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Gil Thorp, 9/22/07

And once again, another Milford football season begins with defeat, vandalism, and desperate media spin. I may not know much about football (I went 0-3 this week in my family’s friendly betting league, setting me up to go out of the running altogether next week in some kind of all-time record for futility) but I can tell you that if the coaching staff of Valley Tech or Oakville or Generic WASPy Name High or whoever the Mudlarks are playing next week haven’t worked out that “awful quarterback + vaguely competent offensive line = working on screens and draws”, they’re probably even worse at their job than Gil, and may actually be Europeans who are confused by the odd shape of this so-called American “football”. Thus, Gil’s “off the record” comment to Marjorie (I think that’s Marjorie, right? Snoopy reporter girl? Broke the head-bashing Tyler story wide open, just like Tyler broke his head wide open?) seems particularly pointless, as it’s hard to imagine what she’d do with it, journalism-wise, other than just, you know, report it. Maybe Gil knows that by making her feel like she’s privy to insider information, she’ll remain his pliant media mouthpiece, leaving Marty Moon the only reporter who dares ask the tough questions of Milford’s althetics politburo. It can’t make that much difference in the long run, since the Milford Star, like most high school papers, probably only publishes two or three times a semester, so this interview probably won’t run until the Mudlarks are already out of the running for the playdowns.

Meanwhile, panel three is about the saddest thing you’ll ever seen in your life, as a trio of Milfordians hang their head in shame at the savage spray-painting the front of the school received. There’s nothing more humiliating than losing a football game by 10 whole points, so surely these kids are going to be way too depressed to learn anything today. I do like the fact that, if Gil’s segue is to be believed, the athletic department is responsible for cleaning the graffiti up. I can just see the janitor sneering at Coach Thorp and saying, “I’m not doing it! This never would have happened if your team wasn’t so shitty.”

Family Circus, 9/22/07

You know how sometimes a cat doesn’t seem to know whether it wants to be inside or outside? Oh, that’s always funny when that happens! So it’d be just as funny when a little kid does it, right? Of course! Well, except change “funny” to “indicative of crippling obsessive-compulsive disorder.” Poor Jeffy is hopping back and forth over the door lintel, tormented by an inner drive that he can’t really grasp, only knowing that it’ll only be OK for him to come in the house when he gets it just right. So he goes in, then out, then back in, over and over, until his little thighs get so tired that he just collapses in the doorway, and all Dolly can do is stand there with her hands on her hips and say “Mommy, I think Jeffy’s stupid.” Nice support you get from your family there, Jeffy.

Dick Tracy, 9/22/07

I have to admit that other than the horrible stub-fingered hands that are omnipresent in the strip, I really do like the art in Dick Tracy. It has a very distinct stylized aesthetic that is both unique and unmistakable; Gretchen’s crazy eyes looming menacingly over that wrapped package could appear nowhere else in the newspaper. I also think that events in the individual strips actually have a great internal rhythm. It’s only when you start contemplating the continuity as a whole that it dissolves into a sea of incomprehensible nonsense. I was sort of hoping that Gretchen and her spy flunkies would crash their helicopter directly onto the Baron, killing all four and removing any chance that any of the details of this baffling plotline would ever be clarified. Instead, we’re presumably going to get Gretchen running endlessly towards the Pentagon or whatever for three weeks, following by the bomb going off in her hands and some cryptic explanation from Detective Tracy. At least we’ll get to see someone blown to bits, which is also an event that could be portrayed nowhere else in the newspaper quite as graphically as I expect we’re going to get treated to here.

Marmaduke, 9/22/07

Having failed in all of his other attempts to stop this huge, rampaging hellhound’s reign of terror, the dogcatcher has decided to try to kill Marmaduke with lung cancer.

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Marvin, 9/19/07

At some point between my childhood, when I read and disliked Marvin, and my decision a few years ago start reading and disliking Marvin again, the strip expanded somewhat from its initial emphasis on infant-related humor. In these days of shrinking newspaper circulation, this may be because babies very rarely actually read the comics. Anyway, Marvin now also features thought-ballooning-animals (who don’t read the paper but who have been repeatedly demonstrated to appeal to those who do) and cranky old people, who do definitely read the paper (boy, do they ever). Fairly typical of the Marvin old people schtick is today’s comic, which features two sick, angry old men, their body language transparently demonstrating their mutual dislike, sitting together (because they have nobody else to spend time with, except their even more hated wives) at the mall (because they have nowhere else to go).

By the way, Roy’s “I hear you” isn’t a way of showing solidarity or agreement or anything like that; it’s part of this duo’s continuous game of mutual oneupmanship, and he’s just boasting that he hasn’t gone completely deaf yet.

Family Circus, 9/19/07

“Actually, Jeffy, after years of horrifying mistakes and experimental subjects that had to be put down as an act of mercy, Grandma determined that it’s best to go with leathery, bat-like wings. She’ll be forming them out of the skin from your thighs, since you won’t be using your legs anymore. Oh, also, you’ll be living in her basement from now on, OK?”

Archie, 9/19/07

Haw haw! It’s like men are from Mars, and women are from Venus, am I right, everybody? Like two different planets entirely! Haw! Also, it’s like women will believe completely bogus statements and men are high all the time! Haw haw!

Pluggers, 9/19/07

Pluggers are both unbearably cheap and completely thoughtless.

Oh, and confidential to everyone who couldn’t get enough of yesterday’s slap-happy Mary Worth action: thanks to faithful reader Dingo, you can get in on it!

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Rex Morgan, M.D., 9/14/07

Sometimes I get a terrifying moment where I believe I control the comics with my mind and all the nonexistent subtext I go on and on about is actually true, and I had a doozy of one of those when I read today’s Rex Morgan. Sure, it’s the usual “Hey, Rex, let’s screw!” “I think someone’s forgetting our arrangement” routine that we’ve come to know and love, but then everybody’s fun is spoiled by the look of heartbreaking disappointment on June’s face in panel three. Yes, Rex is dashing off, and by taking Nikki with him, it’s check and mate, if you know what I mean; June is once again the lonely point on the triangle. Will the next plotline be about how June needs to strike out on her own to find love, or at least satisfaction? Or will it just be endless pederastic innuendoes about fishing, with that sad, big-eyed face in the last panel floating at the edge of our consciousness for the next six to eight weeks?

Rex’s already feeble desire to have the relations with his wife may have been further dampened by her weirdly elongated neck and oddly shaped head in the first panel. Watch out, Elastic Lass! You need to return your body to its default configuration before interacting with the non-stretchies, or you’ll disturb them!

Gil Thorp, 9/14/07

I knew that high school sports have an essentially religious significance in the God-forsaken burg of Milford, but that didn’t prepare me for the scene of absolute mayhem in the third panel here, which I assume to be a vignette from a football pep rally of some kind. As Gil announces the starters for this year’s team, he seems oblivious to the monstrous geyser of flame erupting from the Earth’s crust just behind him. Presumably, as is the tradition, the student body is celebrating the beginning of football season by gathering in front of the town volcano. They’ve ingested some kind of hallucinogenic root or fungus, so instead of fleeing in terror from the magma, they writhe in a great ecstatic mass, as you can see in the background. Those who are splashed by the ultrahot lava but survive are considered to be marked by the fire gods, and will be permitted to try out for the team next year, which explains why the Mudlarks are all so hideously ugly and/or deformed.

Family Circus, 9/14/07

Wow, Billy really, really cares about music. And about imposing his will on everybody around him. I don’t know what’s more unnerving: the fact that he looks like he’s about to haul off and punch his sister in the face for mishumming some damn Wiggles song, or the fact that Dolly looks sad and scared but also resigned to being punched in the face because, really, she should have learned the melody better before humming it in public.

For Better Or For Worse, 9/14/07

There’s a lot to dislike about this FBOFW. For instance, it’s fairly obviously a new strip, but it’s just as obviously been done in the style of the old strips we’ve been seeing for the past few weeks, which is kind of jarring. I guess the simpler style is supposed to represent “in the past”, but the lettering and the gradients and multiple background characters give it away. It also features that stunning and totally unselfaware Michael Patterson self-regard we’ve all come to know and loathe. But I still kind of like it, because panel four features baby Elizabeth visibly vomiting, and there just isn’t enough puke in the funny pages for my taste.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 9/14/07

There are generally two kinds of reaction shots in the punchline panel of Snuffy Smith. Either one character is visibly laughing, mouth open and tongue wagging, because the simple folk of Hootin’ Holler don’t need anything more than the corny jokes typical of Snuffy Smith to have a good time; or one character looks frowny-faced and wrinkle-browed, because even in Hootin’ Holler, the best kind of punchline involves someone suffering at least a little bit. But rarely do you see the sort of dumbstruck amazement that’s on the face of Snuffy in panel two here. It’s as if he’s thinking, “Jesus Christ, was this Snuffy Smith built around a frickin’ astrology joke? Seriously?”

Dennis the Menace, 9/14/07

Ha ha! It’s funny because Mr. Wilson doesn’t have any friends!

Luann, 9/14/07

Ha ha! It’s funny because Brad doesn’t have any friends!