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Sally Forth, 5/14/08

Ah ha, now we see why Ted Forth was so sad to leave his minimum wage retail job and return to the world of respectable, salaried employment. When we last saw him hawking Chinese-made choking hazards to media-oversaturated youth, he was wearing a humiliatingly bright orange vest. But since then, the toy store has apparently switched their vests to black, and now Ted can pretend to be Han Solo every day when he goes to work, making the Kessel Run in his Chevy Aveo in less than twelve parsecs.

By the way, that “up, up, down down” jibber-jabber is apparently some kind of video game reference, and Vampire Weekend is apparently some kind of indie rock band. Today’s Sally Forth made me feel old and out of touch, and there are few more depressing sentences in the English language than “Today’s Sally Forth made me feel old and out of touch.”

Apartment 3-G, 5/14/08

The world of illegal drugs is full of dramatic possibilities. You can build a tense and exciting story out of the cat-and-mouse game played out between drug dealers and law enforcement, or among the various shady players in the drug underground. You could take a hard-nosed look at the way that drug use and addiction affect people’s lives and relationships; or you could expand your scope and see how drug use and drug laws affect society as a whole.

You could also just do a sitcom-level series of “Gosh! Where can I hide my ‘dope’?” gags, which is obviously where Apartment 3-G is going with this.

Hi and Lois, 5/14/08

I have to admit that I find the fact that Ditto is just sitting in a cardboard box for no reason pretty hilarious. Maybe that pamphlet Dot’s reading outlines FedEx’s shipping rates, and she has a plan that will make sure that all of the upcoming birthday gifts are for her.

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Hi and Lois, 5/11/08

Yes, happy mother’s day, Lois! I’m glad to see that you’re spending it crushing any ambitions your girl-children might hold of having kids and having some other identity for themselves when they grow up. After all, everyone knows that nobody could possibly be a princess, rock star, poet, or CEO while also being a mother. Why, that’s pure madness, I tell you, pure madness!

I do have to give Lois points for having rock star fantasies that involve a gig at CBGB — and since she’s probably in the 40-45 range, this is even vaguely appropriate, chronologically. The beatnik poet look, not so much. I’m also curious as to where Chip is during this celebration. Because he’s an aspiring musician himself, it may be too painful for him to hear once again how her band had to break up after she got knocked up with him by some corporate tool she met one night after a show.

Shoe, 5/11/08

HOLY CRAP THEY’RE FLYING! I complain a lot that the bird-ness of the birds in Shoe is not exploited often enough, so it’s somewhat gratifying to see Shoe and the Perfesser swooping through the sky in living color. But since all the offices and homes and restaurants we see the Shoe characters hanging out in are on tree branches, it makes the sprawly suburban landscape that they’re navigating over somewhat disconcerting. I’d like to see them walk into one of the strip malls below them and order lunch, only to be met with uncomprehending stares and/or shrieks of terror.

Another strange anomaly thrown into sharp relief in the air: the Perfesser wears clothes — a shirt and shoes, at least — while Shoe is naked as whatever kind of bird he’s supposed to be. This brings a whole new level of discomfort to his drunken advances on barflies that we’re occasionally forced to endure.

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Hi and Lois, 5/10/08

Watch out for Lois’s crazy eyes, Hi! This “spontaneity” she’s experiencing is entirely meth-driven. If the completely barren room in which you’re standing is any indication, “cleaning the attic” is a euphemism for “finding everything of any possible resale value there and hocking it to buy more drugs.”

Spider-Man, 5/10/08

I was surprised as anyone to see this Spider-Man storyline start out with the introduction of a supervillain, even though this strip has debased the notion of “supervillain” to the extent that some chump in a dorky bird suit qualifies. Things got more in line with the Spider-Man I know when our hero was felled by the influenza virus, and today we see that our feathered baddy is actually going to stymied by some random swell in a blue tux in his very first post-prison robbery attempt. Thus, the path is open to the real plotline: endless whining from Peter Parker about how nobody needs him and being a superhero is pointless and he’s wracked with ennui and self-loathing and blah blah blah.

Crock, 5/10/08

Gah! I laughed aloud at Crock today! Curses, all my curmudgeonly street cred is gone, gone!