“I’m confused that the words on the cards are not only secular but seem to also have nothing to do with anything happening in December. ‘Hi’? ‘Greetings’? What else is in the box — ‘How’s It Going’? ‘What Up’? ‘Do You Have The Time’?” –jenna

“Mint is an aggressive plant that will take over your yard if you’re not careful. Maybe that was Mark and Cherry’s plan all along? The writing business is in worse shape than ever, so I wouldn’t be surprised if they’re being sponsored by Big Julep.” –BigTed

“The Newnited States government, in attempts to educate their most illiterate communities, have been injecting PBS style lessons into local news and radio broadcasts in far flung areas like Hootin’ Holler. While this same programming managed to boost science and math scores in many struggling urban schools, it’s never really taken root in the proud region of Hootin’ Holler, where throbbing pain in joints from old injuries are held up as most accurate predictors of changes in the weather.” –Philip

“Big Daddy Keane is not happy about being outed as these kids’ father. There was at least some plausible deniability before — he could have been their uncle, or handler of some kind.” –pugfuggly

“I feel like we’re sleeping on the background characters here. There’s the store detective, who’s been alerted that there’s a cartoonist in the building, and the social worker from Child Protective Services, who’s picked up a sweater for her husband while she’s here, but who is monitoring the little melonhead very, very carefully nonetheless. A tense game of cat-and-mouse begins!” –I’m Not Cthulhu, But I Play Him On TV

“Jared, having decided that his vast repository of mansplainable material is wasted on just one woman, is assembling a harem.” –MKay

“Presumably Dawn is going on about a dumb phone call from Jared because, while Cathy’s family takes her skiing at Christmas, Dawn’s dad ditches her and goes to Cancun by himself. Sad on so many levels.” –Twinkles the Elf

“How did you reply? I need to know because I’m desperately trying to learn the patterns of contemporary human speech, but my generative programming has only been able to use 18th century novels as a training set.” –But What Do I Know?

“It’s one thing to kill an animal on camera, but making the corpse participate in some memeable dance is taking it to another level.” –taig

“Or, ‘I assume this was made by Elon Musk — at The Boring Company.’” –Anonymous

“Not sure when Trixie started anthropomorphizing the sun as an elderly person, but it’s probably better than if she assumed it was a weakening god that needed to be fed the sacrificial blood of thousands of slaves to regain its strength.” –jroggs

“Sorry, Margaret. That’s not Santa. That’s Sam the Snowman from the 1964 beloved TV classic Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer … which is, you know … fine if you want a Burl Ives anthology record and some cigars for Christmas … which actually might be something an eighty year-old child might want as opposed to dolls or whatever Santa would bring, so nevermind … you text that letter to Sam, girl.” –Old Man Shadow

“Looking at Gertie’s expression, I think it may actually be good that her fixation is on NASCAR. She could have become a costly hypochondriac or an animal hoarder or someone who files lawsuits against all her neighbors.” –Poteet

“A squirt of Heinz on your Toll House cookie is the latest thing in elite culinary circles. Stir a spoonful of Dijon mustard into your coffee for an extra kick.” –Ukulele Ike

“Lack of aphrodisiacs in her diet or diminished libido due to oxidative stress caused by that factory in the background? You know, environmental exposure to di-2-ethylhexyl phthalate is associated with low interest in sexual activity in certain women, leading to … um, I’m sorry, I was just reading today’s Arctic Circle and assumed climate disaster was the daily punchline with this strip as well.” –Her Father, John Darling

“Obviously ‘I’m going to take two weeks to interview hurricane survivors in Tampa and then a solid month in Cancun’ means Wilbur is running drugs, but everyone’s like ‘Yeah you’re fleeing from your public humiliations, makes sense’ even though he hasn’t been publicly humiliated for at least three storylines. He’s got the perfect cover story! He’s a criminal mastermind!” –matt w

“Too many cringe memories. Like the time Mary talked me down from suicide? Pretty sus, y’all!” –Dan

“Wilbur’s words indicate that he’s learned from his mistakes and needs time to really reflect on the direction of his life. Wilbur not telling Dawn that he’s leaving for at least a month until he’s hastily throwing a few things in a duffel bag while keeping one eye on his Uber driver’s ETA indicate that he has not in fact learned a thing.” –TheDiva

“Dating a predatory wolf furry with huge boobs and a miniskirt is only the second most perverse part of Suburban Fairy Tales. The winner by a long shot is Third Pig’s horrible vest, running shorts and leather gloves combo.” –Schroduck

“Apparently Hi and Lois spend most of their alone time propped up on huge pillows, watching a TV placed prominently at the foot of their bed. Which is probably a good thing — considering the decade-and-a-half age range of their children, it’s not like they put a lot of thought into family planning during the rare nights when they turn off Kimmel.” –BigTed

“Our office is having a photography contest! Rules? There’s only one rule: no kids. Anything else, fine and dandy. Photos of the victims chained in your cellar? Hey, sounds swell! You’ll be competing with my elder abuse series, though, so you’d better be good.” –BeckoningChasm

“Dawn wants only ethical food to consume. Mary can no longer enjoy food without the taste of cruelty and the suffering of others. How will she resolve this wacky conflict? Eating Dawn is the obvious solution, but Dawn isn’t self-aware enough to feel suffering. It’s quite a conundrum for our eldritch abomination protagonist.” –Old Man Shadow

“Wilbur is out of town for Dawn’s storyline, just like she was for Wilbur’s storyline. It looks like their actors had a huge quarrel and now they cannot stand to be on set at the same time — their shared scenes at departure and return are filmed separately on green screen and combined in post.” –Ettore Costa, on BlueSky

“Dennis is an ageless being, millions of years old. He was there when the first archaic gymnosperm tree put out a tentative stunted seedling in the dark soil of Carboniferous era. An impossibly ancient creature, almost as old as the average Dennis the Menace reader.” –Schroduck

“I actually had trouble figuring out initially whether the oven mitts were part of whatever glop Mary cooked … I thought ‘Did Mary cook this woman a HAM? The new vegan???’ But then I realized that couldn’t be right, because the ham would have looked semi-appetizing and, well, also have been the correct color, neither of which seem to be actual strong points of Mary’s cooking.” –LTJpezcore1

“Jesus, just look at Hi’s panicked expression. It’s not just that he has no other ideas for gifts, it’s that he can’t even conceive of any. ‘Ok, ok … it’s winter … I could get them something warm … and colorful … that they could wear around the house on their fee– SHIT NO THAT’S SOCKS AGAIN EVERYTHING IS SOCKS!” –pugfuggly

“But … but you don’t have to type in ‘Add to cart.’ You just click the button that says ‘Add to cart.’ Is bird-lady up there shopping in a text-adventure game from 1987? Is she buying grues? the Coconut of Quendor? (I’d love to stick around to see if there’s an answer to these questions, but apparently I’m needed back at the old-folks’ home for whittling lessons.)” –els

“Josh might not appreciate the humor in this strip, but all across this fine nation many a 62 year-old or so office manager is chuckling lightly as they sip from their 1990s era Cathy ‘I Shop, Therefore I Am … Broke’ novelty coffee mugs originally bought at a Spencer’s in the mall.” –Philip

“The new Gil Thorp art leaves a lot to be desired but I can get used to it if it keeps depicting what appears to be a football player pooping out a football.” –Tabby Lavalamp

“I’m not convinced Sarge knows the word ‘effigy.’ He may be assuming it’s a fancy way of saying ‘his sleep.’” –Steph

“Sarge is right to be concerned. His troops will soon turn to actual human sacrifice when their burning a mere replica proves insufficient to stop the progress of history’s fastest lunar eclipse.” –seismic-2

“‘It’s easy for you to say now after all of that is behind you.’ ‘It wasn’t easy at all at the time, dummy! But it’s easy now that it’s all behind me! So there!’ ‘That’s what I just– you’re not even listening to– look, just tell me what I have to say to get you to leave.’” –jroggs

“Dr. Jeff notices Mary eating her dessert with a canapé fork and immediately calls 911 after disconnecting. ‘Hurry! She’s nuts I tell ya!’” –Hibbleton

“It was the least we could do — literally! Now, we’ll need to see a doctor’s note before we’ll come within 50 feet of you again. Love you, Mary!” –MKay

“Well, of course there are five clams in Santa hats! Good God, man, don’t you ever read the Bible?” –Handsome Harry Backstayge, Idol of a Million Other Women

“Floppy-haired semi-sleeveless T-shirt dude looks so sad about the proceedings. Turn that frown upside down! You haven’t yet been stabbed or bitten!” –matt w

“I don’t mean to downplay the emotional importance of Lois’ story, but Hi’s interest in the football game does have more material importance to the family and its future, at least if I am correctly reading his baggy-eyed expression as a sign he bet the next six months of mortgage payments on a prop bet for Broncos’ kicker Wil Lutz making this field goal.” –Philip

“Oops, looks like Snuffy tripped over his dog and fell right onto his Roland TR-909 drum machine. Who knew that Hilly Billy House was so big in Hootin Holler?” –pugfuggly

“Sent my mind down an absurd rabbit hole imagining an article in the future about how most readers don’t know why Mary Worth is called that since the original cast hasn’t been seen in decades, after it became about Wilbur falling into a sinkhole to Hollow Earth, unable to return.” –Jake Nelson, on Twitter

“I fail to see the irony. Beetle’s ancestors came over because of a potato famine, and it worked! Now Beetle has more potatoes than in the dreams of Olwen! If Beetle were lining up to buy fries from Killer at $25 an ounce, now that would be ironic.” –White Rabbit

“I’m extremely grateful for that bottom caption in Alice that clears things up after Alice’s reply, ‘Just don’t tell Mr. Bossman.’ For a second there, I was going to tell Mr. Bossman! Thanks, caption at the bottom!” –Chance

“In the first panel, this is just a harmless prank. In the second panel, the handle from the trashcan lid and the steering wheel from the truck have both been removed, so the trashman can neither defend himself nor escape.” –jroggs

“Mr. Bossman is the perfect nemesis of modern women, since he incarnates the authoritarian and hierarchical power of both capitalism and patriarchy. Believe me, it makes sense if you know Jungian archetypes! Or if you smoke the good stuff.” –Ettorre

“I haven’t read Alice before, I like the whole general vibe of her skull. It’s like when a comic book character has fire instead of hair, then an action figure designer has to figure out how the hell you do that, and the result is, like … mostly a head? You can call that a head, sure. You can tell the colorist is doing their best.” –Dan

“I thought the internet was killing print newspapers but only printing two pages, one of which is nothing but headline? That ain’t helping.” –Tabby Lavalamp

“Get in Gerard’s head. As soon as the ball is snapped, run full steam towards the Goshen sidelines and give that POS coach a concussion!” –seismic-2

“Gil’s idea of psychological mind-games is apparently just doing regular coach stuff, which probably explains why he’s so terrible at both coaching and psyching out the enemy.” –ectojazzmage

“For a moment, I thought the first word was ‘Merde!’, which opened up the potentialities of an intriguing new world of French intellectualist cynicism for Rex Morgan, M.D. [sighs] For a moment.” –odinthor

“Chip must have been the easiest baby to raise ever. ‘Just stop crying!’ ‘[sigh] Okay.’” –Joe Blevins

“Just wait until he finds out The Ghost Who Drinks is lactose intolerant. A pint of that milk stout and the Phantom will be launching gas attacks for hours.” –teenchy

“‘I know what I did was stupid’ should replace ‘This serial comic strip … features a no-nonsense, upstanding lawyer who stoically handles drama inside and outside of the courtroom’ as the syndicate’s official Judge Parker synopsis.” –Where’s Rocky?