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Funky Winkerbean, 11/5/13

One of the downsides of the thick, suffocating blanket of omnipresent gloom that covers the characters in Funky Winkerbean at all times is that it’s often difficult to know how exactly how we’re supposed to be reading their facial expressions. I think “Maybe we should’ve known!” is supposed to be a light-hearted “Maybe we should’ve known that Cory would love old comic books, just like his dad, the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, ha ha!” But with everyone looking so glum in that final panel, it comes across much more like “Maybe we should’ve known, oh God, we never knew our son at all, we wasted the sort time we had with him, and now he’s almost certainly going to die in some God-forsaken desert cursing our names, we’re monsters, we’re all sad, broken monsters.”

Family Circus, 11/5/13

The expression on the face of the checkout clerk here is a bit easier to parse. “Listen to how excited that little kid is about grocery bags! What a terrible bleak home life he must have, devoid of the ability to choose anything for himself, or have fun of any kind!”

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Apartment 3-G, 11/4/13

Oddball misfit Marty sure is learning some stuff about how to be a bad girl from her bad girl friend Tori! For instance, she’s learning how to make the jerk-off gesture when talking (or, in this case, thinking) about jerk-offs like her dad. She hasn’t quite gotten all the nuances down yet — for instance, you should do it sort off to the side while sneering, rather than right in front of your face while you look like you’re about to cry — but it’s nice to see her trying new things!

Slylock Fox, 11/4/13

I originally thought the solution to this puzzle was going to involve the boxer shorts that Count Weirdly hadn’t taken off yet, thanks to his last shred of human decency. But no, it’s based on the fact that your hair and nails are already dead! I’m not sure what’s more unsettling, the image of a man invisible except for his hair and nails, or the thought that we’re all covered with corpse-bits that spout out of our very flesh.

Spider-Man, 11/4/13

You’d think that Peter Parker’s own extremely non-lucrative journalism career would give him a little more sympathy for the sad souls who pissed their editors off enough to be exiled to the Spider-Man beat for their various publications. But nope, being Spider-Man means you can just be a stone-cold dick to whoever you want!

Heathcliff, 11/4/13

I love how unimpressed and aggravated Heathcliff’s owner is here. What good is it even to have a cat that uses his terrifying control over the forces of darkness to manipulate matter and cancel out gravity if you still have mice?

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Spider-Man, 11/3/13

Good news, everybody! The Tarantula and Spider-Man defeated El Condor, and the Tarantula was all about restoring democracy to Costa Verde and holding free and fair elections, but then like forty guys who showed up in the capital to watch El Condor’s arrest shouted that Tarantula should lead them, so now he’s going by “Mr. Presidente” and striking a Jesus Christ pose in front of his fanatical followers. ¡Viva la revolución! Anyway, Spidey, having encouraged Tarantula’s coup, is now enjoying some of its sweet, sweet material benefits. “Whoa whoa whoa, I get to fly on a plane while lying on a couch? This is amaaazing!”

Crock, 11/3/13

Speaking of violent revolution, years of privation and failed leadership have finally broken down military discipline in the Lost Patrol. The angry men plan to lynch their leader, only to be killed themselves by a stratagem of the brutal commander they hate so much. It’s OK, though, because this bloody conflict has been given the cute name “grumble time!” Ha ha, those kooky grumbling starving murderous legionnaires!

Panels from Hi and Lois, 11/3/13

I’m not sure what I love more about today’s Hi and Lois throwaway panels: that Chip (estimated birth date: 1997) is waxing nostalgic to his little sister about the cocaine-fueled glory days of the ’70s New York disco scene, or that Dot, sullen and angry at having been confronted by an unfamiliar cultural reference, calls him “chip dip” in her head. I for one will be responding to things I don’t understand with “Whatever that means, chip dip” from now on.

Luann, 11/3/13

“So I’m available? Over here? Eh? Eh? Available for sex? Eh?”