Post Content

Mother Goose and Grimm, 4/10/21

I’m old enough to get the why of it, but it’s genuinely funny to me that “flatscreen” is used as a shorthand for a certain kind of luxury electronics, often with the connotation that it’s an indulgence you shouldn’t be spending money on. It’s literally not possible to buy a new non-flatscreen anymore (I’m sure there people who prefer such vintage TVs for their “warmer analog picture” or whatever), and you can now get flatscreens for cheaper, indexed for inflation, than CRTs ever were! Anyway, there’s a lot going on here, including (a) a therapist who looks like a 1970s (?) stereotype of a Freudian analyst, (b) Grimm is stealing things from Mother Goose, who he lives with?, (c) someone (Mother Goose?) is paying to send Grimm to therapy, and (d) they have pills for kleptomania now????, but for whatever reason it’s the flatscreen thing that jumps out at me.

Dustin, 4/10/21

Sorry, as an [extremely heavy sigh] daily Dustin reader, I reject the central premise of today’s strip. Dustin’s mom absolutely does not care if Dustin’s dad lives or dies. Nobody does!

Post Content

Dick Tracy, 3/22/21

OK, just going to admit that I do not get what Dick means by “not without 5G” in panel three. I’m assuming he means the wireless telecommunications technology and this isn’t some piece of cop/gangster/Dick Tracy-specific slang, but, even so: I don’t get it. I guess he could be making a little joke, like “With all the new 5G phones and great wireless plans they have out now, it’s never been easier to reach out to a loved one or drop a dime on your underworld associates.” But maybe it’s more “We’re not going to get him to talk unless we turn up the 5G mind control rays, and those libs at the CDC say we’re not allowed to do that anymore now that we know they cause COVID.”

Gil Thorp, 3/22/21

Oh, man, I haven’t been updating you on the Gil Thorp plot, have I? Well, good news: the Mudlark girls’ basketball team made the playdowns! [five minutes later] We regret to inform you that the girls’ basketball team’s magical playdown run is over.

Gasoline Alley and Mother Goose and Grimm, 3/22/21

God damn it, we went through all the trouble of setting up the shared “What hoary old joke are you going to use in your syndicated newspaper comic strip today?” Google calendar, but it doesn’t work unless everyone updates it!

Post Content

Six Chix, 2/4/21

Everyone of us, of course, it absolutely goes without saying, is familiar with the phrase “your house is so warm and fuzzy,” the completely normal and indeed beloved English-language idiom that we all know and love. But what if — and stay with me here for this one — what if we took this phrase, whose metaphorical meaning we all understand, and treated it literally? And what literal scenario springs to mind more quickly when you think of a warm, fuzzy house than a nightmarish tangle of enormous caterpillars, writhing in great piles on top of your furniture and yourself! That would indeed be delightfully droll, as their chitinous legs scramble for purchase on your flesh!

Mother Goose and Grimm, 2/4/21

Speaking of taking metaphorical phrases literally, here’s today’s Mother Goose and Grimm, which I actually enjoyed quite a bit. The key, for me, is that Grimm doesn’t live on a farm at all in the everyday world of the strip. It’s as if he was wandering through the countryside, spotted an open barn door, and thought to himself, “Oh ho, the perfect opportunity to really blow some poor farmer’s mind.” Then he leaned up against the barn and waited, sipping from the cup of coffee he brought with him for just such an occasion.

Funky Winkerbean, 2/4/21

Like every character in the strip that bears his name, Funky long ago learned to deal with the utter misery that permeates his world by suppressing all feelings other than smugness and whatever prompts the endless smirks (also smugness, I guess, though occasionally it’s also pun-recognition). But now that he’s about to go under the knife, he needs to experience a real emotion, for what might be the last time. He’s begging everyone to help him, but neither he nor anyone else knows how to even begin.