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Archie, 6/23/09

Here is a comedy tip for you: humor grounded in the specific is always funnier and more vivid than jokes about vague, abstract nouns. Thus, I would argue that the lame pun for which this strip is the ostensible vehicle is redeemed to a certain extent by the amusing notion that Archie, Jughead, and Nameless Car Pool Denizen #3 are not just going to some random teenage job, but have actually taken up careers as carnies, for some reason. More delightful still is the insane tableau in the second panel: Archie’s boss has clearly been beaten down by the realities of life as a wrangler of sullen teenagers and burnouts, buyer of giant stuffed pandas and a fryer grease in bulk, and briber of ride safety inspectors, but he still has enough of his belief that amusement park management might be insanely lucrative (no doubt developed over years of playing Roller Coaster Tycoon) that he decided to wear his tie covered with dollar signs to work. No doubt he’ll lose that faith altogether when he turns around to see one his fursuit characters, a giant squirrel thing not currently trademarked by any major media conglomerate, attempting to capture and kill a child, the crazed eyes of a serial killer gleaming madly out of the rodent’s grinning mouth.

Mark Trail, 6/23/09

Actually, Mark didn’t say anything of the kind, Cherry, as his only comments about the appearance and attractiveness of mammals involves the phrase “healthy, shiny coat.” Your transparent jealousy and shameless smoochery may in fact backfire, as the thing he most likes about country girls is that they find the intermittent sexual relations that are apparently a required aspect of marriage just as terrifying and unpleasant as he does.

Apartment 3-G, 6/23/09

All important information in this storyline is apparently going to be conveyed by having characters thrust newspapers at one another, so you may wonder why the voyage to India’s most blandly decorated hotel was even necessary at all. Obviously, though, without this trip we wouldn’t be graced with the hilariously offensive series of Margoisms that we’re going to get. “Dad, there are cows in the street! Everybody here is dirty, and nobody is white! They don’t take American money! The Indian food here is terrible!”

Beetle Bailey, 6/23/09

This is honestly one of the saddest and most poignant Beetle Baileys ever. It should probably be on the front page of the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network home page.

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Mark Trail, 6/19/09

Who has the greatest hair in Mark Trail history? This guy! Panel two offers us a close-up of its jellied texture, but I’m more intrigued by panels one and three, in which the backflap appears to be hanging stiffly down the back of the skull, presumably attached by some sort of hinge mechanism to the top panel. When it comes time for punching, we’re apparently going to learn that it isn’t just facial hair Mark hates; it’s abnormal hair of all stripes.

Gil Thorp, 6/19/09

Wow, I never thought I’d be pleased to see Jeff “The ’Czak” Ponczak and Matt the Hatt and their stupid public access show, and I certainly never thought I’d be pleased to see them mostly naked, but I have to admit that panel three is something of a breath of fresh air. It’s not as good as Gil urging a parent to sue his employers in panel two, but it’s pretty close.

Beetle Bailey, 6/19/09

When General Halftrack finally decides to end it all, he’s not going out alone. The folks who work in his office can only pray that when he reaches that moment of despair, his fingers will be so palsied from drink that he’ll lack the fine motor control skills necessary to pull out the pin.

Marmaduke, 6/19/09

Vasectomy?

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Hey kids, it’s comics education time! You’ve probably seen me refer to “throwaway panels” when I tackle some of the Sunday strips, and it may be that you don’t know what this means! Essentially, most Sunday strips are shipped to newspapers with an extra row of panels at the top, which some (many, in these days of shrinking budgets) papers cut off so that they can fit more comics into a limited space; as a result, the strip as a whole must be able to stand without these panels. There are varying strategies for dealing with the narrative problem thus raised.

Panels from Dennis the Menace, 6/14/09

For instance, some strips use them to present little mini-episodes that stand somewhat apart from the main action. A good example is today’s Dennis the Menace, where we learn that Mr. Wilson would like nothing better than to spray his irritating neighbor with deadly poison.

Panels from Curtis, 6/14/09

Another is today’s Curtis, where we discover that Gunther is sweeping the floor to his barbershop! Ha ha! That Gunther! What won’t he do?

Mary Worth, 6/14/09

Sometimes the throwaway panels change the focus of the strip. For instance, without the top row of panels in today’s Mary Worth, we’d probably manage to ignore those pinkish briquettes that Mary and Toby are gobbling up by the fistful. But with those panels in place, we’re forced to confront the fact that they’re genuine Mary Worth-prepared “salmon squares,” and must kill a little bit of our souls trying to figure out what, exactly, a “salmon square” might be. Has Mary taken moist, delicious, tender salmon and mercilessly baked it until it’s a series of hard, crispy pucks that are easy to pick up without getting your hands oily, and that taste like ashes in your mouth? Is the salmon inside some kind of pink pastry shell, resulting in an awful salmon-flavored Pop-Tart? Was this so-called “new recipe” written on parchment in human blood in the bowels of hell by Satan himself? Probably!

Marvin, 6/14/09

Then there are throwaway panels that alter the entire thrust of the strip. For instance, without the top row of panels, this strip could be summarized as “babies love cookies, and grandmas love giving cookies to babies”; but with them, the message is more “babies and dogs are an awful lot alike.”

Mark Trail, 6/14/09

And sometimes the throaway panels can accommodate differing levels of ambient prudishness across various media markets. Would a drawing of a comely lass in a bikini result in angry letters from comics readers in your paper’s distribution area? Just remove the top row et voilà! You’ll still get a helpful text wall on avoiding rip currents, and a terrifying close up of our naive swimmer dying in terror. That seagull in the final panel doesn’t seem to be helping matters; in fact, I’m guessing that he will soon be dive-bombing our hapless swimmer, so that she’ll drown more quickly and fatten up the fishes that he’ll eat later. Nature is cruel!

Funky Winkerbean, 6/14/09

Unrelated to throwaway panels, but related to dying in terror: does this strip finally settle the “What happened to Wally” question? This being Funky Winkerbean, we should have guessed that he died, probably in terror.

I was going to make a crack about how Becky conveniently arranged the parade to conclude at the cemetery where Wally’s grave was, but in all likelihood in the world of Funky Winkerbean it’s impossible to plan a parade — indeed, it’s impossible to plan a trip of any significant distance — that doesn’t end up at a graveyard.