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Mark Trail, 2/11/25

Oh, sorry I didn’t update you on the “Mark helps return a displaced manatee to the sea” storyline, or even [checks archives] tell you about it in the first place, but today’s strip pretty much recaps the high points so I don’t have to, in a real reversal of this blog’s original mission statement. The whole thing about the guys in bear costumes is actually a story that was ripped from the real-life headlines, except the real-life guys were actually just doing some light insurance fraud rather than trying to prevent the return of a manatee to the sea for murky climate-change-denial reasons. Anyway, I’m showcasing today’s strip because I’m furious that Mark is doing “flight” wordplay about guys in bear costumes, and you can tell that foreground bird in the last panel is upset that it’s been dragged into this thing as a fig leaf. “They’ll be hibernating for the winter … in jail” was right there!

Luann, 2/11/25

On the note of returning to some of my old favorites, I’ve decided to start reading Luann again, I guess because it’s worth it to inflict deliberate pain on myself just to feel something? Anyway today’s strip is about Brad trying to bake Toni a cake but the whole thing is actually an elaborate metaphor about his dick that’s both fully transparent and also doesn’t hold up to any degree of scrutiny, so I’m glad to see the vibes have not shifted too much.

Crankshaft, 2/11/25

Also, Crankshaft is back, in your life and mine! God, look at how completely dead Crankshaft is behind his eyes in panel three here, I love it, put it in a spoon and feed it to me like I’m a little baby that loves Crankshaft’s pain. Do you think the implication is that, now that marijuana is legal in Ohio, it’s not clear what “under the influence” specifically means? Or is it simply that the mayor may have gotten blotto after drinking too many Budweiser beers? Sorry, it’s neither: Crankshaft isn’t “implying” anything, he’s merely saying vaguely wordplay-shaped sounds while his soul screams endlessly inside, begging for a death that will never come.

Dustin, 2/11/25

Wow, Dustin’s mom has decided to divorce his dad! Obviously a big move but I think we can all say that it’s not a particularly surprising one.

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Mark Trail, 12/18/24

Mark Trail can of course never be an anti-hunting strip per se, but it has always adhered to a strict moral code when it comes to the sport: for instance, it’s highly dishonorable to stage a canned hunt of a little girl’s pet deer (which is named “Lucky”) as part of an ill-conceived plan to run for governor, or to buy a rare white lion specifically to hunt it. But this is Nu-Look Mark Trail and we need to move on to modern hunting crimes, like hunting a deer that’s famous on TikTok specifically to gain clout on TikTok. They don’t say TikTok, but people definitely mean TikTok when they say “social media” generically right now, the same way everyone who said “social media” generically in 2011 meant Facebook and everyone who said it in 2018 meant Twitter. Anyway, will vengeful TikTok teens punch Cherry’s sister’s bad boyfriend out before Mark can get to him? More on this story as it develops.

Curtis, 12/18/24

The Elon Musk-related punchline to this strip is neither here nor there, but I actually think it’s very funny that for three panels we get Greg Wilkins explaining to his tween son, in earnest detail, what a snow globe is and how it works. I guess the joke is that the kids today with their cell phones and Tesla cars (?) don’t know what a snow globe is or how it works and have to have all that explained to them, but I’m actually pretty sure that most of them are at least passingly familiar.

Alice, 12/18/24

This joke is actually — well, “good” is too strong a word, but it’s definitely passable. The only problem is that it should involve a child looking at a huge bookcase packed with books, not a small end table with six relatively slim volumes stacked atop it. But I guess we should respect the fact that Alice never wavers from its commitment to always take place in a mysterious and mostly featureless void.

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Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 12/15/24

Geez, man, what kind of weird Slylock Fox-ass riddle-telling meteorologist do these Snuffy and Lukey listen to. “Frozen precipitation,” oh ho ho, you’ve really tricked all your listeners. Jerk. Oh, if King Croesus crosses the Halys River, a great empire will be destroyed, is that it? I guess I forgive these guys for living in a violent culture where civil society and independent information sources are regarded with suspicion and paranoia if this is the kind of shit they have to put up with.

Mark Trail, 12/15/24

Oh, not much to see here, just Mark and Cherry Trail urging you to go out and buy some GROW LIGHTS for your indoor “herb garden.” That’ll spice things up, will it??? This is clearly about DRUGS and you two should be ASHAMED.