Post Content

Shoe, 8/13/10

This diner patron has suddenly realized that the ambiguities of the verb “serve” could be deadly in a world of talking animals. We already know that the birds in the strip eat other birds, so why wouldn’t Roz just kill her bird-man customer and feed him to a fish-man? No reason. No reason at all why she wouldn’t. Better tip big, bird-man!

Family Circus, 8/13/10

The whole “Keanes go to the beach” storyline we’ve been enjoying (for certain limited definitions of “enjoying”) over the past couple of weeks is, as several readers have pointed out, a repeat from the ’70s or ’80s. Certainly that was a more innocent time, when Jeffy’s brazen nudity was merely implied and not rubbed in our faces.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 8/13/10

“No, yore paw is passed out, from th’ likker.”

Post Content

Jumble, 8/6/10

Well, the climax of the Jumble’s three-day slide into degradation and sleaze is frankly a little anticlimactic. A couple of bluehairs scandalized by porn? Enh. I’d prefer a couple of bluehairs discussing their favorite smut stars, myself. Still, points for rendering the lascivious leer on the gentleman in the poster so evocatively in the small space allotted.

Shoe, 8/6/10

It saddens me sometimes when I discover that I have an emotional connection to minor characters in even the lamest strips I cover. For instance, that bird-man on the left is longtime strip feature Senator Batson D. Belfrey! He should only be used to make toothless jokes about politics, or (occasionally) toothless jokes about alcoholism and/or man-sluttery. It irks me to find him here setting up a Generic Shoe Gag, when there are dozens of interchangeable clip-art Generic Shoe Birds that could be used for this purpose. For shame, Shoe creative team, for shame!

Luann, 8/6/10

You know, this is the sort of strip that gets me emails like “OMG Luann today OMG!” All I can say is: are Brad and Toni still not smelling each other, or at least doing so off-screen? Then everything is just fine with me, thanks. The loving depiction of Knute’s sexy shoulder blades is just icing on the cake.

Post Content

Archie, 7/23/10

You know, I actually feel kind of bad for Archie, here; his facial expression in the third panel, though partly masked by terrifying clown makeup, really is sort of heartbreaking. Archie’s a nice guy! He only wants the best for Veronica, at least when he doesn’t want the best for Betty! Why won’t Mr. Lodge love him, or at least treat him with grudging affection? With all the mean things Mr. Lodge has said to Archie’s face, you’d think there wouldn’t be anything he could say behind his back that would make Archie so upset, but there he is, looking like the saddest clown in Riverdale.

Archie, you don’t want this heartless plutocrat’s love! Look, he’s currently smugly reading his own autobiography, Me! Not that he wrote it himself, mind you; he passed that duty off to one of his minions, which is why the author photo is actually of the money he used to pay the ghostwriter.

Shoe, 7/23/10

The Inappropriate Goggle Eyes of Horror are one of my most favorite visual tics in Shoe; these occur when a Shoe character encounters a typical lame Shoe punchline and reacts with a facial expression more appropriate for someone who just heard news about a fresh round of genocide. It’s common enough that it’s actually sort of remarkable when you don’t see it, as you don’t here. What is the distinction between punchlines that elicit goggle-eyed horror and those that do not? They all seem equally tepid. Is Shoe’s desperate alcoholism just such a well-known part of his personality that nobody bothers to react to it? Or is the Perfesser even more numb to life’s horror than usual today?

Crock, 7/23/10

Well, I guess this week’s evidence is that Crock is just going to hurl headfirst into horror and nightmare. If they’re going to go that route, I wish they’d do a little fact-checking. For instance, generally speaking germs are used in germ warfare rather than chemical warfare.

Mary Worth, 7/23/10

Oh, God, please let the Oedipal Complex be one of the Freudian theories Mary disputes. “Tell me about your mother. She and I are probably about the same age. Do I resemble her … physically?”

To avoid having this conversation, Dr. Mike has clearly chosen suicide. In panel one, his face twists in pain as he plunges that pencil he was playing with into his gut; in panel two, his expression goes slack as he finally finds peace.