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Spider-Man, 11/21/16

I am really enjoying JJJ’s world-weary expression in panel three here. It takes a lot of emotional energy pretending that it isn’t super obvious that Peter Parker and Spider-Man are the same person, you know? Like, Jonah may be a blowhard, but he’s not a moron. He just likes getting those Spider-Man pictures. The Spider-Man pictures sell papers, and he loves selling papers. The whole “SPIDER-MAN: THREAT OR MENACE?” pose was probably sincere, once, but now it’s a key part of his shtick, and he can’t give it up. It’s exhausting performing Comically Gruff Newsman all the time, guys. Exhausting. Just let him have a minute here.

Funky Winkerbean, 11/21/16

Hey guys, remember how our gang tracked down Starbuck Jones serial star Cliff Anger, and found out that, true to his name, he used to star in cliffhangers and also was angry all the time? Well, if you wanted some background on his perpetually steamed emotional state, good news: we’re about to get some fun anecdotes about how he’s super mad because his prison term derailed his movie career, or maybe about how he went to prison because of some act of violence driven by his uncontrollable temper. Either way, his new girlfriend seems drawn to his irrepressible bad boy nature.

Slylock Fox, 11/21/16

It’s really gotta disappoint Slylock to waste his time on human-on-human crime like this. This once-great species should be retraining and adapting to the new sentient beast-focused economy, not nonproductively stealing each other’s meager savings. Personally, I blame their culture: look at the media they consume, all full of violent power fantasies. Sad!

Marvin and Mother Goose and Grimm, 11/21/16

This Thanksgiving, let’s all give thanks for our wives. Wives, am I right? They’re, uh, bad? This seems … off message, but I guess it’s what we’re going with.

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Spider-Man, 11/4/16

Hey, remember J. Jonah Jameson, who was forced out of his job beloved job at the Bugle, by Egghead? To the best of my knowledge he’s been completely out of the loop on Spidey and Ant-Man’s quest, and has presumably come over to Egghead’s house on his own initiative to cut the Gordian Knot of this extremely silly storyline and just bludgeon Egghead senseless with a lamp.

Funky Winkerbean, 11/4/16

So it turns out that all Coach Stropp ever wanted was to have his ashes carried over the goal line one last time before Bull left, since his team was stopped on the goal line in their attempt to win a championship. And it didn’t work! Bull tripped and spilled his powered remains all over the field, a few yards out! I absolutely love this, because the only time I respect Funky Winkerbean is when it really, really owns its total oppressive gloom. I honestly hope we get a solid week of an increasingly agitated Bull trying to get the cremains back in the jar, weeping as he watches flakes of Coach Stropp’s bones fall between his fingers over and over again.

Dick Tracy, 11/4/16

So Selfy Narcisse’s characterization has veered wildly over the course of this plot, from “slick, unctuous fixer for an nativist politician” to “comically preening narcissist” to “sinister poisoner” to “dude who likes to do sweet jumps over drawbridges.” But it’s his latest incarnation — “guy who practically grew up at the zoo, and who now is presumably going to lay low at the zoo, disguised as an orangutang or monitor lizard or something even more hilarious” — that has really won me over. Let’s follow Selfy’s increasingly insane adventures for months!

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The Phantom, 11/1/16

Hey, so remember how Kit, the Phantom’s son, journeyed to a Tibetan monastery to receive his Phantom training, which the Phantoms go back to Tibet to get every few generations? Remember how Kit had to study a bunch of old-timey bullshit history facts so that he could hoodwink the Tibetan monks into believing that he was the reincarnated soul of the man they had taught centuries ago? Well, turns out that last part was a bunch of hooey. Turns out the monks know what’s up and are happy to play along so long as the Ghost-Who-Pays-The-Bills deposits hard currency in their tax-sheltered savings account. What are we going to learn next? That the word in the Bandar tongue we’ve been translating as “ghost” all this time really just means “white dude with a pistol who wears spandex for some reason”?

Spider-Man, 11/1/16

I admit to laughing aloud at “we’ve no defense against Starr’s bug-bomb!”, because he’s saying it like the bug-bomb is a high-powered super-weapon developed by an evil genius, and not, say, an ordinary pest control product you can buy at any store over the counter. Anyway, we appear to have gotten to the point in the story where things have gotten quite silly enough, so thank God the original Ant-Man brought his canister of Undoing The Central Problem Of This Plot Potion.

Funky Winkerbean, 11/1/16

Coach Bushka, forced into retirement by incipient dementia caused by the very nature of the game he loves, about to leave for the last time the job that feels like home for him and go off into the gathering twilight of his life, pauses as he remembers his predecessor’s mortal remains, which have been sitting in a darkened corner for years and have been so thoroughly neglected that they’re covered with dust and spiderwebs. I don’t want to say “peak Funkyverse” but I feel like we’re at least on the slopes.