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Lots of comics testing their traditional boundaries today. Check it out:

Mark Trail, 7/23/15

Slowly, with predator-like stealth, Mark Trail’s Sunday Nature strips have moved beyond their traditional range to invade and conquer the week. Tiny steps, at first – panels just a little larger, audience distracted by an African vista or boat explosion. Then the wildlife — foreground animals starting with bugs, then rodents, a comical lynx, then POW! A fin whale, right in your face!

Next comes dialog, and (like most dialog) this won’t go well for Mark: “They are known for attacking their own kind. Not like the FIN WHALE, a peaceful member of the RORQUALS, all of which have dorsal fins and throat grooves! Ken has been fishing these waters a long time … I’m confident he knows THE WHALE IS NOT A FISH … or else he wouldn’t be a fisherman but a WHALER, BRINGING THESE MAGNIFICENT CREATURES TO THE EDGE OF EXTINCTION, right? Hahaha wait what’s happening? Are those villains at NOAA behind this? I bet they are!”

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 7/23/15

Doc Pritchart is a dentist? Why?

Mary Worth, 7/23/15

Huh? A change of mind can’t be forced? Mary, have you completely forgotten what you’ve been doing for the past seventy-seven years? It is your brand, lady.

I sure hope this isn’t a move toward a kinder, gentler strip in which Mary minds her own business, keeps more and more to herself, and gradually withdraws into privacy of her room until a passerby notices that the talc-and-salmon smell outside her door has developed a distinct undertone ….

Meanwhile, AdamandTerry, get a room, wouldja?

— Uncle Lumpy

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Zits, 7/22/15

Here’s a fun physiology fact: you don’t taste your own saliva because the chemical senses adapt quickly and thoroughly unless the stimuli change. (If you wanted to taste your own saliva, you could, um, “save” some, rinse your tongue with distilled water for five minutes or so, reintroduce the saved saliva, and then sit down and wonder what kind of person does that, and how you became that kind of person).

Anyway, Jeremy and Sara got so close this summer that even long-time androgyne uniteen RichandAmy started calling them by one name. But in parting after months of liplock, Jeremy isn’t tasting all of his own saliva, only the saliva components that are unique to him. He can’t taste the components (like salt) that he shares with Sara — unless their concentration has changed, he’s still adapted.

What will Jeremy experience, tasting his unique “Jeremy flavor” for the first time (unless he did that spit experiment, ew)? Will his tasteworld be an intoxicating Red Bull and Dorito-tinged nirvana that lures him away from Sara toward an independent bliss? Or a fetid, caustic slick of industrial food additives that drives him back between Sara’s lips, there to purge the evidence of his personal corruption? Your future lies ahead, Jeremy — let your tongue point the way!

Curtis, 7/22/15

Curtis gets a lot of mileage repeating story arcs about the First Day of School, Derek and “Onion,” Magical Gunk, and in days gone sadly by, Insane Kwanzaa Folkways. Over the past couple years, it’s introduced Curtis’s Summer Job: Curtis works at nonprofits where he Learns Valuable Lessons but Earns No Money. The stories are sanctimonious and flat, so what humor there is comes from eccentric one-off characters. Last summer we got Dr. Chang of the Improbable Pants, and this summer it’s Miss Dot from the Charles Street Disaster Relief Coalition. Miss Dot is gap-toothed, says “awesome,” “like,” and “totally” to excess, and congratulates Curtis for jokes not in evidence.

I think this year’s Valuable Lesson is “bring back Dr. Chang.”

Judge Parker, 7/22/15

On Sunday Sophie told Sam and Abby that Neddy and Mark had spent a late night together, that they’d been writing to one another ever since, and that she, Sophie, could read between the lines.

The sex lines.

But sex lines have never been written that our Sam can read: “Something happened to give him confidence! What’s your theory — Tony Robbins DVD, energy drink, ginseng? New Testament readings? Motivational poster, winning lottery ticket, found a penny? Rhinoceros horn, visualization exercises, call from Mom? Sunday Mary Worth quote? “Participant” trophy? Think, Abby!”

Abby stares mute as Sam double-knots his robe; she will dream of Mark tonight, his soft words and rough hands.

— Uncle Lumpy

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Family Circus, 7/21/15

Fifty weeks out of the year, the fine folks at Team Family Circus bring you wholesome jokes beneath drawings of children. This is them telling us they’re on vacation, dammit.

Beetle Bailey, 7/21/15

I’ve always suspected that for Sarge, beating down Beetle was an end in itself rather than an attempt at discipline, and here he flat-out admits it. But it’s sad how bored and disengaged he looks in the second panel there. “No, I don’t care about the nap.” you can hear him say, “Beatings — of the prescribed duration and intensity — are what I do. They have become who I am. But lately I don’t even care about the beatings. As soon as I’m done here, I’ll go weep into my food.”

Phantom, 7/21/15

OK, so Kipawa here has challenged Guran for chief of the Bandar, which really irritates Guran trufans Kit Jr. and Heloise. Now we all know Guran is going to pull some mysterious win-by-losing BS out from under that manskirt of his so don’t worry. But what’s with the dress code for these Bandar events? We usually see the kids in loose-fitting Bandar-style thong ‘n’ sarong outfits, but they put on Gap to visit the tribe? I mean, Dad hasn’t even changed from his work outfit (never changes it so ripe ugh poor Diana).

— Uncle Lumpy