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Funky Winkerbean, 7/7/17

I don’t want to just throw around my big-shot Hollywood insider knowledge, mostly because I don’t have any, but a “sizzle reel” is in fact … not whatever today’s Funky Winkerbean thinks it is? It’s generally a short video cut together from clips from other things aiming to sell or promote something to producers or casting directors, not the general public. You usually hear the term in connection with actors, who will have a sizzle reel of their best performances available for people thinking of hiring them. For a whole movie, a sizzle reel is something that would be created long before any filming actually took place, often pieced together from short scenes from other films in an attempt to show potential financial backers what the final product might look like. (Here’s one for the 2012 film Looper to give you a sense of how they work.)

Needless to say, movie sizzle reels generally do not include footage from documentaries about washed-up actors playing minor roles in the film, and they definitely aren’t put together right in the middle of what has appeared to be a very long and well-funded shoot. I can only assume that the financial backers of Starbuck Jones: The Movie, after viewing the dailies with despair, have abruptly pulled out, and the producers are desperately trying to find new funding, which they won’t because they have no idea what should and should not go into a sizzle reel.

Pluggers, 7/7/17

My longstanding theory is that Sheila Roo, a kangaroo-lady who suffers the indignity of being rendered in white by syndicate colorists who think she’s a rabbit, is not of true plugger stock, as indicated by her employment at a job that requires a suit and her desire to eat at non-chain restaurants. Today’s piece of evidence is the way she looks at her husband with subtle but withering contempt, possibly because of his dietary habits but also possibly because of, you know, just everything.

Spider-Man, 7/7/17

Meanwhile, Spider-Man is significantly degrading the fire-safety features of a building that never did anything to him.

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Blondie, 7/5/17

For everyone who’s ever wanted a comic panel of an electronics salesman contemplating whether his parents were overseas when they fucked him into existence: today’s Blondie is for you!

Dennis the Menace, 7/5/17

I’m not sure what’s a bigger menace to the patriarchy: Dennis in his childlike innocence wondering aloud about sartorial double standards, or Alice’s unabashed usurpation of the male gaze as a sexy surfer catches her eye.

Shoe, 7/5/17

I may not think much of the jokes in Shoe, but I have to give the strip credit: at least the characters always look like they want to kill themselves as they deliver them!

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Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 7/4/17

It’s never entirely clear where Hootin’ Holler is supposed to be, but many places like it in the American South and border states, like Appalachia and the Ozarks, were hotbeds of pro-Union sentiment in during the Civil War, being mostly inhabited by poor farmers with no love of slavery or rich slavers. And so Hootin’ Holler has uniformly celebrated Abe Lincoln and the Union victory ever since — for the most part. Check out Loweezy there in the center of this image:

We don’t know her origins or her politics. Could she be trying to send a signal of her secret dedication to the Lost Cause?

Mark Trail, 7/4/17

Welp, I guess we really are going to get a blow-by-blow retelling of the Water-World Disaster shaggy dog story over the course of this week! I’m assuming it ends with an explanation of why Gil’s right arm is all shriveled up, possibly involving the process of extracting walrus twins from their mother’s birth canal in the midst of a raging fire started by an exploding boat.

Slylock Fox, 7/4/17

I don’t want young men getting the wrong idea from this cartoon. Guerilla fence-painting does not make others respect your devil-may-care attitude, and will definitely not attract wide-eyed blondes who won’t be able to keep their hands off you. Sorry to shatter your illusions, but those are the hard facts!