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Crankshaft, 7/5/15

Sure, Ralph Meckler says he’s just an ordinary citizen fighting for the little guy’s right to drive on safer streets. But his campaign is in the pocket of the sausage restaurant industry. Do we really want our city government ignoring important environmental and zoning concerns and just rubber-stamping approvals of chain eateries that serve substandard biscuits? Mayor Kane: Leadership We Can Trust.

B.C., 7/5/15

Here is a sequence of words that has almost certainly never been constructed before but which I nevertheless believe to be meaningful and also true: these prehistoric ants appear to be Seventh-Day Adventists.

Panels from Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 7/5/15

OH MY GOD LOWEEZY IS GOING TO RAISE CORPSES FROM THEIR GRAVES USING FOUL BACKWOODS NECROMANTIC SORCERY

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Apartment 3-G, 7/4/15

FUN FACT: Current Apartment 3-G artist Frank Bolle did the interior illustrations for many of the beloved Choose Your Own Adventure books published in the 1970s and ’80s, and I’m sincerely hoping today’s strip is a tribute to this. What exactly will the confusing, unsatisfying explanation for the recent weirdness in the strip surrounding Margo be? It all depends on you!

Mark Trail, 7/4/15

This Mark Trail strip is definitely from the opening minutes of a movie where a terrible plague makes the jump from shark to man, maybe transforming those unlucky few who don’t die right away into monstrous shark-human hybrids. So it’s probably for the best that Ken is calling in Mark Trail instead of, like, an actual veteranarian or some other kind of biologist or medical professional. We’ll need all of those we can get once the mass deaths really start getting underway; no need to expose them to the virus on day one.

Mary Worth, 7/4/15

Oh my God, Adam’s eye, staring emptily into the middle distance as Terry moves in for her smooch, is my everything. He’s finally won her heart — but at what cost? He suddenly realizes that the only way to stoke the fires of love within her is to join with her in escalating acts of violence. Sure, tonight they just subdued a convenient mugger, but he knows that won’t sate her bloodlust for long. Soon they’ll need to maim, to kill, and soon they won’t even use vigilante justice as a pretense. You’ve made your bed, Adam, and now you’ve got to lie in it.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 7/4/15

This comic is here to remind you that the desperately poor are generally too busy with trying to survive to work for political change, and most revolutions erupt when an emerging middle class finds that they lack a political outlet for the rising economic power. Happy Fourth of July, America!

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I hope American Comics Curmudgeon readers enjoy their patriotic holiday weekend! And you foreigners should feel free to enjoy your non-holiday weekend as well. Either way, this comment of the week will start things off right.

“Deputy Duck there looks petrified that everyone will soon realize he’s not special like the others, just an ordinary duck dressed up in a suit. I know how you feel, Deputy Duck.” –Steve S

These runners up are exactly what our Founding Fathers dreamed of when they rebelled against the tyrannical British crown!

“When is Slylock Fox going to expose this scam? It’s in the exact center of his wheelhouse.” –A Concerned Reader

“Neddy’s going to make her fortune the old fashioned way: a) come up with a product of marginal utility, b) chisel everybody in sight to death in order to get it made and in stores, c) hope lightning strikes and it becomes popular and d) start out with a fortune.” –jim, some guy in iowa

“Are we not going to comment on the herpes? Because the thing I have against the American worker is that massive cold sore.” –Ellen Marszalkowski, on Facebook

“Normally, violations of the 180-degree rule can be corrected in the viewer’s mind by our understanding of the characters and their situation. But Adam’s frequent creepy possessiveness/rush-to-commitment means that the initial illusion that he’s the mugger is oddly plausible at first glance. ‘Perhaps’, thinks the reader’s subconscious, ‘Adam just assumes all relationships naturally progress to something like this.'” –Lenoxus

“I have to admit, I kinda respect Count Weirdly’s defiant protest of the animal justice system. ‘You want to put me in jail? I’ve already put myself in a jail much worse than anything you could throw at me! In here I get no food, no exercise, not even a hole to discretely rid myself of waste! Pretty soon I will be chocking on my own farts as I slowly succumb to oxygen deprivation, and yet I’ll still have my dignity!'” –pugfuggly

“Look at their smug faces while they figure out bond ratings and how to share water treatment options with neighboring cities while managing ever-shrinking municipal budgets and an aging city workforce needing ever more health coverage. Yep, some local stiff is just gonna waltz in here and manage five decades of pension obligations because he hit a pothole that one time.” –James Dowd, on Facebook

“‘…and here is a person you’ll be working with whose name is Echo Chambers.’ Gotta come up with a put-down, quick. This is like prison, you’ve got to establish dominance or they’ll relegate you to the back office. What’s a sick burn I can give Echo Chambers, show her that I’m no one to mess with? ‘I wear really old clothes.'” –handsome Harry Backstayge, idol of a million other women

“That’s good, right? Means you’ll be able to move onto Chapter Six of the Kama Sutra, right? Yoga’s a sex thing, right?” –Pozzo

“And this is how we learn of Mark’s secret kink — vandalizing sharks.” –Joe Blevins

“He’s got lifeless eyes. Black eyes. Like a doll’s eyes. Hey! There’s a shark next to him, too!” –Mikey

“While you were all distracted by Adam and his cane, someone has made off with half of Terry’s body (the good half).” –lumaca morente

“Ha, ha. Are you still tying up and abandoning UPS guys?” –Dood

“‘Mark, your phone is ringing!’ ‘Would you answer it, honey?’ ‘It’s your cell phone — why don’t you keep it with you, instead of leaving it lying around this enormous house we can somehow afford on an occasional nature writer’s salary?’ ‘Oh, yeah, I keep forgetting that phones don’t have cords now. But where could I put it? My shirt only has six pockets!'” –BigTed

“‘Indeed I am, Mark! I have it tied back as we speak! Is your hair still short?’ ‘Why yes it is, Ken, thanks for asking!’ ‘How about Doc? Is he still bald?’ ‘He sure is! I keep telling him he should shave the sides, but he won’t listen! What about Kelly, is she still a brunette?’ ‘Nope, blonde now, from the neck up anyway, ha-ha! Is Cherry still rocking that retro fifties thing?’ ‘Yup, Cherry is not a person who is growing her hair long…’ And so forth, for literally hours.” –Ratiocinator

“Those aren’t roots by the tree, but freshly tilled soil. Nope, that handyman won’t ever be coming back.” –Malaclypse

“Since this is the Crankenverse — the funny (for certain values of funny) part of the Funkyverse — I have to assume that in the next panel she loses control of the wheelchair, which goes careening down a steep section of road and flips over. That flowerpot she’s carrying (for some reason) smashes down on her head, killing her instantly. The last picture is her crumpled corpse with the flower sticking out of her head. Crankshaft says ‘too bad, but we always knew she was a late bloomer.’ Fin.” –Voshkod

“Is that a beach ball, or the disembodied pitch-black blue-pupiled eye of some dark God, taken as a trophy when he was defeated and slain in mortal combat? But I thought Dick was on vacation? Must just be recreational killing.” –Jack loves comics

“Yeah, you’re supposed to keep your finger outside the trigger guard when not firing (that’s why it’s called a ‘trigger guard’), but I’m pretty sure that gun’s not actually cocked — and that’s a good thing, because the cylinder clearly doesn’t line up with the barrel, so trying to fire it would do more damage to the shooter than to the target. That’s what she gets for buying a cheap, knockoff handgun. ‘No stars, Schmidt & Western! Would not buy again!'” –Paul1963

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