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Ziggy, 3/3/13

This would just be another “Ha ha, Ziggy is foolish” panel if not for dark bags under Ziggy’s eyes. As it is, it’s pretty harrowing. What botanical horror has been going on at this house, leaving Ziggy unable to flee and yet still fearful of the ever-proliferating zucchini? Is it an Invasion of the Body Snatchers-type situation, where each of those pods contains a gestating duplicate of one of Ziggy’s innumerable pets? Ziggy has been awake for days, knowing that he’ll be replaced by a soulless pod person the moment he dozes off. This exterminator was his last hope. Nobody can help you, Ziggy. Nobody can help you.

Marmaduke, 3/3/13

Luther’s wife’s look of face-melting terror in the fourth panel is one of the most amazing things I’ve seen in this strip in years. Still, her reaction at the end of the strip just goes to show how numb she and her husband have become to presence of the caniform hell-demon in their midst. Better the devil you know than whatever she was imagining, am I right? I mean “devil you know” literally, of course. Marmaduke is the Prince of Lies, and everyone in the neighborhood knows him quite well, having been close enough to him to smell the damned souls on his hot, awful breath.

Marvin, 3/3/13

Speaking of monstrous dogs: would I endorse this monstrous dog eating every single one of the recurring Marvin characters one by one, each of them screaming as they slide down his gullet? Yes, yes I would.

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Archie, 1/2/13

This sick burn on Mannequin 2: On The Move and/or soulless corporate control of all media was probably more pointed back when the strip first ran in the early ’90s, when Mannequin 2: On The Move was a recent memory and we hadn’t yet resigned ourselves to soulless corporate control of all media.

Crankshaft, 1/2/13

The sad, love-starved souls in the Funkyverse think that gently resting your back against somebody else’s back qualifies as “cuddling.”

Heathcliff, 1/2/13

Heathcliff’s owner has lost a bet to his cat, and because they’re not allowed to bet for money, he’s now subject to humiliation and physical abuse on his own front lawn.

Shoe, 1/2/13

Biz’s old buddy Zeke is going to die soon.

Ziggy, 1/2/13

Ziggy is sick and tired of working so hard to prevent his animal friends from killing each other.

Marmaduke, 1/2/13

Translation: WWHOORRRR WHOOORRRRORRR HORROR HORROR KILL KILL I WORSHIP THE DEMON BLOOD GOD BELOW

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Heathcliff and The Family Circus, 12/1/12

Celebrate, everybody! Three and half weeks of the Holiday Season lie before us, and if these whimsical one-panel cartoons for children are any indication, they will be a singularly grim and joyless affair. Billy is rooting through his box of toys so he can make his list of gift ideas; he literally has so many geegaws that he’s in real danger of getting duplicates. His toys may be spilling out of the top of a box that comes up to his shoulders, but they can never fill his bottomless need. Dolly looks on, expressionless. Meanwhile, Heathcliff, who is a cat and therefore not a participant in human religion or holiday celebration, merely sees the hustle and bustle at the mall as another opportunity to assert his dominance. He’s disrupting a farcical Christmas tradition meant to generate more sales revenues, and neither the bored mall Santa nor the stoop-shouldered children waiting in line can work themselves up to be even slightly upset by his antics.

Archie, 12/1/12

I bet you thought that yesterday’s late-night recycling laffs were just a one-off Archie joke, but no! Morning has come and now Archie and his dad are going down to the recycling center to return … the papers … which are now pamphlets about environmentalism? Or maybe the newspapers are being turned into the pamphlets, right there, at the recycling center? Anyway, the point is that recycling’s for chumps, kids, make sure your newspapers end up in a landfill, or, to go that extra mile, find a small endangered bird and smother it with the sports section!

Herb and Jamaal, 12/1/12

Do people outside of wacky fictional settings ever do elaborately sarcastic performances like this? I mean, it’s one thing to mock your lonely, heartbroken friend by telling him he’s having a “pity party,” but it’s quite another to take off your apron and leave the room and announce that you’re going to make actual concrete preparations for such an event. I certainly hope Herb has the determination to see this thing through to the end and really go to Kinko’s to have something printed up, or at least create a Facebook event and send invites to everyone Jamaal knows.

Ziggy, 12/1/12

God, this squirrel is quite the little name-dropping asshole.