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Dustin, 6/7/23

I would hesitate to ever say you have to hand it to the syndicated comic strip Dustin, but you do have to hand it to the syndicated comic strip Dustin for making even imaginary conversations both hostile and confusing. Like, the whole point is that the donut is begging Dustin’s dad to eat it, right? Like it’s talking about how much he wants it (nonsexually) and basically offering itself up to be devoured. So why would Dustin’s dad yell “So there!” rather than “You’re right!” or “Thank you!” or something? Have years of work in the legal system and/or dealing with Dustin left him unable to conceive of any interaction that isn’t at its root adversarial?

Dick Tracy, 6/7/23

I love the sweet innocence of the hiring manager here. “Oh, maybe she just forgot! Maybe she got distracted, didn’t put on shoes, and then went outside and either got in her car, which she uses her feet to operate, or maybe walked or got on a bus or subway, then walked into this building, and never at any point noticed that she didn’t have shoes on, as she was coming in for a job interview. That’s probably the most likely explanation.” Anyway, I guess I buy that if you hold “I worship Mother Earth and keep in touch with her” as a belief system, you might think you should go around barefoot, but I’m not sure why, if you think that Mother Earth can feel you through the depressing industrial carpet and the several layers of subflooring and foundation underneath this call center, throwing a comfy pair of Keds into the mix would really make all that much difference.

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Pluggers and Shoe, 6/6/23

How are the various human-animal hybrid monstrosities of the Jeff MacNelly Extended Universe grappling with the concept of the “beer belly”? Well, Pluggers would like you to know that they do not guzzle alcoholic beer like some lout; instead they get all the stimulation they could need from a combination of sugars and starches that every doctor on earth would look at and beg, “Please, rethink this.” Shoe, meanwhile, is confident that its core readership of elderly shut-ins has never been a store that sells novelty t-shirts and are unaware that they can find them online, so they’ll never realize that this is a shamelessly ripped off joke.

Slylock Fox, 6/6/23

Ah, here’s a delightful scene from the closing days of the Animal Revolution, in which one of few remaining human holdouts is cornered in a tent deep in the desert, while a grotesquely enhanced scorpion waits eagerly to sting him to death. However, as the snake-vulture interaction at the right of the panel illustrates, the animals are beginning to turn on one another, which explains why they failed to “finish the job” and Slick Smitty and Count Weirdly remain at large.

Gasoline Alley, 6/6/23

Oh, hey, how’s the tale of Rufus’s head injury going? Well, he’s unconscious and unresponsive, and emergency services are unable to reach him, so, not great, really! Not great at all!

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Mary Worth, 6/5/23

Haha, remember how when Saul Wynter was first introduced to this strip, Toby made a big show of not liking him, and when his original, pre-Greta dog died, Toby reported the news with a certain amount of — well, not glee, exactly, but the vibe was less “this is a true tragedy” than “ha ha, an old man is emotionally in turmoil, can’t wait to relay this little morsel of gossip!” So anyway, that’s why Mary has to emphasize to her that “Look, if you see the dog, do not just say to yourself, ‘Oh, that’s Saul’s dumb little dog,’ and then go on with your day, and when Ian sees that you have a little smile and asks you what you’re thinking about you just say ‘Oh, nothing.’ Please tell me, OK?”

Blondie, 6/5/23

Look, I’m not going to say that I would pay $200 a week for lawn maintenance, but I don’t have a huge suburban lawn and an HOA that would threaten to put a lein on my house if the grass was longer than half an inch like the Bumsteads probably do. I also feel like any time Blondie brings up the question of pricing for the sort of services that upper-middle-class people might avail themselves of, the attitude is usually “Oh, you think your labor has value? You think your riding mower is a capital expense for your business that needs to be recouped, rather than the fun toy that I would treat it as if I owned it? Well an exaggerated version of you is about to be cut down to size in a nationally syndicated newspaper comic strip that I inherited, buddy!”