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Everybody nags writers, “Show, don’t tell.” But when the showing fails and the deadline draws nigh, telling will have to do.

Judge Parker, 6/16/2008

For days, we’ve been speculating, “Terrorist plot or drug bust — which will appear in the newspaper?” The answer? Not this strip, if you keep this up. And hey — the maid gets
the inside seat in the breakfast nook? How does that work?

Mary Worth, 6/16/2008

Here’s another newspaper comic about what appears in a newspaper. But don’t worry — the narration box helpfully explains that the newspaper photo is misleading. Taking Mary’s side, of course.

The Phantom, 6/16/2008

Ignoring the convenient ladder, the Ghost-Who-Showboats speculates about how awesome his awesome feat will look when it appears in print. As though anybody’s going to look past the first panel.

Spider-Man, 6/16/2008

Spidey’s narration box is as baffled as we are. And perhaps as bored.

Mark Trail, 6/16/2008

The second panel’s giant tortoise is rendered mute. Cramming his gullet with peyote — or is it deadly nightshade? — he prays only that his release, or the end, will be quick.

— Uncle Lumpy

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Judge Parker, 6/15/08

Yes, because obviously this woman would have had to bring her explosives with her from Terrorist Land where she lives. Here in the terrorist-free U.S.A., we never have any reason to blow things up! We solve our disputes and demolish our buildings with pure, unfiltered Freedom.

And speaking of Freedom, thank goodness we live in country where we have a free press that’s free to not report about attempted terrorist attacks on American soil. That’s certainly not the sort of thing the public would or should be interested in, after all.

Marvin, 6/15/08

The first non-throwaway panel — in which an unshaven Jeff looks sidelong at his his sleeping wife and thinks “I never realized how devious Jenny was” — is creepy. But not as creepy as the first throwaway panel, in which we see Marvin in the same blue nighttime lighting, wide-eyed, grinning, and obviously ready to kill. The unspoken conclusion to his thought balloon in the final panel is “Feed me … with your flesh.”

Rex Morgan, M.D., 6/15/08

And thus began Rex’s never-ending quest for young Dipstick.

Get it? Because it sounds like … oh, never mind.

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Mark Trail, 6/9/08

Is it just me or is Cherry actually looking a little excited about Kelly Welly coming to Lost Forest and asking her do things that might be outside of her comfort zone? With Mark once again dropping by for thirty seconds, talking to her like she’s eleven years old (just because you’re an emotionally arrested man-child doesn’t mean everybody is, Mark), and then fleeing into the woods, poor Cherry needs to have her fun somehow. Admittedly, girl-on-girl action in Mark Trail would be among the least hot girl-on-girl action in any daily comic strip (not as sexy as it would be in Herb and Jamaal, but probably sexier than it would be in Cathy), but anything’s gotta be more interesting than Mark handing out free puppies to sad little girls.

For Better Or For Worse, 6/9/08

Oh, it’s ever so appropriate that Liz will be finally shoved headlong into the spiritual and emotional death that her marriage to Anthony represents by the looming specter of her grandfather’s actual death. That’s the great circle of death, is what that is.

Judge Parker, 6/9/08

“Bales and bales of awesome weed … all gone! That’s the sad part. Oh, I promised myself I wouldn’t cry…”