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Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 8/20/21

The residents Hootin’ Holler were vaguely aware that some catastrophe had caused the collapse of the flatlanders’ Newnited States government, but in truth they had been isolated so long that it made little difference when they were cut off from the outside world altogether. But the older folks did have some poignant and unsettling moments, like when they realized that their entertainers were now doing performances based on their vague memory of an earlier generation of entertainers who were in turn imitating someone else who had been forgotten entirely.

Crankshaft, 8/20/21

As if living in a city devastated by war weren’t bad enough, imagine how awful it must feel to pick through the shattered ruins of your home, looking for prized possessions or maybe your even your loved ones, and knowing that somewhere, thousands of miles away, Crankshaft is doing wordplay about it.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 8/20/21

“Oh yeah. I’m going to have to invite Buck, aren’t I? I can’t even remember if he and I have ever met in this strip, but this is a Rex Morgan plot so I guess I have to pretend I find him tolerable or interesting.”

Mary Worth, 8/20/21

YES LIBBY

RISE UP

KILL

KILL

DESTROY

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Rex Morgan, M.D., 8/8/21

ME, MERE DAYS AGO: ugh, this whole thing with Sarah is so boring, can we please move on to someone else, even Buck would be better than this

ME TODAY: oh my GOD Sarah is about to DROP SOME ANIME KNOWLEDGE ON REX, this is the greatest moment in my life

Judge Parker, 8/8/21

Oh, hey, remember when Abbey decided she wanted to open a bed and breakfast at Spencer Farms, only to discover fairly quickly that running a bed and breakfast kind of sucks? Well, not long after that, there was a worldwide pandemic that really hurt the global tourism industry and, long story short, it looks like Abbey has decided to burn the thing down for the insurance money. Sophie is really selling her anguish! Probably going over the top, but it’s a nice little performance for a witness, just in case any arson investigators come snooping around asking questions.

Dennis the Menace, 8/8/21

I like Margaret’s bemused face in the final panel. It’s like she’s finally figuring out that these boys she spends way too much time with may be kind of dumb. Better late than never, girl!

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Rex Morgan, M.D., 8/5/21

It is truly amazing the way this strip has retconned its Sarah storyline from 2014, in which she made a lucrative book deal with the art museum, in the course of which she did a public event at which another kid was briefly mean to her but mere seconds later she rallied an army of the oppressed to turn the tables on her attackers, and also in an unrelated turn of events befriended a mob boss and acquired a brutal gangland enforcer as her babysitter’s chauffeur. At the time, Sarah seemed to be having a blast, but apparently the syndicate got an angry letter about the impact all this might have on a real child, because now it’s something that Rex and June talk about in hushed tones as the worst thing that ever happened to their daughter, worse than the time she got hit by a car, which erased year of her memory. Anyway, thank goodness we’re recapitulating this now and learning how a child can become a big creative success “the right way”: anonymously, after sending unsolicited fan fiction to their favorite author.

Shoe, 8/5/21

Not sure why, but for the many years I’ve been reading Shoe I’ve always assumed Roz’s was primarily a lunch spot? But the characters seem to be hanging out there more and more after hours, and this is clearly an end-of-the-day gripe session the Perfesser is having. Say, what do you think Skyler, the Perfesser’s nephew and ward, is doing at home while the Perfesser eats dinner after work by himself? What is he, like … ten, eleven? Does he know how to cook, do you think?

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 8/5/21

Snuffy Smith is the only comic in which I will accept a joke about how someone swapped two different kinds of bells as a prank and then everyone has a good hearty chuckle over it. Bells are Hootin’ Holler’s only source of artificial noise of any kind, so of course the inhabitants are going to be able to distinguish the subtle differences between the various types!