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Gil Thorp, 10/1/24

Ah, well, it seems that Gil’s airborne lovefest under old artist Rod Whigham was some kind of hallucination he was having during a massive cardiac event on the sideline of a football game, and now, under new artist Rachel Merrill, he lingers comatose in a hospital, kept alive by machines the size of a 1950s mainframe computer. Anyway, this is a perfect time for Keri to confess to bulimia, I guess, and just like the time in Mary Worth when Dr. Jeff’s drippy daughter accepted her cop boyfriend’s proposal when he was in a coma, this will only lead to positive outcomes.

Gasoline Alley, 10/1/24

Gasoline Alley will never try to confuse us with abrupt narrative shifts. In fact, if characters who we last saw a year and a half ago appear in the strip, Gasoline Alley will remind you what their names are by having another character say them out loud, in bold type! Gasoline Alley is just thoughtful like that, and as a rapidly aging member of its audience, I appreciate it.

Mary Worth, 10/1/24

Sorry, Estelle, I know your mind is clouded with sorrow right now, but you had both these pets for some time before you met Ed, so he can’t possibly have achieved “daddy” status with them. Technically Wilbur owned Pierre before he handed him off to you because of their complete failure to bond emotionally, so to Pierre Wilbur is daddy! Frankly this just seems to be pointing towards a reunion wiOH NO OH NO OH NO ABORT ABORT ABORT

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Mary Worth, 9/29/24

I’m going to remain neutral on some the big moral questions being raised by this storyline for the moment (Is it fair to fall in love with a passionate man then demand that he give up his passions to focus on you? Why, in a relatively small community that nevertheless can support a whole convention’s worth of veterinarians, is Ed somehow the only vet available for seemingly every emergency call? Does it make sense to put “a reunion dinner with a once beloved but subsequently estranged family member” and “a visit to the bakery to taste cake” in the same “wedding stuff you can skip” bucket?). Mostly, I want to say that chucking your engagement ring directly into your fiance’s chest at full speed and watching it bounce off is a very funny move, and I’m glad we got to see it in today’s strip.

Marvin, 9/29/24

There are all kinds of dubious things that I am willing to accept as part of the Marvin world-building, such as the fact that babies and dogs have adult-human-level cognition and ability to communicate, but neither has mastered the simple art of shitting in a toilet. However, seeing dogs just casually wandering around suburban neighborhoods unleashed immediately exceeds my ability to suspend disbelief. I realize that the idea of this has been ossified into comics lore but I refuse to believe that anyone actually involved in producing the comics in the futuristic year 2024 personally remembers a time when this was commonplace.

Six Chix, 9/29/24

I find the drawing of the plumber at bottom right interacting with a undersink cabinet that has been removed from its context (the sink) very funny. “Welp, let me see if the problem is from inside your Portal and–” [horrified screams as he is pulled into the ~v o i d~]

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Hello everyone! I am back from my vacation! Did you miss me? Did you realize you liked Uncle Lumpy better? Did you not even notice any changes? Feel free to only answer those questions in ways that won’t hurt my feelings. Anyway, I do want to thank Uncle Lumpy for his fabulous fill-in duties, and thank everyone who donated to the annual fundraiser (said donors will be getting individual thanks from me, this week!).

Mary Worth, 9/22/24

I also want to give thanks to the usually cold and unfeeling universe and/or the vagaries of the King Features editorial calendar. It seems strangely common that truly wild Mary Worth action, like the legendary Operation H-Town warehouse shootout, happens when I’m on vacation. But this year, I’ve gotten home just in time for the truly incredible panel in which Estelle decides to murder her fiance, and probably a bunch of sick animals too. Can’t wait!!!!

The Phantom, 9/22/24

An extremely long-simmering plot in The Phantom is that at one point the Phantom had amnesia, and ended up enlisting under the name “John X” as a patrolman in the Jungle Patrol, the paramilitary unit he ordinarily leads from the shadows as the perpetually unseen “Unknown Commander”. Before too long he regained his memory and had to juggle both roles, which was increasingly more trouble than it was worth, as fun as it was to intermittently show up as John X and make all the patrolwomen extremely horny. So our hero has finally decided to wrap up his double life by having the Unknown Commander order John X off on what’s widely understood as a suicide mission. This has the added benefit of modeling for the patrolpersons he commands the idea that they’re expected to nobly sacrifice themselves for unclear ends at any time, which could make his life a lot more convenient even ignoring the whole thing where he has one less identity to juggle now.

Beetle Bailey, 9/22/24

The throwaway panels assure us that Beetle is aware that he is a member of the U.S. Armed Forces, but it’s fascinating that in subsequent panels he contemplates various increasingly fantastical transportation modes only in terms of the convenience they would offer him, and not the incredible tactical advantage they would grant his platoon in combat. I guess there’s a reason he’s never been promoted: he simply doesn’t have the mind for military leadership.

Mark Trail, 9/22/24

WOW, Mark Trail, you had an opportunity to depict a GRAPHIC vulture vomit scene in the Sunday full-color comics and you chickened out? For shame, for shame!