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Mary Worth, 2/11/09

The last time Mary Worth decided to build a story around this new-fangled “Internet,” was last summer, when Tobey Cameron foolishly decided to engage in e-commerce rather than patronizing one of her local shabby strip malls. Obviously she immediately fell prey to a terrible phishing scam, which gave her nightmares about Ian leaving her because of her foolishness. (In the end, the punishment was much worse: he decided to stay.) The takeaway, obviously, is that the Internet is nothing more than a four-lane highway for deceit that good, honest people should stay away from at all costs, which means that Adrian’s new guy will be one or more of the following:

• Married
• An con artist
• A World of Warcraft addict/shut-in
• A furry
• Wanted war criminal Ratko Mladic, wearing a “very clever disguise”

Not that there’s anything wrong with at least two of those things! But let me say this: my wife and I met on an Internet dating site, and, perhaps more relevant to this strip’s demographics, so did my father-in-law and his fianceé, and if this plotline ends with Mary narrowly preventing Adrian from being made into a lampshade by her maniacal online paramour, leading many lonely Mary Worth devotees to hurl their devil-computers into the street in terror, then I will be very upset! If, on the other hand, the Internet is shown to be a fun and exciting way to meet new people, I will be pleased, even if the result is a surge of new users on Match.com with screen names like DrJeffLover.

Family Circus, 2/11/09

Possible sets of individuals that Billy might be encompassing with the pronoun “we”:

• Billy and Mommy
• Billy and Jeffy
• The entire family, together, in some kind of horrifying pollen-mingling process that takes place in the Keane Kompound’s secret underground breeding chamber

It’s a sad day when the alien plant-monster hypothesis is the least disturbing.

Judge Parker, 2/11/09

“Also, seeing as the only people who ever dressed like this were FBI agents, circa 1964, I need you to tell J. Edgar Hoover that I’ll be out of the office for a few days.”

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Hi and Lois, 2/5/09

Ditto’s teacher’s enormous grin probably indicates that she’s on some kind of serious mood-altering medication, which, seeing as she’s Ditto’s teacher and all, God bless her for it.

Crock, 2/5/09

Ha ha ha, fat character created solely to be the butt of fat jokes! Let’s string together a bunch fat jokes about you! No, they don’t actually have to lead into each other logically. Say, has anyone pointed out to you that you’re fat?

Family Circus, 2/5/09

“Certainly not for unsophisticated, derivative trash like this. Why, you couldn’t get a gallery show in Peoria with crap like Running Man In Hat in your portfolio!”

Mary Worth, 2/5/09

“You helped Lynn by talking through her problems with her … and helped me with that incredible nine-hour sex session last night, which the comic syndicate censored but which I’ll imply by gently resting my hand on your shoulder!”

…

What? What? Did I blow your little minds? The way Mary blew Frank’s mind, last night? OK, I’ll stop now.

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Spider-Man, 1/16/09

Most of us actually go out and do things when we’re in college, but once we get older and get married, we mostly just stay at home, watch TV, and bitch about stuff that annoys us. So it perhaps shouldn’t be surprising that newly time-jumped college-age Spider-Man is engaging in a surprising amount of superheroics. Fortunately, the core attribute of the Spider-Man newspaper universe — namely, that everyone there is dumber than a box of hair — remains unchanged. Our hero has been knocked unconscious by a stream of water he unleashed himself, and our “triumphant” villain is driving off in armored car of loot with its rear doors open, allowing said loot to fly out into the street as he makes his getaway.

Dennis the Menace, 1/16/09

Isn’t Dennis’s usual schtick in this context to repeat insulting things his parents have said behind their unsuspecting guest’s back, rather than just letting lose with his own insults? As this is the sort of thing that can laughed off thanks to kids and their darndest-thing-saying ways, I judge it to be less menacing, unless “grapefruit” is some kind of obscure ethnic slur that I’m not familiar with.

Ziggy, 1/16/09

Ha ha, Ziggy asked the star to fulfill some foul, perverted sex fantasy!

Wait, did I say “ha, ha”? I meant “OH GOD I JUST THOUGHT ABOUT ZIGGY’S SEX FANTASIES WHY WHY WHY”

Family Circus, 1/16/09

Aw, isn’t that cute! Jeffy thinks he’s going to college!