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Just a quick note: As several commentors have pointed out, the blog of cartoonist Mike Lynch reports that They’ll Do It Every Time artist Al Scaduto passed away yesterday. There are no further details and I can’t find any other source for the news, but it seems that Lynch knew him personally, so I don’t have reason to doubt it.

TDIET is one of the few comics that I have become more affectionate towards over the course of doing this blog. It’s always enjoyable to poke fun at the strip’s anachronisms and patois, but it created a world that many of us found fun to visit, like the house of our favorite and slightly crazy uncle. Perhaps the biggest sign of that is the sheer number of Comics Curmudgeon readers who submitted their ideas to the feature. I was very excited about the fact that there are no less than ten TDIETs from our readers coming up in the next six weeks; now the prospect is tinged with melancholy, but at least I hope they can serve as an extended tribute to the man, who probably won’t get the mentions on NPR and in the New York Times like Johnny Hart did.

It will be interesting to see if King Features gets anyone else to do the strip. Scaduto was the third artist for a strip that was actually only a year younger than he was, and had only been the lead artist on it for the last 18 years (though he had been an assistant for years before that). It might be interesting to see what someone with a more modern sensibility would do with it, but, based on numerous email exchanges with him I’ve had reported to me (including one with my wife, who’ll never get to see her idea worked up now), it will be hard to match his good nature and generosity of spirit. Best ever, Al.

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Fans of They’ll Do It Every Time know all about the Urge, that unnamable impulse that drives the urged to visit some horrible act of violence — usually something along the lines of skinning alive or burning to death — upon the perpetrator of whatever minor transgression is the subject of that day’s installment. Sometimes it’s the urge to e-mail someone to the moon; sometimes it’s the urge to pan-fry his hide; and sometimes, it’s just an undifferentiated and all-encompassing urge. In TDIET, the urge is denoted by a helpful label and an arrow pointing to the urged individual — but how can you let the world know that you have the urge? Why, with one of these awesome shirts designed by faithful reader monsieurjohn, obviously!

Don’t be shy about showing the world your urges! Order one today! I think these will be really fun for taking pictures in with the wearer in some TDIET-esque situation, so I urge you to please do that! And, as always, there are other kinds of merchandise I can add this graphic to, so please let me know if what you’re looking for isn’t available.

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They’ll Do It Every Time, 12/1/07

Boy, hat’s off to Brentwood’s Ann and Frank for showing off the sad, empty core of their marriage for our amusement. Panel one is particularly poignant, as we see the song of melancholy running through Ann’s head as she gazes longingly at her uninterested husband. You’d think she’d arrange the furniture so her TV watching spouse wasn’t directly visible from her cold marital bed, if only so the noise wouldn’t keep her awake, but apparently she thinks that watching him drink beer and doze off to cowboy movies is better than not seeing him at all. By the time panel two and the Internet age arrive, however, she’s clearly gone from the “depression” to “anger” stage in mourning the death of the passion between her and Frank, if that clenched fist is any indication. An unsuspecting hubby is about to get cold-cocked in the back of the head just as he composes his latest masterpiece for the John Wayne Fans message board.

Marmaduke, 12/1/07

Marmaduke likes to ritually humiliate new dog catchers in public before killing and eating them.