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Rex Morgan, M.D., 9/4/20

“Get lost, kid; can’tcha see I’m working? Go huff glue or something.”

Judge Parker, 9/4/20

Producer Ellen knows the score. Don’t confront a hysterical narcissist who has the attention span of a gnat. Just spool out empathetic-sounding noises until she loses track and falls into incoherent screaming.

Kevin and Kell, 9/4/20

Net neutrality is a policy that regulates Internet Service Providers (ISPs) as common carriers. ISPs generally hate net neutrality, because it doesn’t let them prioritize, meter, block, or differentially price different types or volumes of traffic. So Kevin is acting against his own interests here — maybe he’s a customer-service-driven altruist? We’ll see what happens when a couple basement-dwelling teenagers choke his routers with game and porn downloads from The Pirate Bay.

Or maybe haha he’s a rabbit and doesn’t want to be a tortoise.

Mother Goose and Grimm, 9/4/20

Ol’ Grimm is on remarkably good terms with his parasites.

For Better or For Worse, 9/4/20

Long-time readers will remember when For Better or For Worse was a BIG DEAL here at The Comics Curmudgeon. I remain impressed at the author’s gall in promising “new-runs” that would blend legacy strips into new material to create a “Michael and Meredith nostaligize” narrative, only to drop that pretense the instant editors fell for the scam, offering instead flat-out reruns for the next thirteen years.

One of the strip’s unresolved puzzles was how insufferable Michael and vapid Elizabeth could Do No Wrong (even in the choice of the execrable Anthony as her spouse), while relatably human younger daughter April could never catch a goddamn break. Here, in recap, we see the exact moment April was ostracized. It appears that Les Moore may not actually be the biggest asshole in comics!

— Uncle Lumpy

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Gasoline Alley, 1/5/12

I won’t waste my time or yours trying to explain the Gasoline Alley plot that led up to this — it’s all summarized in the first two panels here, and it took months, and Slim and Clovia were very angry with each other about it — but I do think it’s worth pointing out that all this drama has very suddenly been resolved with no action on the characters’ part, and with enough time left over to slip in a joke about toilets to boot. It’s kind of disorienting to see it all end so abruptly, and on a Thursday too. I’m thinking that the original ending, which involved yelling and knives, was nixed by the syndicate at the last minute. The remaining three days until the next plotline starts will just consist of Slim and Clovia standing around awkwardly.

For Better Or For Worse, 1/5/12

Ha ha, For Better Or For Worse, remember that thing? When it stopped with the ongoing storylines and became mostly reruns of young versions of the Pattersons talking in weird fake cute-speak it stopped being all that interesting to me, but I still feel compelled to read it daily. I also feel compelled to try to figure out, based on the art, whether we’re seeing old strips or new ones injected into the old continuity, and I think these are the latter, and I’m thinking: what if Lynn Johnston suddenly feels compelled to seize the reins and start aging the characters all over again, only this time John and Elly have a contentious divorce, leaving April to vanish in a limbo of never-was and Michael and Elizabeth with terrible emotional scars? Except look how they turned out when their parents stayed married, maybe they’ll be healthy, functional adults this way, who can say. Michael’s already showing a streak of self-loathing that, with years of therapy, might serve as a counterweight to his unbearable smugness.

Gil Thorp, 1/5/12

I’m extremely amused by the low-key Mudlark reaction in panel two, though you know that deep down they’re thinking that a Pokémon tattoo would be kind of awesome. They’re also playing it cool so as not to anger the disembodied claw-thing that’s casually draped itself on Punisher t-shirt dude’s shoulder.

Mark Trail, 1/5/12

“Yes, why don’t I come and hang out with you and Sally and your blind dog for a few days? Sweet Christ, I’d do anything to get away from my wife and adopted son.”

Beetle Bailey, 1/5/12

After billions of dollars were spent, the Defense Department began to suspect that Camp Swampy may not have been the best test site for its robotic supersoldier experiment.

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Your comments of the week momentarily, but first: EXCITING NEWS! As you may know if you follow along with these sorts of things in the comments and/or forums, Mid-Atlanticon, a meetup of readers in the greater Potomac/Chesapeake region, has been in the works for a while now, and the details are at least ready to unleash upon a waiting world! On Saturday, May 22, 6 p.m., dinner and drinks will be happening at the Capitol City Brewing Co., right next door to Union Station in D.C.! And who will be drinking and dining among attendees? Me, that’s who. Also, there is a zoo excursion in the works in the afternoon (which I will unfortunately not be able to attend). Details are here in the forums. If you’re coming to the dinner part, please e-mail faithful reader and tireless meetup organizer bourbon babe, unbuckled ASAP at bourbonbabeunbuckled@yahoo.com so she can get an accurate headcount to the restaurant. So excited to see you all!

Also! Faithful reader rocketbride points out that you can bid on an original work of For Better Or For Worse Art! Three days left and it’s a steal at $71! If you want to see have an original panel where John slavers over the prospect of adding more trains to his model railroading empire and, like, frame it, or burn it, or something, go nuts. Proceeds go to the Doug Wright Awards, which recognize Canadian cartoonists. There’s actually a whole bunch of Canadian art being auctioned, including this super-rad Wonder Woman comic from the super-rad Kate Beaton!

And now, your super-rad comment of the week!

“I love Sabretooth’s exaggerated dash away from the scene in the last panel just when things are finally going his way. You can almost hear him giggling as he takes off. ‘Yeah! Take that, SOCIETY! I’m totally blogging about this!'” –Bryan Bryan

And runners-up! Very funny!

“If you rolled unmodified 3s in intelligence, dexterity, and charisma, you’re a plugger. You are required to make a daily saving throw vs. spontaneous organ failure.” –One-eyed Wolfdog

“Timmy, Timmy, Timmy — sure Olivia put up with your ‘it’s okay to touch it, we’re “married”’ for a little while, but the girl’s got prospects. She can’t wait around for you to get taller and wear less stupid hats forever.” –Megan (Best of Fates)

“Perhaps Sabretooth’s greatest ability is matching his sound effects with his own description of what he’s doing. Playing golf with him is probably a lot of fun for maybe two or three holes.” –Oavis

“Cherry’s expression in that ‘Get my hair done’ panel makes her look like she banged her head on the countertop after her usual breakfast of corn flakes swimming in vodka and lightly sprinkled with crushed Valium.” –Paul1963

“‘Getting my hair done’ is just Cherry’s code phrase for ‘getting the physical attention I desperately need, and that my husband will not provide, from Gus the gas station cashier.’ Mark’s unexpected pronouncement that he will be home for a while left her with no time to call Gus and cancel their standing Tuesday afternoon rendezvous. Fortunately, Mark will not notice that she did not actually get her hair done.” –Brian

“I hate to be catty, but what the hell is Cherry going to do to that hair that hasn’t already been done?” –mustang

“I haven’t really been following this Mark Trail storyline, so can someone fill me in on the plot points that led to an ad hoc contest for the best sexual euphemism for masturbation?” –Jester

“Are we talking about the same person? ’Cause the Lu Ann I know can barely master the intricacies of converting oxygen into carbon dioxide. If you get my drift. Which she wouldn’t.” –boojum

“I sure hope that the ‘Sassy runs off without her collar’ storyline will be settled with violence, or at least a board meeting.” –chrishocker

“The fact that Jules can make shoes that drive a man mad is an interesting plot twist. Perhaps — I hope — Judge Parker is about to move down into Lovecraftian terror, as Jules finally cobbles together that one pair of shoes that not only drives you mad, but summons the Great Old Ones from beyond? Those rugose, squamous shoes that you can hear walking across the floor in the small spaces of the night, echoing footfalls of gods of madness. It will end with murder, unspeakable depravity, and finally purifying fire. And Sam Driver will watch it all with his arms crossed and a smug expression.” –Vosh

“Honestly, this will just recycle the Rusty is nearly killed by a station wagon story we saw 30 years 6 months ago. The set up is exactly the same. Just replace ‘station wagon’ with ‘horse’: (1) Mark works on something that isn’t safe for young kids to be near; (2) Sassy runs towards the danger; (3) Rusty follows; (4) Mark yells; ‘No’ or ‘Look out’; (5) Rusty gets stuck; (6) Mark saves Rusty; (7) Rusty forgives Sassy; (8) Sassy wonders how she was foiled yet again.” –Thomas B.

“I don’t want to criticize you. I just want you to understand that you’re wrong! Horribly, horribly wrong!” –LaurenM

“Mary’s look of absolute panic in panel 1, combined with her submissive ‘I surrender’ pose, makes this entire storyline worthwhile. For a split second, Mary remembers: ‘Oh, yeah, I’m alone in the apartment of a crazy lady — one of those hot-blooded gingers, no less — and no one knows that I’m here. Maybe I’ll just give her $40 and run for the door.’ Between the first and second panels, Mary regains her smug superiority because she remembers that she’s invincible.” –Joe Blevins

“I was puzzled as to why Jack was so shamelessly kissing Margo’s ass until I got to the last panel, where it was revealed that Margo had a viselike grip on Jack’s hand the whole time, ready to snap off a finger at the first hint of anything that’s not complete compliance. ‘Don’t we always agree, Jack,’ indeed.” –Lawyerbob

“Mark Trail remains a seamless blend of new delights and old standbys; reading it is like pulling the middle lever on the soft-serve ice cream machine (when the left is ‘poo’ and the right is ‘horror’).” –Dragon of Life

“Tommie doesn’t understand why Margo and Lu Ann are fighting, but she instinctively understands it may be interesting and she has no place being part of that.” –Chip Whittle

“Pluggers may not have deep pockets, but their vacant, heavy-lidded staring at the ground indicates they sure are high.” –Keratacon

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