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Blondie, 1/23/09

I have to admit that I’m so charmed by Dagwood’s stunningly bizarre parking spot sign that I’m willing to forgive the fact that it completely ignores his long-established carpool. Not only does it declare his love for impossibly large sandwiches to the literate and illiterate alike, it also fails to indicate in any way that the parking spot it sits in front of is reserved for anyone in particular. Still, I’d be hesitant to park there, as it’s clearly the work of a madman. An extremely hungry madman.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 1/23/09

Whereas the gals, they’re talking about the fellers they met in their youth once, the ones that weren’t their cousins! Haw haw!

This strip seems to indicate that the book Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus would do well in this community, if not for the fact that speaking aloud the names of the terrifying demon-stars that move through the sky will get you burned at the stake there. The strip also seems to promise a series of gags lifted entirely from episodes of An Evening At The Improv circa 1989, such as the different driving habits of black dudes and white dudes and the unpalatability of airline food, but mention of flying machines and non-whites will also get you burned at the stake.

Beetle Bailey, 1/23/09

Gosh, Sarge, I’m not sure happy is how your stomach will feel about a box of matzo, a bowl of eggs, and a bottle of soy sauce.

Herb and Jamaal, 1/23/09

Say, remember when Herb and Jamaal ran this exact same strip two months ago? Remember how it wasn’t funny then, either?

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Apartment 3-G, 1/21/09

As a native Buffalonian, I resent Margo’s implication that “upstate” is a great place to go bury bodies or answering machines with terrifying messages or whatever else she’s planning to dispose of out there. (Yes, Buffalo is technically Western New York, not Upstate New York, but devout Manhattanites use “upstate” as a blanket term for anything north of Columbia University, and if you need any confirmation of Margo’s devotion, just look at how resentful she is at the very thought of letting the sun go down on her in Schenectady or wherever.) Does she think that the whole state outside of her precious Five Boroughs consists of nothing but decaying, abandoned industrial sites, or vast stretches of barren wasteland punctuated by the occasional slowly collapsing barn, where she can just hide evidence of criminal wrongdoing at will? I mean, she’d be right, but that doesn’t mean that we want snooty urbanites with their fancy New York City corpses messing up all the good hiding spots.

Herb and Jamaal, 1/21/09

Usually Herb and Jamaal’s primary mission is to suck all the fun and enjoyment out of the English language by making it as bland and nonspecific as possible, but I really like this new euphemism for masturbation that it’s introduced today. “I spent the evening in, ‘dating my shadow,’ if you know what I mean.”

Marvin, 1/21/09

Good lord, as if rendezvousing in person with someone you first met online wasn’t already fraught enough, can you imagine if you meet some guy you’ve been chatting with and are sort of excited about, and he turns out to be a literal, actual baby? Especially if he were a loathsome, hateful baby, like Marvin?

Spider-Man, 1/21/09

Spider-Man, well aware of his intellectual limitations, is right to ! in the final panel. If the little boy’s statement is correct, it’s a wonder that Batman can even figure out how to chew.

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Judge Parker, 1/14/09

If the Dixie Julep story has taught us anything, it’s that Judge Parker loves a violent blonde. But hopefully, as this story unfolds and we watch Sophie wreak a righteous, Carrie-style vengeance against snooty cheerleaders and everyone else who ever wronged her, we’ll learn that sometimes, the violent blondes are violent for a reason.

It’s worth noting that this storyline is part of Sophie’s continuing transformation, from a pantsuit-wearing prepubescent superbrain to a surly teenager with a hair-trigger temper. Said transformation has taken 14 months of real time, which is actually halfway realistic, but (and hopefully Uncle Lumpy can come up with the exact number) only about six days of strip time, which is less so. It’s possible that this shockingly rapid onset of puberty is precisely what’s causing her erratic and aggressive behavior.

Herb and Jamaal, 1/14/09

Having seen Jamaal trying to bust a move on Yolanda for much of the last four years, I can see why he doesn’t understand how Herb came to have a wife … or a daughter, for that matter. But a mother-in-law? “Gee, Jamaal, I don’t think I ever implied that my wife was grown in a lab.”

Apartment 3-G, 1/14/09

Hey, look, after three months, we’ve returned to Lu Ann in South Dakota! Last we saw her she was reconnecting with Cody Styles, and now she’s … reconnecting with Cody Styles. I’m beginning to form a theory about Apartment 3-G’s singular failure to follow Lu Ann’s prairie adventures: the producers have been unable to hire locals for extras at poverty rates, discovering to their surprise that these hardy midwesterners still have too much dignity to appear in this comic.