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Mary Worth, 11/21/12

In keeping with its overall M.O., Mary Worth is grappling with its current high drama in a weirdly blunt and concrete way that ignores underlying motivations and issues. To wit: Jim is a profoundly emotionally damaged creep who wants to be “more than friends” with Dawn because she reminds him of his dead sister (gross). He also has an irrational fear of water due to his own tragic boat-themed accident, and refuses to go to the pier because it’s “not safe” (because WHO KNOWS when some ferry is just going to stone cold slam into it, without warning?). Naturally instead of thinking, “Gosh, Jim is profoundly delusional and also creepy and controlling,” Dawn has managed to simplify this into a conflict about whether they should go down to the pier or not. If only some arbitrary compromise could be found to paper over this conflict, Dawn could live happily ever after with the guy who wants to have sex with and/or dictate every move of someone who looks just like his dead sister.

Judge Parker, 11/21/12

So it looks like this Judge Parker storyline is going to end without any chainsaw murder, but with all the newly introduced characters getting what they want — Bea a new business partner and/or boyfriend, Bubba a road out of the precarious marijuana business and into the no-risk, sure-to-succeed solar power industry, and Avery with a financial interest in both, a romantic interest in one, and a fishing hole he can go to whenever he wants to boot. But where is the lucrative financial windfall for our main characters, which is an important part of the resolution of any Judge Parker plot? At first I thought Avery’s back-cast talk was some specialized bit of movie jargon — remember, Sam and Avery’s completely conflict-free negotiations over movie rights to Judge Emeritus Parker’s book set this whole plot in motion — but no, it’s some kind of fishing thing, boring.

Shoe, 11/21/12

Longtime readers know that the patented Shoe Goggle Eyes Of Horror, in which a character reacts to a mildly corny punchline as if they’ve been told they have less than a month to live, are one of my favorite visual tropes in the strip. They’re a particularly funny overreaction when, as here, the character sporting them was the one who set up the joke in the first place. “Look, I just wanted to make a little joke about how the gender-coded cultural constructs of romance inform marketing for Mattel’s Barbie toys, and how that construct contrasts with real-world experience of monogamous, state-sanctioned relationships, but you … you took it too far!”

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Funky Winkerbean, 11/9/12

So, yes, as predicted, an innocent if somewhat ham-handed query about why the word “comic” usually means “funny” but doesn’t in the case of comic books has led to a week-long and increasingly self-important diatribe about the history of the medium and why it’s been forced unfairly into a ghetto where nobody takes it seriously, man (The question that was actually asked was answered fairy succinctly by webcomics hero David Willis.) Hat-bro has been allowed to occasionally say quasi-funny things this week making the point that, ha ha, this answer sure is going on for a while and is boring, but he’s now been silenced, and in today’s final panel the oppressive crush of verbiage manages to drain all color from the room as it reaches a critical mass.

Apartment 3-G, 11/9/12

Ha, so, Aunt Cathy, Evan’s mean girl aunt, is … running a publicity agency that competes with Margo’s? And Evan is secretly working for Margo’s agency as a mole? And he’s spiriting young starlets away to his aunt’s agency by convincing Margo that they’re rivals for his massage-y affections? This makes so much less sense than anything else I thought was happening, which is really something of an achievement.

Mary Worth, 11/9/12

Haha, I love Dawn’s wide-eyed expression in panel two, as she realizes she’s basically been given parental authorization to just stone cold make out with a bunch of dudes without having to worry about boring old “commitment” or anything. Of course, her new friend/love interest Jim is possessive and controlling, so I’m sure he’ll be thrilled to hear about her plans to play the field.

Shoe, 11/9/12

In world gone mad with ruthless and pointless competition, the Perfesser knows that the only winning move is not to play. That’s why he’s just going to sit in his overstuffed armchair with a beer, eating a pizza right out of the box, and staring at the TV with dead eyes until the reality show that is reality declares a “winner” he can get behind. Till then, he’s opting out of the whole thing. Where do you suppose the pizza box went between panels one and two? Do you think there are a bunch of other pizza boxes piled up there, wherever he threw it?

The Lockhorns, 11/9/12

Here … enjoy the greatest Lockhorns ever written.

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Gil Thorp, 10/26/12

Oh, hey, sorry I haven’t been keeping you up to date on what’s been going on in Gil Thorp, but trust me when I say that what’s been going on Gil Thorp is exactly the same thing that was going on when we last checked in with Gil Thorp — some Milford kids whose names I am not bothering to commit to memory are trying to make Irish Terry Gallagher into a star, for some reason — and it hasn’t gotten more interesting since. Today’s strip is mostly of note because the plot requires that characters find out information from a newspaper but somebody at some point in the creative process said, “Wait, kids don’t read the newspaper anymore, do they? iPads, kids love iPads, have them looking at iPads.”

Pluggers, 10/26/12

I love the bear-man’s facial expression and body posture of cringing terror here, as he becomes increasingly alarmed that he’s been lured to a non-plugger dining establishment, perhaps as some kind of trap. In fact, the bear-man’s wife is looking pretty smug, and it’s already been established that she’s not of plugger origins, so maybe it is a trap, or at least a deliberate attempt to drag him out of his comfort zone for the dual purpose of eating some non-deep-fried food for once and also seeing him squirm a little.

(Side note: I’m vaguely embarrassed to even know this, but Mrs. Bear-Man is actually supposed to be a kangaroo; I think the colorists have misinterpreted the ears and guessed that she’s a rabbit, thus the white coloring. Either that or the years of hated she-plugger existence have turned her normally brown pelt prematurely grey.)

Spider-Man, 10/26/12

Hmm, how to distract readers from the fact that Peter’s logic — “Kraven will steal that diamond tiara! Except, wait, that doesn’t seem like the sort of thing Kraven would do at all? Looks like I’m going to have to figure out why he’s going to do the totally out-of-character thing I’ve just arbitrarily decided he’s going to do!” — is completely insane? Hey, why not have Peter take off his teal suit jacket, hang it up on a weird, ill-drawn blob on the side of a building, and put on an electric blue suit jacket? Perfect! That makes even less sense!

Shoe, 10/26/12

“And I don’t care how much of the world has to be destroyed to lower those gas prices, as long as I don’t have to see it!”