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The Lockhorns, 10/20/21

If you’re reading this blog, I assume you’ve dedicated at least a little bit of your brain space to the question of why Leroy and Loretta, who demonstrably do not love each other, or like each other, or derive any pleasure from each other’s company, continue to stay married in this era of relatively easy-to-obtain no-fault divorce. They have no children that they’re staying together for, Loretta’s mother hates Leroy, Leroy has no family to speak of, they don’t seem to have any social circle that would be disrupted by a separation, so what are we missing? Presumably the depth of their dysfunction is so great that that they feel psychologically bound to one another, each of them profoundly unhappy but also unable to conceive of life without the other and the pain they receive and dish out by turns. Today, we see a key part of this dynamic: each Lockhorn must occasionally offer the other the free choice to leave or stay, the opportunity to head out the door and never return. Or to come back, if they want, and walk into the future together, hand in unlovable hand.

Mary Worth, 10/20/21

I’m extremely unsettled by the frankly erotic way that Wilbur is eyeing the discolored piece of meat (?) at the end of his fork in panel two. Wilbur can’t deal with salsa dancing, and we all know why, but if there are limits to his digestive system’s ability to process garbage, he hasn’t found them yet.

Funky Winkerbean, 10/20/21

It’s genuinely weird that Mason’s Lisa’s Story production had a wrap party but not even an extremely modest premiere party for the cast and crew, and even weirder that Les and Cayla didn’t even get a copy of the movie to watch. It’s also pretty weird that the Valentine Theater simultaneously was on the verge of failure in 2017 when Max was in his late 30s and then subsequently closed in 2021 when Max was in his late 20s, but let’s not dwell on Funkyverse chronology and think instead about how Les casually adds “or something” at the end of his last sentence here while cringing away from Cayla, as if he doesn’t know exactly where this strip club is and what its hours are. Now, a lot of Funkyverse characters would go to this strip club and talk loudly while getting a lap dance about how you used to be able to see classic serials like Radio Ranch there, but Les I’m sure approaches things with more dignity (he sits silently and contemplates the fact that the Valentine failed and took its owners’ dreams with it, just like everything else good in the world, because that’s what sex is, to him).

Shoe, 10/20/21

In the world of Shoe, birds hold down various human-style jobs, like publishing a newspaper, running a diner, working in a mortuary, running a dating service, and so on. Today we learn that fish in this universe have jobs too, or at least one job: to go to a lake and get murdered.

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Family Circus, 10/15/21

Wow, this one is pretty tough! Obviously it’s totally believable that Jeffy has managed to tragically injure himself due to his own clumsiness and incompetence; but it’s also very plausible that he’s covered with stains and bits of food, even though his last meal was several hours ago.

Shoe, 10/15/21

Big news, everybody! The Perfesser got hit by a truck. But he seems fine now? Plus he’s getting 35% of a pretty lucrative settlement. Things are looking up for him!

Mary Worth, 10/15/21

THAT’S RIGHT CAROL

BREAK HIS HEART

BREAK

HIS

HEART

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Dick Tracy, 10/14/21

Say, remember a few weeks ago, when Dick seemed to grudgingly agree that a free press is an important element in society and gave an interview to some lady from a newspaper? Well, surprise: that lady was a criminal, and Dick, who’s never forgotten a single misshapen criminal skull he’s laid eyes on, knew it at the time, but gave her the benefit of the doubt. Too bad, because it looks like she doesn’t even work for the fake news after all! Wait, does not working for the fake news make her better or worse? Either way, I’m sure Dick is regretting not shooting her while she was trying to escape from the interview.

Shoe, 10/14/21

I’m a strong believer in the Occam’s Joke Razor, by which I mean that when it comes to setup material, entities should not be multiplied beyond necessity. However, this should be balanced against the Law of Joke Specificity, which says that specific things are more funny the vague ones. Take today’s Shoe, for example. To set up the punchline, the lady bird needs to say she has a particular dream job, because it wouldn’t make a ton of sense otherwise; but the strip goes so specific, having her claim she wants to work at an English department store that went out of business in 2006, that you sort of expect that to feed into the punchline, when it really doesn’t. That said, I do enjoy the loving way the Perfesser is gazing into his beer glass in the second panel. I think we know what he is doing in his dreams when he’s not working, ha ha! (He’s getting bombed in the middle of the afternoon.)

Dennis the Menace, 10/14/21

Speaking of facial expressions, I am absolutely loving Alice’s face and body language here. This is the moment when she realizes that Dennis is never going to become a functional enough person to move out of the house, and she is not OK with it!

Mary Worth, 10/14/21

Speaking of facial expressions, I’m interpreting Libby’s here as one of grim determination. She’s not sure how many more piece of furniture she’ll need to piss on to break Estelle of the Wilbur habit once and for all, but she’s willing to do whatever it takes.