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Mark Trail, 1/27/11

A couple of days ago a faithful reader left this comment on the blog:

Excuse me, but where the fuck is Mark Trail? Or has this site gone completely to hell?

I always feel strongly that foul-mouthed belligerence should get its way, so here you go! Honestly, I haven’t found the endless discussion of Ben Smith’s oversized lures (all the better to please a woman smuggle diamonds inside) particularly compelling, but I am enjoying today’s strip, in which Kelly natters on without waiting for Mark to respond. And that’s just as well, as I’m assuming that he long ago tuned her out. If we could see inside his mind, there would just be an adorable squirrel running back and forth on a tree branch, chittering amiably.

Apartment 3-G, 1/27/11

Speaking of tuning people out, this date has apparently gotten so dull that even Lu Ann has stopped paying attention to it. “Wait, you did what now? Spent money … on a thing … look, are we going to make out or what?”

Mary Worth, 1/27/11

Meanwhile, Mary Worth has hit a new crescendo of edge-of-your-seat tension, as Dr. Jeff seems insistent on forcing Mary to start using a Kindle-thing by any means necessary. Why is Mary resisting the 21st century so strongly? Does she fear that she might accidentally subscribe to this very blog, read about her adventures, and implode into paradoxical nothingness when she realizes she is fictional, and ridiculous?

Pluggers, 1/27/11

Surprisingly few Comics Curmudgeon readers have broken the Pluggers code — perhaps we all have too much dignity? — but based on the name I have a sneaking suspicion that “Kanomi Kelrast” is one of us. And if enjoying the occasional microwavable processed food treat makes us all pluggers, well, then so be it.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 1/27/11

Never doubt the ability of even the corniest strip to occasionally break your heart. The fact that Bearded Husband Whose Name I Forget calls his wife “Sugar Bun” in panel one just makes the strip’s comical misunderstanding all the more poignant.

Crock, 1/27/11

Wow, I never realized until today how few installments of Crock involve the title character’s romantic life.

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Hagar the Horrible, 1/16/11

At least one of you out there has, liked me, wondered about the relationship between Hagar and Helga and Lucky Eddie. Is he just Hagar’s shipmate and bosom companion? If so, why does he spend so much time with Hagar and Helga, even attending dinner with them? The answer might be implied in the degrading task he’s been assigned by Helga today: no doubt he’s their slave, presumably captured by Hagar during one of his raids on some peaceful, unsuspecting village somewhere along the shore of the Baltic or North Sea. Since only Hagar’s whim will ever be able to free him, and even then he won’t be a full-status member of the community, his “Lucky” nickname seems particularly cruel.

Panels from Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 1/16/11

Ha ha, it’s funny because these poor hillbillies have poor insulation, no central heating, and few garments to keep them warm!

Pluggers, 1/16/11

You’re a plugger if you’re old enough to use archaic dialectical terms for everyday concepts, and also if you had to get married because you knocked your girlfriend up on the chesterfield in the den.

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Ziggy, 12/20/10

Today Ziggy has gone to see Santa for what’s at least the third year in a row, and we really have to start asking ourselves why he’s doing it. The easy answer is that he’s there for unspeakable reasons involving children, but if there were easy answers to anything involving Ziggy, the strip would have been purged from newspapers, and our collective pop-cultural consciousness, years ago. Here’s my theory: do you notice that the children in all these panels are particularly loathsome and cruel? I think Ziggy has sought out the worst children he can find — perhaps he’s managed to find out when Santa is going to visit the Home For Very Young Delinquents And Sass-Talkers — just to see them insult the jolly old elf. This is Ziggy’s way of pulling himself out of his bottomless pit of low self-esteem. “At least I’m better than these brats,” he thinks to himself. “At least I’m not calling poor Santa fat. I mean, I’m thinking it, but I’m not saying it aloud. That’s the difference between me and them. That counts for something, right?”

Herb and Jamaal, 12/20/10

Note that Herb is drinking out of his “Herb” coffee mug, while Jamaal is drinking out of a mug featuring the elaborate monogram logo of the soul food restaurant he and Herb co-own, which combines an H and a J. In other words, Jamaal is honoring their friendship and business partnership, while Herb thinks only of himself. This has much more troubling long-term implications for the duo than the personnel changes at the local high school.

Pluggers, 12/20/10

It sure is hard for pluggers to deny the same-sex attractions that shame them so, but somehow the compulsive eating helps them push it all deep down inside, where it can’t get out.

Update: Uh, as faithful reader Ned Ryerson pointed out, I made basically the inverse of this joke the first time this panel ran this year. In my defense, it’s actually a sign of good mental health that I don’t keep an infinite mental file of all the Pluggers panels I mock. I’m still working on the infinite mental file of Mary Worth strips with a team of trained psychiatrists.