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Mary Worth, 8/24/26

So, just to bring you up to speed on Mary Worth, last week there was no follow-up to Dawn’s single tear of romantic longing, and instead we got the sort of Mary congratulatory victory lap (Wilbur admitting to her at length that he was wrong to think ill of Dawn and Tommy hanging out and thanking her for setting him straight) that we’ve come to associate with the end of a storyline. So, it’s not clear to me if this BUZZ BUZZ! is Dawn-heartbreak-related, or if we’re starting a new plot, one where the United States has devolved into chaos and Charterstone residents now rely on the supplemental food supply that Mary was wise enough to establish. Sure, everyone seems pretty calm given that background, but you have to understand that Mary decides how many weekly calories your conduct has entitled you to, so nobody wants to get too out of pocket no matter how much panic they’re feeling inside.

The Phantom, 8/24/26

The Phantom was introduced to the world two years before Superman and three years before Batman, and I appreciate the way that he has stubbornly stayed a sort of proto-superhero rather than evolving with the rest of the cape genre (he’s never worn a cape, for one thing). So, for instance, he’s kind of like Batman in that he’s an ordinary human whose “powers” are the result of relentless training, but unlike Batman or just about any other superhero, one of his powers is that he’s really good at shooting guns. And he’ll do it, too! New problem on the horizon, like AI-controlled drones? Why not solve that problem by shooting at it, with guns? Let’s give it a go! Probably can’t hurt!

Herb and Jamaal, 8/24/26

You gotta admit, Sarah is taking a high-risk, high-reward strategy in this conversation. Sure, Jamaal was probably going to reply to her statement in panel two with a question that would allow her to bust out this sick burn, but wasn’t guaranteed by any means. What if Jamaal had been like, “Oh, he keeps saying he’s going to start working out, good for him!” and then, what, she’s going to say, “Uh, yeah, well, uh, guess what kind of exercises he’s doing. Just guess.” “Huh, I dunno, I told him he might want to start with some resistance tr–” “DIDDLY SQUATS”

Pluggers, 8/24/26

A public library is a plugger data center, in the sense that it’s something a plugger will go to a city council meeting to oppose because he thinks it’ll make his taxes go up.

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The Phantom, 7/30/26

The question of how an elected civilian government can keep control of its own security services is as old as democracy itself, and you have to imagine the issue is a delicate one in Bangalla, a relatively young post-colonial republic where the main paramilitary answers to a dude who lives in a cave and has much of the country believing he’s a ghost. Still, President Luaga is doing his best, letting the Ghost Who Could Probably Do A Coup If He Wanted know that he’s very disappointed about this whole “leave a supervillain in an open-air cage for years where it would be very easy for drones to free him” situation by glowering meaningfully during a Zoom call.

Six Chix, 7/30/26

Now, I’m not a doctor, but I am a comics blogger with literally decades of experience, and I can tell you that in both these scenarios that guy has Xes for eyes, which means he’s dead. Dead! Don’t worry, doctors, you don’t need to trouble yourselves, go about your business.

Gearhead Gertie, 7/30/26

I was going to do a joke about how all this time Gertie has yearned to be part of a throuple, and that the “3” t-shirts she wears constantly aren’t just about Dale Earnhardt, but I’m sorry, my heart’s not in it. Look at her face, free of any hint of guile or eroticism. She simply has done the minimum amount of mental processing necessary to respond — “husband not happy with wife? solution: husband get new wife” — while 99% of her brainpower continues to focus on watching and thinking about NASCAR, as per usual.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 7/30/26

The scam twins have decided to avenge their Uncle Rene by scamming the Morgans, despite the fact that he specifically told them not to, and have been staking out the Morgan house in order to plan their next scam move. Mainly what they’ve learned is that the Morgans are incredibly boring, which, no shit! Have you noticed that they’re barely in their own comic anymore? That’s because they’re even less interesting than whatever Buck or Auggie or Mud Mountain Murphy are up to. Do you know how uninteresting you have to be to make that happen?

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Crankshaft, 7/24/26

Boy, these multiverse stories sure get complicated! Like when Barry Allen Flash teamed up in the past with Jay Garrick Flash to battle The Thinker, The Fiddler, and Shade so Barry could persuade real-world writer Gardner Fox to write a comic book about their adventures! Or when Spider-Men Tom Holland, Andrew Garfield, and Tobey Maguire team up to defeat Electro, Green Goblin, and Doctor Octopus in Spider-Man: No Way Home to keep the hordes of people who know Spidey’s not-so-secret identity from overrunning our world. Or here, where transparent authorial self-insert character “Batton Thomas” teams up with opaque actual author self-insert character Tom Batiuk, presumably to Fight Crime. I don’t know, but if I were Lillian Mackenzie, Harry Dinkle, or Ed Crankshaft, I’d watch my back—these guys are cartoonists—they have erasers and they know how to use them.

Bizarro, 7/24/26

Whoops, looks like the stress finally got to our guy. Forget what I said yesterday.

Crock, 7/24/26

“At last! Our comic strip is saved!”

Phantom, 7/24/26

Chatu “The Python” has surrendered and put on the AI-enabled “Tokoloshe” control anklet, and I’m frankly a little disappointed in him. I mean, this is the guy who tried to Ebolify the whole world through an infected fruit-bat scheme, and blew up half of downtown Mawitaan just to get back at his nemesis the Phantom. He may or may not be a coward, but there is no way he’s gonna let some rich upstart out-evil him! All those years in that cage must’ve softened him up, or maybe he went mad from that interminable drum solo. Either way, get ready for an epic supervillain match-up and battle—now enhanced with AI!

No Comments of the Week on my watch; last week’s victor Victor Von gets a twofer.

—Uncle Lumpy