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Are you emotionally and psychologically prepared for this week’s comment of the week? I sure hope so, because here it is:

“Wizard of Id has succintly portrayed the difference between Early and Late Medieval modes of warfare: while his Dark Age companions are boldly dying for their feudal lord, the canny Sir Rodney treats war as a profession. He is akin to the condottiere who would dominate later Italian warfare. That sly look and crooked smile is that of a man who sees human corpses as nothing more than money in his purse, arguably far more barbaric than his predecessors. But trebuchets suck for hitting single guys so we’re probably about to see Sir Smarty Pants’ insides in spite of his historically progressive role.” –m.w.

And brace yourself — here are the runners up.

“Some bold theological claims on Pardon My Planet: It stipulates that pick-up lines, jaded sarcasm, and calling women ‘baby cakes’ all predate original sin and can be done in a state of perfect innocence.” –Nevin, on Patreon

“Interesting to see that the Garden of Eden may be free of physical pain, but that ‘cringe’ still exists, even (especially?) among the animals. Maybe our heaven on earth was their hell. Makes you think.” –pugfuggly

“I was going to laugh at these village hicks sitting down with big grins to watch two hours of sickening hallucinogenic body horror, but then I realised this is the intermission! They know what they’re watching and they love it. Psychosexual insect drug orgies? To the Vikings, that’s basically regular orgies.” –Schroduck

“I have never seen character designs more built for an animated series that no one will ever fund.” –Tristan Olson, on BlueSky

“The real joke is that the movie isn’t even over, they’re talking right in the middle of it.” –The Rambling Otter

“Grimm has mistaken Ty-D-bol for Blue Curacao liqueur. Right now his head is spinning but no worries, he’ll be dead soon.” –Hibbleton

“Ignoring your direct report because she’s leaving at the end of her contract, so why bother trying to make her feel like part of the team: JERK BEHAVIOR. Ignoring your coworker because you’re leaving at the end of your contract, so why bother trying to make her feel like part of the conversation she is currently attempting to have with you, and also stone cold referring to her as ‘this woman’ in your head: TOTALLY COOL!” –Lomo

“Do you really need a whole book to tell the story of Noah? Doesn’t Genesis get through it in, like, three chapters? Maybe the rest of the book is advertising for Northern Kentucky’s Ark Encounter.” –Pozzo

“If a guy walked up to me bound up on his cot like that, I’d forget the wailing of the siren: ‘came’ would not land as ‘moved from that place to here.’” –Handsome Harry Backstayge, Idol of a Million Other Women

“I like how seriously Killer is treating this. ‘D-do you NOT hear that loud emergency alert, dumpy fat guy and weirdo bed-man? Why are you just standing around? GET OUTTA MY WAY!’” –Astroboy

“The previous version of this gag was only two panels. I hope they keep producing new versions of this strip with more and more panels, until it’s just a series of tiny slivers with one word in each.” –Peanut Gallery

“Mr. Lodge has a point. Clowning has a traditional set of exercises starting with selecting a clown archetype (whiteface, auguste or tramp) and building through gesture, expression, movement and running gags to develop a coherent character, separate and distinct from the person playing the character. Archie’s just Archie with bigger hair, different-colored freckles and the same lack of humor.” –I’m Not Cthulhu, But I Play Him On TV

“Mr. Lodge clearly used AI to write the book and put a picture of the money he saved by stiffing a human on the back as a power move. The proleteriat is on notice now!” –Jerp + Jump

“There is something about the way the barbarian’s weapon is drawn — the perspective, I guess — that makes it look too three-dimensional to be a flat sword. Wait, I have it: it’s a popsicle. The barbarian is trying to eat a popsicle in peace and this idiot keeps sticking a pointed stick in his face.” –Nekrotzar

“The waitress already knew Andy Bear is kidding. He isn’t wanted anywhere.” –matt w

“As he scurried away with the loot, the Millipede laughed. Leaving two of his 1300 right gloves behind … no way the Vulpine Vindicator was going to figure this one out!” –Voshkod

“I, myself, had a pair of eyeglasses that hid my pupils, and disguised normal eye functions. Took ’em driving! Many have died needlessly.” –A Grave Mind

“That TikTok still only got 5 likes. It’s tough out there.” –BillieVee

“In panel two, Killer is holding a bottle of Instant Hat.” –Ukulele Ike

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Beetle Bailey, 7/25/25

This strip is a pretty good demonstration of the fact that comic characters even within the same universe each have their own distinctive design, and, unlike actual humans, the wide variations in their head shapes means that you can’t just slap glasses on someone who doesn’t usually wear them and expect it to look not insane. But no matter how uncanny Sarge looks in this final panel, it’s all worth it to deliver this joke about wearing eyeglasses in order to disguise the fact that you’re crying, the normal and relatable thing that we all do and that would definitely work.

Blondie, 7/25/25

Hate to be churlish, but today’s Blondie doesn’t include what we in the biz call a “joke,” and while I’ve given the ennuimeisters at Hi and Lois permission to explore this discursive mode, I do not grant the same dispensation to Blondie. The last panel here should definitely have included a thought balloon in which Dagwood imagines himself winning a sandwich-eating competition in front of thousands of cheering fans, if only to distract us from his increasingly inexplicable relationship with Elmo.

Wizard of Id, 7/25/25

Oh, hey, the Wizard is still on his kick of forcing animals of different species to mate with each other, I guess. “But Josh,” you’re probably saying, “this is some kind of fantasy setting, and maybe that sort of thing is normal there.” Wrong: this random knight (?) is clearly horribly burned in the final panel, but his moral disgust at the unnatural act that produced this fire-breathing dog is so profound that he says “ew” instead of “ow.”

Pardon My Planet, 7/25/25

This lady straight-up murdered her husband! And she’s bragging about it! Right here at his funeral!

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Slylock Fox, 7/24/25

I gotta say, it’s probably pretty annoying to have to write Slylock Fox at this point, because doing cute little animal mysteries attracts lots of “um, ACTUALLY”s of both the “um, ACTUALLY, the pedantic fact you used as the solution for this mystery is more nuanced than you’re implying” and “um, ACTUALLY, the animal you’re using as a character in this mystery doesn’t work like that” variety. Thus you get puzzles like today, where you’re preemptively anticipating this kind of feedback in the solution. “[heavy sigh] Besides telling us that the gloves were not worn by a snake [closing eyes, briefly resting thumb and forefinger on either side of bridge of nose] or other handless animal…” Honestly someone is probably penning a furious email about “um, ACTUALLY, some invertebrates aren’t bilaterally symmetrical and could have two right hands and maybe they also became sapient along with all the other animals? can you prove they didn’t???” as we speak.

Pluggers, 7/24/25

Feels like this one is based on seeing a “Don’t talk to me before I’ve had my coffee!” mug and trying to work backwards from there to someone cheerfully claiming to be a criminal right up until the moment that first sip passes their lips, when in fact the appropriate cartoon would be a bleary-eyed plugger saying just the most casually cruel thing you’ve ever heard to his wife for no reason.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 7/24/25

Well it looks like I got my wish on this situation allowing us to delve into Truck’s psyche, because he’s really doubling down on “Please, living genetic evidence of the fact that I got cheated on, please let me pretend to be your dad!” Meanwhile, his not-son is just increasingly upset and unresponsive. “How can I feel anything for someone with whom I don’t share any genetic material?” he’s thinking. “This man has nothing to tell me about my phenotype! What’s the point?”