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Apartment 3-G, 8/11/07

WOO-HOO, ALAN’S BEATNIK BUDDY IS BACK! If you don’t remember this bad-news countercultural type, check out his first appearance, from more than a year ago. Crazy kick! I don’t know if we knew before today that his name was “Jones,” though. I wonder if this fellow is actually the Archie gang’s resident nonconformist, Jughead Jones, all grown up, who’s traded his first name and his felt crown for a soul patch and a gig dealing weed (“good”) and smack (“bad”).

Momma, 8/11/07

I was going to write a screed about how if you weren’t a dedicated Momma reader, you wouldn’t get the “joke” of today’s strip, which is that Francis doesn’t really have a steady job and so “getting up and going to work” probably means putting in applications or working at one of his various menial but otherwise not particularly stressful jobs and that based on the level of dishevelment in his hovel, you might assume that he did literally work in a salt mine, albeit one with complimentary wake-up calls, and that furthermore this meant that nobody would get the “joke” in today’s Momma because there was no such thing as a dedicated Momma reader, but then I realized that I was a dedicated Momma reader and that I got the “joke” (keeping in mind that “getting” is not the same as “being amused by”). Then I was sad.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 8/11/07

Good news, everyone! Hugh’s conscious and his histrionics levels are back to normal!

Judge Parker, 8/11/07

All right, Judge Parker, you’ve been waving those things around all week trying to get my attention, so here it is: boobs. BOOBS. Boobs boobily boobs boob. BOOBS. Are you happy now?

Mark Trail, 8/11/07

Speaking of boobs: You’d think that Sam, who’s been through a lot with Mark, would take the lead in thanking him for his help in saving this small-town airport, which help mostly took the form of violence and threats of the same, but it’s her dad who’s doing all the jawing here. Still, in panel three it does sort of appear that she’s about to thank him … visually.

And now, a little something for the ladies…

Gil Thorp, 8/11/07

Legitimate questions were raised about whether yesterday’s crotchtastic Gil Thorp was really as crotchy as all that, or if it was perhaps just the view through Bill Ritter’s boxing gloves. There’s really no doubt today, though. No, sir. That’s quite the crotch shot. Yep.

By the way, if Bill were holding a pack of cigarettes and wearing chaps, panel three would look uncannily like an enormous Marlboro billboard that loomed a mere two blocks from my high school when I was a kid, I swear to God.

The Lockhorns, 8/11/07

Ha! It’s funny because Leroy has a crippling problem with alcohol! Funny!

Beetle Bailey, 8/11/07

Ha! It’s funny because General Halftrack has a crippling problem with alcohol, and is so drunk that he’s managed to intoxicate his golf ball, in defiance of all the laws of biology and physics! Funny!

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For Better Or For Worse, 6/12/07

So, Mt. Foob has gotten sick of my cutting decision to refer to the Milquetoasty-Potential-Love-Interest-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named only as “The Mustache,” eh? They’ve gotten so sick of it that they’ve chosen to remove his mustache, eh? Well, two can play at this game! From now on, he’s … The Vast, Disconcerting, Fleshy Expanse Of Upper Lip! Or TV,D,FEOUL for short. I can go as far down this road as you want, Foobmeisters!

I am in fact 99 percent sure that’s supposed to be Anthony, though he looks weird enough that I can understand the doubts. The tip-off is the freckles, people. I’m assuming his suddenly non-droopy features are a product of FBOFW’s patented “Sexy-Cam” technique.

I just want to say that I love the collection of bizarre, misshapen faces in the second panel. Apparently they saved money on the tent by just getting married at a circus freak show.

(P.S. Remember that bit of Foobery from T Campbell I solicited artists for a couple of weeks ago? The results are here. Sadly, we may be too late after all…)

Momma, 6/12/07

I don’t pretend to fully understand what makes a fellow attractive, but I always thought of Tony Blair less as “cute” and more as “pasty and somewhat weasel-faced.” (He’s gotten better looking with age, I’ll admit.) Of course, Momma has long been slightly obsessed with the attractiveness of prime ministers, so maybe this is all of a part. Maybe, like her brother Francis, Mary Lou just has a thing for the head of a cabinet government elected by a parliament. She just can’t get worked up about the separation of powers we have going on the United States, and wants Tony Blair and the sexy, sexy Westminster system he represents to come over across the pond.

I realize I’m just pussyfooting around the larger issue here, which is that this cartoon makes no sense. But it makes so very much no sense that I’m somewhat in awe of even approaching the lack of sense that it makes.

Pluggers, 6/12/07

Oh, come on, Pluggers! See, there’s supposed to be a little wordplay going on here to justify your existence; otherwise, there’s nothing but passive-aggressive anti-elitism and the least sexy furries known to man. Here, I’ll help you out. “Pluggers don’t use twist ties … they just give the bag a good …” Did you guess what the last word should have been? Something that appeared earlier in the sentence? Hmmmm?

Archie, 6/12/07

Overheard in the year 2015: “Boy, Archie turned into Tom of Finland-style beefcake so gradually, we all hardly even noticed it. And they all used to be so wholesome…”

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Dennis the Menace, 5/22/07

Dennis the Menace rightly gets flack on this site for his repeated failure to menace anybody, and today’s installment, in which he and his pal Joey take a whimsical trip down memory lane on the family footstool, would seem to be even less menacing than most. But think about it: Dennis is well aware of the fact that Alice, who used to have a name, and, moreover, an identity of her own, has now, by the very fact of his whelping, become merely an adjunct to his own larger-than-life personality. She’s no longer Alice Mitchell, and she’s definitely not Alice Whatever-Her-Maiden-Name-Was; she’s just “mom,” and, more to the point, she’s mom to the most hated child in the county. And Dennis looks pretty damn smug about this state of affairs. That sound you hear is millions of women across the country opening the cases that hold their birth control pills, double-checking to make sure they haven’t missed a day.

Hi and Lois, 5/22/07

I like the fact that Hi is not charmed by his twins’ antics, but rather stares at their handiwork in goggle-eyed panic. The lawn is shaggy enough that he can’t really care that much about the damage to the landscaping; rather, he sees that his golf dates, which were his only chance to get away from his hated family, will now be replaced by sullen putting around his backyard to delight of his squealing kids, followed by his suicide.

Crock, 5/22/07

Today we learn that the characters in Crock are in fact parasites who live their days wandering around the bright yellow flesh of some unimaginably huge being. If you had told me that somehow they’d find a way to make this strip even more unsettling than it already is, I wouldn’t have believed you, but there it is.

Momma, 5/22/07

Today we also learn that Momma’s Francis is into watersports, or maybe scat play. This revelation really ought to make the strip even more unsettling than it already is, but after I found out that Francis surfs for Internet porn while sitting right next to his mother, frankly nothing he does could possibly shock me.