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Family Circus, 8/16/13

I freely admit to being charmed by the little drama in today’s Family Circus. It is a story told almost entirely in facial expressions. Dolly and Jeffy are largely uninterested in where they eat, so long as they get to eat soon; PJ doesn’t really understand what’s happening, but he can feel the anger in the air, and it makes him sad; Ma Keane is upset both about the sassback she’s getting and about the fact that once again she’s been assigned the role of the enforcer. And then there’s Big Daddy Keane and his eldest son, the axis around which today’s story revolves. Far in the background, but still deliberately made very visible to us, Daddy is practically glowing. It’s because he’s looking forward to an entire meal of adult conversation for once, of course, but it’s also because he’s getting to watch Billy get put in his place. Billy, meanwhile, is just as aware of what’s going on. He glowers back at his mother, seething at his banishment to the kitchen. Alone among the Keane Kids, he understands that the seating arrangements are based on status, and that he has fallen on the wrong side of the dividing line. Someday he’ll be at the grown-up table, he thinks, and the grown-ups will all be shut up in a nursing home somewhere, unvisited and unloved. Someday.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 8/16/13

Finally, after showing the main characters lounging around in their underwear and threatening to show them in a bikini and actually showing them in a bikini and having them walk in on people wearing just a towel and order people to take their shirts off — finally the strip gets to depict a naked butt. Jokes on you, prudes! That naked butt is a naked statue butt, so it’s art. Can’t argue with art!

Crankshaft, 8/16/13

Crankshaft’s viscera are still bathed in enough bodily fluids to keep them functioning, in case you were wondering.

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Mark Trail, 8/7/13

The cruelty of Nature is well documented, but the cruelty of Mark Trail, Man of Nature, retains its power to shock. Blissed-out Rusty nurses his otter and dreams of fishing, but mere days from now he will have neither otter, nor fishing, nor any last shred of hope. Mark just twists the knife, while Andy’s mind is all on dinner. Say — maybe they’ll have fish!

Beetle Bailey, 8/7/13

In the grip of his alcoholic hallucinations, General Halftrack misinterprets Lieutenant Fuzz’s invitation to Where the Wild Things Are costume sexplay. Lt. Fuzz takes it as a rebuff and retires to his quarters for another long night of Patton, tears, and self-abuse.

9 Chickweed Lane (panel), 8/7/13

OK, I take back all the terrible things I said about the Not-Ardins’ mouths yesterday.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 8/7/13

Heather’s hissy fit reminds Rex what June has in store for him when he gets home. Four months wasted figuring out Milton’s vomiting might be something he ate, and no boat or free meal in it for them anywhere? And now he’s supposed to look into the Alzheimer’s thing, too? These wealthy, entitled jerks! Why, if Milton weren’t his only patient ….

Shoe, 8/7/13

Well OK on the face of it this is one of those “reverse-engineered from the punchline” jokiform utterances we see so often in Shoe, Archie, and Herb and Jamaal. A real-life bird-woman would say, “I surprised my husband in fishnet stockings”, but where are you gonna go with that when you’re on deadline and that tee-time is coming up fast, huh?

But on a deeper level, blondie here is being really unfair — I mean, sometimes a fella just wants to feel pretty, and pantyhose is gross in August and it’s not like I didn’t double-check to see what time you were coming back. Wait — HE! He didn’t check!

— Uncle Lumpy

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Momma, 7/18/13

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised by the Momma-centric nature of Momma, but today’s strip really brings home how little energy the strip spends on the relationships amongst the Hobbs siblings. Is Francis just hanging out at Thomas’s house? Is this a thing that happens a lot? Do they have a close relationship? Is the whole “earmuffs” exchange a private joke between them, based on years of shared experiences? It surely can’t refer to actual, physical earmuffs, since none of those are visible or even implied in any of the panels here. Or maybe Francis has just learned to take Thomas’s intermittent delusions in stride!

Rex Morgan, M.D., 7/18/13

Good news, everybody! We’re temporarily done with “Life is too easy and it causes li’l Sarah ennui” and back to “Milton’s heart is going to explode.” Is Milton’s heart exploding right now, inside his chest? Is “10-41” secret doctor code/CB radio lingo for an exploding heart? Who knows! Not me, I’m not a doctor. I do appreciate panel two’s sexy nostril close-up, a traditional form of RMMD fan service that the strip has been far too stingy with lately.

Shoe, 7/18/13

In about 30 seconds these bird-men went from a serious discussion of a pressing issue that forces us to examine the very meaning of our political ideals to dreamily imagining an island made entirely out of pie. Or maybe just an island where pies grow on trees, ready for the plucking. It’s not entirely clear. The point is, though, that these bird-men are, in a profound sense, us. Mmmm, pie!