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With literally no ado: this week’s top comment!

“Man, I can not wait for Mark Trail to tell us about the flora and fauna of Guantanamo Bay. ‘As I enter my fifth year of captivity as an enemy combatant, let’s look again at the common iguana. I call her Shirley. She’s my wife now.’” –Voshkod

Are the runners up almost as funny? You better believe it

“Max is looking all like, ‘You can steal hats from here? I’m totally stealing this hat! Solve this, Slylock!’” –Jfp

“Oh, are you thinking of buying a new hat, Max? Maybe interested in a new look? Yeah? That’s nice. You know what else would be nice? It would be nice if you finally got a shirt, freakshow.” –made of wince

“And the model for Wendy’s time machine is this desk lamp! And all the trees I draw are modeled on these paintbrushes! The thing is, I’m chained to this desk.” –Peanut Gallery

“The buried lede here is that the Wilsons have some sort of animal infestation they are about to have dealt with. The neighbor’s kid is still running around their house, though. So either they actually can’t stop him and George is sort of right, or they’re that indifferent to his health and safety and are the real menaces. (The second seems more interesting so I am guessing the first.)” –pachoo

“I have several warrants for arrest outstanding, so I avoid intersecting with police personnel whenever possible.” –Just John

“RIP Trixie” –matt w

“Beetle Bailey’s shape shifting powers did not come without a cost, as those who lost their lives when the building behind him suddenly shrank can attest.” –Tabby Lavalamp

“Who are you talking to, Buck? Rex left the room as soon as he heard ‘no.’” –Mr. A

“Hi can’t really cook but his kids aren’t much good at making puns so nobody’s perfect.” –Artist formerly known as Ben

“Hmm, which magazine was Dagwood test-reading? Oh, there’s one called Food. Do you think it was Food?” –Rita Lake

“Menacing and non-menacing: the two genders.” –Ettore

“C’mon, give me a break! My employment situation is precarious at best and my wife’s catering business is cratering because of the pandemic, so I have to be more prudent with my discretionary spending! It’s either slash my $1,000/week grocery budget, stop eating lunch at the world’s worst diner, or save $5 a pop by reading magazines for free! You do the math!” –Doctor Moreau

“Huh. Dawg is missing. [CHECKS YESTERDAY’S STRIP] ‘Nobody can boil a hot dog like you!’ Huh.” –Pakman

“Mary listens intently as Saul remarks about ‘long lags’ in Eve’s ‘response time.’ Has he stumbled upon her plan to replace the residents of Charterstone with robots? Damn, she thinks, I knew I shouldn’t have released Eve 2.11 until I got her Unix nice values optimized. Now Mary faces a tough choice: re-direct Saul away from his suspicions with muffins and platitudes, or feed him those week-old salmon(ella) squares and get it over with?” –Hannibal’s Lectern

“Eve was no lady, Jeffy. Read the story critically.” –jenna

“I guess a GTO is a car or something, and when Doug says ‘Found it in a barn, rebuilt it with my dad,’ I understand intellectually what he’s referring to. But with his oddly proportioned hand filling up half the frame, I have a hard time keeping my brain from drifting to wondering if his hand was rebuilt following a grisly accident in the barn, perhaps, and yet no girl can compete with it? Doug, honey, I frankly think you can do better than that fugly old hand. Gross!” –Duke of Early Grey

“Crankshaft seems to have entered her ‘shop’ just to brag that he has no intention to read anything, which I kind of respect.” –Jon Bennett, on Facebook

“I’m surprised that Dustin’s Dad was so intent on making a joke about his wife that he didn’t take the time to complain about his failure son talking with his mouth full.” –nescio

“When I consider how my shots are spent,
Ere half the game, in this dark world and wide.
And that one talent which is Loss to hide
Lodg’d with me useless.
‘Doth Coach exact day-labor, light-denied,’
I foolish ask.
But Mimi to prevent that murmur soon replies,
Milford hath no need of lock-down defense.
Who best bear my incompetent yoke serve me best.
They also serve who only stand and wait.” –But What Do I Know?

Remember: If you never want to see banner ads on this site, and want to get cool comment-editing features to boot, for a mere three dollars a month you can become a Comics Curmudgeon Supporter! If you just want to give me money directly, you can put some scratch in my tip jar, or back me on Patreon! Thanks to all for your support and readership!

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And this one is your comment … of the week!

“That last Crock panel speaks volumes. ‘Damn,’ he thinks, ‘He got me with the blacksmith ploy again. Shows me for letting my libido lead the way. I’m a simple man, really. Just want a cute, good-tempered dame who doesn’t heat metal and shape it with a hammer. Practical but fun-loving, caring but not smothering, completely unfamiliar with the bellows, the sort of girl you can take home to mother. Lord knows I’m not a demanding person, I don’t expect a perfect life, but is it too much to ask for someone who loves me as I am, wants to spend the rest of her life with me, and doesn’t forge curved iron objects intended to protect hooved quadrupeds? A pox on Captain Preppie! I hope he takes his vows at the anvil!’” –Urlance Woolsbane

Hilarious runners up, coming right up!

“Sorry, Daddy, you’re too old to pretend that your life could be enjoyable in any way, like it was before you had us!” –BigTed

“I will ask about the elephant missing from the room: Why the emphasis on Spark Plug being the grand-sire and not the sire of Li’l Sparky? What happened to the middle generation? I assume that Snuffy ate him decades ago and the strip’s creators are too committed to the Googleverse continuity to retcon him back to life.” –FE

“Barney Google: a century of not knowing what the hell horses’ bodies look like. (‘Oh, it’s just a big yellow bag with four potato-like blobs at the bottom.’)” –Joe Blevins

“Yes, pretty much everyone of every age in most of the country wears shorts when it snowed but is warming up, but do you stare expectantly at the fourth wall waiting for someone to notice? No? Then you’re not a plugger.” –ChicagoMSTie, on Twitter

“I’m going to try and take Sarge at his word and pretend ‘snack breaks’ isn’t a weird euphemism for ‘chronic diarrhea.’” –Spunky The Wonder Squid

“Like, dude. Libraries are more relevant than newspaper comics, old media shouldn’t be dragging on anyone.” –jerp jump

“The fact that an entire panel is taken up explaining that this comic strip is now about the former main character’s horse’s grandchild is much funnier than the strip itself.” –Rosstifer

“As a librarian who is also a millennial I really just don’t know who to root for in this Dustin (kidding, obvs, I’m rooting for everyone to vote yes for the library levy every time).” –Cana

“I’ve never been able to snap my fingers in a way that emits anything but a pathetic wee thud. And now, late in life, I find out that there are a fair number of us. I feel a warm glow of kinship with all you other non-snappers. But I still think we should exclude Billy from our snapless community. Requiring that each member have at least one finger with an actual joint doesn’t seem like too high a standard.” –Poteet

“The optometrist has figured out that the town’s tragedies are divine punishment for terrible jokes, and he’s got a family, damnit.” –Bill L

“Gil overhears Vic’s comment about leaving at halftime, and he is inspired to develop a whole new game plan for the rest of the season.” –seismic-2

“What’s truly menacing? Anaphylaxis, that’s what.” –Chip

“If Jeff approaching the kid’s head with sharp steel blades doesn’t cause Marvin to poop himself, what even is the strip doing?” –Tabby Lavalamp

“Saul was miserable until Mary made him her special project. Now he tries to complete the cycle by making Eve has special project. Which, as we all know, is a perfectly healthy place to start a relationship, right? RIGHT?” –Dread

“Isn’t it clear what’s going on, here? Marvin’s been banned from the baby salons. I’m sure you don’t need my help in figuring out the reason.” –mary!

Remember: If you never want to see banner ads on this site, and want to get cool comment-editing features to boot, for a mere three dollars a month you can become a Comics Curmudgeon Supporter! If you just want to give me money directly, you can put some scratch in my tip jar, or back me on Patreon! Thanks to all for your support and readership!

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Folks, it is time for your first comment of the week of 2021, but first, a link I have been sorely remiss in sharing with you: faithful reader Mark Carlson-Ghost’s comprehensive guide to Mark Trail’s long, weird history. Check it out!

And check out this week’s top comment!

“I’d love it if Tootsie had an alliterative nickname for everyone in her social circle. ‘So then Chatty Charlene told me that Frowny Frances never wants to see Hairy Harry again. Anyway, how’s Dumb… I mean, how’s Dagwood?’” –Mr. A

Also: Enjoy this week’s hilarious runners up!

“Happy holidays from Mary and friends! Well, she could only get one friend to be with her on Christmas — despite the fact that most of the others live in her building — and the one who’s there is mostly in it for the sex (or maybe the muffins). Mary’s advice? Try not to get estranged from your family this year!” –BigTed

“Wait, are they just piling up damp clothes? I know it’s winter, but good lord, at least hang them up. Slim’s nudist lifestyle will be mercifully cut short by black mold poisoning.” –Schroduck

“I like that the dude is drawing the line at killing five men. He’s just a murderer, not a mass murderer.” –Rube

“I like that a full panel of this is just a peace symbol. To remind us who the true enemy is.” –Joe Blevins

“Today I learned something: you can take two distinctive types of vagueness and abut them to create the semblance of a joke! ‘Boy, past year was quite difficult for a number of unnamed reasons. Not unlike the reports that you prepare about the various activities we perform at this company. Coffee?’” –pugfuggly

“Is Saul bangable? On the one hand, he still has all his hair, he regularly goes for walks to stay fit, and he’s never not in a suit. On the other hand: pink shirt, green jacket, beige slacks, and a yellow tie?!” –Ace

“Finally. Some ‘hot lady pulling on khakis’ action!” –lorne

“The Phantom needs someone to shoulder his blame
And so Hawa and Kay are pulled back in the game.
When a guy needs some stooges for damage control,
He can call on the girls of the Jungle Patrol.

That luchador hombre’s an obvious dupe
And Worubu is once again out of the loop.
The gals take up their rifles and shoulder their role
As the cleanup brigade for the Jungle Patrol.

The Patrol is a front for a thug wannabe
Who murders folks extrajudicially.
The girls are accessories, not in control
Of the crime at the heart of the Jungle Patrol.” –Uncle Lumpy

“There really is endless potential in these pluggerized slang terms for sexual partners. Like how a plugger’s ‘side piece’ is an extra order of curly fries, or how a plugger’s ‘young friend on the down low’ is a neighborhood kid who will take fifty cents to crawl under their porch and clean out the dead cats.” –jroggs

“Sorry, but that is infuriating. Curtis, you cannot introduce a talking, trunkless elephant and then end it with, ‘I’m not magic,’ and consider the matter closed. If this was the banal, The More You Know-style, ABC Afterschool Special lesson you were going for, why not use a wise old hobo/possible genie? That would work. Talking, trunkless elephant? DOES. NOT. WORK. I believe it was Chekhov who said, ‘If you introduce a talking, trunkless elephant into your comic strip on Monday, there better be some god-damn explanation for it by Wednesday.’” –Chance

“It’s so great I asked you out to do a thing I don’t like and turns out you don’t either!” –Jay Pennington, on Facebook

“Tootsie’s name was on the van, but after a strong cease-and-desist letter from Tootsie Roll Industries, they had to drop it. The band Blondie is currently retaining counsel.” –Voshkod

“Of course Marvin is number 2. What other number could he be? I’m so tired, you guys.” –els

“‘Ha ha ha! Imagine if this kid didn’t sit meekly in the corner, as he was told, but did so in a way that defied his mother! Wouldn’t that be outrageously rebellious? How wonderfully absurd!’ –The thought process of someone totally unfamiliar with actual children.” –Urlance Woolsbane

“I admire this guy’s outfit. Does he want to be a trucker, or a character in an old Woody Allen movie? Yes. The answer is yes.” –made of wince

“Wilson is telling the random vagabond he’s come upon that Dennis’s parents are just ‘ordinary people‘ and wouldn’t have the financial wherewithal or political connections to mobilize a large scale search should their child go missing or something.” –Hibbleton

Remember: If you never want to see banner ads on this site, and want to get cool comment-editing features to boot, for a mere three dollars a month you can become a Comics Curmudgeon Supporter! If you just want to give me money directly, you can put some scratch in my tip jar, or back me on Patreon! Thanks to all for your support and readership!