Post Content

Rex Morgan, M.D., 7/12/17

“Well, how about the toast, then? With the crusts on, obviously — that’s where the nutrients are. Also, no butter or jam. Fats and sugars are the silent killers! But don’t worry, you can pair it with a piping lukewarm glass of tap water!”

Marvin, 7/12/17

Oh man, Dr. Dog is about to get some furious letters from Welsh corgis, along with some nuanced explainers on geographical nomenclature from the Unionist Irish wolfhound community.

Funky Winkerbean, 7/12/17

[Inside the offices of Conaco, LLC]

ASSISTANT: …oh, and there’s also that request from that comic strip artist to use your likeness in a ComicCon plotline.

CONAN O’BRIEN: Oh, right. Sure, say yes to that. It’ll be a good promo for the shows I’m going to be taping there.

ASSISTANT: So do you want them to sign something promising you won’t be portrayed in the comic strip as some kind of cartoonishly sexist boor?

CONAN O’BRIEN: What? Why … why would they even do that? That seems unnecessary. I’m sure it’ll be fine!

Post Content

Gasoline Alley, 7/11/17

Ugh, fine, I guess I will supply some cursory backstory on what’s going on in Gasoline Alley, which is that this freaky-lookin’ dude was briefly irritated by two children while fishing because they thought he was weird and scary looking, and probably we’re going to learn some valuable lessons about ugly hermits with hearts of gold and not judging a book by its cover and blah blah blah, but really today’s final panel makes it look like the guy is coolly examining the unconscious kid with his single eye, trying to determine how best to cook and eat him.

Funky Winkerbean, 7/11/17

I feel like the whole “Starbuck Jones is a movie!” thing has spiraled completely out of hand in Funky Winkerbean, as it started with our sad-sack comics-obsessed characters writing for a neglected comic book hero and now they’re giving a presentation at ComicCon as part of its multimillion-dollar marketing push. It would be like if Joe Shlabotnik got called up to the majors and batted .335 and Charlie Brown got hired as his personal assistant during his team’s undefeated playoff run? Anyway, mostly I’m featuring today’s strip to point out that that, in addition to suffering the general indignity of appearing in Funky Winkerbean, famously ginger Conan O’Brien has been transformed into a blond by the syndicate colorists, possibly because they can’t tell that he and Mason Jarre as supposed to be different people.

Family Circus, 7/11/17

Ha ha, yes Jeffy, it’s there to bury the evidence! (Specifically, the evidence that you or your siblings ever existed.)

Post Content

Mark Trail, 7/10/17

Ahhhh, finally we get the payoff to this long story of the Great Water-World Disaster, a delightful panel depicting our wayward walrus giving birth in the shattered, water-logged shell of a formerly high-prestige sport utility vehicle. Given Mark’s previous downplaying of the disastrous nature of this episode, you’d think that he’d be a lot cheerier about helping this majestic sea-beast in its time of need; but instead, he and Johnny are watching the birth process with expressions of open horror. One suspects that this is the first time they’ve become truly acquainted with the procedure through which baby walruses are born, and are beginning to connect the dots to the human children they occasionally encounter as well.

Lesley, meanwhile, has purported throughout her retelling of this anecdote to be in a high dudgeon, but her expression and body language in today’s strip resemble nothing so much as Bernini’s frankly erotic depiction of Saint Teresa in ecstacy, so maybe we need to re-evaluate everything we thought we know about her attitude towards Mark and her obviously complex inner life.

Pluggers, 7/10/17

Pluggers may leave a trail of pollution wherever they go, but by God they aren’t going to SHARE THEIR CAR with SOMEBODY ELSE like BIG GOVERNMENT WANTS THEM TO like some kind of COMMUNIST