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Mark Trail, 2/20/18

Oh, man, sorry I haven’t been keeping you up to date on Mark Trail, but the short version of the story is that, after showering his giraffe-seeing son and monkey-riding-ostrich-seeing father-in-law with amused contempt and probably not even hearing about the nice campers who got attacked by a rhino, Mark finally saw a tiger with his own eyes and now all of the sudden the situation is very serious indeed and he needs to take charge of it! Based on Mark’s grim facial expression and his determination to stockpile on ammo, look for the tone of the strip to rapidly shift from “zany farce with wacky circus animals” to “gritty Assault on Precinct 13-style seige drama, with wacky circus animals.”

Mary Worth, 2/20/18

This Mary Worth plot about Ted Miller, sex creep, is doing a good job of simulating having professional dealings with an actual sex creep, in the sense that you have to sit through a lot of boring professional talk on edge wondering when the next hug that lingers right up to the edge of plausible deniability is going to abruptly arrive. Until then, though, I guess we should go back to the extremely improbable story of Mary as a muffin maven, a story that starts with her selling a plate of five muffins at Aileen’s Grocery and ends with everyone involved a millionaire! This story obviously requires Ted to wedge himself onto the loveseat with Mary to tell it, so she can feel the power of his narrative.

Pluggers, 2/20/18

A PLUGGER ONLY HUGS SOMETHING

AFTER HE KILLS IT

AND CHOPS IT UP WITH AN AXE

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Mary Worth, 2/14/18

Hmm, it seems that Mary, normally so firm in her boundaries, has internalized the pernicious idea that she has no right to her own bodily autonomy! Mere seconds after being visibly alarmed by Ted’s lingering frotteurist farewell and then essentially yelling him out the door, she already tries to normalize the experience in her own mind by dismissing Ted as a mere “character.” Who is going to raise her consciousness? Candidates are thin on the ground. Tobey? Dawn? My guess is Iris, who will return the favor Mary did in giving her permission to pursue Zak by explaining what it’s like being with a woke bae who knows all about consent and is also extremely hot and rich.

Dick Tracy, 2/14/18

Meanwhile, Dick Tracy is pulling away from showing us a literal alien invasion of earth and moving on to a much more exciting storyline: a man with goofy hair plans to purchase an off-brand Chili’s!

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 2/14/18

Every Valentine’s Day, Loweezy has to indulge Snuffy’s kink of having sex in a boat, and she is not feeling it this year.

Six Chix, 2/14/18

HEY MAN MAYBE THE BICHON WOULDN’T HAVE LEFT YOU IF YOU HADN’T TRIED TO POISON HER

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Mary Worth, 2/13/18

Oh no, Mary was only into her hug from Ted when she thought it was a quick goodbye squeeze, and now it’s turning into something more and she’s not into it at all. I guess it was inevitable (it wasn’t inevitable, we could’ve stopped this at any time) that the strip would take on the current cultural moment of reckoning with sexual harassment and assault. I have to say that I’ve already spent way more time than I’m comfortable admitting trying to parse what exactly is supposed to be happening in panel two here. Since this is the chaste newspaper comics, it could just be Ted leaning in and closing his eyes and breathing in Mary’s scent and imagining what it would be like to be in a beautiful, committed relationship with her, but he also might be humping her leg.

Shoe, 2/13/18

Ha ha, heavy alcohol use can result in … tattoos! Tattoos and that’s it. No other health problems, no sir. This strip is heavily invested in the financial solvency of depressing fern bars, so we’re just going to leave it there.