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Beetle Bailey, 1/15/11

This is another strip where the top row of throwaway panels — so called because they’re often discarded by newspapers to cram the strip into various arrangements — completely change the tenor of the strip. Without those first two panels, we have the story that we’ve always been sold about Beetle: that he’s smugly and pathologically lazy. But with those added strips, we see that he only spends as much time as possible in bed because he’s in constant physical pain, no doubt because of some combination of forced manual labor and the beatings he receives daily from Sarge. So too his final panel fantasy becomes much more poignant: it doesn’t represent some kind of apotheosis of sloth, but rather his dream of a job that helps alleviate his all-pervading agony.

Mary Worth, 1/15/11

So Mary Worth and this waitress have basically been congratulating themselves on saving Emily since about Tuesday, and you know how sometimes something irritating in small doses can become awesome in mass? That’s pretty much how I’m starting to feel about this. I’m hoping the two of them just keep saying this stuff back and forth for another week or two. “Do you think she’ll be OK?” “Hopefully! But the real important thing is that we saved her, together, as a team! We’re amazing!”

Panel from Slylock Fox, 1/15/11

I don’t know what I like best about this: that the sentient lobster is making a desperate bid for freedom to avoid being eaten by the sentient mouse, knowing that it’s either kill or be killed, or that Slylock finds the whole thing so amusing. “Ahh! Ahh! Ahh! It’s tearing my nose apart! For the love of God, Sly, why won’t you help me?” “Heh, heh, Max, looks like you’ve bitten off more than you can chew! Should have had your food-animal killed and slaughtered before you tried to eat it, like I did!”

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Were there many hilarious comments this week? Yes. Was this one the funniest? Maybe! It’s my pick, anyway.

“I saw Funky Winkerbean and was reminded how much I hate this sort of wordless padding. Then I saw Luann and was reminded that there is both fire and ice in Dante’s imagining of hell.” –Spunde

But judge for yourself, based on these runners up!

“‘Magical dreamland,’ nothing. Lois is sailing high on Vicodin and mojitos.” –Pope Buck I

“No, Paul’s mom — you need to make it seem like your voice is coming out of the puppet’s mouth.” –Chyron HR

“I have to admit I’m in awe of Mary Worth’s powers. Liza stalked Drew for months, but one quick lunch meddle from Mary and she’s completely disappeared. I mean it’s like she never existed. Like the lines in Mary’s forehead. She’s like botox for relationships.” –Mark B

“Leroy seems to be a chilling, future-tense mirror image of that poor kid. Few things could be more disturbing to a young child, especially while a cruel incidental Ziggy character looks on impassively from his cardboard-box fort.” –Doctor Handsome

“Oh, ye cats, Luann, not this again. Can’t we please go back to the Weenieworld sexual harassment plot? While both storylines will no doubt be rife with gag-inducing innuendo and maddeningly implausible behaviors and reactions, I don’t see how this one is going to measurably advance the noble cause of Brad’s suffering.” –Violet

“It looks like Da Judge and Constance are about to enact the world’s most boring porn scene, with Judge Parker falling asleep mid-coitus from too much cocoa while Constance pretends she’s being fucked by Matt Lauer.” –Frippin on the Krotz

“Judge Parker: ‘It’s your turn now.’ Constance: ‘What does that–‘ *HIT BY BUS*” –blah

“In the last panel the Judge looks ready to be added to Mt Rushmore, probably permanently replacing, say, Teddy Roosevelt (because isn’t that guy’s fifteen minutes up anyway?). ‘Just do justice to my manly chin, boys!'” –Greg

“Holy crap, Mary Worth even lectures herself in her own mind. She has no Off switch.” –captainswift

“Mary sensibly hurried to the doctor right after that marriage proposal by Dr. Jeff, just to make sure he didn’t give her cooties.” –Mardou Fox

“Mary’s so proud to have ‘DODGED A BULLET!’ I only wish Dr. Jeff were still within earshot.” –Écureuil Écumant

“Y’know, I’m not the expert outdoorsman and wildlife photographer that Mark is, but I can’t help but feel that the goose in question is not ‘getting out in that deep water,’ inasmuch as it is on land.” –Alter S. Reiss

“MARK! RELAX! GEESE FLOAT!” –word-doctor

“Since Canada geese aren’t sexually dimorphic and also don’t change plumage as they age, how does Mark know this goose is both (a) old and (b) a ‘fellow’? My guess is that behind the clumps of grass, there must be a copy of Modern Maturity and a bottle of ‘Just For Ganders’ feather dye.” –Perky Bird

“Sarah sighed. This old biddy was going to order a salad, water, top it off with pie and ice cream, and stiff her on the tip. Her eyes narrowed. What was that on her face? Was that a … seam? The dark line ran from her earlobe to her chin and as Sarah leaned in a bit closer she saw it, a chitinous limb slip out of the seam and beckon to her. As her gorge rose she barely had time to mutter excuses as she ran from the madness, out into the street, away from the diner forever. Mary gently pushed the claw back under her skin and smoothed away the seam. ‘Not yet, children, not yet,’ she whispered. ‘The stars are not right.’ She fixed a smile on her face. ‘Excuse me? My waitress has left.'” –Voshkod

“UH-OH, I THINK I MADE IT MAD BY YELLING AT IT! CLEARLY THE SOLUTION IS TO CONTINUE YELLING!” –Esther Blodgett

“Sometime in the near comic future, Quill and Luann will be doing it all the while saying its ‘not a date.’ However, more importantly, Gunther will be watching the sloppy sex ensue and will consequently turn into the Phantom of the Opera and haunt the high school basement with a 1980s era keyboard that only plays midi music.” –Government Cheese

Thanks to all who put some cash into my tip jar! And we must give thanks to our advertisers:

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You guys, I normally do my ad love bit at the end of this post, but this week’s ad should get better treatment, because it’s for a book written by One Big Happy scribe and faithful Comics Curmudgeon reader Rick Detorie: The Accidental Genius Of Weasel High! Kirkus Reviews says: “No accidental work of genius, this — Detorie’s carefully crafted novel is an engaging experience.” And Stephan Pastis of Pearls Before Swine says “This book gets the highest rating I can give a book without actually being paid to say so.” Well, I’m being paid, but I still think you should check it out.

And now, your comment of the week!

“Wait a minute! It has been amply demonstrated that Liza does not love Mountview Hospital. Are we to understand that she is a mug thief along with everything else?” –Violet

And your very funny runners up.

“I do like the drug metaphor. ‘I AM WHO I AM. Specifically, I am like heroin. Sweet, sweet heroin.'” –Neigedens

“Having successfully integrated the messages of his new corporate sponsors into a sermon, the preacher in Gasoline Alley proceeded on to phase 2 — replacing the sacrament with Diet Pepsi and Necco wafers.” –NoahSnark

“I hope when we finally see John Fucking Thrasher that he’s dressed in a hoodie and aviator glasses. And pants, too, I guess.” –Maggie the Cat

“Clearly, the purpose of Rick’s head examination was to select an Easter bonnet to go with his peach suit.” –Fashion Police

“I’m hoping that Rick’s statement ‘I was busy having my head examined’ is a euphemism for ‘trepanning.’ Gruesome, outdated medical procedures can only improve Apartment 3G, especially after Margo learns how to use them to further bend Tommie to her will. Failing that, I hope that ‘I was busy having my head examined’ is a euphemism for ‘seeing a phrenologist.’ Because 19th century pseudoscience is vastly preferable to seeing Rick go on for weeks about his numerous insecurities. Also, because I’m interested in any sort of explanation for all of his weird extra facial clefts seen in the second panel.” –Alan’s Addiction

“Liza is obviously flooding Facebook with iPhone photos of her half-eaten cafeteria sponge.” –Patrick

“Of course this nurse doesn’t have any information on this patient – it’s a little difficult to accurately diagnose a problem when the only equipment in your patient’s room is two IV stands and a cash register.” –Scott Bot

“Who gives a shit about this no-name gomer and his stupid fever when that crazy fucking nurse is releasing General Zod from the Phantom Zone?!” –Doctor Handsome

“Liza’s not a good nurse because she hasn’t got the patients. Get it? Huh? Patients = patience? Ha! Also because she lets them die while she plays Fruit Ninja.” –Esther Blodgett

“My favorite thing is how royally pissed the Python looks. ‘A freakin’ open-air cage? Anyone here ever hear of the rainy season? Happens every year? Hello!!?'” –boojum

“Remember that Morbius bit Spiderman during their battle. In most vampire mythologies this means that Spiderman would come under the vampire’s power. However the power is reversed here, as it is now poor Morbius who can’t keep his eyes open and can’t tell whether he’s awake or asleep. At their next encounter Morbius will meekly submit to Spiderman’s whims, which will involve a couch and widescreen plasma TV.” –Bill Thompson

“I dunno. I just assumed sandwich was code for ‘threesome’ personally.” –Jobrill

“In the third panel, who is the guy behind the sheriff? It looks like Mark in a bad ’70s porn star disguise. Maybe that is how Mark will get to talk to John Thrasher — either by delivering a pizza or say that he is there to clean the pool. –Liam

“Shouldn’t that be ‘2nite’? C’mon, girlfriend, that’s how all the hip texters talk! Oh, well, at least she hasn’t found a way to dot her i’s with little hearts.” –Pozzo

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