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(Hey! What’s with the new site design? What’s this business in the top menu about “membership?” Get all the info here!)

Guys, apologies that Important Website Development delayed my return to comics blogging for [looks at watch] 16 days?!!??!?!?! Holy cats, that means a lot of strips to tear through in my traditional beginning-of-the-year comics recapping of the stuff I missed in the continuity strips. Let’s get to it!

Gil Thorp, 12/24/16

One of my favorite things about Gil Thorp is how Coach Thorp and Coach Mrs. Coach Thorp used to have two hideous children who appeared on their Christmas card with them, and now those children don’t appear on said Christmas card anymore and also anywhere else in the strip. What do you think is the most likely fate of the Thorplings?

• Died in tragic “accident”
• Sent away to boarding school, graduated three years ago but parents forgot to go pick them up
• Coach Kaz sent to the past to surreptitiously add birth control to the Thorps’ water supply, removing the children from the timestream altogether

Mary Worth, 12/24/16

Wilbur, meanwhile, in Antarctic exile and unaware that Iris has very quickly moved on, looks at the stars and takes solace that, despite the vast distance between them, he and his beloved are both under the same sky. They’re not, though! There are totally different constellations in the Southern Hemisphere. You have nothing in common anymore, Wilbur! Nothing!

Mary Worth, 12/25/16

Back at Charterstone, we get what I think is our first glimpse at the new art team’s rendition of Dr. Jeff and the Camerons. And it’s a doozy of an introduction! Dr. Jeff is wide-eyed in wonder and delight at the sight of the monochromatic Christmas ham Mary is presenting him with; meanwhile, the Camerons are celebrating the holiday in the traditional manner, by watching TV in the dark and feeding each other off of plates balanced precariously in their laps, an image that will haunt me (and, I presume, all of you) for years.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 12/25/16

Good news! Little Sarah finally woke up, possibly after being healed by baby Jesus!

Rex Morgan, M.D., 12/26/16

Bad news! Sarah has amnesia! Actually, if she ever gets called to testify against her erstwhile mob associates, that’s still good news.

Curtis, 12/27/16

By the way, despite last year’s brief return to form, Curtis honored its recent tradition by failing to honor its longer-established tradition and spinning an insane Kwanzaa fable, unless you consider this tale of urban real estate to the be the insanest Kwanzaa fable of all.

Dick Tracy, 12/29/16

New-look Dick Tracy continues to milk that comics nostalgia for all it’s worth, bringing the Spirit on for a guest spot and providing red-hot brightly-colored-hat-on-brightly-colored-hat action. Anyway, here’s Dick telling his counterpart that he’s a tool of the state, imposing the harsh order that a sullen citizenry secretly wants but could never bring itself to ask for.

Mary Worth, 12/30/16

Whoops! Iris is going to a concert with Zak and his millennial friends, and she overdressed! Like all people born in the early ’70s, Iris has never been to a so-called “rock and roll” show, and is unaware of the socially acceptable forms of dress at such events.

Mark Trail, 12/31/16

Hey, Mark, maybe you should wait until that boat gets to shore before you start bragging.

Mark Trail, 1/1/17

Or maybe the boat is going to get eaten by that nightmarish 30-foot-long gelatinous tube-thing? Ever think of that? That Cherry and Bill will have their nights haunted by the image of you being slowly digested by millions of microscopic mouths and the bill for the boat, respectively?

Mary Worth, 1/2/17

Back in Santa Royale, Zak likes that Iris dressed like an old lady at this concert, and is rewarding her with some erotic finger-touching.

Mark Trail, 1/3/17

Back in Kauai, Mark didn’t get Cal’s boat blown up or eaten at all, and Abbey is rewarding him with some erotic finger-touching.

Gil Thorp, 1/4/17

Oops, looks like we’ve learned why Aaron Aargard is so inconsistent: when he goes to all those warehouse raves, he’s totally high on drugs! According to this Three’s Company-style accidental overhearing of a partial conversation, anyway. It’s even money that “Molly” is actually his girlfriend, whose name is Molly.

Mary Worth and Mark Trail, 1/4/17

OH MY GOD THINGS ARE JUST GETTING MORE EROTIC! NEAR NOSE-TO-NOSE CONTACT! AWKWARD CAR HUGGING! I CAN’T BELEIVE THEY PRINT THIS STUFF IN THE NEWSPAPER WHERE CHILDREN COULD SEE IT, IF CHILDREN EVER LOOKED AT THE NEWSPAPER!

Mary Worth and Mark Trail, 1/5/17

Oops, never mind, Mark mentioned his wife and Iris was reminded that Wilbur exists, all eroticism has been aborted with extreme prejudice.

Judge Parker, 1/6/17

Oops, the mysteriously returned Sophie stumbled upon Sam’s crazy person conspiracy board! If she’s the know-it-all we all remember and love, she’s hopefully going to critique all the many ways he screwed this up. By the way, there are few large-font headlines I can think of that would be more hilarious that “VAN FOUND.”

Rex Morgan, M.D., 1/6/17

OH NO, SARAH’S AMNESIA TOOK AWAY ALL OF HER ART SKILLS! She is working overtime to prove, to whoever might want to know, the cops or the FBI or the DA or whoever, that she doesn’t know anything about any mob ladies or any art forgers in the employ of said mob ladies, no sir.

Crankshaft, 1/6/17

Hey, remember how the young people in Crankshaft bought that old movie theater? Well, they’re having sex in it now. Young people! Is there anywhere they won’t have sex?

Anyway! I’m back and I’m blogging again and my 2017 resolution is the same as it always is: to keep writing jokes about the comics until they make me stop! Brace yourself for another fun year!

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Hello all! Thank you for your patience with the delayed return to comics blogging; hopefully you think it’s worth it as you behold in all its glory the latest redesign of the site, courtesy of longtime faithful reader and site-redesigner Adam Norwood! (If you’re not seeing the redesign, hold down the shift key and reload the page to clear your cache.)

As usual, we haven’t gone too crazy with the site redesign, and have hopefully made it more streamlined and easier to use. Besides the visual tweaks to make the site look a little less 2010, we’ve made made a couple important functionality improvements:

• A responsive theme. This is fancy web-design talk for a site that shifts on the fly to accommodate different sized screens and browser windows. You can make your browser window smaller or larger to watch this in action. This helps everybody have the best experience, but it’s particularly important for people viewing the site on phones, who were a niche audience the last time we redesigned the site but now account for something like 30% of visits to the site. Mobile users no longer have to click through from the front page to read an individual post, and should have an improved experience overall.
• Full-sized comics images. I’m now uploading comics to my server in as large a format as I can find them. The site is now smart enough to render the comics in as large a format as your browser can comfortably accommodate, but all you have to do is click on an image (or, on a mobile device, tap on it) and it will expand to full size, and you can scroll around to see it in all its glory. Click or tap again to shrink it back.
• Preview as you comment. Instead of needing a “preview” button, you’ll now see a preview of your comment appear as you type.

I think that the new design will be an improvement for everyone. I’m also introducing a new feature that I think some of you will find worthwhile: For a mere $3 a month, you can become an elite Comics Curmudgeon Supporter, an elevated status that comes with benefits.

• An ad-free experience. When you’re logged in to your account, whether on a PC or a mobile device, you’ll see a version of the site with no banner ads cluttering your view or slowing load times. You’ll also have access to an ad-free version of the site’s RSS feed. (You’ll still see the textual ad shoutouts at the end of the weekly COTW post and posts promoting the semi-annual pledge drive.) Behold, in all its glory:

• Advanced commenting features. Logged-in users won’t need that preview-as-you-type feature, because they’ll be able to edit comments for up to ten minutes after posting them, and will see a what-you-see-is-what-you-get editor that makes it easy to add bold, italics, and other formatting to text. Check it out:

As you may already know, the ad revenues across Internet publishing are declining and my site’s been no exception. I’m going to be tweaking my ads this year in an attempt to get ahead of this, and while I have some red lines — no ads that play audio or expand to cover text without you clicking on them — being a Comics Curmudgeon Supporter allows you to back the site (and me!) directly and bypass ads altogether. So if you’re interested in being a Comics Curmudgeon Supporter, head over here to sign up! Either way, I hope you enjoy the new site. And of course, as with anything new, there will be a few bugs: please email me at jfruh@jfruh.com if encounter them, or if you have any other questions or concerns.

UPDATE: The bug where images were covering the text on old posts should now be fixed! And I think I might’ve done something that will fix the “text shifted too far to the right” problem. If you’re still seeing these, or if you see other bugs, please send me an email at jfruh@jfruh.com rather than commenting here. I mean, you can comment here, but sending an email is more helpful because we can correspond that way. Please let me know what your operating system and browser is when you email, and take screenshots if you know how to do that. Thanks!

Content-wise, this site is going to remain as it always has been, which is to say amazing, the number one go-to Internet home for jokes about Mary Worth and a Safe Space where you can make jokes about Mary Worth! I’m glad you’re here. Let’s have a fun 2017!

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Hi everybody! The time has come for me to go off on my multi-city Christmanukwanzaa journey! As usual, I will be returning after the first of the year and leaving this week’s COTW up until I get a week of comments when I return. (And I’ve jiggered the discussion settings so the comments for this post will remain open during my entire absence.)

I might be on hiatus a little bit longer than usual this year because faithful designer Adam Norwood and I are hard at work at unleashing a new, improved design and some exciting features for you in the new year! If we get to January and it looks like we’re close to a rollout, I may hold off on restarting posting until the second week of 2017 or so, but if it seems like it’ll be longer I’ll start in again with the old design. Refresh joshreads dot com constantly for updates!

UPDATE: Happy new year y’all! Adam and I are putting the finishing touches on the new design, so I’m gonna hold off until January 9th to start posting again. Brace yourself for excitement!

Anyway, with that said, please enjoy your comment … of the week!

“‘Now on to matters of the heart!’ [SMASH CUT TO WILBUR’S CARDIOLOGIST READING TEST RESULTS AND SHAKING HIS HEAD IN DISGUST]” –Doctor Handsome

And your very funny, 2016-capping runners up!

Peter has to put his foot down right away, or MJ will pester him to call every other superhero that they know. ‘What about Jameson? He wore Iron Man’s suit once, he kind of counts, right?’” –TheDiva

“I like the vulture in Slylock Fox. ‘C’mon, Max, you want this dollar, don’t you? Sure you do. You probably need it, am I right?’” –BeckoningChasm

“‘We’re currently in the Negative Zone’ simply means ‘No, I don’t want to talk to you.'” –Ettorre

“So, is Killer supposed to be a sheep, a cloud, or just a highly-visible, easy-to-hit object that wants to get out of the wargame as quick as possible?” –pugfuggly

“I just realized that Shoe takes place in the same universe as Slylock Fox. Down below the trees the mammals fight for dominance over what remains of the human’s world while the birds live in a futuristic society full of driverless cars and ennui.” –EscapeZeppelin

“Okay, with a little imagination, I can picture Killer wriggling, worm-like, into his tube-shaped ‘sheep’ costume and finally poking his head out the other end after a half hour of struggle. But how did he get the hat on his head after that?” –Joe Blevins

“The real tipoff came from Loweezy, who is not surprisingly delighted to see her husband go to jail.” –Spunky The Wonder Squid

“Of course, even if Snuffy isn’t frozen to death, there’s no way he’ll be able to hear the Sherriff with so much snow and ice packed around his head. After the Sherriff shoots Snuffy for ‘resistin arrest,’ the snowman will serve to keep the body from putrefying too much until the ground thaws enough to dig a grave.” –JJ48

“Today we learn that Zak is not, in fact, 25 years old. He’s a centuries-old undead creature who maintains his youthful appearance by absorbing the life energies of his middle-aged paramours. Just look at the process happening to poor Iris right before our eyes! By tomorrow she’ll be a dry, discarded husk.” –Steve S

“General Halftrack isn’t dying; the Rapture is occurring. Miss Buxley is about the ascend, hence her spreading her arms so she can fly better. Also, we, the readers are also rapidly rising, which is why the General seems to be sinking from out perspective. Clearly, reading Beetle Bailey for our entire lives counts as our penance.” –Drew Funk

“Just realized, Mark Trail is dropping the ultimate ironic twist: everything but the boat is exploding.” –Dan

“If only there were some way to convert electricity to heat.” –James Dowd, on Facebook

“Even in Wilbur’s imagination, Iris looks like she’s settling” –Kevin on Earth

“It’s fun to imagine that the military has grabbed Wilbur for research purposes in trying to figure out his immortality. ‘Sir, he’s been in the oxygen-deprivation, mayo-starvation unit for 30 days. Seriously, he shouldn’t be alive. But. He. Is.’” –Dood

“Aaron wants to know what’s coming up this weekend? Well, Christmas, for starters. And I didn’t even have to scroll down through the ads on Google!” –seismic-2

“Wow, hey, Spider-Man is looking like a muscular sex machine in panel one as he’s popping his shirt off. Oh, wait, next panel has him huddled very awkwardly in his undies trying desperately to get his costume out. Immediate re-balancing of the scales.” –Chareth Cutestory

“‘No sense blowing my secret identity’ shouts Peter to his famous wife as he carefully unfolds the costume he carries everywhere and pulls it on in public, mask last.” –Schroduck

“I feel like saying ‘Stay back, honey’ as he disrobes probably sums up all levels Peter and MJ’s relationship, unfortunately.” –Here csome the Judge

“What’s that box supposed to be? Did Peter have to type his costume?” –made of wince

And I must give a huge thanks to all the extremely kind people who put some scratch in my tip jar or backed me on Patreon! I’m taking a moritorium on ad buys because the redesign is going to reshuffle the ad slots, but look for exciting ways you can advertise on this site come 2017! Happy New Year! Merry Christmas! Happy Hanukkah! Let’s hope for a real Kwanzaa madness tale in Curtis this year! I love you all! See you next year!