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Crankshaft, 8/23/11

One aspect of the Funkyverse that is correctly only dwelled upon by a limited number of comics obsessives involves the question of intra-universe chronological continuity: what happened to Crankshaft when Funky Winkerbean jumped forward 10 years? I say “correctly” because really the timelines of all non-Doonesbury non-FBOFW comics, which generally run for years and years and yet the characters never get any older, is totally mucked up, so really, there’s no point in dwelling on it. The fact that the Funkyverse strips are permitted by a morally bankrupt comics industry and a loving God to continue spreading soul-killing gloom via the last few remaining newspapers is a Funkyverse dilemma that is incorrectly only dwelled upon by a limited number of comics obsessives, but that’s neither here nor there.

ANYWAY, for those of you who care, today’s Crankshaft confirms what we’ve all suspected, which is that Crankshaft’s universe never got time-jumped, and so the action in his strip is taking place about a decade before the current mopery in Funky Winkerbean. Here we see future Les romance victim Cayla, still sporting an Afro and still probably capable of experiencing joy. What event in the next decade will reduce her to the straight-haired, Les-proposal-accepting broken shell of a human that she is to become? Will it be because of something terrible Crankshaft is about to say to her this week? Yes, let’s go with that, it seems like a pretty safe assumption.

Spider-Man, 8/23/11

Another thing that’s only of interest to comics obsessives: changes in comics lettering style. More often than not this indicates that one of the dwindling number of holdouts who still hand-letter their strips have finally given up and start using a computer font. You can spend a bit of money and get a font based on your own handwriting that is almost indistinguishable from it, or you can make like Spider-Man and use the font that’s one step up from Comic Sans. Today our cyberletterer clearly was having so much fun playing with italics and bolded italics that they neglected that other great digital advance, the spellchecker, which probably would have helpfully noted that “copsin” is not a word in standard English.

Archie, 8/23/11

I actually completely love the middle two panels of this strip; Archie and Reggie’s mirrored angry faces together make a minor pop art masterpiece. The same could not be said for the hideous shirt that’s the source of the disagreement, which lends the whole dispute a certain air of absurdity.

Gil Thorp, 8/23/11

Guys, if you don’t find Kenny’s “‘Course not, mom. You were bombed!” response to his weeping, emotionally shattered mother hilarious, then I’m not sure if we can be friends anymore.

Marvin, 8/23/11

At last, the strategy behind Marvin’s constantly filthiness is revealed! By establishing an ever-expanding sphere of poop-stench centered on his person, he is marking his personal space.

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Mark Trail, 8/3/11

Oh my goodness, is something new and different happening in Mark Trail? Longtime readers know that the only good guy characters in Mark Trail other than Mark and his family are (a) square-jawed lawmen, (b) eccentric but lovable cabin-dwelling rustics, and (c) little children who love animals. The only acceptable bad guys are (a) animal-nappers, (b) smugglers, (c) thieves, (d) nature-hating developers, and (e) corrupt politicians. Nowhere on this grid is there room for a mysterious individual or group who attaches gold bands with bible verses on them to hapless geese. Who is this bizarre goose-centric sect? Are they a band of apocalyptic hermits who believe that these majestic birds with their huge wingspans and trumpeting cries are the angels spoken of in the Book of Revelation? Will their religious certainty resist even Mark’s fists? Will they kidnap Rusty and mold his feeble, pliable mind to match their monomania? I am extremely interested in finding out.

Spider-Man, 8/3/11

Exciting as it is to see a continuity strip do something new, it can be reassuring when one of them keeps on with its usual antics. For instance, Spider-Man is still an incompetent feeb! All’s right with the world.

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Spider-Man, 7/14/11

Oh boy, this bespectacled lady wants to capture Spider-Man, in photographic form! This is delicious, because of course taking pictures of Spider-Man is, as far as I can make out, Peter Parker’s sole source of income. One of Newspaper Spider-Man’s least attractive qualities — and lord knows there are lots to choose from — is his continuing macho panic at the idea that his wife makes more money than he does, despite the fact that his wife is a successful actress and he’s a stringer working in the dying newspaper industry (and also a superhero, a role that you’d think would be enough to boost his fragile ego, until of course you see how he goes about filling it). Anyway, my bet is that this woman will humiliate Peter further by displacing him from his pathetic job; I assume that her pictures of Spider-Man will be better than his, both because it’s tricky to stage photos of yourself and because Peter is an incompetent who’s no good at anything.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 7/14/11

Haw haw, looks like Jughaid’s startin’ to hallucinate! He’s probably sufferin’ from heat stroke, no doubt because he insists on wearing a fur hat in the middle of summer.

Family Circus, 7/14/11

Dolly, nothing in your current life might match up with the sanitized fairy tales in that book, but surely the Brothers Grimm or Russian folklorists have recorded stories of a quartet of terrifying, stunted gnomish things locked away in a compound by their horrified parents.

Hi and Lois, 7/14/11

This is the first Hi and Lois I can remember laughing at. Ha ha, it’s funny because the innocent little baby is learning about disappointment! Oh, I’m a terrible person.