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Mary Worth, 6/15/12

Well, it looks like I need to stop making assumptions about people! I have always taken it for granted that Wilbur’s advice column was called “Ask Wendy” because there was in fact a “Wendy” persona — a smiling, attractive, late-middle-aged female avatar who served as the public face for the column. Moreover, I assumed that the few dozen elderly shut-ins who made up the column’s core audience would be made profoundly uncomfortable knowing that “Wendy” was really a man with a wispy combover who tucks his too-tight polo shirts into his jeans, and so Wilbur toiled on his column behind the scenes, getting no recognition for a job mediocrely done except for the huge paychecks that everyone in print media gets. But apparently Wilbur is well known to all as the brains behind Wendy, which is why another platituder can’t just be plugged in seamlessly while he jets off to Italy. Except that also means that the new fill-in Wendy will also be visible to readers at home, which means that maybe they’ll like her better, especially if Wilbur’s bold italicized JUST FOR THE SUMMER (…the summer … the summer …) is as foreshadowy as it looks. At least Wilbur has made one vaguely smart business decision: he hasn’t mentioned actually paying Mary anything yet.

(By the way, if you haven’t read this 100% amazing interview with Mary Worth writer Karen Moy about Dawn Weston yet, you really, really need to do so right now.)

Gil Thorp, 6/15/12

Sorry everybody, I just can’t get into this Gil Thorp teen pregnancy storyline, even now that it’s escalated to a mass team walk-off in support of their persecuted teen mom pitcher. I do want to point out that even the narration box has gotten bored and is now experimenting with sassiness. (“Um, not exactly…” is fairly low-level sass, but cut it some slack, it’s just a simple narration box.)

Judge Parker, 6/15/12

“Doesn’t the weather understand that rich people are planning on enjoying themselves outdoors? I’ll have my assistant call God at once and get this all worked out!”

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Mary Worth, 6/8/12

I was about to make fun of the very concept of offering to find some random busybody to fill in for you on your job while you jet off to Italy for two months, but then I realized I’ve actually been on both ends of this scenario — I’ve covered for someone on vacation, and I’ve conned one of my friends into doing the same for me. But that was for weeks, not months, and the work involved was your typical mid-’00s freelance web dronery, not a crucial task like writing the “Ask Wendy” advice column for Santa Royale’s top newspaper. This seems like a much more shocking abdication of responsibility.

Anyway, Wilbur is so excited about the idea of Mary filling in for him as Ask Wendy that he’s forgetting the #1 rule of finding a temporary replacement for yourself, which is that you don’t want them to be so good that they become a permanent replacement. Mary is of course an advanced advice-giving practitioner, and while I don’t know exactly what Wilbur’s advising skills are like, I’ve seen how he lives his life, and I’m frankly pretty unimpressed.

Apartment 3-G, 6/8/12

“Something has changed. I feel different. Oh, hey, looks like I had my baby while I was asleep! Whaddyaknow, I was all freaked out that it was going to kill me and it turns out it didn’t even wake me up. If only Scott were here to see it. Oh, why did I push him away?! Oh, right, because of the whole thing where he was macking on some other chick. That’s actually a pretty good reason. Welp, guess I’ll go get breakfast. Do babies eat breakfast? Enh, I’ll figure that out later.”

Marmaduke, 6/8/12

OH NO MARMADUKE HAS LEARNED TO HARNESS THE MIGHTY POWER OF THE SUN

NONE OF US IS SAFE

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Judge Parker, 6/5/12

That’s quite the sly and sinister expression Sam’s sporting in the final panel there … almost as if he’s thinking “With the contract signed and the money on its way to Alan’s bank account, I can take these saps up to the Old Cherry Creek Lodge at Payton Crossing, where I dispose of the dismembered bodies of all of my victims! Abbey, please make a note of their names on my ceremonial Clipboard of the Doomed.”

Actually, “The Old Cherry Creek Lodge at Payton Crossing” sounds like a ghastly faux-rustic luxury condo building in a meticulously landscaped and completely soulless exurban development, which, if you think about it, is exactly the sort of place where Sam would stash corpse parts if he were a serial killer.

Spider-Man, 6/5/12

Meanwhile, I love the expression of pure joy on the face of … whoever that is with the microphone in panel two. The broad shoulders and brush-cut imply that he’s a sportscaster who’s been assigned to cover theater as some kind of punishment, and over the course of the first act he was horrified to learn that you’re not expected to or even allowed to offer a stream of loud running patter about a play the way you do at football games. But now something interesting is happening! Something you’re allowed to talk, or at least, whisper, about!

Mary Worth, 6/5/12

Wilbur’s editor is maintaining a poker face, but you know that it was really difficult for him to not dissolve into giggles while saying “Did you fall in love with someone new?” I mean, he’s probably been on the verge of hysterics from the minute Wilbur walked in wearing that suit.

Six Chix, 6/5/12

Ho ho! Turns out Larry’s bad at sex!