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Apartment 3-G, 6/12/10

OMG GASP WHO’S THAT AT THE DOOR! IT’S … IT’S … damn it, I’m not actually sure who that it is. This is a major problem in a strip where everyone but the three main characters looks more or less alike! I suppose it’s supposed to be late 2006-early 2007 beloved ancillary character Gina, who had similar short hair flips; Gina left to find fame and fortune in Hollywood, which may explain why she’s looking somewhat older and wiser, as presumably that terrible town chewed her up and spat her back to New York in short order (“short order” in soap opera strips being three years or so). Anyway, most of her time in the strip was spent in two main pursuits: insulting Tommie, which means that Tommie’s pleased-to-see-you smile is just another sign of her deeply ingrained self-loathing, and bedding the Professor. This explains why Ari was so excited by the new arrival on Monday, I guess. Ha ha, isn’t it convenient when, right after one of your lovers has been bundled off to a crooked mental hospital, another one shows up, her dreams broken and her heart vulnerable? Yup, being the Professor is pretty sweet.

Wizard of Id, 6/12/10

Wow, the Wiz is a kind of funny-looking bearded old man, so I guess Id’s aesthetic standards for rentboys are quite different from those that hold in early 21st century America. Of course, you know, magic powers and all that; he could be supernaturally sexy.

Pluggers, 6/12/10

You’re a plugger if you once, entirely by accident, got a gift to which your wife reacted positively, and you just keep buying the same thing for her, over and over again, because that’s so much easier than trying to figure what sort of things she likes and dislikes, or even just asking her what she wants, and anyway you can get birdhouses for cheap, sure enough.

You’re married to a plugger if your fantasies veer wildly between divorce and murder.

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Wizard of Id, 5/15/10

I must give reluctant kudos to the Wizard of Id for not only acknowledging its medieval setting, but using it as a springboard for an anachronistic play on words. The modern expression “fell off a truck,” a euphemism for stolen goods, would of course be meaningless to the inhabitants of Id, who are wholly ignorant the internal combustion engine, so “fell off a wagon” is the closest equivalent; but this in turn is itself a modern expression, denoting an addict whose attempts at reformation have failed. The combination of the archaic and the modern results in a commendably multilayered gag that ought by rights to be the stock in trade of these period strips.

The Wizard of Id also holds true to its milieu by depicting human beings being bought and sold like chattel.

Mary Worth, 5/15/10

Ho ho, we’ve spent all this time focusing on Bonnie’s piddling little compulsive shopping problem, and only now does she confess that she has “many bad habits”? I can’t wait to see how Mary reacts when she realizes that she’s spent all her meddling energy on a red herring. Does she have the strength left to deal with the cross-country bank robbery spree? The ketamine distribution ring? The dismembered drifters neatly packaged in Charterstone’s communal storage space?

Family Circus, 5/15/10

Soon Jeffy’s possessed demon-hand will lead to a string of gruesome stranglings. “Now, Jeffy, tell us why you did what you did,” the court-appointed social worker will ask. “I’m sorry!” he says. “It was my fingers! My fingers got away from me! My bloody, murderous fingers!” [GENTLE LAUGHTER FROM ELDERLY NEWSPAPER SUBSCRIBERS ACROSS AMERICA]

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Mark Trail, 5/4/10

Oh ho ho, women, am I right, everybody? First they’re all like “Oh, we’re married, we should maybe spend more than six days a year together,” then when you agree to stick around, they’re scooting off to have themselves professionally groomed, because they just hang around the house looking like a slob when you’re not there! Who can understand ’em?

The best part of this strip is how happy Cherry’s dad looks in the second panel to get a little Mark time in. “Say, Mark, we don’t really get much opportunity to chat, so while she’s off at the beauty parlor, why don’t we…” “No, Cherry! Don’t leave me alone with him!”

Hi and Lois, 5/4/10

Is Hi’s face covered with bruises? I guess that’s just to show you that when men gossip, they do it in a manly way — at a bar, after drunkenly punching each other in the face.

Spider-Man, 5/4/10

Super-heroics update! While the sinister Sabretooth disarmed a police officer and fled, our hero nestled his face into his wife’s ample bosom and muttered semi-coherent nonsense. THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN, EVERYBODY!

The Wizard of Id, 5/4/10

Wow, this strip sure is on the cutting edge of social commentary! Yes, sir, the times sure are changing, if by “the times” we mean “the times forty years ago!” But, whatever, women, am I right?