Post Content

Judge Parker, 8/5/07

Wha … buh … WHO IS THAT DISTINGUISHED-LOOKING OLDER GENTLEMAN LURKING BENEATH THE STRIP’S LOGO? Why, that’s Judge Parker, natch, just like the label says! Hizzoner has appeared in this strip exactly twice in the three years or so that I’ve been reading it, but I like the way he’s staked out his position in panel one here so that he can still claim proprietorship. “I may not jet off to find lost treasures in Mexico, or to tussle with punks in Paris, or get involved in high-stakes real estate deals in the Napa Valley — but I’m still Judge Parker, damn it! Without me the rest of you losers are nothing, do you hear me? Nothing!” Presumably he’ll remain in the first panel of the Sunday strips, glowering manfully, until his totally-not-gay son Randy cruises to an easy election win and becomes a judge himself. Then Judge Parker the Senior, no longer needed for his one current duty of justifying the name of the strip, can drop dead post-haste.

In the ostensible “action” of today’s strip, Sam and Trudi are doing a little dance around the patio or balcony or wherever the hell it is they are. Sam’s presumably ducking and weaving because he’s afraid of losing an eye to one of Trudi’s pointy, bullet-like breasts. Still, leaping up on the railing and striking a pose out of the Cosmo’s sexiest male comic characters feature may have been a little much.

Spider-Man, 8/5/07

Speaking of breasts, I wish — oh, how I wish — I had time to hunt through the Spider-Man archives to prove this, but I’m pretty sure that Mary Jane’s “Oh, I’m so tired, I think I’ll stand up and stretch in a way that is advantageous to the display of my unusually large chest” in panel five is a fairly regular occurrence in this feature. Today’s is more blatant than most because she’s wearing the skin-tight pink fuzzy belly sweater that’s all the rage with the movie stars this season.

Meanwhile, in the final panel we’re introduced to the Shocker, who, based on what generally goes on in this strip, I must assume is an eccentrically dressed network programming executive who plans on picking up a number of shows that will annoy Spider-Man now that he’s turned the TV off.

Curtis, 8/5/07

For those who believe in a more or less literal interpretation of the Genesis creation story, the question of whether Adam and Eve had navels — and, for that matter, whether the trees in the Garden of Eden had growth rings, or whether anything that was created by God in the beginning carried evidence of age — has been a subject of theological discussion since at least the time of Saint Augustine. There’s actually an Answers in Genesis pamphlet on the subject, and the philosophical issues arising from the question gave rise to the so-called omphalos hypothesis. Thus, Rev. Caldwell ought not to have been reduced to weeping, sputtering incoherence by Curtis’s question, like a computer in the original Star Trek series presented with some elementary paradox. One can only assume that Caldwell had a sudden panic attack because his claimed divinity degree is a fraud that he purchased online for $10, and that he’s afraid that his theologically curious congregation, led by young Mr. Wilkins, will soon discover that he’s been skimming off the collection plate for years and plans to decamp to the Cayman Islands very soon.

Speaking of theological conundra, I’m a little disturbed that Barry is both so convinced that Curtis will be condemned to an eternity of torture in hell and that he’s so smug about it. On the other hand, Curtis does wear that damn hat with his church clothes, which can’t be pleasing to the Almighty.

Mark Trail, 8/5/07

Jesus, the final panel of this strip — aka Salvador Dali’s “The Persistence of Bloodhounds” — is going to haunt my dreams for weeks. Mark is all very upbeat about bloodhounds not mauling your children to death despite the breed having the word “blood” in its name, but you notice he doesn’t say anything about the emotional scars of seeing melting dogface every morning when they wake up.

Post Content

Spider-Man, 7/15/07

I know it gets old hearing me go on about how Spider-Man is an incredible feeb, but … Jesus Christ, Spider-Man is such an incredible feeb. Today’s he’s decided that he’s just had about enough of this terrible secret identity curse, and so he’s going to pack up his things and go retire the Spider-Man identity entirely. Here’s a hint, Spidey: Spider-Man is the interesting one — by comparison, anyway. You know who should be going into retirement? Mr. Peter “Waaaah my wife makes more than me” “Waaah I don’t have health insurance even though I have super powers and don’t need it” “Waaah I can’t reach the remote” Parker, that’s who. Does this happen to all superheroes eventually? Were Rex Morgan and Mary Worth originally crime-fighting mutants who retired their superhero personae but somehow held on to their spots in the comics pages? Because Peter Parker sans Spidey could out-dull either of them.

I do like the leftmost panel in the bottom row, though, which dramatically illustrates the insane mob of camera-wielding maniacs that would surely drive even the most powerful superhero into seclusion. “Look, there’s a guy on the roof — he might be Spider-Man! Photograph, photographers, photograph!”

However, in the long run, even the usually reliable NEXT! box disappoints. Is that Papyrus font? Sheesh.

Judge Parker, 7/15/07

You can tell Mr. Caesar is a bad guy, because he wears a full three-piece suit when he goes to inspect his sinister industrial operation, which probably exists solely to transform crude oil directly into global-warming-causing CO₂ without even refining it into useful gasoline first, because he’s just that evil, you see. So also clearly this “Rusty” will have something really awful in store for Sam and Sophie. I’m guessing that when he makes his arrival tomorrow (tomorrow in Judge Parker time; actual date: June 3, 2008), he’s going to look a little something like this:

“GEEEAAHHH!” Sam will say. “YOU CAN HAVE OUR SHARES IN THE WINERY — JUST STOP POINTING THAT FACE AT ME!”

Sophie, meanwhile, is so worked up about environmental disaster that her left eyeball is rolling into the back of her head. It’s kind of freaking me out.

Crankshaft, 7/15/07

“Wait a minute … damned souls, trapped in trees and begging to be urinated on? Packed swimming pools full of boiling water, with the scent of cooking human flesh wafting over the whole neighborhood? That’s not ‘the past’ … those are my fantasies about the torture of my enemies in hell! Sorry, I’m old, I get things mixed up sometimes.”

Post Content

Gil Thorp, 6/28/07

Milford’s boys of late spring aren’t content to let the softball team get all the glory when comes to insane and pointless acts of dogooderism. Today we see that the Milford baseball team is on a “peace tour” of the Middle East: they’ve injected themselves with an experimental growth serum and are now sixty feet tall, and are playing a series of baseball games along the West Bank separation barrier to cow the locals with their Godzilla-like might and force peaceful existence upon them. Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem to have worked, as Clambake has apparently been beheaded by a radical Islamic Jihad splinter cell, presumably because he wouldn’t SHUT UP with his filthy infidel Negro League lies.

Mary Worth, 6/28/07

You know what? I want to see more flirting in Mary Worth. Honest. And then the sex. Because any sex that results from this ham-handed danse l’amour will be so awkward and excruciating, it’ll be like pornographic performance art. And if there’s one thing I want to see in the funnies, it’s pornographic performance art.

Man, those Charterstone pool parties have some good grub — a bowl of French fries, a bowl of yams, and a bowl of off-color hard-boiled eggs. Mmm-mmm! I also love the huge, brutalist set of concrete stairs that lead nowhere. Presumably that empty platform at the top is the altar for human sacrifices. You’re it, Dr. Drew! Lottery in June, corn be heavy soon!

Judge Parker, 6/28/07

I moved away from the Bay Area five years ago now, but I still feel a lot of affection for it. I knew that the state was having trouble paying for the new eastern span of the Bay Bridge, but I don’t see how painting the Golden Gate Bridge grey is going save any money.

Pluggers, 6/28/07

You’re a plugger if everything you own is garbage.