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Rex Morgan, M.D., 4/18/25

The chronology of this Rex Morgan storyline flashback has now looped back around to the point where the beat cop who’s been summoned to deal with this inconvenient corpse is like, “Hmm, wouldn’t it be nice if I could successfully pin this on literally the first person I talk to, even if it is the guy who called it in to begin with,” and The Stalker Strangler: The Man Who Only Strangles Stalkers doesn’t like what he’s hearing. This was probably his first strangle, and he’s only now coming face-to-face with the dilemma of performing high-profile acts of righteous but legally unsanctioned vengeance: on the one hand, you don’t want to get caught, because you want to have more strangling opportunities, but on the other, you put all the work into strangling a stalker and then some other guy is going to get credit for it? Doesn’t seem fair, really.

Heathcliff, 4/18/25

I refer to our cats, who are both well into cat middle age, as “babies,” but that’s because they are not bipedal sapient comic strip cats but rather real-life cats who, like human babies, are tiny and cuddly and pretty stupid. The question of “is Heathcliff an adult” is complex, but the fact that he has a steady girlfriend and needs ED drugs in order to have sex with her is a good sign that he should be thought of as one, and thus today’s strip, in which his human companions have dressed him as a baby, taken him in an old-timey pram to the city dump and its vast open field piled high with undifferentiated brownish slurry, and declared that “it’s baby’s feeding time” while he eagerly licks his lips, is what we in the biz call “real sicko shit.”

Crankshaft, 4/18/25

Not much to say here about yet another Crankshaft word-mangling bit, though I do enjoy learning that Ed finds the daily grind of his existence disappointing. Mostly I want to point out the very purposeful way the waitress is striding away from the gang in panel two, probably because one of them said something really off-putting.

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Blondie, 4/15/25

When I read today’s Blondie, I had one immediate and overwhelming thought: isn’t Dagwood’s beloved living room chair blue, rather than the sort of grey-white we’re seeing here? Now, if this were a blog that, against all trends in online content production, had only been started a few weeks ago, I would’ve been stuck with that nagging Mandela effect feeling forever, as recent strips all had the grey chair. Fortunately, however, I have posted a statistically significant sample of Blondie strips every year for the past two decades, so I was able to do an in-depth study of this chair situation, and am happy to report that he had a blue chair in that spot since at least December of 2004, and was still sitting in it as late as April of 2024, which is a pretty good run for a chair, really. The grey one made its appearance sometime in the subsequent month. Too bad it’s the last thing he’s ever going to sit in, as the Council of Gynarchy has clearly decreed his execution, if I’m reading his facial expression in panel three correctly.

Mary Worth, 3/15/25

I was originally going to start this post with “I know Wilbur is hard up,” but you know what? Wilbur is not hard up. Between Iris, Fabiana, and Estelle, he’s had a more varied sexual history than just about any other recurring character in this strip. That’s why I’m saying something that I can’t believe I’m saying: Wilbur, you can do better than someone who tries to initiate sex by letting loose an evil chuckle. You really can! Dawn, meanwhile, once thought that the most brutal life could get was being dumped by some dude named Dave, but she never imagined that someday she’d be listening through Charterstone’s thin, thin walls to her dad fooling around with a lady who’s trying to kill her.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 4/15/25

Update to my previous Rex Morgan, M.D., update: this guy isn’t the widower of the late (?) former stalking victim Debra, but rather her father; and he didn’t shoot this guy with a magical booze and pills gun, but rather just strangled him to death with his bare hands. Don’t leave your windows rolled down when you pass out drunk and/or high in your car if you’ve made a lot of enemies, is the lesson I’m learning from this.

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Rex Morgan, M.D., 4/13/25

Oh, a thing I forgot to tell you about that happened in Rex Morgan, M.D., is that Summer managed to track down other people her stalker had stalked, and messaged one of them on Facebook while Augie was checking the perimeter. Apparently that lady, “Debra,” is dead (from … stalking?) or at least no longer in charge of her phone, and her … widower? … has it, and he got the message, which led him across town to confront the stalker … with a gun. A gun that shoots booze and pills straight into your bloodstream, I guess!

Mary Worth, 4/13/25

Hey, remember that time that Wilbur was having a fantasy about being a superhero, but actually he was having a series of wacky, clumsy misadventures while lost in his fantasy, but actually he saved a guy from getting killed, so maybe the superhero thing wasn’t a fantasy, after all? Well, I guess we’re seeing something similar here, with Wilbur saving Dawn from that poisoned tea in the process of reaching across the table for no readily apparently reason. Unless … he knows that the tea is poisoned, and just hasn’t said anything because he’s hoping to get laid a couple times before he calls the cops on his murderous paramour? I think we may have found a way for Wilbur to go Too Far, and I dread the consequences.

Dick Tracy, 4/13/25

Sorry, I misspoke Thursday, that guy with the flattop isn’t a cop; he has a much higher calling, as an insurance investigator, and he and the dentist are going to crack this case wide open. Imagine thinking you could disguise a corpse by simulating someone else’s dental work in a superficial way, without taking into account the natural wear and tear that occurs over time! It makes this good doctor furious, and he’s showing his anger by baring his teeth — his beautiful, beautiful teeth — as is custom among his people.

The Phantom, 4/13/25

Speaking of customs among the people, it seems our Wambesi city kid has gone straight from never looking down on the old ways to hopping straight over Chesterton’s fence into the Forbidden Zone. Sure, it’s not permitted for you to go in that direction, rube, but Nia has a metal detector and a shirt from the Gap. She’s going to be fine! Stop complaining!