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Gasoline Alley, 3/31/20

I’m going to ignore panel three here, which makes the frankly offensive suggestion that Snuffy Smith somehow has an ownership claim over entirely common turns of English phrase, and instead focus on panel two, which I love very much. “Figure out an equitable way to cushion family farmers, who are committed to an increasingly economically unviable business model today, at the tail end of a century-long process of agricultural industrialization?” says Boog. “I doubt it! I’m, like, twelve years old!”

Dennis the Menace, 3/31/20

There’s actually a couple different kinds of menacing happening here, as Dennis dreams of a machine that can control the weather and thus impose its master’s will upon a terrified world, but is also stupid enough to think that that’s what he’s looking at right now.

Curtis, 3/31/20

While it’s not quite explicit here, I think we have to give Curtis the award for the first syndicated newspaper strip to acknowledge the coronavirus pandemic and the prolonged social distancing necessary to fight it. I don’t really have much of a joke here, other than that Curtis and Barry are definitely going to murder each other before this thing is done.

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Gasoline Alley, 3/18/20

One of Gasoline Alley’s most prominent characters is a World War I veteran, so it’s a strip that’s admittedly somewhat untethered from our timeline, but I was still prompted by this strip to look up when the international whaling ban went into effect and was surprised to learn it was 1986 — much more recently than I expected! So it’s not too unrealistic for Baleen to have worked on a commercial whaling ship in her youth, or maybe even on the Icelandic, Norwegian, or Japanese ships that continue the practice despite the ban. The important thing is that “glabella” is like Proust’s madeleine for her, the mere word immediately evoking the image of firing a bolt of metal between the eyes of some majestic, intelligent, endangered sea beast, shattering its skull and pushing on right into its brain.

Six Chix, 3/18/20

Now, I don’t want to criticize here, because you’re a tiny robin that mastered human speech and that’s pretty impressive, but … it actually sounds like you do care which game he puts on? It sounds like you care quite a bit, honestly!

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Mark Trail, 3/11/20

Wow, some wild swings in tone happening here as the Mark Trail art, formerly wooden and repetitive, becomes mysteriously and surreally fluid. One of the gang of anti-orphan bullies suddenly becomes very intent on Rusty joining his clique, eyes bugging out derangedly as he makes his pitch. But as Rusty’s sly expression in panel three indicates, he would rather rule in hell than serve in heaven, by which I mean he’d rather be in a position of strength, hanging out with his dad and the world’s saddest orphan, than being at the bottom of the pecking order among the cool kids. Finally, Rusty will have his own Rusty!

Rex Morgan, M.D., 3/11/20

Oh my god, check it out, June is trying to get Tildy to slow down and think through her impulsive decision to move out of the Morgans’ house and shack up with her ex who she hasn’t seen in decades, and Rex is trying to physically restrain her. “Don’t you dare, June! Her bags are packed! Her bags are already packed, we’re so close!”

Gasoline Alley, 3/11/20

Ha ha, it’s funny because, like most service industry workers, Baleen doesn’t have any paid sick leave, so she has to choose between working while injured or infectious and financial ruin!