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Six Chix, 9/15/16

My favorite thing about this cartoon (or, more accurately, the thing I dislike the least about it) is that the hand emerging from the bottom of the panel could plausibly be assigned to either of the two characters. I’m pretty sure we’re supposed to understand it as the blonde lady rubbing her chin thoughtfully as the brunette’s insane forehead tattoo causes her to completely rethink her opinions on the small conversational pleasantries that serve to lubricate our every day social interactions. But I’d like to believe that in fact tattoo-lady is resting her own fingers seductively on the chin on her interlocutor, as if to say, “Look, you and I both feel the energy between us, so let’s not waste our time with the conversational dance that normal humans use to build up levels of intimacy. Let’s make out. You ever made out with a woman with a bonkers personal philosophy tattooed on her forehead before?”

Judge Parker, 9/15/16

“People will line up for any job. Even if the job involves being locked up in a shipping container doing painful manual labor, even if the job is only open to old people in violation of any number of federal and state labor laws: if you post a job ad in the paper, dozens of desperate people will line up to apply for that job, no questions asked. There’s no story here! Covering this ghastly carnival of economic anxiety is a complete waste of our time as journalists. Ugh, why can’t we go film a war or something important like that?”

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Judge Parker, 9/14/16

Ever since Sophie and her friends went tumbling down that rain-slicked hillside, Neddy has been on tenterhooks waiting to find out if her dumb little sister managed to ruin her big day, by dying. Turns out she’s alive! Turns out it’s not incredibly inappropriate at all that Rocky lined up those three champaign flutes and held that bottle of bubbly at the ready, waiting for this call. Turns out we’ll never get to see him quietly returning the glasses to the cabinet and putting the bottle back into the fridge, unopened, while Neddy weeps over the terrible loss of publicity, not to mention all the money spent on jumbo cookies for the press, just gone to waste. I’m a little disappointed by this, honestly.

Marvin, 9/14/16

Considering how most babies and dogs actually have their temperature taken, I think we’re finally discovering the limits of what the normally scatologically-obsessed Marvin is allowed to get away with.

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Hi and Lois, 9/13/16

One mark of many a sitcom and comic strip with middle-class American characters is the dad working a generic, nonspecific white-collar job at a generic, nonspecific large company of some sort. So shoutout to today’s Hi and Lois for answering multiple decades-old questions in a single strip: Foofram Industries manufactures nuts, bolts, and other fasteners, and Hi is works in its PR department. This should provide lots of opportunities for gags where Hi, dead-eyed and emotionally exhausted, builds up the strength to churn out 500 peppy words about a revolutionary new alloy that Foofram Industries is going to start using in its screws to increase their stress tolerance by a full 8% or whatever. What I’m trying to say is that based on how boring his usual duties must be, Hi should be thrilled about the opportunity to write about something exciting like this lawsuit, which, for the record, Foofram is getting hit with because one of their nuts didn’t fit properly onto one of their bolts, causing the bleachers at a minor league baseball game to collapse, killing twelve people.

Mark Trail, 9/13/16

Having been denied the use of the company credit card to rent a boat, Mark has decided to rent a helicopter (apparently the risk of choppersplosion is already priced into the insurance?) to get to Abbey Powell’s Mysterious Invasive Species Island Which Is Also Volcanic Even Though It’s Near Kauai And Thus Not Really In The Right Spot For That. I’m particularly fond of Mark’s slightly put upon expression in panel three. “Women! Always thinking they’ve discovered signs of invasive species, amiright? And taking so long to get ready for a date? Eh?”

Crankshaft, 9/13/16

So the tale of the kid who fell asleep on Crankshaft’s bus never … actually got resolved? Last we saw Crankshaft was grouchily driving him home while his mother desperately drove by the bus in the other direction, presumably in a panic that her child had disappeared. Anyway, today it looks like the kid never did get reunited with his family and has had to live on the bus ever since, quietly training himself in the violent arts at night and awaiting his day of vengeance. That day … has arrived.