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Judge Parker, 7/4/10

So it turns out that Neddy’s lunch date “Mark” was not her ex of “tongue thing” fame; that was “Bob,” proving that, for whatever his faults, Jules has at least helped break Ned’s addiction to guys with bland, WASPy names. Anyway, Mark, despite apparently being of collegiate age, has since parting with Ned gotten married and then divorced. I have to actually speak up in favor of the dialog in this strip: while soap strips are usually filled with awkward, unnatural speech, this installment is actually marked by the realistically awkward speech you’d hear when two exes with unresolved feelings get together. Mark’s final line is a nice touch. “Ned, uh, even though we discussed getting together in the near future, which would involve one of us calling the other, do I have permission to call you? Just making sure! I think about your body all the time! Uh, I mean, say hi to Jules for me!”

Funky Winkerbean, 7/4/10

OK OK WE HAVE RESOLVED THE FORM OF TIME TRAVEL UNDER QUESTION HERE, which is that Funky’s fiftysomething body has been propelled back to his high school days. This raises another question, though. Tom Batuik has said that the chronological question raised by the strip’s time-jumping — that is, whether the recent jump shoved the cast into 2017 or what — doesn’t interest him, an attitude I have sympathy with! However, if that’s not a question the strip wants to grapple with, then adding a time-travel plot isn’t the way to avoid it. How old is Funky supposed to be, anyway? I said “fiftysomething” above because that’s how he looks to me, but all Westview inhabitants are prematurely aged by grief, so I’m not actually sure at this point. If he’s supposed to be, say, 45, then he’s back somewhere around 1980, I suppose. And I’m sorry, but this crowd is looking insufficiently outrageous for the tail end of the disco era.

Panel from The Lockhorns, 7/4/10

I enjoy the vaguely simian but still contemplative look Leroy is giving that poster here. “‘Dracula,’ eh? He looks scary enough, I suppose, but he’s no The Blob.”

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The Lockhorns, 6/25/10

I’m deeply intrigued by the looks Leroy and the gentleman half of the rapidly departing couple are flashing at each other. That sheepish, crumpled smile is Leroy’s usual expression when he does something shamefully enjoyable, often while drunk (generally this is flirting with a statuesque blonde three times his height). The easy answer is, of course, that this guy is Leroy’s gay lover, but in fact I think the situation is sadder and more poignant: Leroy has finally made his first-ever friend. He was so excited at experiencing a brief moment of human contact that wasn’t steeped in passive-aggressive bile that he invited the man over to visit without asking or even telling his wife. “Sorry, new friend!” Leroy is thinking as he waves. “We’ll do this again sometime!” “That Leroy’s a nice guy,” the other fellow thinks, “But just being around him and his wife for 45 seconds has almost sapped my will to live. We’re never coming back here again.”

Funky Winkerbean, 6/24/10

Oh, darn, Funky survived after all, and now he has something else to be pissy and self-righteous about. Unless … that inky black panel really was his death, and now he’s a dead-and-doesn’t-know-it ghost, à la Bruce Willis in the Sixth Sense. Seeing how much everyone resents his angry dickishness and fails to mourn him would be a suitable punishment for his various crimes.

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Mark Trail, 6/20/10

I cannot for the life of me remember the name of the geometry teacher I had my freshman year of high school. She was an excellent teacher, but she had one quirk: she had a crazy underlining tic. Any word she wrote on the board that she felt had even the slightest importance would be underlined. Sometimes the word was “important” only in that it was a verb! Thus, in order to designate things that were actually important, she would double-underline, but she was pretty free with that, too, so it wasn’t unusual for our chalkboard to end up with certain words sitting atop three or four levels of underlines. (I eventually learned to just remove two layers when taking notes.)

Anyway, she may have been a middle-aged African-American math nerd living in a city, but I think she had a certain similarity to Mark Trail, outdoorsman extraordinaire. Mark is a serial abuser of boldface and exclamation points, so when he’s really worked up about something (like the dangers of sky-electricity — he’s already kept all electrical appliances out of his primitive home, but you can never escape these devilish electrons!), he has to turn the text-shouting up to utterly bizarre levels. ALL THUNDERSTORMS ARE DANGEROUS! DO YOU THINK THAT RUBBER-SOLED SHOES CAN PROTECT YOU? NO! THAT IS A MYTH! NOTHING CAN PROTECT YOU! NOTHING CAN PROTECT YOU! STAY AWAY FROM TREES! STAY AWAY FROM ALL FORMS OF METAL! STAY AWAY FROM WATER! HUDDLE IN A FETAL POSITION IN YOUR RUBBER-LINED ROOM, EVERY DAY, FOREVER! OTHERWISE LIGHTNING WILL KILL YOU AND YOU WILL DIE!

Mary Worth, 6/20/10

The transition of Dr. Roberts’s face from pleased to devastated in panels four through seven is a delight of visual storytelling. “What’s this, another head case for me to fix? KA-CHING! Oh, wait … she wants me to … I mean, with a woman … emotional intimacy … oh, God. Oh, God. Well, I guess I don’t really have any choice, do I? Oh, right, her e-mail address, Christ. Ugh ugh ugh.”

Panel from the Lockhorns, 6/20/10

Loretta is ashamed because she and/or Leroy are addicted to prescription medication! But really, anyone who knows them wouldn’t be surprised at what they need to do to get through life married to one another.