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The Lockhorns, 4/21/18

You know, I have this vague idea that the names of foods sometimes have historical or religious meanings embedded in their etymology, so I thought that maybe there was some tenuous connection between martyrs and minestrone soup, but no, it just means, basically, “stuff that’s served” in Italian, so, yeah, this panel is literally just Leroy telling his guests “the meal we’re about to feed you sucks, so I sure hope you get some psychological kick out of suffering,” with no wordplay or jokes of any kind.

Shoe, 4/21/18

Haha, remember blogging? Remember when it was a whole thing, that people talked about and cared about, and it was going to change the world, somehow? Thank goodness those days are over! Thank goodness nobody is left who would think that substituting the word “blog” for other vaguely similar words in common English phrases is something that would be funny at all, or worthy of publication! [aide whispers in ear] Oh no. Oh my god. I’ve just been given some terrible news.

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Mary Worth, 3/7/18

Mary has tossed Ted Miller and his unpleasantness down the memory hole, and it seems that none of her supposed friends are going to really press too hard to get to the bottom of what happened. Certainly not Toby! Toby frankly doesn’t care about Ted Miller, who she can barely be bothered to remember as “Jeff’s friend.” Toby doesn’t care about anything that’s not a delicious muffin. “I guess it wasn’t meant to be,” she says dreamily, staring at the muffin in her hand with an expression of erotic languor that Ian has never seen over the entire duration of their marriage, not even once.

Shoe, 3/7/18

I’m pretty sure in Treetops the vultures are generally depicted as owning the town mortuary? This guy has a different name — “Dooley” instead of “Mort” — but it’s enough to establish that the corrupt Senator Belfrey is in the pocket of Big Death.

Dennis the Menace, 3/7/18

Usually Dennis’s parents are nothing but embarrassed when he perpetrates his menacing antics in front of other adults, but today they seems slyly pleased as he wreaks havoc all over the fancy tablecloth at this snooty restaurant. Maybe they’ve decided to weaponize their son’s bad behavior to strike a blow in the ever-running battle between snobs and slobs? “These assholes are gonna make people put on ties and they aren’t even really French?” the Mitchells think. “Fuck ’em.”

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Shoe, 3/1/18

I can imagine a couple possible genesises (geneses?) for this strip that are vaguely interesting as backstory. For example, this could be an instance of a huffy “look what these DEGENERATE LIBERALS are teaching OUR INNOCENT CHILDREN in GOVERNMENT SCHOOLS.” On the other hand, the fact that Shoe is full of bird-people might mean that the “polly”-“parrot” joke is meant to be understood in that context, and this is a shoutout to Shoe’s hardcore base of bird-o-sexual perverts who will be pleasuring themselves tonight to a vision of getting double-teamed by two brightly colored birds who can mimic human speech, including erotic talk.

Sadly, though, my actual assumption is that this strip has the exact same origin story as every other Shoe strip with the loose structure of “a teacher asks Skyler a question that he responds to ‘humorously’”: it’s an excuse to shoehorn in a joke or a bit of wordplay someone thought up, or maybe heard from somewhere else, and that’s it. Skyler’s expression of profound self-loathing in panel three is a chilling reminder of how everyone involved in the production of this strip feels about it, and themselves.

Mary Worth, 3/1/18

Mary Worth is of course a master of the fine points of etiquette, so I guess roast chicken is the official meal for letting your boyfriend know his friend tried to rape you!

Pluggers, 3/1/18

Pluggers’ bodies are breaking down so gradually that, when they do eventually die, it’s gonna take a while for anyone to notice.