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For Better Or For Worse, 8/30/06

Never has the flabby make-it-up-as-you-go-along nature of the Foobian plot been on display as nakedly as it is here. I mean: How far away is Liz’s apartment from her parents’ house that she would considering moving back there to shave a little off her commute? And she’s been back down south for, what, three months now? Don’t they have leases in Canada, or are Pattersons just allowed to break them with impunity? And doesn’t Ellie have any say over whether her totally adult and self-sufficient daughter decides to up and move back in, or is she just going to go on with the passive “It’ll happen if it happens” attitude? These are questions that I want answered. In return, I’ll answer April’s question about why Liz wouldn’t want to move back home: it’s because she’s, like, 26, and living at home when you’re 26 and have a job is for looooooosers.

Dennis the Menace, 8/30/06

Speaking of losers, Dennis is continuing his trend of eschewing menacing, preferring instead to hone his floral-themed dinner-table bon mots. It actually took me about 45 seconds to grasp the “bud”-“blossom” wordplay going on here, and I finally only got the joke because of the presence of the rose on the dinner table, which I assume was intentional. Note to cartoonists: If you need to put in a visual aid to forward the cause of a pun in your comic, your pun needs work.

Slylock Fox, 8/30/06

Apparently it’s terrified prey week in Slylock Fox. As if the terrified beaver wasn’t traumatizing enough, check out the discarded ribcage, presumably of one of his family members, next to the crocodile on dry land. Today’s scene of the savagery of nature provides a backdrop for a true/false quiz. “True or False: Sometimes things that are cute and basically good die in agony for so that something more powerful and vicious can survive. (Answer: So very true!)”

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Slylock Fox, 8/29/06

Ah, what a cute little game in which little kids can hone their powers of observation … and learn that adorable, tiny mice live in a world of constant fear, knowing that at any moment a powerful predator might swoop down out of the darkness and rip their frail bodies apart with its ravenous beak and razor-sharp claws, devouring them so quickly that they’re no doubt still alive as they slide down its gullet. By extension, kids also learn that the world is full of things that are powerful and threatening, and that they have no hopes of surviving in it, and so should just stay inside their safe, suburban homes, never taking risks or exploring, until eventually they graduate from college with no life skills or sense of wonder or adventure. Slylock Fox: Breeding a generation of weaklings since 1987.

Pluggers, 8/29/06

Stupid Plugger! There’s no porn in there!

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Slylock Fox, 8/26/06

Poor Count Weirdly! Why can’t he draw the plans for his new lair, to be built on federally protected wilderness land, in peace, without that damn fox detective keeping tabs on his routine real estate decisions? The sheer density of creepy critters in this cartoon indicates that he needs a mountaintop castle with a bit more space. I like the fact that the Count eschews chairs in favor of a stubby butt-supporting beast that he presumably whipped up in his lab.

Family Circus, 8/26/06

Portrait of a vacation that has gone on too long: Dolly fills PJ’s head with libelous lies, Jeffy refuses to blow his own nose, and Billy, holding a purse for some reason, looks ready to get into the car of whichever stranger offers him candy first. Meanwhile, Daddy seems to be contemplating how far he can get from his family if he just starts walking and never looks back.