“Otto will not be distracted: the grave has been dug, only one of them can have Sarge’s affection.” –Old Man Shadow

“‘I wasn’t actually a spy, but I knew from experience that sometimes it’s better to tell an incriminating lie than the honest truth.’ –Thorvald the Treefucker, 873 CE” –jroggs

“Don’t worry, that flying sound was just Peter Pan. He’s coming through your window to steal your shadow, and there’s not a darn thing your parents can do about it. Well, sleep tight!” –BigTed

“Funny you mention our infamous cook, because guess who’s going into his pot tonight? Hint: it rhymes with woo.” –ectojazzmage

“I’m pretty sure the logical opposite of ‘it wasn’t Moe or Larry’ is ‘it was Moe AND Larry.’ Yes I, a professional computer scientist, have proved that this puzzle for children is internally inconsistent. No, I’m not proud of that.” –Stuart F

“I AM ONCE AGAIN WARNING REX MORGAN NOT TO COMPLAIN ABOUT THINGS BEING BORING” –matt w

“If you decide to depict a dog that walks on its hind legs, you should make all mammals in your comic strip bipedal. That way may lead to the Slylockverse, but at least it will add some visual interest to your work when you don’t have a joke for the day.” –Tabby Lavalamp

“I know it’s dark out, Helga, but remember this is November and you’re in Scandinavia. It’s probably what, 2 p.m. right now?” –TheDiva

“Li’l Sparky’s attempt to score weed completely fails.” –nescio

“…it’s up to them. But not if feeling good starts to alleviate their physical ailments. My AMA buddies will have him shut down faster than you can sing ‘Muddy Boots’…” –But What Do I Know?

“First it was NCAA athletes being able, after a century of exploitation, to sign Name, Image and Likeness deals. Now every Gen-Zer with a social media account wants their own brand deal. The Army, always chronically struggling to fill its ranks, will soon have to adjust to the times.” –Philip

“‘Hoo boy, what a bunch of nonsense’ he says after sitting in front of the TV for thirty minutes. Loath as I am to admit it, Rex Morgan, M.D. understands the very current concept of ‘hate-watching.’” –Ettorre

“Hmm, sounds like Sarge is referring to the Peter Principle, though while that was framed as a flaw in a hierarchical system, here is seems to be an intentional strategy to maximize incompetency, presumably to ensure they never get deployed to an active warzone.” –pugfuggly

“Hi and Lois has discovered mid 2000s Office-style mugging to the audience, adjust expectations for the funny page’s rolling delay on pop culture awareness accordingly.” –Dan

“So, today’s Hi & Lois expects me to believe that, in 2023, A) A suburban middle-class family with four kids and two working, salaried parents would only have one car B) teenage boys are still all-in on the sideways baseball cap wave C) you need a license to borrow 20 dollars. I’d comment on Hi reading a physical newspaper but I’ve written enough as is.” –Irrischana

“Is this Gil fantasizing about Bartender Gal (I forget her name and I don’t care to look it up) or vice versa? I’m guessing the latter: Gil seems too boring to engage in quasi-sexual gothic roleplay, but BG is probably naive enough to mistake his dull stoicism for brooding mystery.” –TheDiva

“I would have thought that the saints would have been a pretty austere group, but just look at them whooping it up in that first panel. Fuck yeah, it’s Saints Day Eve! We’re gonna sing ’til we puke!” –pugfuggly

“Today’s Family Circus made me reflect on that eternal theological quandary: do ghosts go commando?” –nescio

“Jeffy is unequivocally dressed as the Yellow Power Ranger Trini Kwan, who was played by Asian actress Thuy Trang. Trang tragically died in a car accident. Jeffy doesn’t know or care about any of that however; he is the Yellow Ranger because it helps conceal the urine he’s drenched in.” –Ambrose

“‘Graveyard gumbo’ is probably corpses, right? I’m more than a bit concerned that these two might not be cosplaying after all. Call the cops, Blondie!” –astroboy

“Keith is just looking at the bill. ‘$10 for a root beer?!’” –Flipper

“Sure, Crock, it’s all pun and games until the Algerian National Liberation Front hears of your weakness, your surviving soldiers betray you, and the two groups parade your bullet ridden corpse through the streets to the cheers of your readers.” –Old Man Shadow

“Killer is right to be upset. Beetle’s been busted down to E-1 many times already, and this violation of Article 106 of the UCMJ will end his career and freedom once and for all. Oh well, at least Beetle will have four-star General Lieutenant Fuzz for company in Leavenworth. All that said, Zero wins the award for worst costume, having shown up in his normal civilian attire.” –jroggs

“It will be more plausible when I poison him to death and pretend I didn’t notice he died. I realize I shouldn’t have said that out loud.” –taig

“Does … Beetle write home about Sarge? What’s the over-under on the family knowing more about Sarge than Buxley?? More evidence for my gigantic Sarge/Beetle folder, thank you.” –Pistol Pete

“To be fair, money coming out of an ATM will seem like a rare and delightful occurrence to your kid if you make a habit of sneaking up on them from the side and trying to flip the card into the slot without typing anything into the keypad.” –matt w

“Just a month ago, Hi stormed out of a shop that would not accept cash, but today we find out that the act of withdrawing cash is anxiety-inducing for him! Hi should settle on how to express his angst against the world. Maybe start an affair.” –Ettorre

“‘Rene Belluso? He’s at our window? He’s right outside?’ ‘That’s the television, Rex. We talked about this after you went outside to try to hug Big Bird.’” –Voshkod

“It’s funny because he wants to suffocate his wife so that he can sleep! I guess the upside is that he’ll only have to do it once.” –Pippy the Ziphead

“I gotta give credit to Gil Thorp: referencing a pop-culture-cum-sports phenomenon that’s less than two months old is a lot faster than I’d normally expect from a soap opera strip, which would normally take at least two years. In fact, it’s so quick — the Gil Thorp football storyline had already started by the time ‘Traylor’ started becoming a thing, and my impression has been that soap opera strip storylines are more-or-less planned out before they begin (though The Phantom sure has been casting doubt on that recently) — that it actually makes me wonder if something else is going on here. Am I suggesting that the whole Kelce-Swift relationship has been one huge publicity stunt for their cameo appearance in a newspaper comic strip, a medium people are barely aware still exists, that as a city slicker, I had never heard of before coming to the Comics Curmudgeon? Don’t be ridiculous. All I’m saying is, it would be almost diabolically clever if it was.” –Morgan Wick

“The weird phrasing here is actually because Crock’s mom didn’t buy a Harley motorcycle but a Harley Quinn statue. Crock asks the size, knowing with dread that it’s life size and exactly what his mother intends with it.” –ectojazzmage

“Me, if I won some money, I’d buy a working phone to go with this vintage handset. Then I could talk to people for real instead of ripping off Bob Newhart’s old routine.” –Peanut Gallery

“Hey, Crock got something right! Crock’s mother would be in one of the only generations still buying Harleys. Way to rub it in their faces that Harley-Davidson is a struggling company desperately trying to hang in there, crack Crock writing team.” –Tabby Lavalamp

“An erudite bear (not so vicious)/ Mistakenly used ‘meretricious’/ For you see, those who snore/ That he knew, were all whores/ But it’s ok because he’s fictitious.” –Marcus Theory

“I want to thank the creative team behind this comic strip for offering insights into the collapse of the French war effort in 1940. A military that concerns itself with cacti helps explain why the Maginot Line proved so ineffective and why Gens. Gamelin and Weygand stumbled so badly. ‘I see the Nazis are starting to build up their forces but, hey, that pine tree just got laid.’” –KMD

“Head for the nearest planet! Fortunately, the planets in this particular region of space are all conveniently clustered together like billiard balls. Unfortunately, that means we only have a short time to enjoy our stay on one before they all start colliding with each other like billiard balls.” –Peanut Gallery

“The visual setup in Crock is exactly the same as when depicting one character transforming into another. Perhaps the cook is the eternally boiling chicken, the instigator of his own torment, himself the damned punisher and the punished. Kinda makes you think, doesn’t it? The answer, of course, is no.” –Chance

“My favorite kind of Hi and Lois: Lois realizes that she’s trapped, trapped, TRAPPED.” –matt w

“I’ve never believed the whole ‘Millennials can’t afford houses because they waste all their money on takeout coffee and food delivery’ thing, but given that these vampires can’t afford furniture or even a second chair, maybe they have a point.” –Schroduck

“It’s kinda funny that the Perfesser’s date just whipped out one of her models right there at the table, but then again maybe this was her plan all along. ‘Say, have you ever wanted to own your very own set of quality Cretaceous-era dinosaur figures? They called them terrible lizards, but what’s truly terrible is paying too much for fine theropod collectibles. Why, with just five payments of $29.99, you’ll get…’” –pugfuggly

“Sometimes it’s not about the jokes, it’s about letting the reader know they are seen. Rather than the faux-populism of Pluggers celebrating the downwardly mobile direction of America’s working class, Hi and Lois lets the reader know they understand and will not offer false hope or try to fake some silver lining. Irma is every one of us who woke up, realized it’s only Tuesday, and we have four days to slog through until the weekend. Whatever the health benefits of Lois’s newest fad tea are, it’s going to take our reliable old vice of coffee to get us through the Sisyphean task of work and social obligations this week. [sips from oversized mug] See all you tomorrow for some more Comics Curmudgeoning.” –Philip

“Jughaid is right to object to Mz. Prunelly. This is the dangerous woke new math that improves test scores by forbidding children to even look at the problems. Traditional educator grandparents of America to the ramparts!” –I’m Not Cthulhu, But I Play Him On TV

“‘That’s one thing I don’t know how to cure. The FDA will not authorize experiments for my planned ‘Lobotomy 3.0.’” –Ettorre

“I would get tired of constantly looking up everyone’s nostrils if I were a character in this comic strip, though I guess in fairness they all would be looking up mine too.” –Just John

“From the look on Joey’s face, he’s ‘counting piggies’ to make sure there are enough after he eats one.” –BigTed

“And then he told me I’d already used up my feral days for the year, and if I took one more he’d put me to sleep. It’d make me so mad if my balls weren’t in a dumpster behind the vet’s office.” –Voshkod

“The most menacing part of Dennis is how he and Joey are testing the boundaries of the box that keeps them from entering our dimension. A part of a foot … fingers pressing through the wall of separation … a hurricane on the other side of the world … We are not ready. We are not ready…” –Old Man Shadow

“This is actually the writers telegraphing that this isn’t a real bear, just an insane prostitute in a fur suit.” –ectojazzmage

“Mention your line of work? You think I was proud of banging a square? These days I only have sex with revolutionaries. Occasionally a saxophone player. She was hoping her Dad was Gerry Mulligan.” –Ukulele Ike

“Somebody kidnaps you at gunpoint and shoves you in a car trunk, ehh, let it go. Somebody tries to drown you, yeah, I guess you can see how some people might be bothered by that. Absolutely the only thing that actually bothers people in this strip is not hearing their roots country when and how they want.” –Rube

“‘The new man assigned to the computer section isn’t working out, sir.’ ‘Why not?’ ‘He’s been running such CPU-intensive programs and diagnostics that he’s used up most of the fort’s whole monthly supply of kerosene.’” –seismic-2