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Wizard of Id, 7/3/08

This is one of an alarming number of Wizard of Ids that make me laugh due to sheer immature misanthropy, but since I’m the Comics Curmudgeon, after reading it I paused to see if I could figure out how to make it even more immaturely misanthropic. And the answer quickly became pretty obvious: the punchline in panel two should clearly be not “your sister” but “your mom”. Am I right? Is there no room for “your mom” jokes in the funny pages? Some sort of conspiracy of good taste? Would not every strip benefit from a healthy dose of “your mom” jokes?

Mary Worth, 7/3/08

“This reminds me of a similar situation! I have a suggestion … why don’t you convince Mr. Abner’s long-standing girlfriend to go out on a date with another man, and have her picture put in the paper, humiliating him, and then she shouldn’t return any of his phone calls when he tries to work things out? Because that’s what happened to me, and I feel totally 100 percent fine, so I’m sure he’ll feel fine when it happens to him, right? Yeah, I feel pretty great. Doing fine. Yup!”

(Alternate punchline: “I have a suggestion … I’m going to go do your mom. Later!” See, isn’t that a nice change of pace?)

Curtis, 7/3/08

Hmm, “Honeystump,” that sounds kind of suggestive, but what sort of specific thing could it be a reference to? Well, I suppose … no, wait that’s disgusting; or maybe — no no no ew no! But it could be yargh that’s not an image I need in my head so early in the morning. Thanks, Curtis, thanks a lot.

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Wizard of Id, 6/3/08

This comic is, obviously, yet another in a long line of depressing “my ex-wife is a loathsome harridan, yet I once loved her ha ha ha I hate myself” jokes that have been providing the legacy comics industry with punchlines since no-fault divorce became widely available. However, I think it’s worth pointing out that the Wizard of Id takes place in some at least notionally medieval setting, where presumably witchcraft remains a viable folk tradition, so it sort of makes sense that a bookstore would have a whole section dedicated to it.

I also think it’s worth pointing out that the only bookstores I’ve ever seen that look like the one depicted here (low-slung, featureless, no windows, cheap sign) tended to specialize in porn.

Mary Worth, 6/2/08

I think that Toby has long considered herself Mary’s acolyte and Charterstone’s chief-meddler-in-waiting; now that Mary has been emotionally weakened, she smells blood and is trying to vault to alpha meddler status while the old queen is still alive. Naturally, she’s pretty terrible at it, even with the bar set as low as it is. “Wow, you just sort of broke up and are really mad at each other! Why not spend a bunch of time together, alone, in a strange place where you don’t know anybody else and have to rely on each other to figure out what to do?”

Rex Morgan, M.D., 6/2/08

In case you’re wondering why I haven’t mentioned Rex Morgan in nearly a month, it’s because the strip has focused on the good doctor as he painstakingly pieces together the movements of a bunch of filthy old wrestling mats. Makes you wish for the profoundly uncomfortable glory days of implied pederasty, doesn’t it?

Judge Parker, 6/2/08

Your go-to move if you’re an old white lady caught in a major narcotics bust: blame a Mexican.

Marmaduke, 6/2/08

You can only repress your emetophagia for so long before it starts to come out, subconsciously.

(PS — COTWs tomorrow morning — sorry for the delay!)

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Herb and Jamaal, 3/26/08

That Jamaal! He’s got a “head” that a gal could “rub” all day! If you know what I mean! And I think you do!

Ha ha, just kidding. I’m sure this isn’t meant to be some kind of double entendre; the lady in question is obviously just talking about the head that sits on his shoulders.

Which looks like giant penis, of course.

Man, I wish this cat-calling had been phrased in more typical Herb and Jamaal-style ludicrously nonspecific terms. “Hello, attractive individual! I’d sure like to make pleasurable contact with a portion of your anatomy!”

Beetle Bailey, 3/26/08

The cruel gaslighting of the unlovable and unloved Lt. Fuzz is par for the course in Beetle Bailey; but today I’m just sad that the almost-as-dorky Spc. Chip Gizmo has gotten roped into it. Presumably he’s sick of being a nerdy social pariah and is trying to win points the only way he can: by turning on someone even further down the social ladder than he is. Oh, Chip, they just want your technical skills — they aren’t really your friends! You won’t be getting any offers to hang out or anything, until they need someone to get all the porn viruses off their computers.

Wizard of Id, 3/26/08

I was going to go into a diatribe today about this one, ranting that I haven’t seen an actual child delivering newspapers in more than a decade, and that all subscription billing these days is entirely computerized, with bills arriving in the mail or the charges just being automatically put onto your credit card, but then I remembered that the Wizard of Id takes place in the Middle Ages. So, um: Ha ha! The King of Id likes to torture children in his dungeon!