Post Content

Mary Worth, 8/24/17

When I was a little kid, I read Peanuts anthologies obsessively, which is a great way to learn about melancholy. Peanuts characters notoriously sigh audibly all the time, and like lots of children acquiring language competency, I quickly came to understand how sighs were supposed to be deployed, even if I didn’t get that the word “sigh” in these word balloons was supposed to signify the nonverbal sound we call a sigh and not the actual word “sigh.” The upshot is that I would say the word “sigh” as a kid when it was appropriate to sigh, and no adult told me not to do this for years, presumably because it was hilarious.

Anyway, this is a long way to say that I love Mary Worth’s tendency to put nonverbal signifiers, like “groan!” and “sheesh.” and, today, “sigh!”, in thought balloons. Can you really think a paralinguistic utterance like a sigh? Sure you can! Eight-year-old Josh was there to prove it!

Dennis the Menace, 8/24/17

Wait, so Henry and Alice’s entire wedding/honeymoon album is only six pages long? I can’t decide if this means that Dennis is right and Disneyland would’ve been an improvement on whatever they did, or if they spent their entire honeymoon and much of the wedding reception having vigorous marital relations, and the real menace is the fact that Dennis was simultaneously the product and the end of a pastime for which they once had great enthusiasm.

Post Content

Mark Trail, 8/25/17

It appears that the time for trick riding is done. It has its place, of course, like when you need to trick a particularly dim kidnapper who can’t be bothered to look down a cliff to see if you’re dead at the bottom of it, or if it’s really a cliff at all and not just a gentle slope. But now it’s the draft horses’ time to shine. They’re calm, and they’re strong. That’s the attitude you want a horse to have when you send it to fight a bear in a cave. Horse vs. bear, deep beneath the earth’s crust: the greatest spectacle nature has to offer. I for one am ready.

Mary Worth, 8/25/17

As predicted, Dr. Ned has been off smooching with Dawn (and presumably every other comely young temp in the hospital) despite the fact that he’s still married, to his wife, from whom he earlier claimed to be divorced! And now Jared is about to stumble upon this shocking fact, which there was really no reason for Dr. Ned to ever lie to him about, but whatever. Will Jared able to warn Dawn in time???? He might have an easier time convincing her of his good intentions, if he weren’t such an off-putting dweeb who’s been blatantly trying to get in her pants since day one!

Marvin, 8/25/17

You know, I get the conceit of Marvin. I really do! I get that it’s funny to imagine that preverbal infants and toddlers might have fully formed adult thoughts and personalities inside their little heads, and that it’s funny to extrapolate how adult thought processes would map on to a baby’s everyday concerns. You follow that train of logic and then, sure, you get to a point where you realize you could get a laugh out of someone using grown-up language to complain that his parents don’t want him to shit himself anymore! Then you do that joke at least once a week for 35 years.

Post Content

Guys! Next Friday is the first Friday of the month and that means there’s an Internet Read Aloud show in LA, hosted by me! Do not under any circumstances miss it!

And, while I have you here, I guess it can’t hurt to remind you, or maybe tell you for the very first time if you haven’t heard, that for only $3 a month you can become a Comics Curmudgeon supporter and get an ad-free version of this site, along with advanced comment-editing features! Also, if you use Patreon and have wondered if I’m someone to whom you can give money via Patreon, good news: I am, and there’s a tote bag in it for you if you pledge $2 a month or more! And, of course, you can always just toss some scratch in my Paypal tip jar, or even via Venmo @jfruhlinger!

And, also, if we follow Slylock-style ratiocination logic, if the first Friday of the month is in a week, that means today is also a Friday, and that means it’s time for your comment of the week!

Sigh. Dawn won’t have time to catch up on what’s been going on in her life since they said goodnight late last night. She might have to wait til they have lunch together to tell him all about the drive home, the text from her dad, the laying out of her clothes for the morning, her breakfast, and the drive in. I love these stories where the predator becomes the prey.” –handsome Harry Backstayge, idol of a million other women

And your runners up are also hilarious!

“Really liking the throwaway panel in which Peter’s spidey-sense alerts him that his Aunt noticed him farting.” –pugfuggly

“This is the goddamned weirdest Old Milwaukee ad I have ever seen. Narrator: ‘Subterranea and Old Milwaukee both mean something great to these guys. Subterranea means a complex network of underground caves and tunnels, generous enough to house Lava Men, Gortokians, and Molans alike, far from the blinding sunlight of the surface world! It’s the perfect vantage point to watch your vanquished enemy die of fright on his own wedding day! And Old Milwaukee means a great beer with a clean, crisp, bold taste!’ Cut to Tyrranus, cracking open a cold one as he watches a giant tentacle attack Mole Man on the view screen: ‘It just doesn’t get any better than this!’ Fade out.” –Joe Blevins

“This strip is the antithesis of Moneyball — but relying on an impression gained during a brief training session with an athlete under perfect conditions to predict future performance is just the sort of thing that Gil does year-in and year-out. Let’s call it Milfordball.” –But What Do I Know?

“In today’s Mary Worth, we see the good Doctor set up a light show to convince Dawn she’s being abducted by aliens. This will help him explain away any memories she has of ‘being probed’ and her upcoming pregnancy. ‘Can’t be mine, Dawn, you were on a starship nine months ago, remember? Take good care of your star child, OK?’” –Voshkod

“June and Rex engage in passionate Monday-night handshaking. ‘Sleep well.’ ‘Sounds good. I’ll have my people call your people, and we’ll put this thing to bed.’” –Charterstoned

“I’ll be honest, if I was a cashier at a grocery store and notorious glutton Dagwood Bumstead came to my register with only one banana, I would be shocked too.” –Andrew

“Imagining how much these two couples secretly loathe each other and are seething with anger that they’ll be upstaging each others’ weddings, which they carefully hide with the skill of professional actors, actually makes this strip enjoyable.” –Spunky The Wonder Squid

“I’m sure that ‘evidence of bears‘ is just a polite way of saying ‘bear shit,’ but I prefer to think that he’s seen piles of pic-a-nic baskets.” –Pozzo

“It is well known that Mark Trail hates facial hair. Equally well known is the fact that shaving creatures named Samson drains them of their power. Foreshadowing, yo.” –Dmsilev

“Someone needs to tell the Dick Tracy team that there is more to inventing a punny name than just grabbing a random two-word phrase off Wikipedia’s ‘photography’ article.” –Schroduck

“Actually Dawn taped up ‘RING RING’ as a subtle hint that’s she’s open to an engagement. You can tell it’s Dawn’s because the letters are big and all caps, like she learned in first grade.” –Little Blue Bicycle

“Immediately start imagining a young Henry and Alice on their wedding night. The lights are low, the bedsheets turned down, two half-filled glasses of champagne are on the table. Alice sensuously hikes her wedding dress to slowly take down her stockings and garter, Henry removes his trousers, suggestively unclasping his own sock garters — Suddenly realize it’s August and analyst is on vacation. Call emergency hotline.” –Bobby Sneakers

“For the first panel I just assumed the hat guy was speaking in old-timey gangster lingo. But nope, he literally wants Johnny to let that pony of his head on home. I guess the world of Mark Trail is not yet ready for slang or metaphor.” –Dan

I have to ask the boss about Mr. Smith’s lab results. We have a pool going on back in the files room, and the current odds are about 3-to-5 that Smith has got cirrhosis of the liver, and he has maybe a couple of years left to live. Most of the staff is betting that way, but I think they’re nuts. I say it’s clearly liver cancer, so he’s a goner in 6 months, and I wagered $50 on it! I can hardly wait for the boss to tell us about the lab results. I wonder who’s the lucky one in the pool? Not Mr. Smith, that’s for sure!” –seismic-2

And as ever, we must give thanks to our advertisers:

  • Two Party Opera: A daily comic that features the Presidents of the United States as they live on the stage of history with the day-to-day news of political mudslinging.
  • Oh hey, and don’t forget, I wrote a book! You can get it in hardcover, paperback or ebook forms. It’s called The Enthusiast, and it’s about trains, comics, stealth marketing, capitalism, and joy.

If you would like to buy advertising on the Comics Curmudgeon, and get a text shoutout in these posts, get the details on my BuySellAds page.

About this Post

Comments are closed.