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Hagar the Horrible, 10/2/19

Usually Hagar and his men are depicted sailing off to raid distant lands like France and Italy, where the society and the economy is more segmented and greater riches are to be found in the fortified estates of kings and dukes. But let’s not forget that in the anarchic Norse states, the kings held only tenuous control over the various Viking bands, who also engaged in quick smash-and-grab raids against local jarls who couldn’t muster adequate forces to defend themselves. In the less unequal Nordic cultures, those petty nobles might be of essentially the class as the Viking raiders just a step or two below them in the hierarchy, and they may have known each other from childhood. But that won’t protect them from the extractive, predatory violence that allows chieftains like Hagar to keep control of their power base, and they’ll be forced to muster counter-raids if they want to maintain their own position.

Judge Parker, 10/2/19

Hey, remember when Sophie’s main interest was how a global hegemon could deploy a secretive force of missile-carrying drones to impose its will on the world without having to incur the domestic financial and political costs that would normally arise from open-ended wars? It’s probably for the best that she’s now become obsessed with disrupting the B&B sector or whatever.

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Dennis the Menace, 9/24/19

Dennis not understanding common English turns of phrase is a key part of the Dennis the Menace mythos, but it seems the current strip creators have forgotten why that is. The point is that Dennis is supposed to use his (feigned?) ignorance as an excuse to reveal that something shitty his parents have said about one of their acquaintances in private, e.g., “You said there’d be an old battle axe coming over but all I see is this late-middle-aged woman with a bad personality.” All today’s garbage joke does is make it clear that Dennis is stupid, and somebody needs to take it over to the Family Circus where it belongs.

Family Circus, 9/24/19

The Family Circus really needs that joke, to be honest, because I have no idea what’s going on here. Who is this random teen, and why is Billy hanging around with him talking about math? And why are he and Ma Keane giving each other a knowing glance? “It’s algebra,” they’re saying to one another, wordlessly. “He doesn’t know the word for it, but we both know he’s talking about algebra.”

Zits, 9/24/19

So it turns out the terrible thing Jeremy learned yesterday was that he has to repeat freshman P.E., and I know I almost never talk about Zits here so it’s weird that I’m talking about it two days in a row, but I think it’s kind of interesting that a strip that used to get in trouble with the syndicate for using the word “sucks” can now do jokes where the punchline is that Jeremy is mad because his dick isn’t getting any bigger as his adolescence progresses.

Hagar the Horrible, 9/24/19

Hagar and Lucky Eddie can’t bear to look at themselves in the mirror, probably because of guilt from all the horrible murders they’ve done.

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Mary Worth, 9/15/19

Reading this strip, I suddenly had an intrusive memory of one of the all-time great Dawn Romance Fail plots. In the aftermath of her near death at sea, Dawn was on the lookout for a more meaningful life, and Mary had just the thing: doing volunteer work down at the hospital! Dawn immediately met Jim, a nice young man with one arm who lost his arm and his sister (who looked exactly like Dawn) in the same tragic boat accident, which meant that Jim had to prevent Dawn from getting near any bodies of water at all costs! He also wanted Dawn to have sex with him, and got angry and abusive when she turned him down, but Dawn’s extremely competent psychology professor taught her that it’s very important for women to break down the emotional barriers between themselves and the men who want to fuck/yell at them, so she managed to convince Jim to ease up and just be friends. And, having truly achieved her goal of living a more meaningful life, she never had to hang out with Jim again, but it sure took a while to get there! That’s why it’s great that this noble burn victim has managed to pass in and out of Dawn’s life in only a few moments, giving her a tissue … and a reason to live, and love again … without hanging around or making her pretend to like him or anything like that. He’s got his own rich, fulfilling life going on somewhere else! Probably! I mean, we’ll never know, but let’s just assume.

Hagar the Horrible, 9/15/19

I’m often fascinated by the way the top row of throwaway panels in a Sunday strip, which aren’t printed in many papers, can change the whole tenor of the piece. Like, if you didn’t have them today, this would just be the story of Lucky Eddie being late to dinner with Hagar for some unknown reason. But with them, it’s the story of Lucky being late for some unknown reason and made even later by a couple of comical farmer types who blocked the whole road! Really makes you think, doesn’t it?