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Crock, 12/12/07

Today’s Crock has plenty of little run-of-the-mill terrible touches — like, for instance, the word balloon in panel two, clearly drawn for three lines of text, but with only two lines of text actually floating in it. But I’m sort of intrigued by the random pink squiggles in the background of the first panel. I’d like to believe that they’re blood streaks on the wall from the last perky thin saleslady who tried to talk smack about Grossie, but it’s more likely that someone was trying to draw some clothing racks in the background to add a little detail to the scene and then suddenly realized that no, wait, this is Crock, what am I doing.

Luann, 12/12/07

I thought that for sheer irritation, nothing could beat the “Dirk and Brad compete for Toni’s affection via the Christmas food drive” storyline from a couple of years back, but now I can see that the “Brad and Toni sublimate their incomprehensible attraction via the Christmas food drive” is going to come close. Brad’s Neanderthal suggestion that a meeting isn’t a date unless he’s paying will presumably blow up in his face when he cruises to food-gathering victory (thanks to TJ coming through with a bunch of cans of Dinty Moore stew that “fell off the back of a truck”), leaving him to enjoy a meal of lobster (which he will adamantly insist is NOT A DATE) and loneliness.

Mark Trail, 12/12/07

Luke Wilson spotted canoodling with mystery woman!

Luke Wilson, star of such Hollywood pictures as The Royal Tenenbaums and Old School, has been seen around town with a mysterious dark-haired and arch-eyebrowed beauty. The picture below was snapped as they left the Ivy last month:

Now reports are coming in that this lady is married — or was, until her husband’s murder last month. Hollywood is abuzz with the notion that Luke, long known as the “not crazy Wilson brother”, might have something to do with the dastardly deed. Though a mustachioed French-Canadian hillbilly has been jailed for the crime, NOAA weather spokesman Mark Trail insists that the Quebecker is innocent. “You exploited a friend of mine’s fiery temper!” Trail was heard to shout at Wilson at a party at Chateau Marmont.

Family Circus, 12/12/07

I’m not sure what exactly those papers are that Big Daddy Keane is holding in his lap, but they look official, what with the seal on top and everything. Let’s hope they’re the forms for committing Jeffy to that special school far away so that nobody has to listen to his idiotic questions anymore.

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Family Circus, 12/11/07

Many years ago (OK, three, but that’s a long time in the world of blogging), I decried the narrative technique on display in today’s Family Circus as “dialogue that’s half in word balloons, half in quote marks below the panel, and all half-assed.” Today I think the narrative trickery is there only to distract us from the panel’s total failure to make sense. Never mind the fact that the only people who criticize the youth of today and their “y’know”-saying ways are roughly six to eight times older than Billy; why is Billy standing there with studied ease, one hand in his pocket, as Dolly bellows in his face from six inches away? Are they meant to demonstrate the differing attitudes of their teachers — one all mellow and relaxed (possibly due to weed) and one all shrill and controlling (possibly due to coke)?

Meanwhile, on December 10, 2007, after 50+ years, Marmaduke’s creators apparently ran out of enormous-dog-themed jokes that can be told in a single-panel format, and beginning today will be trying out this “sequential art” concept they’ve heard so much about. Readers who have always been concerned about how closely Marmaduke’s owner resembles Hitler will be made uncomfortable by the upper half of the panel.

Ziggy, 12/11/07

I’m all in favor of Ziggy being taunted by his television set, but this just seems like a friendly jest as he attempts to scroll through all the wonderful entertainment offerings provided by his local cable company. We really need for the question mark on the TV to be removed, along with Ziggy’s dialogue, to provide the sense of soul-crushing ennui that I demand from this feature.

Sally Forth, 12/11/07

I think we’re all glad that Ted has moved from unshaven, unemployed layabout to chipper seasonal minimum wage worker, but someone needs to tell him that he SHOULDN’T. WEAR. THE HIDEOUS ORANGE VEST. IN. THE HOUSE. With the nametag and everything. Really, Ted, just because they don’t come home to find you on the couch screaming at your judge shows doesn’t mean that your family has forgotten who you are.

On the bright side, it’s probably only a matter of time before Ted joins the cast of Shortpacked.

Hagar the Horrible, 12/11/07

Remember, kids, you can make your holiday season ever so much more convenient — with stealing!

For Better Or For Worse, 12/11/07

Ha, ha, “legs!” Everything smells like “legs!” Don’t kids say the darnedest things? Sometimes they can be a little confusing, though, especially when they use quote marks. Let’s call in an expert to help clear this up:

Well … that does make more sense.

And I leave with another amusing out-of-context panel:

Panel from Archie, 12/11/07

The Archie Joke-Generating Laugh Unit 3000 has discovered either absurdism or HotSweatyMasturbatingCoaches.com.

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Slylock Fox, 12/9/07

Oh, Cassandra! Your attempts to snare Slylock’s heart grow ever more transparent — and ever more pathetic. “Accidentally” leaving the heel of your shoe behind? Come on. Staring brightly ahead as you wear that prim little pastel outfit isn’t going to fool anyone.

Getting a lineup together in world shared by many kinds of sentient animal life isn’t easy, but the crew assembled by Officer Duck today is particularly motley. The two creatures of indeterminate species on either side of Cassandra look like they’re hoping that this will be their big chance to break into movies, or at least reality TV. If I were Slylock, I’d start looking into the background of the elephant lady at the far right — she looks guilty as hell, and presumably has got some kind of home counterfeiting business or meth lab set up back at her trailer. The pink-haired bunny, meanwhile, is way, way too stoned to care.

(If you wish Cassandra would “steal some files” from your “office”, you obviously need some Bob Weber Jr.-designed Cassandra Cat gear from the Comics Curmudgeon store!)

Crankshaft, 12/9/07

You might chalk this up as a garden-variety generation gap comic, but with young chinbeard and his sister watching their parents turn into their grandparents and worrying about turning into their parents in turn. But recall that the grandparents in question are rageaholic Crankshaft and the somehow even more loathsome Ukrainian hate machine. The kids probably thought that they’d at last be free once their grandparents kick off, but now are worried about enduring their post-transformation parents. Junior is right to look so terrified.

Family Circus, 12/9/07

Note the bit that I’ve highlighted. Billy is clearly in the “Anyone but Obama” camp for the 2008 elections.

Panels from Apartment 3-G, 12/9/07

Yeah, osmosis! Osmosis and time travel.

(Yes, I know there’s a neo-swing scene that’s alive and well today in New York and elsewhere — but the kids today out doing the Lindy Hop tend to be young hipsters like these. Tommie and Gary are soooo very much not hipsters; and I don’t care how old they’re supposed to be, I refuse to even qualify them as “young”.)

Panel from Shoe, 12/9/07

It’s not like I’m in love with the word “barmaid”, exactly; I just think “bartenderness” sounds kind of creepy. “Come on, baby, I’ve been lookin’ at you all night; show me a little bartenderness.”

Site meta-note: I’ve decided that I’m going to start doing the comment of the week/ad love posts on Monday instead of Sundays. I often don’t even get to Saturday’s comics until Sunday, and doing the Sunday strips takes me longer than usual because I can’t easily see them all at once on the Chronicle site, so often doing blog work eats up a good chunk of what oughtta be a weekend day of rest and relaxation! So, Trilobite’s comment gets an extra day of glory thanks to the shift.