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Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 9/21/17

In their blind haste to develop self-driving cars, elitist Google ignores nutritional needs of rural Americans. Sad!

Beetle Bailey, 9/21/17

Got the celery and the baguette, but still the lamest Art Frahm knock-off ever.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 9/21/17

Heather gets her longed-for baby, and Rex gets an ocean between himself and his patient. It’s win-win!

Sherman’s Lagoon, 9/21/17

Fascinated by the island monkeys, Sherman asks Big Kahuna to transform him into one. I’m more than a little concerned about this! “Beach apes” are food to Great Whites like Sherman, yet he becomes a primate every time he gets a chance. A dimwit shark is funny; a dimwit self-loathing shark is just confusing.

Gil Thorp, 9/21/17

Prodded by evil Uncle Gary, promising left tackle Rick Soto must choose between a chance at high school gridiron glory or wowing the Elks Club with 1928 Kurt Weill show tunes. Follow your extremely modest dreams, kid!

B.C., 9/21/17

You’d think a prehistory-themed strip would know a little more about reptiles.

Luann, 9/21/17

Tiffany put on some weight, which is somehow now everybody’s business. Her nominal friends spring into action: Bernice to read to her from that big copy of Cosmo, Dez to light calming incense, and Luann to set things up with the team.

— Uncle Lumpy

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Gil Thorp, 4/24/15

Don’t worry — Gil hasn’t squeezed all the air out of that blonde in the pink outfit and glasses; they’re actually two separate people. The one on the left is an Athletic Department admin, currently down in HR filling out a sexual harassment complaint. The one on the right is Marjie Ducey, the local newspaper sports reporter who shows up when the strip needs to unload some exposition.

So Wednesday night Aunt Lumpy and I were watching our beloved local major-league baseball team squeak out a win over their hated rival from the detestable Southern Part of the State, a team whose name is literally synonymous with evasion and cowardice. Watching a slow-motion replay of our heroic pitcher’s delivery, Aunt Lumpy wondered aloud “how do these guys not hurt themselves every game?” Now comes Gil Thorp, who is putting True Standish in as pitcher. You remember True Standish — the phenomenal nationally-ranked quarterback who has a scholarship lock at any college he chooses? The guy who led the Mudlarks to their first state championship since the Pleistocene? Accident-prone True Standish?

True to form, Gil cannot find a way to care about the kid’s welfare or future — his mind is all on wrapping up this interview and rushing over to his chiropractor’s office.

Mark Trail, 4/24/15

Wallace Wood “just wants one good year selling his lumber” so he can ask Susan to marry him. But ha ha, Nature hates Wally, and is determined to ruin his life. Parasitoids got the emerald ash borers under control? No problem, we’ll burn his trees to the ground. Fire goes out? No problem, we’ll get those beavers to put his land under water. Breach in the dam? Ha! That wolf will just stone-cold attack and eat Wally. Wally escapes the wolf? No prob, we’ve got a moose around here somewhere.

Find yourself a nice city fella, Susan.

Sherman’s Lagoon, 4/24/15

OK OK OK so Team Sherman here narrowly beat Paul Allen’s sub to sunken WWII battleship Musashi. They found the keys still in the ignition, and it started right up! But Allen’s research vessel, incomprehensibly armed, is closing in fast.

Allen, of course, owns the Seattle Seahawks, hated rival of our beloved local National Football League team, so I’m kinda hoping maybe the Musashi’s guns work, too? Is that so wrong?

Just a reminder that there is no Comment of the Week when I sit in — Enlong’s gem gets to ride up top a little longer.

–Uncle Lumpy

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Spider-Man, 8/10/13

Say, I like the cut of this Tarantula fellow’s jib, if Tarantulas may properly be said to have jibs. Check out the jaunty mask, cut to reveal the lush facial hair sported by men of his ethnic stereotype, and the long ties in back to accentuate the manly athleticism of his superheroics. Hear his speech, formal and polite even as he applies a savage beat-down to this hapless minion. All he needs is a little guitar riff every time he shows up or someone mentions his name. Costa Verde is lucky to have this guy — I mean, look at the motley, second-rate spider-themed adventurers other nations have to put up with!

There’s a missed opportunity in today’s strip, though: the Costa Verdan’s rifle really should be going <¡PUMM!>. But I suppose Spider-Man isn’t much of a stickler for sound-effects orthodoxy, is it?

Gil Thorp, 8/10/13

For weeks, Max ‘n’ Harry Herkelshimer have been lurching from one sandwich shop to another, talking about food on those rare occasions their mouths weren’t stuffed with it. So we should be glad some wrestling action is finally on the way, I guess?

But Gil’s “plan” sounds even more half-assed than usual, if that’s even possible. Based on his insight that Max “lives in the past” or some damn thing, Gil plans to impersonate wrestler Beau Dandy to give “Herk the Mauler” one last bout before he toddles on off into that dark night. How this would do anything but disorient and terrify an actual Alzheimer’s patient is beyond me, Gil admits he’s just winging it, and Harry thinks he’s nuts. But hey — there are two weeks before the start of football season, and they’re not gonna kill themselves.

Sherman’s Lagoon, 8/10/13

It’s Shark Week, the High Holy Days of the Lagooniverse, but oops!

The Giant Squid in Sherman’s Lagoon is the polar opposite of beloved comic relief characters like Pat Brady, Scrappy Doo and Jar Jar Binks. Squid’s rare appearances in the strip signal that it’s suddenly No Joke At All. And since he’s underemployed here, I recommend putting him on tour. He could thin the supporting casts of joke-a-day strips like Hi and Lois (Dot), Beetle Bailey (Gizmo, Lt. Flap, Killer), and Luann (Delta), then go straight for the leads in Dilbert, Crock, and Get Fuzzy. His work accomplished, he could retire to Funky Winkerbean, where he could find a place downtown and work at Montoni’s. He’d fit right in.

Funky Winkerbean, 8/10/13

Hey Rachel, you living at Wally’s now? I know a squid who might be interested in renting your old place. How’s your son? Enjoying his time down the Memory Hole with Gil and Mimi Thorp’s kids? Say, I know “plucky single mom” wasn’t as much fun for you as “high school sex goddess” — but are you absolutely sure “sad-sack Wally’s foil” is the right move?

Next: Band crap!

— Uncle Lumpy