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Rex Morgan, M.D., 8/30/07

So, after three years of doing this site, I’ve discovered The Rex Morgan Problem, which goes something like this: The set-up for each storyline is delightful, but once we get to the climax, my interest suddenly deflates. Rex and Troy’s gay golf game kept me in stitches for hours! But then there was blackmail and SWAT teams and ZZZZZZZ. June and a 12-year-old banter about oral sex! But then there was an attempt to kidnap or kill him or something? YAWN! I’m beginning to suspect that it’s my problem, not the strip’s. Anyway, this is my apology for cutting back on my RMMD coverage just when it got ostensibly “exciting.” See, they found Milton and suddenly Pete the Chauffeur, who has seemed like a good guy all this time, is suddenly fleeing with Heather in tow because … he’s bad? Somehow? And now that Milton is really alive his hopes of being the power behind the throne are dashed? Also, he’s in the NSA? And the Chinese are involved? Maybe? But I don’t really care. Honest to God, can we just go back to June insulting civil servants and Rex being a dick to everyone because an uncomprehending world won’t accept him as he is? Because that’s what I tune in for.

I do like today’s last panel: if Rex were an ordinary protagonist, his implication would be “The cops won’t be able to find him … so I will!” as he drives to Pete’s secret hiding place that only he’s smart enough to discover. But this being Rex, his implication is “So, there’s no hope and we might as well move on,” and his destination is the office. Or Baskin-Robbins.

Family Circus, 8/30/07

This is my favorite kind of Family Circus: the kind where Jeffy is aggressively ignorant. He knows that everyone else in the family thinks he’s a moron — deep down, he probably knows that he is a moron — so he figures he’s just going to make their life difficult with it. Today we have the typical kids-say-the-darndest-things-because-they-treat-idioms-literally schtick, but there’s something about his attitude that says that he knows his little question is going make grandma regret coming over to try to relate to the little rugrats. “Gosh, grandma, how does ‘tight’ relate to sleeping, huh? Are we talking about my bowels? Because mommy says I have to sleep with those tight. What if I sleep loose and poop all over the bed, huh? What if that, huh? Grandma? Huh?”

(oh my god I just admitted that I had a favorite kind of Family Circus I’m screwed now)

Marmaduke, 8/30/07

OK, the MUNCH MUNCH MUCH I can deal with. I get it, the damn dog is chewing his way through bags and probably boxes to devour all of his family’s food before they get a chance to do so, sure, whatever. It’s the LICK LICK that really makes me uncomfortable. I’m assuming that he’s slobbering all over the grocery items that he can’t get down his ravenous gullet — the canned goods, the frozen foods — so that it’s all covered with a thick layer of viscous Great Dane drool. He may not be able to eat it, but he’s going to make sure that it’s so disgusting that his owners won’t want to either, because, fuck you, he’s Marmaduke.

They’ll Do It Every Time, 8/30/07

The Dubbers just love — like, we mean love — their flix with bombings, earthquakes, explosions, train wrecks, etc., etc.

(“Hmm, lotsa shootings in this one … huh, that fella lost an arm … howja think they did all that fake blood, witha computer?”)

But! Let ’em see one li’l nipple … and the whole menagerie is up and at ’em!

(“Awk! Filth! This is disgustin’! And little Hekkie saw it! He’ll be scarred for life … I’m writin’ Senator Blowhard … an outrage … should be able to watch HBO at 10 pm without seeing this garbage …”)

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Gasoline Alley, 8/16/07

Those of you who only follow Gasoline Alley through this blog have probably been wondering, “Gee, what’s going on with Slim’s plan to keep his neighborhood racially pure by dropping thousands of pounds of metal onto a playground? I’m sure he’s totally stepped back from the brink by this point!” Well, I’m sad to report that not so much. In today’s strip, the deranged Vietnam Vet charged with actually perpetrating this vile crime muses grimly on the mercenary’s creed: once that check clears, you have a job to do, and it doesn’t matter how many flattened homes and crushed bodies you leave in your wake.

Gil Thorp, 8/16/07

Today’s Gil Thorp is nothing less than a divine symphony of severed limbs. You cannot convince me that any of the arms on display here are actually attached to the Thorpian quasihumans near whose heads they’re hovering — the scale and the angles are all wrong. Particularly baffling is the behemoth paw in panel one. Is Fu “Rap Sheet” Manchu supposed to be holding a TV remote? It seems unlikely: not only is the hand bigger than his head, but he’s only about eight inches away from the television set.

I love that, having been insulted, Coach Kaz calls his girlfriend to “check in” emotionally, only to be further taunted for his dimwittery. FEEL THE BURN, COACH! She’s not dating you for your mind; she only loves your hairy, hairy arms, and the furious fists at the end of them.

Marmaduke, 8/16/07

Like a lot of Marmadukes, this one doesn’t make any damn sense. It could be sort of fixed, though, if the caption were changed to “Your lap’s so nice, he thinks he’s died and gone to heaven!” Get it? Because with Marmaduke’s drooping extremities and slack features, it appears that this hapless woman has the enormous corpse of a Great Dane sprawled across her thighs!

Of course, we all know that, thanks to Marmaduke’s many sins, he won’t actually go to heaven when he dies.

Ziggy, 8/16/07

Looks like somebody doesn’t really understand what “computer dating” is all about. Hey, Tom II, get with the program! You can have your very own computer in your very own home these days! I don’t want to say this cartoon is entirely inaccurate, though: it is true that the only women who would deign to date Ziggy are in prison.

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Archie, 8/2/07

The Archie Joke-Generating Laugh Unit 3000 managed to churn out a serviceable punchline today (by the abominably low standards of the legacy comics industry) but it’s the weirdness of the setup that really places this strip squarely in the uncanny valley. Who is gap-toothed Leroy? Why does Archie hold him in such contempt? Did Archie’s chest expand between panels one and two, or did his head shrink? Why is he wearing an ankle-monitoring bracelet? Why are Riverdale’s beaches studded with ominous-looking targets? Sadly, I fear that the all of these anomalies are just the AJGLU’s idea of background color.

Mark Trail, 8/2/07

Seeing Mark announce “I’m your worst nightmare!” is of course a delight, a little love letter to everyone everywhere. Still, it wouldn’t be Mark Trail if the dialog emphasis failed to violate all norms of conversation among English-speaking human beings. Mark emerges from his hidey-bush and bellows “I KNOW ABOUT IT!” at the top of his lungs, then politely adds “I’m your worst nightmare” in his indoor voice. Perhaps all the boldfacing in the first word balloon tired him out.

Anyway, we are of course all on tenterhooks to see tomorrow’s punchery. Your firearm is no match for Mark’s bare fists, Buzzard!

Mary Worth, 8/2/07

If you ever needed proof that Mary Worth is some kind 18th-level Jedi ninja archbishop of meddling, this is it. By having a relationship with a somewhat older man, Dawn is enjoying herself in an ever-so-slightly unconventional way, which Mary obviously thinks is the moral equivalent to genocide. Rather than let our young romantic see her revulsion at this depravity, however, she instead pretends to be on Dawn’s side, only to plant a tiny seed in her mind by comparing her and Dr. Drew to the Camerons, Charterstone’s most loathsome couple. Now, every time Lover Boy, M.D., moves in for a smooch, Dawn will be unable to keep from visualizing Ian’s bloated, chinbeared visage, purple with drink and contempt, hovering before her. She’ll move on to a more age-appropriate boyfriend — or a nunnery — in no time, and Mary with allow herself a brief, subtle smile of satisfaction.

UPDATE: In this context, I simply must post to this excellent post at Subdivided We Stand, from faithful reader Smitty Smedlap.

The Phantom, 8/2/07

I know it’s not socially acceptable to test this out, but I’m reasonably sure that, while there are probably several more or less accurate ways to transliterate the sound made by an oar handle plunging into a man’s solar plexus, “PUNT!” is probably not one of them. I will allow that “UHHFF!!” is probably a pretty good approximation of the sound one would make when so oared, however.

Note that the Ghost-Who-Uses-The-Mori-Youth-Entrusted-Into-His-Care-As-Bait has sent a group of mostly naked teenagers with improvised bludgeons into a fracas against men armed with automatic rifles, while he stands above and fires a desultory round or two from his pistol in the general direction of the action. I suppose that if he leapt down, we’d all be denied yet another shot of his stripey ass.

Marmaduke, 8/2/07

This is one of the filthier things I’ve seen today. If you’re a sicko like me, it’s fun to imagine the caption without the second sentence.

Dick Tracy, 8/2/07

“The chief has just issued an APB for an elderly man!” And the cooks at Gitmo start making fewer halal meals and more bran muffins and prune juice as the several million Americans who fit this one-sentence description are rounded up for interrogation.

The Family Circus, 8/2/07

Sadly, the attempt to assassinate the Keane clan was botched. “Next time,” swore a cowed human race, sick to death of their antics. “Next time.”