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Gil Thorp, 3/31/12

Sorry I haven’t been keeping you up to date on the spring storyline in Gil Thorp! (Or, for you Thorpophobes: Sorry I’m about to bring you up to date on the spring storyline in Gil Thorp!) The softball team has been roiled by a standoffish new girl who’s only standoffish to protect a mysterious secret (HER SECRET: she is a teen mom), which I’m sure will be wacky at some point in the future but right now it’s kind of enh. What drew my eye to today’s strip was the second panel. Most of us probably wouldn’t deem five vultures hovering menacingly over the baseball field a “good sign” for the season. My guess is that, having failed at coaching via conventional means, Gil and Coach Kaz have decided to study the ancient art of augury, which the Romans used to divine the future by studying the flight patterns of birds, in order to defeat their enemies and gain the favor of the gods. This will go great, up until the inevitable lawsuit from Americans United for the Separation of Pagan Temple and State.

Mary Worth, 3/31/12

Now here’s an interesting plot twist! This scene of Nola weeping disconsolately in public, pleasing though it is, surely isn’t the last we’re going to see of her; so why the sudden shift to Mary and Jeff (the latter in his sweet letterman jacket), sitting at home watching This Week In Disgraced Televangelists on the Schadenfreude Channel? Perhaps there’s a link between weeping Nola and her biblical-esque parable, failed monogamist Johnny Thomas, and these helpful words from Jesus from earlier this month? My guess: Nola and Johnny will find their way back to righteousness together, after they have illicit sex.

Dennis the Menace, 3/31/12

Mr. Wilson has finally decided to kill Dennis, with insecticide.

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Mary Worth, 3/24/12

I’ve recently discovered that people do not always act the way they’re portrayed in Mary Worth, and pass along this helpful comparison chart:

Funky Winkerbean, 3/24/12

Hey, it’s Lo-Def Lisa, nagging Les from the Great Beyond! Les is watching the “official” version, but Lisa recorded a backup just in case things didn’t work out. Let’s listen in:

“You’re probably still stuck at the high school, if Bull hasn’t killed you and none of the girls sued you for making creepy advances. If you’re desperate — I’m sorry, since you’re desperate — you can try to find an admin in the Principal’s office dim enough to fall for your ‘tragic widower’ act. Just don’t ask her to play ‘Lisa dress-up’ until after the wedding, OK?”

“Keep Summer away from that Cory Winkerbean creep — you won’t have enough money for her next rehab if you keep shelling out for abortions. And don’t give me that ‘But my next novel will be a best-seller’ crap, either. Even those tools at Kent State Press won’t fall for that scam a third time.”

“Finally, would it kill you to weed my grave once in a while? I’ve got dandelion roots up what’s left of my nose!”

Gil Thorp, 3/24/12

Plucky catcher Amanda Carey torments Coach Mrs. Coach Thorp with a slow drip of alarming revelations about pitching powerhouse Darby Kiser: “Yeah, she attends an alternative school where they can actually fire underperforming athletic staff! She’s got a kid she hasn’t thrown down the memory hole! And she stole your face and stuck it on that other pitcher! Wait, who are we again? I have no idea what’s going on here!”

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 3/24/12

No need to imagine an alternate reality in the hellhole that is Hootin’ Holler, where everyday reality is entertainin’ly grim enuf!

— Uncle Lumpy

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Gil Thorp, 3/9/12

Oh, man, you guys. Oh man. As I’ve noted, the Great Mudlark Tattoo Epidemic has been my favorite Gil Thorp plot in a long time, and while I thought it’s flagged a bit of late, it is really paying off in joy this week! See, not only is Ransom Hale of New Zealand really Rupert Hall of Dayton, Ohio, but his sleazy bootleg DVD business is really a non-sleazy, wholly legal business that involves selling DVDs that were obtained without violating any laws. Let’s just pause a moment to contemplate how delightfully little sense this makes. I mean, surely Milford Ink couldn’t buy even used DVDs in enough bulk to undercut, say, Wal-Mart or Amazon, even if we ignore that labor costs involved in doctoring the boxes; and, of course, I’m pretty sure you can’t buy used DVDs of the latest Twilight movie.

But let’s just hand-wave all that away because if we take it at face value it means that Gil has absolutely no legitimate gripe against Milford Ink. That won’t keep him from using his Army training to bust up the joint and/or make a withering speech that will shame the ne’er-do-wells, of course, but it’s pretty hilarious to see his self-righteous indignation grow with each new non-damning revelation about this faux-seedy business.

Apartment 3-G, 3/9/12

This whole week of Apartment 3-G, in which Rick has been passive-aggressively needling Tommie about her lack of passion for the music business (and, by implication, for him) has failed to arouse any passion in me, for the obvious reasons of, come on, Tommie, zzz. But I do want to point out that Tommie is apparently wearing the world’s only existing set of turtleneck scrubs.