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Folks! Your COTW in a moment, but first: when I asked “who is Mel Gordon to Gil?” in my Thursday wrapup, I was failing my job as a Gil Thorp History Knower! I should always assume that when someone Gil knows shows up in the strip, they’re from a storyline from the past — in this case, a storyline from 2002, as outlined in by the folks at This Week In Milford, who are truly doing the work. This was before I was reading the strip, which is my excuse, but it’s actually one of the more famous storylines in the strip’s history! This was towards the end of the writing run of Jerry Jenkins — yes, the guy who wrote the Left Behind novels, who preceded the recently retired Neal Rubin — and was controversial because, among other reasons, it featured Gil convincing Melissa to not have the abortion she wanted. Later the pregnant teen girl tried and failed to seduce Gil, which, uhhhhh, and then we never heard from her again.

Anyway! This seemed to add up to new writer Henry Barajas retconning things by flipping the script on Gil’s teen abortion opinion, but as faithful reader/This Week In Milford co-curator Ned Ryerson revealed in a comment on this blog, Barajas wrote Gil saying “Mel, I shouldn’t have told you not to get an abortion” and something went screwy during the publishing process! Oops! It will be interesting to see how this gets resolved, or whether the cleansing bonfire will make us forget all about it.

OK! With that business out of the way, here is your comment … of the week!

“It only takes one look at this furniture salesman, with his sporty purple shirt and green tie bought together in a plastic box set in the young men’s section at Kohl’s, to realize he doesn’t get paid enough for this shit. Not to participate in family drama, not to sell sad, outdated furniture (also purple), and frankly, not enough even to appear in this strip. Say what you will about the ‘millennial’ Dustin, but weep for Gen Z, who only wanted to get Invisalign and get on with their lives.” –pastordan

And your very funny runners up!

“I can’t imagine a more Worthian piece of advice than ‘The people with whom we have relationships are just abstractions that help us learn more about ourselves.’ Some great chicken soup for the sociopath’s soul.” –pugfuggly

“This is why Cromwell and the Puritans won at the start of the English Civil War: They quickly and effectively dispersed their anti monarchy propaganda that made people throw up in their mouths a little. King Charles III needs to quickly squash the rabid republicanism of Pardon My Planet.” –KMD

“‘What’s so funny?’ Nothing, Sarge. This is Beetle Bailey where nothing has been funny for years.” –Danielakiiki

“I still think he could get a gig as a cereal mascot.” –Pozzo

“Give it up, Mary. no matter how hard you try it’ll never be called ‘Marysplaining.’ It’s a man’s world.” –Hibbleton

“‘Each of us makes our own decisions and experiences our life journeys on individual paths. But if that sounds hard, have you considered Dianetics? If we hurry, we could get downtown to get you tested on an e-meter. Once we know your level of thetan contamination, we can just tell you your path. Have you considered a billion years of service in SeaOrg? You like boats, right?” –Voshkod

“Sure, today’s Dustin is terrible, but it’s still less awful than my first reading, which is that Dustin’s dad wants a couch that won’t stain if he gets jizz on it.” –Schroduck

“As far as I can recall, this strip made no mention at all of work from home during the height of the lockdowns. That it’s getting around to mentioning it two and a half years in … is actually way sooner than I would have expected.” –Rube

“Dustin’s dad is totally going to fill their home with hostile architecture, isn’t he? Once Dustin sees the concrete couch with spikes he’ll have no choice but to be exactly the same person but somewhere else.” –Tabby Lavalamp

“Oh geez, if Rex Morgan is going to hop around its ongoing plotlines and characters until it finds something interesting, it’s going to start flailing like a plugger on a roller skate. Let’s give the old RMMD story wheel a spin, eh? Who knows where it will land — Old people on a road trip? Rex looking pissy? Untalented cartoonist stealing story ideas from a kid? Old people watching TV? Rex looking pissy? Janitor with a mysterious rotator cuff injury? Rex looking pissy? Old people making unhealthy choices at lunchtime? Rex looking pissy? Rex looking pissy? Rex looking pissy?” –Thelonious_Nick

“Look, man, if you’re a plugger, there’s a 99% chance you weren’t even supposed to have opposable thumbs, so keep your expectations realistic.” –Artist formerly known as Ben

“You can’t tell me what to do with my body! The only body you’re allowed to control is your own! And I guess the bodies of the athletes you pump with steroids.” –Ettorre

“Can’t we set up some sort of exchange where Gil Thorp gives half its new plots to Rex Morgan? Rex desperately needs them and Gil can’t possibly use all the ones they’ve started.” –Peanut Gallery

“Lukey, sometimes I worry about the state of my marriage. The thrill seems to finally be abating. It seems like nothing I do surprises Loweezy anymore. If I steal someone’s chicken, she sees it coming. Every time I get arrested, she just shrugs it off. She just laughs, and although it’s as attractive as it’s ever been, I’ve begun to sense there’s something jaded about it. It’s like she doesn’t care. Let’s destroy the mule’s back.” –made of wince

“‘As Wilbur confides in his goldfish…’ is right up there with ‘Call me Ishmael.’ Unless you keep reading.” –Charterstoned

“You know it’s a slow, slow week in the Entertainment section when they’re not only featuring a play about the history of comics but dedicating 2/3 of the first page to its headline.” –jroggs

“How many times do we think Dawn’s had to race to the pet store and buy replacement fish before Wilbur notices? 11?” –Truckosaurus

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Gil Thorp, 9/15/22

Sure, all the FLASH AND DAZZLE in Gil Thorp lately has been “there are trans and nonbinary characters in Gil Thorp now,” but those of us paying attention to the subtle threads have been wondering: who is Mel Gordon, Tobias’s mom, to Gil? They “hadn’t seen each other in years” when she showed up to register her son at Milford, and yesterday we learned that she thinks the Thorp kids are lucky to have Gil and Mimi, who were “so kind” to Mel, as parents. What could this all mean? Today we learn it means that Gil tried to browbeat her into having an abortion at some point, which, based on her reaction, wasn’t particularly kind, but I guess they’d let bygones be bygones, at least until the part where Gil brought it up again, right here at the Bucket. I feel like I need to know who the dude in panel one is, standing there looking depressed? Probably he’s the guy who knocked Mel up? He looks like he’s thinking “I respect a woman’s right to choose, but I sort of assumed that my opinion on the matter would rank higher than Gil Thorp’s.”

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 9/15/22

In several places, the Buddhist scriptures preserve a list that has come to be known as the list of games that Buddha would not play; these were pastimes that he and his disciples felt were “cause for negligence” and were persevered as a way to demonstrate the difference between Buddhists and other kinds of ascetics who, we’re meant to understand, are less serious about asceticism. Board and dice games are on the list, but there’s also a host of whimsical activities that provide a glimpse into what people did to kill time in an era before widespread mass media or other forms of passive entertainment. They include blowing through pipes made of leaves, guessing a friend’s thoughts, trying to guess what letter a friend is drawing on your back, and “dipping the hand with the fingers stretched out in lac, or red dye, or flour-water, and striking the wet hand on the ground or on a wall, calling out ‘What shall it be?’ and showing the form required — elephants, horses, etc.” Basically, people had to make their own fun in the Buddha’s day, just like they have to do in Hootin’ Holler, though Snuffy and his pals at least have the detritus of industrial civilization to use as props while they do it.

Dennis the Menace, 9/15/22

Hey. Hey, Mr. Wilson. The strip is called Dennis the Menace. We already have a comic about an old guy who’s an asshole to everyone; it’s called Crankshaft and he goes the extra mile to make puns. We definitely don’t care about you annoying your optometrist, so how about you go back to yelling at your neighbor kid, which is your actual job, buddy.

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FOLKS!!!! It is I, Josh, your Comics Curmudgeon, and I am back from vacation! Let’s all say a huge thank you to Uncle Lumpy for his delightful filling in, and let me say a huge thank you to everyone who contributed to the fundraiser (though you’ll all be getting individual thank yous soon enough, of course). Uncle Lumpy cannot choose favorites among you so Urlance Woolsbane’s COTW dominance will last until next Friday, but I still have some Saturday jokes to tell and feelings to work out.

Crankshaft, 9/10/22

Primarily, the feelings I have to work out involve the significant portion of my vacation I spent seething about the narrative violence being done to the Funkyverse timeline as the strip grinds into its 50th anniversary. Huh, Crankshaft and Funky Winkerbean, which have been a decade apart for something like a decade now, are suddenly happening at the same time? No thanks! Oh, that reunion the Funky characters are going to is supposed to be their 50th, which means the characters are all in their late 60s now? Wrong! They’re in their mid to late 50s, they just look and act older because they’re miserable and hate themselves. And now they’re dragging the literally unaging Lois Flagston into this whole mess. Don’t care for it! Don’t care for it at all!

Curtis, 9/10/22

Speaking of age-appropriate behavior, we all know that one of Heartthrob’s roles in this strip is to be a spinner of tall tales, but you know this one is bullshit because nobody born before 1987 has a Facebook account.

Gil Thorp, 9/10/22

Uncle Lumpy covered all the soapy drama in nu-look Gil Thorp, which I guess means it’s my job to tell you about the … sports? Specifically, I’m here to tell you that the strip is covering a non-football sport (volleyball) during the fall, which is certainly a change of pace! It’s definitely a change for Marty Moon or whoever is doing the play-by-play, who hasn’t had a chance to learn any of these people’s names and is just yelling their numbers and hoping for the best.

Anyway! I’m glad to be back! Look for more comic jokes from me in this space, every day, indefinitely! I love you all!