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Hi and Lois, 12/20/25

Now, if you were an ordinary, casual comics enjoyer, you’d read this strip and think “Ha, it’s funny because Hi thinks so little of his children that he’s glad they got parts without dialogue,” or, if you’re more theologically inclined, “Ha, it’s funny because Hi is ignorant of the Bible, in which both the shepherds and the angels very much have lines.” If you’re the Comics Curmudgeon, though, you have access to a deep archive of Hi and Lois content and know that just a year ago Ditto was actively trying to abandon the speaking part he managed to land in the nativity play, so actually Hi is being supportive of his children’s ambitions, or, in this case, their lack thereof.

Mary Worth, 12/20/25

Now, obviously, the main attraction here is Mary’s “Oh dear” thought balloon as her gal pal confesses that she can’t choose between her husband of several decades and a parrot she found in a park less than a month ago, but I’m kind of fixated on the weird brown color of the carrot that Toby is hungrily staring at. Seems like the sort of fading vegetable you’d feed to a bird, honestly. Is Toby having trouble determining where her loyalties lie because she’s slowly being transformed into a parrot herself?

Rex Morgan, M.D., 12/20/25

Sure, Summer is a receptionist and not medical staff, but it still must be kind of embarrassing to be the only person working at a health clinic who doesn’t know where babies come from.

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Crock, 12/19/25

The sentence that most bothers me here is “It’s me again,” implying that we’re seeing another installment in a long-running drama between Crock and the … guy? … who’s calling him on the phone. At first I thought this was the same salesperson who annoyed him at dinner last month by calling during dinner and trying to sell him a banking credit card; but while on the surface the dialogue in panel one seems like it could be from someone hawking storm windows, it’s a wildly unprofessional sales pitch, and frankly sounds more like someone who’s only heard about sex second- or even third-hand initiating an obscene phone call. Anyway, Crock’s comeback is not as withering as he seems to think it is, and certainly doesn’t merit an entire panel dedicated to the triumphant slamming down of the phone in its wake.

Mary Worth, 12/19/25

This is honestly a fascinating exchange: Ian has gone fully mad, convinced that Sunny is no mere mechanical repeater of sounds but rather a fully fluent user of the English language, which makes the question of where he learned specific terms irrelevant, and that’s good for Toby, whose “Uh, maybe he heard it from [tries desperately to think of TV shows that have swear words] PBS” gambit is truly one of the least plausible things I’ve ever seen someone in this strip come up with, which is really saying something.

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Mary Worth, 12/16/25

There’s a lot of hand-wringing about “grade inflation” at elite universities, which I have for the most part thought is overblown, but, I dunno: if they’re giving Ian Cameron a “University Excellence Award,” maybe things really are bad.

Family Circus, 12/16/25

Honestly love Thel’s wary expression here. She specifically told Dolly not to talk to Santa like a dumbass, but she’s clearly talking to Santa like a dumbass, and Thel’s too far away to stop her. The way the composition draws your eye to her is great, and I’m imagining a Vertigo-style dolly zoom shot on her face as she listens to this nonsense unfold.

Luann, 12/16/25

Sorry I started doing Luann on this blog again after like a decade only to become fixated on shoving the “Ugh, Brand and Toni have an active erotic life and it’s disgusting” strips in your face. This one I enjoy because I’m imagining the DeGroot parents sitting forlornly around their living room thinking “When is Brad going to come over and aim the snowflake projector at our house? He said he would do it, but where is he? He better not be fucking.”

Slylock Fox, 12/16/25

What really jumps out at me in both versions of this panel is how old these pirates look. No wonder they seem so upset at this joke of a treasure! They’ve wasted the best years of their lives!

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 12/16/25

Damn, Maybelle Pratt! Turns out Snuffy Smith straight-up does not like you. It’s a good thing you’re leaving town!