Post Content

Mary Worth, 1/5/11

Look at panel two in isolation and you’d think that Mary views father-son bonding as a spectator sport. “Here we go!” she thinks, as she pops something tan and oblong into her mouth. “They’re gonna hella bond! This is going to be great!” But check her out in panel one, looking blissed out as she shoves something or other up between her gum and her upper lip. I’m assuming it’s something hallucinogenic. “Here we go!” she’s saying in panel two. “Oh, the colors!”

Gil Thorp, 1/5/11

Much as I’ve been trying to avoid bringing it up, I feel have to acknowledge that the Gil Thorp basketball season plot seems to have set its two new characters — a Jesus-happy basketball player and an almost-certainly-gay teen as imagined by someone who’s heard of gay people but never actually met one — on a collision course. This certainly won’t be awkward, at all!

Gasoline Alley, 1/5/11

Speaking of piety, Gasoline Alley has continued its attempt to ditch its goody-goody image by dabbling in blasphemy. Today it suggests that the Holy Bible is best used as a weight-loss aid.

Spider-Man, 1/5/11

Spider-Man has lost interest in the middle of his own comic strip and let his mind wander. And who can blame him, really? I only wish he weren’t wearing his spider-mask in panel two, because it would be great to see his slack jaw and the little bit of drool emerging from the side of his mouth.

Luann, 1/5/11

Dear Luann,

Never use “finger” as a verb ever again.

Sincerely,
The Comics Curmudgeon

Post Content

Welcome back, everybody! Did you enjoy your holiday week off? I did, but as ever I must submit to the siren song of the comics! How did our favorite characters spend the week?

Apartment 3-G, 12/27/10

Well, over at Apartment 3-G, Lu Ann realized with a sinking feeling that she never should have trampily exposed that shoulder if she expected to win the heart of his altar boy. Would she just burst into flames if she entered Paul’s church? Better not risk it!

Apartment 3-G, 12/29/10

Also, just FYI, never, ever speak ill of Margo’s building if you want to live.

Curtis, 12/29/10

Curtis’s annual Kwanztraavaganza is featuring less insane hallucinogenic ancient African magic and more depressing modern American unemployment, which is a bummer. But at least the protagonist has a horrifying jawless lamprey-dog as a pet. That counts for something, right?

Mark Trail, 12/29/10

Over in Mark Trail, our hero seems to be learning about this thing called “flirting.”

Funky Winkerbean, 1/1/11

And in Funky Winkerbean, Les’s two ladies finally realized that he’s in love with a dead woman, and now they will give up their fruitless and baffling pursuit of him. (Ha ha, just kidding, they still want to sex him up for reasons no sane person could ever comprehend.)

Mary Worth and Spider-Man, 1/1/11

2011 brought us not one but two wonderful weddings: one solemnized under the watchful glower of Mary Worth, and one made more festive by an endless river of silent, inhuman monsters. Happy New Year, everybody! The bestial fiends of Subterranea are coming to devour you!

Panel from Dick Tracy, 1/2/11

Back on the surface, Dick Tracy’s Crimestoppers Textbook seems to be really, really reaching for crimes to stop.

Anyway, expect 2011 here at the Comics Curmudgeon to bring you basically the same awesomeness that you’ve been getting for nearly seven years now, unless of course the newspaper comics industry completely collapses, in which case I’ll turn the whole thing into a Mary Worth fetish porn site. Happy New Year to you all! And check those receipts! ERRORS DO OCCUR.

Post Content

Spider-Man, 12/22/10

Oh, say, what’s going on in the unlikely romance between Aunt May and the Mole Man? Well, Spider-Man’s been trying to break it up, because he’s a sullen dick, but he also hasn’t been using any kind of interesting superpowers to do so, because he’s an incompetent feeb. After coming to the conclusion earlier this week that the Mole Man couldn’t be brought to justice for his New York City rampage because there’s no extradition treaty between the United States and Subterranea (no, really), Spider-Man is apparently trying this desperate gambit, apparently assuming that his aunt is old-fashioned enough to refuse to cohabitate with this freakish mutant without a marriage license and a church wedding.

Now, the legal argument here is patently spurious — as the unquestioned king of this gloomy underground realm, the Mole Man can presumably delegate the authority to solemnize marriages to whichever of his horrifying minions he chooses — but I do think Spidey’s smart to bring up the religious angle. Aunt May is, I imagine, a good churchgoer — Episcopalian, I’m guessing — whereas the Mole Man is the supreme God-emperor of a sunless cave kingdom of shuffling, sightless monsters. There are bound to be some value conflicts there, and they need to discuss that openly if their relationship is going to last.

Wizard of Id, 12/22/10

“C’mon,” they said. “Let’s do a Christmas-themed prison rape joke involving spiders,” they said. “It’ll be ‘edgy,'” they said. “It’s not like anybody reads the newspaper anymore, anyway,” they said.