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Mary Worth, 12/4/08

I realize that I have ignored a very exciting last several days in Mary Worth. Lynn had a picture of … a boy in her pocket! And then Mary saw it! And Lynn freaked out! And she fainted! (But she’ll be fine.) But there’s something even more troubling than the stress-related faint! And that more troubling thing is … IS …

(The fact that all this constitutes a very exciting last several days in Mary Worth tells you pretty much all you need to know about Mary Worth.)

Anyway, bets are now being taken as to what the “troubling” unexplainable medical condition will be. Potential answers: pregnancy, venereal disease, insanity, Electra complex, droopy-ponytail-itis. While we’re waiting, I dare you to make sense of the arrangement of grey and off-green on the wall behind Mary and Evil Figure Skating Father-Coach, either in the individual panels or taking the strip as some kind of theoretical whole.

Herb and Jamaal, 12/4/08

If my years of reading Herb and Jamaal have taught me anything, it’s that this potentially interesting story about Herb’s crime-terrorized barber will be dropped after today, and that his discomfiting anxiety has been trotted out entirely in the service of a cheap gag about shaking hands. Tune in next week for similar yucks when Jamaal’s doctor turns out to have a devastating alcohol problem!

Crankshaft, 12/4/08

This just in: everyone in Crankshaft, without exception, is terrible. “Really, son, this paycheck just goes to show that getting in on the ground floor somewhere to pursue your dreams is for suckers and poor people. Why not work in a high-paying job you hate so you can look as beaten down and miserable as we do at all times?”

I am kind of amused by the fact that the sepia-toned, old-timey album photo panel, once reserved for storylines like Crankshaft’s days in the minors in the late ’40s, has now just become Crankshaft shorthand for “events that happened previously” — even when, in this case, the events occurred well into the era of digital color photography.

Mark Trail, 12/4/08

“I wish I had let Andy come with me!” “I’m beginning to worry about our friend too, Andy!” Hey, guys, Andy can’t always be there paw-holding you as you make your way through life, OK? You’re going to learn how to do things on your own. Meanwhile, it’s obvious that the real hero of this storyline will be Sneaky, clawing at the face of anyone, or possibly everyone, within reach once the melee starts.

Family Circus, 12/4/08

Getting a new encyclopedia for Billy is obviously unthinkable, since it would be full of all that devilish “new learning.” Even the 1955 World Book was chock full of sin, which is why Mommy had to consolidate the clean parts into this single tattered volume.

Apartment 3-G, 12/4/08

At last, Margo’s going to live out her ultimate fantasy — a three-way with two dudes who look exactly alike! Oh, wait, I just described every M-F-M three-way in the Apartment 3-G universe.

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Lockhorns, 12/2/08

When I first started this blog, way back in the day, one of the things I was most perversely excited about was writing about the Lockhorns — I think I had this post written in my head before I had even set the blog up in the first place. Over time, I haven’t said as much about it as I have about other strips, but my weird admiration for its gung-ho commitment to marital heartbreak hasn’t wavered. Today’s installment features one of my favorite recurring aspects of the strip — Leroy and Loretta’s shared bleak, glum expressions, with eyes deadened by years of horror, as if they’ve just stumbled out of a concentration camp or something. Normally, a cartoon character about to have Dr. Blog’s finger up his butt would look comically anxious, but here Leroy just looks like he’s thinking, “Whatever. Nothing you can do can possibly wound my dignity more than my very existence already does.”

Loretta, meanwhile, is equally numb, for private reasons of her own. Maybe she expected to get a fleeting moment of satisfaction from Leroy’s prostate-exam-related panic, and is realizing that even that will be denied her.

Also, it appears that someone at Lockhorns central is fixated on airport security, and rectums.

(Also also: “Dr. Blog?” Really?)

Marvin, 12/2/08

Speaking of emotional devastation, I was pleased to see Marvin’s grandparents left completely shattered as their plans for retirement fall to pieces around them, but that’s just because I hate Marvin and want all of its characters to suffer horribly. Maybe they’ll have to move in with Marvin’s parents! And everyone will get on each other’s nerves, and Marvin will poop in his pants while thought-ballooning wryly! Oh, the hilarity.

Mark Trail, 12/2/08

Now, Mark Trail — there’s a guy who never lets things get him down! Why, here he is, tied up, being held at gunpoint by a dude named “Rabbit,” being handed over to a burly fellow with a Fu Manchu-ish mustache named “Salty” — and he’s keeping his cool! Almost as if he’s secretly pleased, for some reason. I can’t wait to see what happens next!

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Your comments of the week in a moment, but first I must point to a blog of which I was wholly unaware, and which appears to have not updated since July, but to which attention must be paid: The Secret Life of Mark Trail. Pointed out in the comments by faithful reader True Fable, it pairs bizarre, out-of-context Mark Trail panels with funny captions. Do not miss!

And now, your gravy-stained COMMENT OF THE WEEK!

“Drove by a local home furnishings store today whose sign was promoting some piece of furniture (I assume) called ‘The Cuddler.’ All I could think was ‘Damn, he’s gonna kick Spider-Man’s ass.'” –johnbpt

And your also delicious runners-up!

“Somewhere, an assistant is hanging a new number on a large sign in the Fred Basset production office that says ‘_ _ _ _ DAYS WITHOUT A DISCERNIBLE JOKE.'” –Muffaroo

“thatquietkid: According to your fine newsletter, Mark Trail is 32 years old and has been married for 15 years. I now have a glorious mental image of Mark Trail as a seventeen-year-old child bride, swathed in khaki with a mosquito net veil, having been sold to Cherry as breeding stock.” –Jessie

“Lynn, you clearly don’t know what you’re doing. By ignoring Mary’s biddying you’re just making the inevitable meddlegasm stronger and longer. Panel after panel of stale platitudes and broken metaphors rhythmically spurting out of Mary, covering you and your horrible father in layer after layer of fetid sticky cliche, until she lies, spent, in the busybody’s afterglow.” –Baka Gaijin

“Reading zombie Foob is like watching paint redry.” –Uncle Lumpy

“Peter Parker’s only saving grace is that his enemies are inevitably even more pathetic than he is. After such hapless losers as The Shocker and The Vulture, we have perhaps the most pitiful of all — Big Time, who has to work overtime to keep his contrived persona going: constantly reminding people of his self-imposed nickname, carefully hanging clocks around his sad little lair, planning boring clock-related crimes … I just hope he lucks out and gets to die at the end of his storyline instead of going to prison, thus depriving Peter Parker the opportunity to make some lame-ass comment about how BT will be ‘doing time’ or how he’ll have ‘plenty of time to think about his mistakes … while he’s being shivved in the weight room by skinheads.’ Oh, wait, even if BT dies, Parker will be able to say that he’s ‘run out of time.’ Sorry, Biggie, you’re screwed either way.” –Joe Blevins

“Doc: ‘Could I get a second opinion?’ Dagwood: [looks down at his pants] ‘There’s one right there!'” –Ptycho

JP: “It seems like an obvious point, but in most murder mysteries interest is sustained by having more than one plausible culprit. Means and motive can also be points of investigation. But since we got all those questions out of the way quickly, that leaves only the expected rescue by the leather pants lady to complete this story and get back to the exciting subject of applying for solar panel tax credits.” –Mr. O’Malley

“I just think Margo is simply reaching around her ear to remove the flesh-mask that hides her true, scaled, Velociraptor visage. Soon, the assistant will be nothing but stains and entrails, to be hung as art and received as genius.” –Lettuce

“Save ‘some’ of the animals in the swamp? So much for natural selection. Are Mark and Pop to sit in judgement on the swamp, picking and choosing which animals meet their warped sense of worth? In panel three, Mark has already swelled to god-like proportions.” –McManx

“I’m not sure if ‘forvever’ is Milford slang or just the result of the profound aphasia that develops in a society oriented entirely around games of hitting each other — or, indeed, if those two things are different.” –JohnsonDelegate

“I’m pretty sure that Jeff’s shirt really does say MILFORD and not MILF; he just had one custom made to be horribly off-center so it would better match his chin.” –peabody

“So Dixie somehow ties Sam to a chair next to the bed in the motel room (they are in a motel room, right? I’ve lost track in all that noir-ness). Then Sam and Dixie await the arrival of Detective Vavavoom. She, upon walking into the room, gazes at Dixie, who has already removed most of her clothes. Smiling, they wordlessly move toward each other, tenderly remove each other’s remaining garments, and drop to the bed to begin their entwined silken-limbed lesbian lovefest. Sam, still tied to the chair, falls asleep.” –Poteet

“When someone would pass gas, my grandmother used to say, ‘Someone stepped on a toadfrog.’ Mark Trail, however, seems to prefer the phrase, ‘I hear an old gator bellowing.'” –Perky Bird

“I’m thankful that Luann has taught me that just because something is maudlin doesn’t mean it can’t be creepy.” –Spunde

“Why does little Sarah look like a Venetian porn star in the second panel of that RMMD strip? I ask merely for information.” –Angry Kem

“Of course, no one has actually joined the cast of Beetle Bailey in at least a decade, so until we see this new friendly face again, I can only assume Beetle has lead him to Cookie’s tent and that there will be suspicious-looking meatloaf in the mess tonight.” –Black Drazon

“I can only hope that the teaser saying, ‘Is time running out for Spider-man?’ means the strip is going to star Maria Lopez after Peter Parker dies of apoplexy when his cable service gets cut.” –True Fable

“We are all reading TJ’s remarks with the wrong inflection. Should read more like this: Hey, ‘Mom and Dad,’ or ‘Big Jerks who won’t let me mooch off you anymore’ — I don’t care that you kicked me out and got that restraining order because I found a NEW family to ‘borrow’ credit cards from and impregnate ‘younger sisters’. Heh, heh, heh… You just can’t see all the quotation marks because of the dishwater.” –Rachel

“Watch out, Margo! The top button of Mr. Ken Doll Hair’s shirt is unbuttoned! He has no respect for society!” –Echo

“Josh, you’ve just made yourself obsolete. There’s really nothing more left to do with Momma than post ‘Momma: Hengh?’ every morning.” –teddytoad

As ever, I must give thanks to everyone put some change in my tip jar! And our advertisers will never be banished to the kids’ table:

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