Archive: Gil Thorp

Post Content

Apartment 3-G, 8/23/12

Hey, sometimes Apartment 3-G plots get a little leisurely, but leave it to Margo to pick up the pace:

8/20 — 21 Introductions
8/22 — 23 CONFLICT!
8/24 — 25 Hate-sex, tears, attempted murder
8/26 Sunday recap
8/27 — 9/13 Lu Ann paints a flower
9/14 — 10/8 Tommie agonizes over her flossing schedule
     

Edge City, 8/23/12

Obsessive neurotic Abby Ardin hires a babysitter sight unseen to free her kids from the curse of unstructured time during the last days of their summer. Emily shows up bearing a full complement of Rebel Grrl signifiers and a new drivers license. Abby, too embarrassed to admit second thoughts, leaves Colin and Carly in her care. Hilarious hijinx ensue, but no one is hurt, and everyone Learns a Valuable Lesson. Forward two weeks. Obsessive neurotic Abby Ardin ….

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 8/23/12

Sheriff Tait interprets “T’ain’t no big thing” as a confession to misdemeanor theft.

Gil Thorp, 8/23/12

Hey, it wouldn’t be summer without incomprehensible sports action in Gil Thorp! This tournament is match play, which counts holes won or tied instead of total strokes for 18 holes. Steve is playing with a 25 handicap, which means he cuts one stroke off his score on every hole, plus a second stroke on the seven most difficult holes. A “net birdie” means he shot par on a difficult hole or birdied a standard hole.

But hey waitaminute. Steve wanted to play in this tournament expressly to trash-talk an opponent. Yet all we’ve seen out of Steve and twosome partner Pat Laske so far is Judge Parker-level politesse and manlove, unless Steve thinks congratulating an opponent on a three-inch putt is the epitome of smack. Frankly, if we don’t see a huge explosion of PTSD-fueled fury by 18, it’s gonna be a big disappointment. Also: “PLOOK.” And isn’t that a lovingly-rendered golf cart?

Curtis, 8/23/12

Jay Leno and Arsenio Hall duke it out for King of Late Night. Suddenly, there’s a knock at the door — oh, no — it’s Jimmy Fallon! PLAP!

— Uncle Lumpy

Post Content

B.C., 7/31/12

Hey, everyone, have you heard about the Olympics, which are in England, which is foggy, sometimes? Anyway, this is hilarious because if the rowing events were taking place on the Thames (which they aren’t) it would be foggy and there would be antics anOH MY GOD SHERLOCK HOLMES’ CORPSE IS FLOATING IN THE THAMES OH MY GOD HE’S REALLY DEAD YOU MONSTERS

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 7/31/12

So, quick poll: What’s creepier, addressing your spouse (while the two of you are alone together) as “[Honorific] [Your last name]” or as “[Nickname by which one of your descendants would address him or her]”?

Gil Thorp, 7/31/12

“It’s not that you have one arm too few, it’s that you have one arm too many! I’m a pointing top, you see. I’m the only one in a relationship who’s allowed to point at things, like so! No, don’t try to imitate me, you’ll just enrage me further.”

Mary Worth, 7/31/12

Wilbur may be about to tumble to his death, but at least he’s going out as he would have wanted: with his bulbous crotch looming at us menacingly.

Spider-Man, 7/31/12

Meanwhile, in Spider-Man, everyone is literally just sitting around killing time until the title character decides to show up.

Wizard of Id, 7/31/12

And in the Wizard of Id, a witch is puking into a bag.

Post Content

Click the banner to help sponsor Josh’s novel and to reserve your copy! Details here.

Everyone: just wanted to offer a huge thanks to those who participated in my novel’s Kickstarter campaign, and those who helped spread the word. I have been humbled by everyone’s support and I promise to present you the best novel I can, in a year or so!


Family Circus, 7/27/12

I hope I am not breaking any hearts or spirits when I tell you that the Family Circus, like many legacy comics, is pieced together from a huge library of clip art that is modified to the extent necessary and usually no further. At least we know that today’s panel features a genuinely new joke, both because today really is the opening of the 30th Olympiad and because only in today’s fallen, degraded society would the squeaky-clean Keane Kids even know that “XXX” denotes morally repugnant grown-up kissing without baby-making. Still, the TV in today’s panel is kind of interesting to me, as it’s not the usual Carter-era console set, but instead appears to be a flatscreen sitting directly on the floor, which … I don’t think is how anyone actually watches a flatscreen? Especially kind of a small one, like this? Which makes me think that this is just a modified version of an older drawing where a weird brown flatscreen has replaced the traditionally faux-wood-paneled console set. Although who knows, maybe this little TV-on-the-floor is specifically for Jeffy and Dolly (they’re not allowed on the furniture, for OBVIOUS REASONS) and the fact that they have access to such things explains why they now suddenly know that sin exists.

Gasoline Alley, 7/27/12

I really don’t have much to say about it, but I am in awe that this Gasoline Alley faulty DVD player storyline continues against all odds to exist, as it has gone on forever and nothing keeps on happening. Now they’re openly acknowledging that they’re repeating jokes! At least I assume that the referenced joke actually appeared in the strip in another go-round of this endless scenario. My memories of the details are vanishing into time’s mists.

Gil Thorp, 7/27/12

Honest question: Are there people who just assume that any amputee in street clothes is a war hero? What if they lost an arm doing something stupid (e.g., playing with dynamite) or evil (e.g., tried to strangle an orphan, had stranglin’ arm chopped off by an actual hero with a machete)?

Mary Worth, 7/27/12

Every Mary Worth of course takes place in a baffling dreamscape of non-Euclidean spatial relations, but I’m pretty confused about what we’re looking at in panel two. Normally a cruise ship’s deck wouldn’t be that close to the water, right? Is the boat tipping over, and the fellow in red isn’t so much leaping with unnatural strength to safety as tumbling out into space? Or is it sinking straight down, with the lower decks already swamped and the water quickly rising up to reach our heroes? Either way, I admit it’s a bit churlish to question anything about a Mary Worth panel that features a crazed man in a bow-tie screaming “It’s the only option!” as he points to the churning waters of the Mediterranean. But such is the critic’s curse!

Apartment 3-G, 7/27/12

Hey, remember when Lu Ann found out that the woman she always thought was her cousin was really her mother, and suddenly realized why the couple who raised her and her sister were always so bitter and distant, and went off to South Dakota to confront them all and sort out the emotional consequences of this elaborate web of deceit? That all sounds like it would have made for compelling drama! I guess we’ll never know now, though.