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Beetle Bailey, 12/21/07

Man, forget Miss Buxley; Private Blips is obviously where it’s at. Girl is clearly a stone cold freak. She’s gone way past what some dirty book can do for her, and now she’s just going to get any man who walks into the office to talk dirty to her. Miss Buxley’s look of horror in panel two just shows that she’s just a girl, totally unable to deal with the raw sexuality of a real woman like Private Blips. You go, girl!

Killer’s “quivering hat symbolizing arousal” still kind of grosses me out, I have to say. But hey, Blips, whatever floats your boat.

Crock, 12/21/07

You would have thought that Crock had already brought Grossie to the nadir of degradation, perhaps at the very moment at which it chose to name her “Grossie.” But now, with nobody around to make fat jokes about her, she’s being forced to make them about herself. Classy!

Marmaduke, 12/21/07

“Or perhaps you’ve killed your owner and you’re wearing his hat, along with the top of his skull? Yes, that seems most likely, actually.”

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Mary Worth, 12/20/07

Sadly, rules about depicting animal violence prevent us from seeing the bloody glory of this little-dog-on-littler-dog battle, but it’s obvious that Chester won, since his Margo Magee lookalike owner had to fish him out of the fighting pit. The motion lines in panel one also make it look like Mary just backhanded her nemesis in the back of the head for good measure. But for my money the greatest thing about this comic is the wordless exclamation point Mary is emitting in the second panel. It’s clear that nobody has told Mary that anything was her fault, ever. Watch out, fur-collared-coat lady! Mary got a bunch of her friends together to help her talk a guy into suicide once, and his crimes were clearly nothing compared to you attempting to cast blame on the Queen of Charterstone.

Marmaduke, 12/20/07

Marmaduke’s troubling slide into insanity accelerates. Never mind the fact that if Marmaduke wasn’t sitting, he’d just be running around and destroying things, and possibly humping his owner’s hapless guest; his sitting would probably be less intrusive if the various pieces of furniture in the living room were, you know, more than eight inches apart.

Crankshaft, 12/20/07

I’m always kind of interested in the flashback scenes in Crankshaft. This woman is (if I have the family relationships right, which I’m still not 100 percent sure that I do) the ’Shaft’s daughter, so it’s intriguing to see the man’s family when he was younger and maybe not so cranky and HOLY GOD WHAT ON EARTH IS THAT THING IN FRONT OF THE LITTLE GIRL’S FACE IN THE THIRD PANEL WHERE THE HELL IS HER MOM SHOPPING FOR ORNAMENTS HOLY CRAP!

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Luann, 12/19/07

Check out Toni’s right hand. Anything weird about it? A little off? No? How about the fact that it appears to be almost two-thirds as long as the whole rest of her arm? I know she’s a cartoon character with, for instance, weird beady little eyes and an impossibly large mouth, but there’s something about her hand that’s creeping me out. Urrrgggh.

I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I really hope Brad and Toni are overcome by the festiveness of their costumes and end up playing “bad Santa and naughty elf.” Not because I want to see or even imagine their erotic congress, mind you, but I just want it over with. Please. The sexual tension between these two is not hot. It’s soooo very un-hot and queasy-making, and the inhumanly large hand ISN’T HELPING. Just do it already, you two, because it will be terrible and awkward and you’ll never do it again and then we can all rest easy.

Spider-Man, 12/19/07

The sad thing is that the six weeks of Google searches to which we’re about be treated are actually preferable to the alternative, which is of course six weeks of Peter Parker whining at the TV. At least Spider-Man will actually be doing something, even if it’s just typing. I love the way the flat-screen monitor is dramatically foregrounded in the final panel, as if to say, “Here, dear reader! Here is the true hero of this strip! Behold, the Internet!”

Slylock Fox, 12/19/07

Remember, everyone, you don’t need to spend big money on tickets to Stomp! You can just recreate it in your own home! Also, children as young as eighteen months can be trained to make margaritas.

They’ll Do It Every Time, 12/19/07

I have a note in my calendar that today’s TDIET is from faithful reader Tili; if so, stand up and take a bow! I am in full solidarity with you, my night owl brother or sister. The Man tells you that you should get up early and go to bed early, but without late night toiling where would we be? This blog would be short quite a few posts, I’ll tell you that much.

Marmaduke, 12/19/07

Do you ever get the feeling that the creator of Marmaduke is just totally bonkers? Well, today’s comic is not going to disabuse you of that notion.

Hey, remember when I speculated on a Sally Forth-Shortpacked crossover? Behold my power over the world of cartooning!