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Comment of the Week

Is Dr. Jeff's 'again’ meant to indicate that he's already (willfully?) forgotten what Mary's told him, or does it display his belief that Wilbur's life is a karmic circle of disasters that are superficially varied but basically the same thing happening to him over and over?

—Pozzo
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Wilbur’s fierce dedication to inaction

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Herb and Jamaal, 1/30/10

Herb’s mother-in-law Eula is always depicted as argumentative and unpleasant, perhaps because she’s a stereotypical, lazily created mother-in-law character constantly haunted by intrusive thoughts of death and divine punishment. We already know that she attends a church that has a creepy obsession with the afterlife. In this strip, her thought-ballooning begins with a brief moment of justified self-esteem over her good health; but soon she’s distracted that by the realization that her contemporaries are dying at a rapid clip, followed by paranoia that her dead friends are laughing it up at the right hand of Our Lord over her eternal punishment in Hell. Cheery! Presumably she’s going to take this self-loathing out on Herb, for having the temerity to displace her in her daughter’s affections.

Mary Worth, 1/30/10

As is the case with a lot of modern art, I couldn’t tell you specifically what feelings the second panel of this Mary Worth is supposed to evoke, but I enjoy at a visceral level. If I may venture an interpretation: Dawn’s mind is so aflame with shock over Wilbur’s quick capitulation that she’s on the verge of tearing off her own head to rid herself of the confusion and anguish inside it. Wilbur’s eyes, meanwhile, tell the story of a man grimly determined to not force the issue, someone who fervently and implacably believes that, really, it just doesn’t matter.

Family Circus, 1/30/10

Ha ha, it looks like Jeffy has learned the concept of asking for forgiveness rather than permission! Unfortunately, he’s also about to learn why Mommy calls that blanket “the Smotherer.”

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Soapy Friday

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Mark Trail, 1/29/10

I’m hoping that this Mark Trail storyline might be about to turn into Brokeback Mountain meets The Larry Craig Story. “An ‘old friend,’ Ben Harris, has a camp up ahead … I don’t think he’s going to be too happy with me, bringing a handsome young man like yourself along with me!” “It has been a long time, Senator … you’re looking good … so good … and you’re bringing someone else here … to our special place …” *sob*

Mary Worth, 1/29/10

Now, this is the point where all you cynics are going to say, “Ha ha, see, Kurt was lying all along!” That’s nonsense. If a scam artist were confronted with a request for a paternity test, they’d probably sputter and prevaricate. They certainly would not unleash a clipped “I don’t believe in their accuracy.” Thus, I am forced to conclude that Kurt is not a con man; he is a cyborg.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 1/29/10

Rex and June begin to suspect that Sarah is on to their plan to drop her off at a farm upstate and never come back.

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Sam will peck this cad within an inch of his life!

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Gil Thorp, 1/28/10

Most hilarious image in today’s comics: Steve Luhm’s sweatshirt, tied around his waist and twirling about madly, making him look like he’s wearing a tutu in panel two. Almost as funny: him following up his Sherlock Holmes-style sussing out of Cassie’s lack of growth with some dribbling advice. Shouldn’t she be really good at dribbling, since she’s been the same distance from the ground for the past few years? Also, shouldn’t her actual paid coach have noticed that her dribbling was terrible?

Judge Parker, 1/28/10

Also a hilarious image: Sam reacts to the information that Neddy has decided to move in with her boyfriend — no, wait, I’m sorry, has taken a “live-in lover,” which sounds much hotter — by performing an angry interpretive dance, in which he channels an enraged chicken of paternal vengeance. You can see in panel two that he’s strained his neck in the process, but the important thing is that he’s made his point.

Pluggers, 1/28/10

I was going to make a joke about how pluggers are so old that plugger hypochondriacs think they’re dying of archaic diseases. But then I did a bit of research (NOT ON WEBMD I AM NO PLUGGER) and found out that today, most beriberi cases occur in alcoholics whose drink-ravaged bodies can no longer properly absorb Vitamin B1. Thus, I’m going to go with “Pluggers are all terrible boozer degenerates” instead.