Post Content

Dick Tracy, 11/29/16

You have to give the new-ish Dick Tracy creative team credit for bringing the strip into something that’s semi-recognizable as the modern era. I mean, the strip’s trademark bit of gee-whiz futuristic tech is now on sale and really something of a niche market, which I’m not sure if that makes their job easier or harder! Anyway, today’s strip shows that Neo-Chicago’s Major Crimes Unit is really getting with the times; they’re less likely to get information by building long-term trusting relationships with street-level informants or via brutal beatdowns of suspected criminals, and instead are just trolling Instagram for pictures of people who seem reluctant to be photographed. Thank God Dick, at least, reacts in his usual inscrutable and incorrect fashion. “This is great. I want you to have the boys in the photo darkroom print up a blown-up version of this — obviously there’s no other way to get a better look. But that’ll take hours, so let’s the two of us head down to the zoo and start shooting first and asking questions later. Hopefully that blown-up photo will count as ‘probable cause,’ retroactively.”

Rex Morgan, M.D., 11/29/16

I was going to go into a riff about Sarah making fun of her one-year-old brother for not having any friends, but then I realized that Sarah doesn’t appear to have any friends either, especially now that the Morgans have abruptly cut off contact with her mobster patroness. Like, who would Sarah have at her fantasy birthday party with the clown and the bounce house and so forth? Would she invite the kid who made fun of her paintings, just so she could keep him on the other side of a velvet rope and make him watch her frolic, by herself?

Post Content

Judge Parker, 11/28/16

The characters in Judge Parker, who have spent the last few decades as the unquestioned lords and masters of all they survey, with people just handing them money and power for no good reason, have now been abruptly brought low by a series of tragic events. Frankly, we’ve all been so focused on Neddy’s factory disaster and Sophie’s kidnapping that we’ve neglected another damsel in distress: April, Judge Parker Junior’s CIA assassin wife, who actually vanished before the change of writers, after being sent to do One Last Job in Belgrade.

Anyway, Randy’s been pretty broken up about it, obviously, and today’s strip reminds us of a reality of the newly grim Parkerburg: our heroes are so emotionally bereft as to be incapacitated, but they’re still in charge, which means that vital decisions are going unmade. Look at that huge stack of paperwork! Randy hasn’t heard a case in weeks, which means probably there are some people in jail who have no idea if they’ll ever get to trial, or maybe some businesses in limbo because lawsuits they’re involved in can’t move forward. Is Randy a criminal or civil judge? Who even knows? The point is, he’s sad about his wife, and the rest of you people will have to wait.

Curtis, 11/28/16

Curtis’s dad is giving his son a crash course on what life is like in this fallen world, where a constant stream of resources are needed to extend the lives of anything, from an advertising agency to an apartment building to a human body. Of course, all this effort still won’t stave off your inevitable death, but that’s a story for another day!

Rex Morgan, M.D., 11/28/16

“Shhh, June, no. I know what you’re thinking, but it isn’t true. Sarah isn’t the way she is because you worked when she was a baby. She’s that way because we summoned her into existence via unholy, forbidden science! I swear to you we have the procedure refined now!”

Post Content

Mary Worth, 11/24/16

Oh, man, I will be extremely thankful if we get a hot, hot May-August romance between Iris and (stifles laughter) “Zak” in this storyline. Their love begins today as they admire in wonder each other’s names, which come from such different generations! Mind you, Iris was at its least popular in the ’60s and ’70s, the window during which I assume Iris was born, and has seen a real surge in the past 10 years, so I guess Zak is a pretty typical college student in that he doesn’t know any old people or children. Meanwhile, Iris already thinks Zak has a dope (as the kids say) name now, and keep in mind that she’s just hearing this spoken aloud, so she probably assumes he spells it “Zach,” like a normal person. Once she he texts her his info, the hip, edgy spelling “Zak” is going to blow her mind, unless she assumes it’s a typo.

Beetle Bailey, 11/24/16

You know what I’ve always been thankful for? That Rocky was just kind of a sullen, guitar-strumming dick who didn’t have a tragic backstory that explained why he was the way he was. Well, that’s over now, so thanks a lot, Beetle Bailey. (Because today’s Thanksgiving, I feel I need to clarify that “thanks a lot” there was meant to be the sarcastic kind of “thanks a lot.”)

Rex Morgan, M.D., 11/24/16

Hey, ever notice how Rex and June don’t seem to have any family they’re close to, or good friends other than Heather? Just thought I’d point that out for no reason, as they cluster at one end of what appears to be a long, empty table on Thanksgiving!