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Marmaduke, 12/1/06

Have you ever noticed that Marmaduke is allowed to just wander aimlessly around the streets of wherever it is that he lives, more or less unmolested by the long arm of the law? Today we may be learning why: he keeps homeless people from sleeping on the benches of this bucolic suburban town. Don’t listen to him, Marmaduke! Everyone knows the hobos keep old, stale bits of food in their beards for safekeeping! Keep rooting around in there!

The Phantom, 12/1/06

I’d love to see exactly what those resumes look like. “Longtime lackey seeking situation as assistant to thuggish crime lord. Skills include simpering, dodging shoes and crockery thrown in anger, Microsoft Office. References: Unfortunately all in prison and/or incinerated.”

Slylock Fox, 12/1/06

Good lord, can’t these kids engage in a little bit of childish fun — like lowering a head-sized slice of cake down from a treehouse — without every carbon-based form of life in the neighborhood staring at them with blank, expressionless faces? I’d be pretty creeped out if I were them. The dude with his nose over the top of the fence is particularly disturbing.

Crankshaft, 12/1/06

Crankshaft proves that, like its sister strip Funky Winkerbean, it too can bring the gut-churning bleakness. I love the expressions in the second panel: Everyone, particularly the young alterna-teen, seems angry and humiliated by the ‘shaft’s antics, and the old coot’s own face indicates that he’s all too aware that his own family mainly sees him as an embarrassment. This should be a fun dinner. The only bright spot is the hostess, who appears to have been charmed Crankshaft’s little joke. Maybe this is the first time she’s heard it, which means that she’s probably been working there for less than forty-five minutes.

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Say, let’s catch up on what’s going on in some of the serial strips I’ve been neglecting, shall we?

Mary Worth, 11/30/06

In Mary Worth, Ella is giving psychic marital advice to 1944 and ’48 Republican presidential candidate Thomas Dewey.

Gil Thorp, 11/30/06

In Gil Thorp, Bill Ritter has done some sort of grievous harm to himself with a chainsaw, possibly involving the loss of a limb. But the important is that now Stormy Hicks is a real hero.

Gasoline Alley, 11/30/06

In Gasoline Alley, Walt, in what may or may not be some elaborate metaphor for his death and/or apotheosis, has been hanging out at the “Old Comics Home”, and having a high old time of it — until today, when he encountered the terrifying, heroin-addled, twelve-foot-tall puppet-beast they have tied up in the back room.

The Phantom, 11/30/06

And in The Phantom, the-Ghost-Who-Is-Clever caused a villain-killing plane crash with the power … of psychology!

Which is kind of a shitty superpower, when it comes right down to it.

But it’s still better than anything Spider-Man’s got.

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They’ll Do It Every Time, 11/22/06

“Douglas Iannuci” is a distinctive name; having seen it fairly often in the comments section of this blog, it immediately caught my eye at the bottom of the TDIET. So take a bow, Douglas, from down there in the balmy Virgin Islands! I hope for your sake that the Pestina in your life doesn’t actually fly into these sorts of Scadutized rages over old flames.

For me, the best part of this cartoon is that Pestina is giving Fignewt the third degree about his prom, which, from all appearances, must have happened about thirty years before.

The Phantom, 11/22/06

The Ghost-Who-Walks has a whole bevy of tricks that work on two-year-olds. “See, he’s right there … GASP! OH MY GOSH, THE ONLY THING I CAN SEE THERE NOW IS AN OBJECT THAT IS LARGER THAN HE IS! WHERE COULD HE POSSIBLY BE???”

Gil Thorp, 11/22/06

You know, if I were Liz Ritter’s mom, I’d care less about some imagined defects in Stormy Hicks’ character and more about the fact that he’s a whiny little brat. “Waaah, everybody is paying attention to me and judging me all the time, waah waah waah.” If you haven’t been following Gil Thorp, words cannot even describe how uninterested I am in telling you how we got to this point. I mostly wanted to point out the dude half-heartedly doing the robot in the first panel, and say that “Liz Ritter all but forces Stormy Hicks to go to The Bucket” may be the greatest sentence every constructed in the English language.

Hi and Lois, 11/22/06

Since Lois is a classic cartoon stick figure, I’m not even going to get into the horrifying body issues going on here. I’m more intrigued by the fact that Hi is sitting unshaven, unkept, and decidedly unattractive on the bed in his old man pajamas, while Lois is parading around in what appears to be a football jersey over a slip. Presumably it’s the uniform of the local high school quarterback, who she’s banging on the side because her schlub of a husband can’t satisfy her.

Mark Trail, 11/22/06

Oh, man, say what you will about the interminable buildups in Mark Trail, but once the action starts, it does not disappoint. Check out the flying strands of mullet in panel two. It almost makes up for the semantic nightmare of a sentence coming out Mark’s mouth in panel three.

Mary Worth, 11/22/06

Ye cats, Mary has expressed a genuine human emotion! It’s only in thought balloon form, of course, and it’s evil, but it’s a start. Still, it’s kind of condescending of her to offer to run errands for Ella right after Ella makes a point of saying that she’s not an invalid. Maybe Mary will grab “Citizen Cane” (so awful, yet so awesome) as she heads out the door to make sure the new biddy knows who’s boss.

Yeah, that’s real funny, smart guy. I can’t wait to come back hours from now, when you’re still holding that balloon up in the air like a jackass.