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Mary Worth, 12/9/19

Say what you will about this “Wilbur & Estelle & Zak & Iris” storyline, but it keeps zagging when I expect it to zig, by which I mean I never in a million years would’ve guessed that Wilbur and Zak, both heartbroken because their ladyfriends dumped them for wholly baffling reasons (because they’re public embarrassments with serious alcohol problems who aren’t over their ex and menopause, respectively), would end up bellying up to Santa Royale’s one vaguely seedy bar together and engaging in some good old fashioned male bonding. Anyway, Zak is nursing what’s presumably a local craft beer and Wilbur’s obviously on day twelve of a scotch bender, so Wilbur having what’s Zak’s having will actually sober him up a bit, hopefully keeping him coherent enough so we hear every detail of the restraining order Estelle got against him post-boombox incident. “The Charterstone laundry room is less than 150 yards from her apartment so I haven’t been able to wash any of my clothes for weeks, Zak. Weeks!”

Gil Thorp, 12/9/19

Welp, we’ve wrapped up the Chance Macy/Chet Ballard/Charlie Roh story, and, uh, it seems the football team is not headed for the playdowns, despite the revival of the bonfire this year, because we’ve just rolled right into the winter storyline, which seems to be about … a girl named Alexa, like the popular electronic assistant from Amazon, and all the other kids are making jokes about it? This seems fairly realistic, as teens are generally pretty shitty and also much less funny than they think they are, but I’m not sure it’s actually that great a basis for a months-long comics plot.

Dick Tracy, 12/9/19

You know what is a great basis for a months-long comics plot? A washed-up narcissistic old actor, whose enormous office is decorated with larger-than-life posters of himself, following up his successful production of Our Town with a wildly ill-conceived plan for stage version of Metropolis starring a woman transformed via alien DNA. This is a million times better than Steve Roper and Mike Nomad tracking down rogue carnies or whatever.

Crock, 12/9/19

I’ve always understood “entertainment center” to mean a big piece of furniture that has spots for your TV, DVD player, stereo, etc., which more or less went out of fashion when flatscreen TVs came onto the scene in the mid-to-late ’00s, and never would’ve been much of a gift item anyway. But I guess I’m overthinking this strip, where the punchline is that the real entertainment center is an old man’s dick.

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Mark Trail, 12/4/19

Wait, is that … a snow leopard right there, in the foreground of panel two? I honestly can’t tell if it’s a snow leopard or a regular leopard or what, and I need to know so I can assess how ironic Dr. Camel’s dismissal of Mark’s hopes is supposed to be. Anyway, I’m enjoying Marks’s subtle act of rebellion as he expresses his desire to photograph a snow leopard, a real but elusive animal, and not a yeti, the fake animal that is the ostensible reason he was sent on this assignment in the first place.

Mary Worth, 12/4/19

Zak continues to obliterate all competition in the ongoing worldwide Boyfriend Of The Year contest by being young, hot, wealthy thanks to his own hard work, sexually solicitous — and, now, for offering to take many mundane tasks off his girlfriend’s plate, such as monitoring the behavior of her troubled adult son. “What’s up, brah?” the hunky millionaire will ask as he swings by Tommy’s menial supermarket job. “Still fighting off the demons of addiction backed up by the power of Christ? Radical!” Some finger-guns will complete the successful parenting-by-proxy session.

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Happy Monday everyone! Today’s Marvin is not about Marvin’s dirty diapers! Instead, it’s about Jeff and Jenny’s dirty toilet. Look at how big and bulgy it is! Do you think we’re meant to understand that, like a diaper, the toilet has been filled with poop and now needs to be disposed of and replaced? Do you think the Marvin creative team has just forgotten how indoor plumbing works and can only think of human excretory processes in terms of diapers at this point?

Rex Morgan, M.D., 12/2/19

Shout-out to Rex Morgan, M.D., for showing us the moment when Buck learns that he has to change into scrubs in order to be in the room for his wife’s C-section, and the moment after he put on the scrubs and has evaluated their aesthetics, but not, blessedly, the moment during which he actually changed into them.

Gil Thorp, 12/2/19

We’re still in the “Chet gets his comeuppance” phase of this storyline, which will presumably last the rest of the week and never become particularly interesting, but I want to point out that Gil Thorp, the strip that brought us such classic catchphrases as “Ease up, friend,” doesn’t rest on its laurels. Look for teens across the country to be sassing each other with “Catch up, pal. Nobody cares” well into next spring!

Mary Worth, 12/2/19

Oh no! Iris is letting her hot young boyfriend down by choosing to age normally and experience menopause! If she really cared about him, she would maintain her fertility and, by extension, her sexual desirability just by wanting it bad enough! Guys, I’m … I’m starting to suspect that Mary Worth may not be a feminist comic strip.