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Spider-Man, 6/11/15

I’ve been watching the new Daredevil TV show on Netflix, which I enjoy, despite the fact that Vincent D’Onofrio works to bring out Kingpin’s human side instead of going into full-on “Faster! Work faster!” mode. One thing I find mildly irritating is how coy the dialogue is about who these people are, though: they never actually call Kingpin by that name, and, even though the show takes place in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, they only refer to other superheroes obliquely. At one point a character says “maybe if I had an iron suit or a magic hammer…”; how the actor resisted winking hammily at the camera at that point is beyond me. Anyway, that’s a long way of saying that I absolutely love this name-dropping cabbie and I hope he gets his own MCU spin-off series where he just blabs about superheroes and supervillains he’s had in his cab to non-super passengers displaying varying levels of disinterest. “Dr. Doom? They call him a menace to humanity, but in my experience he’s nice guy, good tipper. Doesn’t like take the Deegan — always thinks he knows a shortcut, which never quite works out, but hey, if you’re paying, you’re the boss, is my attitude.”

The Phantom, 6/11/15

One of the slow-boiling plots in the Phantom involves the fact being the Phantom means siring a new Phantom every generation, but the current model managed to actually father twins, and also we live in the 21st century where women can be superheroes, so which of the kids is going to be the next Phantom? This could be the rationale for the Ghost Who Parents Remotely “accidentally” leaving his phone on while he takes care of business, as soon he’ll figure out if either of them is comfortable enough with a little mild extrajudicial torture to follow in his footsteps.

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Slylock Fox, 6/10/15

Slylock and Count Weirdly have a pretty adversarial relationship, which mostly consists of Slylock humiliating the Count and undermining his schemes, no matter how victimless they are. But oh, as soon as Weirdly has a time machine and Slylock decides he wants to go freak out some dinosaurs, all of the sudden they’re best pals. I’m not sure what’s sadder: that Weirdly is so lonely and hungry for Slylock’s approval that he’s willing to overlook years of abuse just to spend some quality time chrono-journeying with him, or that Slylock’s ethical code, always more focused on strict enforcement of the law than on kindness, allows him to exploit the sad Count like this.

Mark Trail, 6/10/15

As the Trail’s extralegally adopted ward, Rusty generally refers to his guardians by their first names. Thus, panel two, in which he blurts out “Dad!” at the unconscious Mark, should be emotionally affecting. Unfortunately, he’s blurting “Dad” out of that … face, with the dead black eyes, and the flesh and the tears and the lips and the gums all the same off-peach color, and NOPE NOPE NO THANK YOU NO THANK YOU AT ALL SIR

Blondie, 6/10/15

EQUAL OPPORTUNITY UNSPEAKABLE FILTH

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Mark Trail, 6/9/15

Rusty isn’t just a hideous boy-thing that the Trails took in because nobody else would let him live inside; he’s also a constant danger magnet who needs to be rescued on the regular! You’ll remember, of course, the time he got stuck under a car, which led to Mark sacrificing his moral code and punching a cop in the face. Today’s drama plays out much more quickly: not only is Rusty endangered not by some human-made machine but by Mark’s beloved nature, but it’s Mark who ends up unconscious and concussed at the end of it. Will Rusty have to find hitherto unseen reserves of strength and drag Mark to safety? Will he allow Mark to die and just forlornly stare at Mark’s corpse until he gets hungry, and then start eating it? Either way, I think the real lesson here is that this lake is surrounded by rotting trees that just fall over when you barely look at them, so maybe there needs to be a local beaver population to clear out the literal dead wood.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 6/9/15

“I mean, my daughter is an actual apprentice art forger for the mob, so what’s a little light counterfeiting between friends? Anyway, take care of it, but don’t feel a need to let me in on the details. Remember, I can’t testify about anything I don’t know about!”

Dennis the Menace, 6/9/15

Dennis embraces the dystopian future where human offspring are grown in vats and, once weaned from their wire mothers, delivered by flying robots to their assigned workstations, A+ menacing.