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Gasoline Alley, 9/18/15

Good news, everyone! Gasoline Alley’s beloved Mildly Rude Salesman Character, an homage/straight-up barely mediated depiction of Frank Nelson’s character from the Jack Benny show, is back! He’s appeared in the strip a couple times before, and this callback to a character who was most popular in the 1950s and who hasn’t appeared on TV in nearly 35 years hasn’t taken off like you’d think it would, but you know what they say: third time’s a charm! Just keep having the guy show up over and over again in your comic despite nobody knowing exactly what his deal is, despite the fact that most of your audience won’t recognize him at all and a small percentage will just say “I feel like I’ve seen this guy” but not bother to research it further! I mean, why not? Who’s to stop you?

Judge Parker, 9/18/15

Having already imparted the valuable lessons of her experience to Sophie, Abbey is now schooling Neddy: use your wealth and beauty to convince as many boys as possible to make out with you! Don’t get married young! Husbands are smug, sexless black holes from which no joy can escape! Have you seen Sam?

Gil Thorp, 9/18/15

Gil Thorp continues to prove that it has its finger on the pulse of the modern teen by introducing characters named Dory Darwin and Breck Darwin, which are exactly the sort of dumb names that modern teens have been cursed with. I sincerely hope that whatever B plot these guys get saddled with ends with them dropping out of school to become Vine stars.

Mark Trail, 9/18/15

This storyline’s bad guys just unleashed their sinister plan: distracting Mississippi Ken from his important screen-looking-at duties with their sweet, sweet yacht.

Apartment 3-G, 9/18/15

“Sorry it took me so long to get here! I was busy growing my hair out.”

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Rex Morgan, M.D., 9/13/15

Oh, boy, everybody, Milton’s son Hugh is back! I barely touched on him in my summary of the last Avery International storyline a couple weeks ago, but trust me: Hugh is hilarious. He tried to take over the company once, already! He was so annoying that Rex decided to mess up his schemes, not out of feelings of friendship for Heather but out of pure spite! He wandered around a parking garage aimlessly with Rex, then had to sit in the Morgans’ ice-cream befouled car! He doesn’t even like his dad, with good reason! He doesn’t really understand what a nurse is! He insulted June’s wine! He flailed around amusingly when he realized he’d been scammed! He got hilariously drunk and maudlin, and was subsequently hilariously hungover! He pathetically begged June to be nice to him! He was visibly unsettled when his stepmother practically flashed him, but soldiered on with his apology! He almost got blown up! Then … I actually don’t know how it ended up with him? I thought he and Heather sort of made up, but now he’s trying to take the company away from her again? Or maybe this is another Avery son, in which case I’m going to feel pretty dumb for having spent the last half an hour hunting down all those links. Anyway, just to remind you that the person attempting to gain control of the company by marshaling support among the stockholders who ultimately own it is the bad guy in this storyline, and we’re supposed to be rooting for the person who had her mentally incompetent husband appoint her a company director.

Mark Trail, 9/13/15

“People aren’t born being naturally afraid of snakes! They learn to be afraid of them when they find out that many of them can inject you with deadly poison with their long, terrifying fangs. Anyway, you know who isn’t afraid of snakes? Mongooses! That’s because snake venom doesn’t affect them. You should probably be afraid of snakes, though. THEY HAVE MOTHERFUCKING POISON TEETH”

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Mark Trail, 9/10/15

Let’s all take a minute to appreciate what a thoughtful nature journalist Mark Trail is. Sure, that box of glowing rods marked by a giant radiation symbol is probably full of radioactive material, but wouldn’t it be embarrassing if a team from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission came out and found a bunch of gag novelty items or something like that? I think once Mark does eventually call them in, and they hear that he dicked around for a few days waiting for special dive suits to be shipped to him and then went poking around himself without any training on how to handle radioactive material, they’ll be glad he didn’t waste their time!

Blondie, 9/10/15

About a year ago I tore into Blondie for obviously having no idea what Twitter was or how it worked, so I now I have to recognize progress: as of September of 2015, Blondie knows exactly what Twitter is and how it works. Be sure to follow me on Twitter and watch how my tweeting rate increases rapidly as my workload and deadlines mount!

Dennis the Menace, 9/10/15

The only employer you ever hear Mr. Wilson talking about is the U.S. Postal Service. So, one job for his whole life, union representation, and a pension on retirement? Story checks out.

Momma, 9/10/15

“Phew! She can’t taste the slow-acting poison after all! The nice man I ordered it from over the Internet was telling the truth!”