pistol more likely to blow up in our misplaced serf’s hand than to do real damage to his target.

Family Circus, 3/18/10

As if the dialogue in this panel weren’t already creeptastic, we also have Jeffy’s exhausted-looking face, which reads not so much as “adorable little kid just waking up” but more as “child exhausted and terrified from trying so hard to dream about YOU MOMMY, ONLY YOU, BUT IT’S SO HARD.” Sorry, Jeffy, if you can’t do it yourself, you’re going to have to wear the Night Terror Jacket again!

Mark Trail, 3/18/10

One of the more baffling undercurrents in this Mark Trail storyline has been a simmering political debate about whether or not “big motors” should be allowed to operate on the lake that has been the focus of the action thus far. I’m not particularly clear on how any of the characters stand on this crucial issue, but the Parker Brothers’ two-smallish-motor-powered boat appears unlikely to satisfy either side. Surely the anti-big-motor activists will point out that this arrangement produces as much noise and pollution as a truly big motor, while big motor aficionados will sneer at the half-assed measure.

Meanwhile, Mark still seems to believe that anyone anywhere still keeps “supplies” in an “icehouse.” Current smart betting on what’s behind that thick door is clustered around “growhouse” and “grisly collection of corpses on hooks.”

Wizard of Id, 3/18/10

Actually, providing adequate sanitation for mobile armies is a problem that has been a crucial part of military planning since the ancient world. It’s one that’s particularly important for armies in the countryside attempting to besiege a city or castle, as Id’s catapult-armed forces appear to be doing here; it wasn’t uncommon for sieges to be lifted not because of the defenders’ military triumph, but because diseases like cholera or dysentery, spread by sewage that hadn’t been dealt with properly, had devastated the besieging army. In fact, in the Crimea in the 1300s, the Mongols … oh, wait, this is the Wizard of Id? Uh, never mind. Ha ha, pooping is funny!

Programming note! Your faithful blogger is now finished with his SXSW adventure … but is just turning around and leaving for a real actual vacation! Said vacation will entail handing over the reins to the inimitable Uncle Lumpy, starting tomorrow and going for a bit longer than a week. Play nice while I’m away!

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Wizard of Id, 3/16/10

One of the interesting things about legacy comics is that over the years the edges slowly wear off their high concepts. So, for instance, Hagar the Horrible is a savage Viking chief, but he spends more time bickering with his wife than he does raiding a hapless Europe, and when he does go marauding it’s all done in the most ritualized and bloodless way. Beetle Bailey is in the army, but he’ll never be ordered to shoot anyone or put himself into a position to be shot at, nor will he ever be hauled before a court martial for his various violations of military discipline.

The Wizard of Id is one of several characters, like Funky Winkerbean and the late Kudzu, who found themselves muscled out of the spotlight of the strips ostensibly named after them, and, well, I guess I’ve never really thought of him as all that “dark.” I mean, I suppose he is the royal wizard for a king who routinely tortures his citizens and imprisons them for years without trial, but for the past several decades his powers have mostly been put to use conjuring up minor ghosts and irritating his wife. I dunno, I guess I just expect more malice out of my dark wizards. Another modern punk kid ruined by Harry Potter!

Mary Worth, 3/16/10

If we want more proof of Kurt’s complete insanity, we should look no further than panel two. If I had been shown a picture of some demon nerd, his eyes glowing the most intense and evil brown, attempting to yank off a lock of young Teri Garr’s hair for who knows what foul purpose, I would have wanted nothing to do with him, yet Kurt actively sought him out! There’s nothing such a person wouldn’t be capable of!

In panel one, we see the final stage of Wilbur’s feeding process. Having crammed an entire sandwich down his gullet with a single shove, he’s now keeping his hand in place over his mouth to make sure it doesn’t come back out. When Wilbur eats a sandwich, it stays eaten (most of the time).

Family Circus, 3/16/10

“So why don’t you let me hold on to these, dearies, while I keep them safe for you down at the greyhound track?”