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Family Circus, 7/7/08

The Family Circus has a long list of crimes that it will eventually have to answer for, but I’m hard-pressed to remember any of its offerings being as visually unappealing as today’s. Faithful reader Dean Booth has already taken things to their logical and repulsive conclusion (warning: very very very gross), so I’ll just point out that in the middle of this filth-eating mess, Jeffy appears to be concerned about his girlish figure. I was going to chalk this up to unrealistic body image propaganda coming from the media, but then I got a look at his disproportionately large ass. Dolly is kneeling, but Jeffy appears to be able to just about put his feet and his butt on the ground simultaneously. It almost looks like he’s wearing the bottom half of a fat suit, or, perhaps more realistically, like he was assembled from various mismatched parts.

(I wrote that last sentence intending to mean that this particular drawing of Jeffy might have been assembled from bits of other drawings, obviously, but I do admit that the idea of the middle Keane boy actually being an unnaturally reanimated collection of corpse parts robbed from the local morgue is deeply pleasing to me.)

Zits, 7/7/08

I like the way Connie appears to be leaning as far away from Jeremy as she can get and still stay in the frame in panel three. It’s like she’s suddenly been forced to visualize her teenage son getting “hands-on learning” from Mrs. Graworski, his biology teacher, and her skull is involuntarily attempting to flee from the source of the offending image.

Pluggers, 7/7/08

Pluggers so enjoy rubbing their carnivorous habits in the face of tree-hugging hippies that they’re willing to pretend to believe in evolution to make their point.

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Dick Tracy, 6/18/2008

OK, so Dick’s waiting for a robbery, and Shirl tells the crime boss to wait for Dick’s move. We’ll check back in six months or so: maybe a meteor will hit or something.

Gasoline Alley, 6/18/2008

Yeah, that meteor thing? Could totally happen! But this is just poor Rufus trying to navigate between his hallucinatory Messiah, celebrity cat-chef Meowrice, and the hellish pit of his own despair. Also, “. . . eat and drown our sorrows. . . ?” Rufus looks a tad old for Similac, and not quite ready for Ensure.

Gil Thorp, 6/18/2008

You know, not long ago this strip was flirting with linearity, coherence, and representational artwork. Sure dodged that bullet, didn’t they?

Pluggers, 6/18/2008

Clenching extra-hard on her cigar butt, our noble plugger vows that this time she won’t forget to ask Dr. S. for her Aricept® refill.

You know, all these comics are from the Tribune Media Service. If I were Chicago’s Department of Water Management, I’d be looking into that.

— Uncle Lumpy

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Mark Trail, 6/14/08

Ever since Roger appeared with his little pencil mustache, the odds were good that he was going to get punched; but what would his transgression be? Now it’s becoming clear: he’s going to try to put the moves on Cherry! Whether it’s because the sight of her pink shirt and mom jeans and essential purity has inflamed his passions or because he and Kelly are engaged in some elaborate and sinister game of “good porn producer, bad porn producer,” only time will tell, but clearly villainy is afoot here.

I know we’re supposed to be outraged on behalf of the Trail household at Kelly’s big-city sneering, but you have to admit that the scene is kind of rustic, and the hosts aren’t exactly up on what constitutes hospitality, if panel three is any indication. “Lunchtime, everyone! Here’s a big bowl of ice! Go on, eat up, I’ll make more!” On the other hand, the ice may have been requested by Kelly and Roger for their movie, possibly for genital-cooling purposes.

Marmaduke, 6/14/08

Hey there Baldy McNeighbor, you look pretty smug for someone who’s about to be devoured by an enormous, hungry dog.

For Better Or For Worse, 6/14/08

You mean everyone who comes is going to get really high and end up encrusted with filth? If only, kids.

Pluggers, 6/14/08

You’re a plugger if nearly everybody you grew up with is dead.