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Gil Thorp, 2/21/20

I know I’ve been “letting you down” when it comes to the Gil Thorp updates this basketball season, but I think I’ve built up a lot of trust over the years as the guy who reads the comics so you don’t have to, so please believe me when I say that it’s because the strip has been extremely dull. Alexa Watson is very smart and competitive and has to learn to be moderately more aggressive on the court, and so has been trying to shift her everyday mindset a bit to get her there and that’s been … it? Sports? Sports action? In Gil Thorp, the comic strip about sports? I know, nobody is more disappointed than I am.

Dennis the Menace, 2/21/20

One duty I will never shirk is the fulfillment of my ongoing mission to keep you appraised of Dennis Mitchell’s wild oscillations between menacing and non-menacing, and I don’t think I need to tell you where “extremely excited about the possibility of electronic correspondence” falls on the spectrum.

Pluggers, 2/21/20

Pluggers will grab onto any possible human connection, even if it’s tenuous and accidental, as tightly as possible. All their friends are dying and they’re terribly, terribly lonely!

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Beetle Bailey, 2/7/20

I admit that I’m fascinated with the way that comics use fire hydrants as just a visual signifier for “dogs peeing”. Like, most people know that dogs just pee … pretty much anywhere, right? They like vertical surfaces and like peeing where other dogs have peed, but in a pinch, they’ll just go wherever. Inside the house, or barracks, for instance, if nobody lets them out, despite their clear signals that they want to go outside. Weird the Sarge assumes “horny” or “hungry” but not “has to pee, the thing we all know dogs have to do several times a day.” I do kind of enjoy how big the hydrant is in Otto’s vision, almost filling the frame, as if when a human had to use the bathroom all they could visualize was an enormous toilet floating in an otherwise featureless void.

Pluggers, 2/7/20

Welp, it finally happened: all the “pluggers are old/indulgent grandparents/the salt of the Earth/owners of crappy cars/better than city folks/hate and fear technology” suggestions have finally, finally run out, and all that’s left in the barrel is gibbering nonsense like this. I’m really looking forward to this new direction!

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Mark Trail, 1/6/20

Hey, Mark, I just want to point out that you’re on an expedition through the Nepalese foothills of the Himalayas, something that most people would consider the trip of a lifetime, and not only are all your expenses being taken care of but you’re earning your salary by being there. And all you have to do in return is write an article about it; if you actually do find a yeti, it will be the story of the century, of course, and if you don’t, well, there are all sorts of angles you can take about your weird trip with an obsessive, larger-than-life personality that will both entertain readers and allow you to work out any feelings you have about Dr. Camel. My point is, maybe you don’t have to act like such a giant pissy baby at all times? Just a thought.

Slylock Fox, 1/6/20

I really feel sorry for the kids in this strip, not just because they have arrived with big, eager smiles at Career Day to learn about some potential job possibilities only to be fed a bunch of patented Slylock useless-fun-fact bullshit, but also in a larger sense because the Animal Kingdom that they inhabit seems to have an entirely pedantry-based economy, and their post-graduation career prospects are extremely gloomy, as the entire society is probably already overdue for a collapse.

Pluggers, 1/6/20

These are this plugger’s last words because he had a massive coronary later that afternoon. “Famous” is probably a strong word, but when his wife and their friend finally connected and heard about the last phone call he took, they had a good chuckle about it, anyway.