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Gil Thorp, 5/9/14

Yeah, what’s with the hand? Or the hands plural, for that matter? Why is one of them all turned around at a weird, unnatural angle? Why is the other one flapping in the direction of the first one, fingers splayed, as if that’s a gesture that’s used by humans to convey information of some kind? What’s with the hands? It’s what we’ve wondered for years about this strip, so I’m glad someone’s finally worked up the nerve to ask.

Apartment 3-G, 5/9/14

Speaking as someone who writes dumb jokes about newspaper comics on the Internet for a living, I do sort of understand the appeal of “real work” that Tommie’s talking about here — not enough to actually do any of it, you understand, but I can sort of see it. But it’s worth pointing out that before she came out to the country to shovel horse poop in exchange for room and board, Tommie was a nurse, which strikes me as pretty real? You’re not supposed to get your hands dirty, though, what with the danger of deadly infections. Maybe Tommie was just tired of the relentlessly sanitary hospital environment?

Crankshaft, 5/9/14

This week Crankshaft has been poking a little light-hearted fun at golf by explaining the emotions a golfer experiences after a whiff in terms of the Kübler-Ross stages of grief one goes through after suffering the death of a loved one or other serious life trauma. Today we reach the Funkyverse’s natural level with stage four: depression. What’s more depressing than contemplating killing yourself? Why, contemplating what it’d be like to fail at killing yourself, just like you always fail at golf and everything else, of course!

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Dick Tracy, 5/8/14

Bored with getting into gruesome shootouts with human suspects who all sadly end up dead before they can be arrested and stand trial, Dick Tracy is going to see what it’s like to shoot a horse for resisting arrest.

Mark Trail, 5/8/14

Mark Trail is in newspapers everywhere walking around with no shirt on, which seems like it should be at least as big a news story as this missing plane thing.

Beetle Bailey, 5/8/14

Beetle has a pretty bad bed-wetting problem, apparently.

Apartment 3-G, 5/8/14

ARISTOTLE PAPAGORAS, PROFESSIONAL AND ACCREDITED THERAPIST, EVERYBODY

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Mary Worth, 5/7/14

Ten years ago (ten years ago!), Mary unleashed a magnificent act of passive aggression on poor Iris; after smelling Tommy’s weed-smoke drifting through the air vents, she dropped by to say hi to Irish and mention “whatever Tommy was smoking” all snide-like. Now, a decade later, she’s prepared to get semi-confrontational right to Tommy’s face! I’m not sure what I like better, her casual reference to “your history” or the idea that an ex-con will somehow magically have an easier time finding a job if only he reframes the process in his mind as some kind of redemption narrative.

Heathcliff, 5/7/14

So, I guess Heathcliff must occasionally seek legitimacy from the electorate to continue his reign as untouchable god-king? I’m assuming that this is just a Stalinist sham election with only a single name on the ballot: the campaign poster doesn’t even try to convey even the vaguest of political philosophies to entice the voter, but merely promotes a vision of Heathcliff as omnipresent and inevitable, which is of course its own sort of ideological stance.

Hi and Lois, 5/7/14

I’m not exactly sure why Hi and Lois decided to go with a featureless, inky black floor for their kitchen rather than a more traditional tile or linoleum pattern, but if they thought it wouldn’t show dirt or stains as vividly, they were clearly very much mistaken.

Mother Goose and Grimm, 5/7/14

Grimm is panhandling for money to see what appears to be a porno version of Spider-Man.