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Beetle Bailey, 10/31/23

Maybe I’m overly into the holiday spirit today but I genuinely enjoy the pathos of today’s strip. General Halftrack is so mad, and well might he be! He put a lot of effort into his vampire costume and these two did just the absolute minimum necessary! Now he looks like a tryhard, like the women and that goober Zero! Even Lt. Fuzz is making him seem like a chump.

[UPDATE: haha yes this is Killer, not Gen. Halftrack, for some reason I was visualizing an elaborate mustache-dyeing scenario that is quite honestly beyond the General’s ability to focus for short-term gain]

Dennis the Menace, 10/31/23

I’ve seen zero evidence that the Wilsons are into health food at all, and in fact Mrs. Wilson is constantly plying Dennis with cookies and such whenever he stops by unannounced, so I assume their trick-or-treat game is solid. You can just tell Joey that Mr. Wilson hates you, Dennis, I’m sure he’s got it mostly figured out already.

Gil Thorp, 10/31/23

LAST WEEK’S GIL THORP STORYLINE: The older Thorp kid has an abortion, a normal thing that happens all the time in real life, whole family is supportive, minimum of drama, not worth covering on this blog, of most interest because in a post-Dobbs world it helps us narrow down what state Milford is in

THIS WEEK’S GIL THORP STORYLINE: Gil is a vampire, this lady is offering herself up to him to have her blood erotically drained, I’m crying and throwing up and calling my Congressman to demand a government investigation into this filth

Hi and Lois, 10/31/23

Speaking of filth, I can believe these TWIN SIBLINGS went out dressed as a ROMANTICALLY INVOLVED COUPLE from a popular video game. I guess they’re “too young to know better,” but honestly, their parents should be guiding them away from terrible mistakes like this.

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Blondie, 10/30/23

I had a conversation with a friend the other day about those haunted houses you can go to at amusement parks and such for Halloween, and she drew a distinction that really stuck with me: some stuff you encounter at these things, like decor with skulls and bats and other goth business, is spooky, and other stuff, like people jumping out of the dark and grabbing you, is scary, and not everyone is into both! Anyway, what Blondie experienced — a couple weird cosplayers coming up with a series of ever-dumber Halloween puns — is spooky, whereas Dagwood’s day, in which he once again had to weigh his emotional health against his family’s finances when dealing with his abusive boss, is scary. Here to help!

Crock, 10/30/23

Big news! After 48 years of doing a dumb comics riff on P. C. Wren’s 1924 novel Beaut Geste, as of today Crock will start doing a dumb comics riff on Albert Camus’s 1947 novel The Plague.

Dennis the Menace, 10/30/23

Is it just me or does the perspective in this panel make Dennis look like he’s about seven feet tall, but with the bodily proportions of a child, making him a truly nightmarish figure? Anyway, if I could change one thing about him, it’d be that. I’d like him to be a normal size again.

Mary Worth, 10/30/23

“Ugh, it used to be we would have sex, but now it turns out that people you have sex with sometimes have opinions? That are different from yours??? What the heck!”

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Barney Google and Snuffy Smith and Family Circus, 10/29/23

You know, I was about to go on a whole rant here about how the fact that Hootin’ Holler’s only clergyman is a grifter and fraud has resulted in Snuffy holding to some kind of folk syncretism, since he’s freely combining a pagan ritual in which humans take on the guise of evil spirits with a celebration of the risen Christ. But then I was humbled when I got to today’s Family Circus, a strip whose theology I have always assumed is impeccable. We see the Saints themselves rejoice at seeing children dressing up as gangsters or literal witches! I am, as the kids say, sitting my ass down and learning.

Dick Tracy, 10/29/23

Hey, let’s not forget, this Dick Tracy plot isn’t just about the elevated world of rare book crime, it’s also about stabbing, and since Xaviera here has a knife, she probably did the murders, case closed! I do sincerely appreciate the cinematic composition here; presumably Xaviera keeps talking over the last few panels, but from Dick’s perspective her voice fades away as he catches the glint of the blade and all he can think is knife knife knife KNIFE KNIFE STAB STAB STAB KNIFESTAB