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Judge Parker, 9/18/22

Oh, hey, you all remember Marie, the longtime Spencer-Driver maid who, back in 2019, found out her husband faked his death because he was in too deep to the mob, which led to her quitting her job as a maid and “going to grad school” (e.g., hanging out on a beach with some hunk) but then just a few weeks later Abbey tricked her into running her AirBNB? You’d think that the AirBNB burning down would’ve been a great excuse for Marie to skip town again, but Abbey has managed to browbeat her into keeping her company, and, well, I’m not saying she’s back working for Abbey again, but she is jogging a respectful distance behind her while desperately trying to calibrate exactly what she says in order to validate Abbey emotionally, so I hope she’s geting paid something.

Mary Worth, 9/18/22

Ha ha, yes, this is perfect: All the Mary Worth regulars talking themself into believing that romantic failure is good, actually, while the two off-putting guest stars are about to fingerbang to Jeopardy! Truly could not ask for a better end to this storyline. (Please, please, let this be the end of this storyline.)

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Beetle Bailey, 9/17/22

God, I legitimately love this Beetle Bailey. Look at how absolutely miserable Halftrack is in that second panel! Golf is the thing he does for fun, on his day off, and he’s played miserably all day and it wasn’t fun at all and he hates it. Now he’s going to drink a mason jar full of whiskey and get blackout drunk. It’s perfect, no notes.

Crankshaft, 9/17/22

Oh hey, uh, why exactly is Crankshaft tagging along on this theater-buying expedition, exactly? Does he think they can’t do the strip without him? Did he get wind of Dennis getting pushed out of his own strip even though his name is on it? “I’m not going out like Barney Google,” he thinks to himself. “I’m gonna do a labored pun, or at least a smirk, in every one of these stupid strips. I’m the brand!”

Judge Parker, 9/17/22

Big news everybody! Remember Steve, the heroic double-amputee war vet who was Sam’s law partner for a while before running off with their legal secretary Gloria back in 2014? Well, he’s back, which is probably … exciting in some way? For the real Parker trufans? I don’t actually remember Steve being particularly interesting, but maybe he’ll shake things up in the current iteration of the strip, after he and Sam finish this elaborate social dance of mutual blame over the next six to eight weeks.

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Judge Parker, 9/12/22

Hey, remember when Judge Parker Senior ran a vanity campaign for mayor, and not only didn’t win but ended up dropping out before the election even happened, which is even more embarrassing? Well, now another member of the local nobility wants in on that, apparently. Alan at least had the vague outlines of a political platform for his abortive stab at relevance — I described it at the time as “prison abolition and left-leaning NIMBYISM from a perspective of noblesse oblige” — but I’m assuming that the extremely divorced Abbey’s main goal in seeking political power will just be revenge on her various enemies, which frankly has a much greater chance of success.

Mary Worth, 9/12/22

Oh, sorry, since Dawn successfully self-actualized her breakup I thought maybe we’d be getting a new storyline this week, but no, we need Mary to explain what Dawn has learned first. Panel two makes it clear that Dawn has long experience in this scenario and knows that if she assumes an absolutely neutral facial expression this won’t last as long, or at least she can retreat to her mind palace while she waits for it to blow over.

Dick Tracy, 9/12/22

“By which I mean, you’re still gonna wear this stuff when we have sex, right? That’s kinda what I signed up for.”