“I’d like to think that those background panel colors are actually happening in-universe, and that there’s a free-wheeling gaffer just off panel trying to bring the General’s story to life through the magic of gels.” –pugfuggly

“It figures that Morgantown would feature a beige-and-black art museum.” –But What Do I Know?

“Dude is a terrible stalker. Broad daylight, lots of witnesses — including her companion — probably tons of cameras and on-site security. I mean, hiding in plain sight, I guess, but come on man, you’re just blowing it.” –Old School Allie Cat

“That’s actually the shade of Abraham Lincoln, plotting his return to save the nation by destroying whatever insufferable town Rex Morgan takes place in so nobody has to suffer through its roots country-obsessed inanity again.” –ectojazzmage

“Marty is in need of whichever 12-step addresses Jeckyll and Hyde transformations.” –MKay

“Beth starts the ’86’ process by soaking a rag from her bottle of ether.” –Hibbleton

“30 years from now, that little boy will learn that it means ‘two weeks,’ and be devastated that grandpa lied to him, and that he’s been wrong about it his whole life.” –Ignatz

“Nobody responds with ‘In a fortnight,’ like their sole reason for being is to force wordplay in a comic strip, Grandpa Pickles. Plenty of people do die of carbon monoxide poisoning though. ” –Tabby Lavalamp

“The guy in background is a maître d’ who has fallen on hard times and taken a bagging job. He went from commanding the staff of a fine restaurant to now having to stoically listen to a Midwestern bumpkin cow shit-talk cowpies that were specifically made to appeal to sentient livestock. Cows may have joined humans in intelligence and bipedalism, but they will never truly be as sophisticated as us until they learn manners.” –Philip

“Next, Sly’s going to waltz in and inform us that the Frankenstein knockoff won’t work because the electrical connections aren’t grounded, or some shit.” –astroboy

“Noir died as a genre with the invention of the water cooler. I want to see my hard-boiled detectives knocking back bourbon in the shadowy, smoky backroom of a decaying brownstone. I do NOT want to see them sipping mineral water in an air-conditioned, fluorescent-lit open-plan office grumbling about computer systems while carefully recycling their little paper cups.” –Schroduck

“Speaking of shooting, Dick’s been shot, right? He’s tenderly embracing the water cooler, leaning on it for support, to spare Sam — and us — the trauma of seeing his bullet wound? I can’t think of any other reason the art in three separate panels would be so reluctant to admit that Dick has a torso.” –Navigator

“Happy relationships rarely make comedy happen, and these bird ladies know it. Any good male partner they ever met had to be rejected to serve the comic strip. Their audiences of aged spinsters would never forgive them their happiness.” –Philip

“Egg-laying mammals are of course some of the most primitive, with a cloaca, five sets of sex genes and a lack of connective tissue between the hemispheres of the brain. They’re a complete anachronism by millions of years, in other words, perfectly suited to the Wizard of Id.” –I’m Not Cthulhu, But I Play Him On TV

“Coach Gerads says he’s heard folks refer to him as ‘the bad boy of Milford sports.’ I’ve never heard that, and no one I’ve ever talked to has ever said that, but that’s what he says. He also says he’s heard folks call Gil Thorp ‘the egg-sucking weasel of Milford sports,’ but again, I cannot confirm.” –Cleveland Mocks

“The latest Bland Love Interest (I’ve already forgotten his name and I’m not bothering to look it up) is conducting this date as some combination of a job interview and those painful icebreaker exercises they do at conventions, and honestly that’s a red flag as vibrant as Mary Worth’s Obviously Abusive Dirk and Rex Morgan’s Goatee McStalker ever waved.” –TheDiva

“I guess this all must’ve taken place back in, say, the nineteen-fifty-aughts, in an era when convicts wore black-and-white striped uniforms and kids wore beanies with propellers for some reason. It’s hard to remember from that long ago, but those were some tough times — heck, some folks couldn’t afford furniture in their kitchen or even doors in their house. It seems like pussycats were a bit more clever back then, though — you know, just smart enough to commit crimes, but not quite smart enough to avoid getting caught.” –BigTed

“They’re going to confront him with a particularly nihilistic piece of avant-garde art, leading to crippling existential questions.” –odinthor

“I suppose when your museum has an entire room with nothing but diplomas, you’re used to peace and quiet.” –Guts Dozier

“‘Belle’ from Florida isn’t a fling, she’s just a Disney fanatic who needed Wilbur ‘Beast’ Weston to complete the look at Cancun Cosplay 2: Beachside Boogaloo. Next year, they’ll reunite as Nemo and Dory at the Southwest Furry Convention in Needles, CA.” –Bull City

“I bet Thel didn’t figure she’d get so much trouble when she took Jeffy shopping for a… New Jersey! I hate myself.” –matt w

“For Pluggers I just assume the cast of characters are a troupe of actors from an improv group who got hired to star in a series of short vignettes sent in from readers. They are actually big city dwelling thespians with fancy art degrees and a relatively middle-class status thanks to regular work in the comics. It’s no Peanuts (in comic strip actor world, the phrase ‘working for Peanuts’ had the opposite meaning than for us), but anything that keeps you employed, and not in the political cartoons, is a win for many of them. Anyway, Claude has a wife, but she works outside the industry.” –Philip

“Oh, this one’s super-easy, and the kids will get it in a snap. Slylock opts for the lesser-priced wand because he’s heeded the words of veteran investor David Roche, who predicts a bear market in 2025 on account of smaller-than-expected interest rate cuts, a slowing economy and an AI bubble. So Slylock wants to save his investment dollars.” –Bob Tice

“Batiuk advances the radical eugenic proposition that if you are not tall enough to reach the high shelves you should not be allowed to own a shop.” –Ettorre

“I love Standard Sal’s name and facial expression. Yup, that’s me, I’m just a regular ol’ pig, down here at the market, selling my three common bubble wands so I can take my four fifty back home to my wife, Conventional Connie, and my kids, Common, Normal, Meh and Standard, Jr. in good ol’ suburban Typical Town.” –astroboy

“I appreciate that the bird refers to his fiancée as ‘the Widow Palmer’ instead of ‘Betty-Lou’ or whatever her first name is and I hope this continues throughout their marriage because I can’t think of anything funnier to cry out in orgasmic joy.” –Tabby Lavalamp

“‘How’s your vegan ice cream?’ is so menacing that Dennis has lost his raison d’être.” –Drew, on Bluesky

“It’s not your memory, Lois, it’s the fact that you live in some kind of constantly changing hellscape that makes reality itself impossible to grasp onto. Look: the walls changed colors and your teacup shrunk between those two panels! What even is ‘memory’ in that kind of a space?” –pugfuggly

“You need a brain cloud. It involves trepanation, a blender, and a diffuser. When it’s done, your brain will be floating around the room as a fine mist. You’ll feel much better. I have a drill if you want to get started.” –Voshkod

“Studies have shown that frequent web use actually does reduce our working memories, because we just assume we can find information right away by Googling — so in that sense, the internet really does become our ‘brain cloud.’ That’s something Dot would know if she spent more time on her phone like a normal kid, and less time conversing with her stupid parents!” –BigTed

“Hm I haven’t checked in on Gil Thorp in a while, I wonder what kind of sports-based fun they’re up to (in a featureless void, an unfamiliar figure beckons closer and whispers, ‘Don’t be afraid. Horses are prey.’)” –Dan

“‘Pluggers don’t smoke cigarettes’? Not feeling it. How about ‘Plugger edibles’ (a table full of food)?” –matt w

“‘Silver? Now THAT is a horse of a different color.’ — Sherlock Holmes, The Adventure of Brown Blaze” –Only Here For The Ads

“Okay, new pitch for a Dick Tracy spinoff comic: Those two sucky nephews trying and failing endlessly to open a jar of pickles, wrestling with it, themselves, and each other, often in bizarre and contorted positions. They could travel from place to place, entering and exiting stories and situations we never fully see, because our attention is focused rightly on their attempts to open this fucking jar like a goddamn pickle-based Sisyphus. Sometimes they affect those situations or are affected by them, and sometimes they just drift through them without anything changing, like leaves on the wind.” –Craig!

“I’ve seen things you people wouldn’t believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. The owls are not making life easier for Atazhoon tonight.” –Doctor Moreau

“Jughead chokes on his drink. ‘Not paying attention!? That’s so unfair! Don’t these girls know you have shit for brains!?’” –Hibbleton

“List five people you’ve haunted in the past week or you’re fired. Amazing how few ghosts can pass this simple pulse test. Worthless work from home slackers, scamming the ancient of days. I wouldn’t want to be in your sheet…” –Dennis Jimenez

“Looks more like a vast expanse of desert than a beach. Where’s the ocean? Are they spies, posing as confused tourists, sent by the US to monitor aboveground nuclear tests somewhere in Central Asia? With the prospect of capture and imprisonment, you’d think they’d set aside money for long-term dogsitting.” –A. Mulyak

“It must gall Mary to know that she can fill in for the perennial loser Wilbur, distribute her pearls of wisdom to the masses (via print?) and that as far we know no can tell the difference. By the way, is she doing this for free? If so, I have some advice for her.” –Kirkout

“Mary can’t be bothered with all the tedious Ask Wendy letters (‘I caught my boyfriend cheating.’ Zzzzzzz.) So she throws them away and is now just using the column as an opinion piece to spread her platitudes to the public at large. She’s never felt more alive!” –Cleveland Mocks

“I’ve heard of shaggy dog stories, but this guy actually grew a beard in the course of listening to this one.” –Dennis Jimenez

“A veterinary exam room having a big open window is so stupid I can’t even come up with a joke about how the human vet is wearing leg irons or something.” –Rex Thrillho, on BlueSky

“That the animals sometimes revert, Island of Dr. Moreau style, to their old instincts is tragically illustrated by Lady Lynx kicking the severed head off Max Mouse into the room. Before she got so upset, she was going to leave it in the doctor’s shoe. A little feline gift.” –Logar the Librarian

“I’m loving Glen’s reaction to Sophie’s story. ‘I’m sorry. Maybe it’s the 15 tiny beers I’ve had, but did you just use the words hack and drone with no regard to their meaning?’” –Joe Blevins

“Is it really an outrage to steal a body from a morgue? I’d think it would be worse if it were, say, the library or a supermarket.” –taig

“I’m not in the mood to deal with Mr. Parker right now. Or his brother. I’m Sorry, but they don’t have a Monopoly on my time. I’m not going to Scrabble around and take Risks for them just for the sake of some Trivial Pursuit. They should get a Clue!” –Peanut Gallery

“‘No offense, but I don’t think any advice can make me feel better right no–‘ the next moments are a blur. Dawn feels a disorienting rush and a sharp pain and suddenly she’s face-down on the ground, with a blunt weight on the back of her neck. Something has cracked, and blood is pooling underneath her. She doesn’t know what happened to the sun, everything is dark, like night. A voice appears to come from everywhere, asking what about now, Dawn? Do you think you could use some advice now? Suddenly everything rights itself. The light returns, the pain recedes, she’s standing upright, and only a faint taste of blood and a sense of vertigo suggest she didn’t imagine it. ‘Well then,’ says Mary happily, her blank eyes fixed on nothing in the middle-distance. ‘A home-cooked meal may do the trick!’” –Dan

“As the Saxons stormed the fort at Badon Hill, Arthur looked desperately for a weapon to turn the tide of battle. His eyes fell upon the table. The next table will lie flat, and our best knights will sit around it, he thought, but for now, improvise, adapt, overcome. The jarls and thanes would later speak in hushed tones about the moment the flaming wheel broke through the abatis, followed by crazed Britons, charging to victory. Of the anonymous workman who had built the table, nothing is remembered.” –Voshkod

“So is a meat bath when you sit in a bathtub of meat juices and drippings, or is it sitting in a bathtub of meat itself? Is the meat raw or cooked? Red meat? Pork? Poultry? A combination? Do Catholics substitute meat baths for fish baths on Friday? I need answers, yet I fear to have them.” –Lauralot

“Why is everyone wearing black in Dick Tracy? Did somebody die? I mean, I’m sure several suspects have, recently and gruesomely, but those usually don’t get mourned.” –nescio

“Silver, dead-eyed, stands pondering. How many teen girls has this been for whom he has served as a transitional object of affection, as they move from dolls to fathers to adult love and then their own foals and fillies? Silver cares not, he was gelded long ago. Now he is docile at best, saturnine at worst, on the cold and wet days when he has no blanket to keep him warm. As long as the oats come and the stable is mucked, he is content. Joy is the occasional apple or carrot, ecstasy the opportunity to run through grass. Tonight, the blonde girl will dream of Silver. He will forget she ever existed, until the morning. He is content, as content as any horse can be, or so he thinks.” –I’m Not Cthulhu, But I Play Him On TV

“The outfit says ‘genderfluid Realtor,’ the posture says ‘three-year-old throwing a tantrum,’ and the language says ‘parody of a nineteenth century robber baron.’ Someone needs to work on their branding.” –TheDiva

“I know that it’s all just for the alliteration, but ‘anachronistic’ seems like a particularly bizarre insult, especially for Dick Tracy. You’re calling cell phones with radio watches and driving 1940s electric cars!” –pugfuggly

“Toddlers bang on pots because they’re exploring their senses along with cause and effect. Dennis at five is well past that stage and is banging away noisily solely to cause Wilson a blinding migraine. And I find it hilarious. I’m a bad person.” –Hibbleton

“I can understand Americans doing a soccer comic during the Men’s World Cup (or the Women’s, if it were a female player on a screen). At a push, maybe the Copa America. But I’m meant to believe Leroy, the picture of suburban downwardly-mobile WASPism, is watching soccer in an odd numbered year, on a Thursday in February? What is he, some sort of European? What’s he going to get into next? Buttered crumpets? Shitty dance music? Recreational nudity?” –Schroduck

“I feel like this Aunt Claire person could learn a thing or two about nephew berating. There’s a lot of rich material in the Hall and Oates area, perhaps upon the lines of them both being Oates or something. It would be a cinch to work in the alliteration. Oafish, odious, onerous — shit, if you’re going to say anachronistic anyway, obsolescent is right there. Are you even trying, lady? Now I’m just getting mad.” –Violet

“‘When God closes a door, Jesus opens Windows. That’s how the phrase goes right?’ –Dan Piraro (probably)” –The Rambling Otter

“In 1944, when D-Day code words began turning up in the Daily Telegraph crossword, British intelligence was alarmed, figuring a spy was transmitting the invasion plans to Germany. The puzzles’ creator was arrested and interrogated. It turned out that he was headmaster of a school, located near a military base in northern England, who had his students supply words for the grid. The kids had heard soldiers using the code words but didn’t know their significance. I hope Jughead hasn’t written a bombshell investigative story, and that its fragments in the puzzle section won’t land him and Reggie in Guantanamo. No, wait, I hope that’s exactly what happens.” –A. Mulyak