Archive: Hi and Lois

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Rex Morgan, M.D., 2/29/16

FYI, guys, Rex Morgan, M.D., isn’t just about people giving Rex and his family money. It’s also sometimes about wacky old people! Like remember when a pair of demented seniors wandered away from a nursing home and made a small-time drug dealer’s life miserable? Or when an elderly brother-sister pair won the lottery, with hilarious results? Anyway, it looks like Rex has finally been bullied into buying that house in town, and sure, it’s in the leafy, huge-mansion part of town, but it’s also in the cranky, argumentative old people part of town! The next few days should give us plenty of the great Grimacing Rex Reaction Shots I crave.

Mary Worth, 2/29/16

[Mary Worth at the airport newsstand]: “People? Oh, my, dear, between you and me, it’s very difficult to keep up with multiple celebrities these days. Who has the time, really? No, one copy of Person, please.”

Hi and Lois, 2/29/16

I mean, you don’t want to do it so often that it becomes Funky Winkerbean-esque self parody, but if you want to end your gag-a-day strip once in a while with a son snidely reminding his father about the grim banality of his adult life, and the father just stares sullenly into space with his arms crossed across his chest, I’m not going to complain.

Marvin, 2/29/16

“I pee on it! I pee all over my phone! My phone is covered in urine. I’m a baby, but I’m depicted as having adult-level cognitive abilities, and, for some reason, I own a mobile phone, but I still pee and poop in my pants!”

Shoe, 2/29/16

“Ha ha, get it? Because of the ice cream flavor? Anyway, the actual story is that I was very drunk.”

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Dennis the Menace, 2/24/16

It’s the quote marks around “out to pasture” that make this truly menacing. They indicate that Dennis knows he’s not being literal. Literal horses literally get put out to pasture, it’s true, but in other contexts, the phrase’s connotations are a bit grimmer. And Henry Mitchell is not a literal horse. Dennis is finding his father too physically weak for the level of roughhousing he requires. Henry should be put down — humanely, of course — and a new, more vigorous father acquired.

Crankshaft, 2/24/16

Ha ha, it’s funny because the kids today are so dumb that they think an “old movie” is one that came out a year and a half ago! You know what always works out really well, is when you introduce young characters into your story despite the fact that you clearly hold young people in visceral contempt.

Hi and Lois, 2/24/16

If Trixie finds the emotional labor of keeping the rest of the Flagstons entertained crushing, wait till she finds out about all the people around the world who cut Hi and Lois strips out of their newspapers and hang them on their refrigerators. You’ve got to bring joy to the whole world, Trixie, not just your family!

Spider-Man, 2/24/16

You know how you can tell when the cycle of neighborhood gentrification is complete? When all the damn wizards start moving in.

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Hi and Lois, 1/28/16

“Why can’t we ever have a sleepover?” Trixie thinks. “Why can’t the sun remain forever in the sky, quickly warming our side of the globe beyond the ability of any life to survive, until the seas boil and the air burns away, while the other hemisphere is locked into eternal, icy night?” Fortunately, she isn’t one of those babies who have God-like powers to control time and space with her mind. She can just form adult sentences and concepts but can’t verbalize or act on them, so we really dodged a bullet here.

Judge Parker, 1/28/16

You know, I poke a lot of fun at the Spence-Drivers for their vast wealth and privilege, but let it never be said that they don’t deal with hardships! For instance, Abby spends so much time on her vast, lucrative farm that she’s no longer physically capable of smelling horse shit. Give Sam a few months in his new home office and his nose will be similarly damaged!

Marvin, 1/28/16

Meanwhile, Marvin’s friends, in defiance of all medical logic, are still fully able to experience the toxic miasma that surrounds him at all times. Today, though, the cold weather has caused whatever foul brew is in his diapers to freeze solid. This seems like it would be bad for him, health-wise, so it’s a good thing I don’t care about his well-being.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 1/28/16

“So you see, honey, I get to decide who lives and who dies and I have an excuse to ignore you while we eat. It’s what grownups call a ‘win-win.'”