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Mother Goose and Grimm, 4/27/05

So many objectionable items in this strip: cannibalism, vomiting, racial stereotyping, the inappropriate use of quotation marks. Yet I can’t bring myself to object to it. Why? Because far from loving Ray Romano, I in fact hate him with the passion of ten thousand suns. You hear me, CBS? Hate! Now, I’m not saying that I’d like to see this Emmy-award-winning comedian captured by Dayaks or Fore tribesmen, cooked alive, and eaten in a ritual meant to bring power and status to the elite members of the clan. I’m just saying that if such a thing were to happen and I read about it in the newspaper, I wouldn’t linger over the tragedy for very long before moving on to the sports pages, if you follow me.

Still, I have a few problems with this strip. For one thing, why is it that our cannibal savages live in a palisaded hut, apparently beyond the reach of modern society (you can tell by the thoroughly 1980s wristbands they’ve adorned themselves with), yet still have access to modern porcelain toilets, and, presumably, municipal plumbing? Secondly, why would Ray Romano be wearing a pith helmet? And glasses? Ray Romano doesn’t … wear … oh, crap! These guys didn’t eat Ray Romano at all, just some random explorer dude named Raymond! OK, all this comic’s redeeming qualities have vanished for me. I hate it now.

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Mother Goose and Grimm, 10/26/04

OK, so why does recycling human corpses outrage me, but marrying the taxidermied head of a member of your species who’s been killed for sport make me laugh? I guess I’m just fickle when it comes to dark humor. It’s just wrong at so many levels that I can’t resist it. I particularly like the fact that it’s at the Elk’s Club. Ha! Get it? It’s like the Elk’s Club that exists in the real world, only it’s for, like, actual elks!

Ooog. To quote The Simpsons: “Are you being sarcastic?” “Aw, I don’t even know anymore!”

The other thing that I like here is that Ed is grinning kind of maniacally, while his wife (quite understandably) looks miserable, and the other guys at the club look … uncomfortable. Not the way you’d look if, say, one of your acquaintances presented you with a stuffed and mounted severed head and demanded that you treat it as his wife, but rather as if Ed has committed some social faux pas that they don’t really want to call him on but that they aren’t really happy about either. It must be tough being an elk.