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Mary Worth, 2/9/16

“Well, the surface of the ice represents our ability to move quickly or slowly, according to our needs and our abilities. The boundaries of the rink represent the restrictions placed on our behavior imposed by society or the nature of the universe, restrictions we need to respect and learn to live with. And the razor-sharp ice skates that swish and slice so quickly, that carry us to and fro with ease but can also, in the briefest of seconds, slice us open and end our lives in a terrifying moment of screaming and blood, so much blood — well, they represent the danger that is omnipresent, the danger that makes life so precious. Join me, Olive! Join me in this world of lightning-fast skating and sudden, violent death!”

Slylock Fox, 2/9/16

In panel one, this nice lady is going to use the scissors to cut this poor man’s shirt so that this vicious dog will finally let go of him. In panel, she’s going to use them to stab him to death.

Hagar the Horrible, 2/9/16

Ha ha, it’s funny because they’re about to be horribly killed and Eddie’s real broken up about it!

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Mary Worth, 2/6/16

Uh oh, looks like Olive fell down and hurt herself! And now she looks … angry. You know, we’ve been having plenty of fun here watching Mary sexually reject dudes, but we shouldn’t lose sight of what this Olive story is really about, namely a little girl who talks to angels and can see the future. If there’s one thing movies have taught us about creepy children with mind powers, it’s this: they seem cheerful enough until they encounter a difficulty or obstacle that a normal person would take in stride, and then they get very angry indeed, generally with terrible consequences. The population of Midtown Manhattan seems to have dodged a bullet this time, though. Dude with the mustache is panel one in lucky his head didn’t explode, splattering goo everywhere, as a side effect of Olive’s rage.

The Phantom, 2/6/16

The Phantom is in the middle of a fairly dull story about teenage royal love that’s a sequel to one from six years ago, but I mostly want to point out that among the amenities of the Skull Cave is a Skull Hot Tub. I wonder if this is an ancient natural hot spring that’s formed a crater deep in this cavern over the centuries, or if the Ghost Who Walks just ordered a regular hot tub from Home Depot and had his interior designer “cave it up a bit.”

Pluggers, 2/6/16

Pluggers know that, no matter what you say about the Nazis and the regimes that collaborated with them, they sure knew how to maintain law and order.

Mark Trail, 2/6/16

Meanwhile, over in Mark Trail, a thing exploded pretty dramatically. HAPPY WEEKEND EVERYBODY

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Mary Worth, 2/2/16

Huh, Mary’s trip back east seems to be turning into some kind of “let’s revisit old favorites” victory lap. Fresh off of sexually humiliating old pal John Dill (not in the way that he’d prefer), Mary rekindles her old love of ice skating. Let’s not forget that back in 2008, after seeing her old figure skating pal Frank Griffin on TV, she abruptly dropped everything to fly to New York and watch him browbeat his daughter Lynn into skating better. Mary disagreed with Frank’s coaching techniques, because they were making his daughter sad, but it turned out she was actually sad because a boy she liked died and so Mary good-copped her back into competitive skating again and everything was fine (?). Anyway, I certainly hope that as Mary and Olive are out there skating around Rockefeller Plaza, they encounter a deranged Lynn Griffin, doing aimless twirls, still hearing her now-dead father’s enraged shouts in her ears. “This lady doesn’t need my help, does she?” thinks Olive. “Probably not. Probably best to not make eye contact.”

B.C., 2/2/16

One of the interesting things about living in Southern California is that all of the non-religious iconography around Christmas involves festive winter scenes, if by “winter” you mean “winter in the Northern U.S. or Europe.” So much fake snow in so many window displays! That’s considered “real” American winter, even though we’re the most populous state! Factor in the Southwest and Deep South and I wonder if there’s more Americans than not who don’t see white Christmases. Anyway, I’m glad to see B.C., of all strips, acknowledging our glorious diversity of winter climates.

Six Chix, 2/2/16

Here’s a comic about a fish who jumped out of the fishbowl and his friends watched him die in agony and now they’re trying to convince themselves they didn’t see what they just saw. I’m not sure what the “joke” is, per se? Maybe the joke is that anybody thinks there might some escape from the prisons that simultaneously hold us captive and keep us alive.