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Funky Winkerbean, 4/21/10

Funky Winkerbean’s trip to New York featured a few moments of publishing hope for long-suffering victim Les (though surely we’ll see those dreams get squashed later), but we’ve quickly moved back to familiar territory: impotent, misplaced rage. Actually, “rage” is the wrong word: the dialogue seems rage-y enough, but the slouchy body language and numb faces denote a total absence of the passion that is rage’s necessary prerequisite. I stand by the impotence, though.

And the misplacement. There are any number of greedy, amoral morons who can be blamed for our current macroeconomic state of affairs; but, assuming that Funky is maundering about the failure of the Montoni’s franchise in New York to take off, I think it’s unlikely that, even in the best of economies, crappy midwestern pizza would have been a big hit in a city well known for its many well-established and much-loved pizza vendors. It’s not like Goldman Sachs was nefariously creating synthetic CDOs based on pizza futures and then betting against them.

Beetle Bailey, 4/21/10

Towards the end of Tony Kushner’s Angels in America, God is briefly depicted as an enormous flaming aleph, the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet. The God of Beetle Bailey is much less impressive, consisting merely of the tiny and non-fiery Name of the strip’s creator. Today, God is attempting to make Beetle sound like someone you might actually want to go on a date with, with mixed results.

Mark Trail, 4/21/10

From my long and dedicated observation of the fauna in this strip, I’ve learned that when a senator starts emitting visible sweatballs, he is on the verge of a heart attack. This is a good illustration of the moral difference between our two rival lawmakers: Senator Good Senator only suffered a cardiac event after engaging in righteous fisticuffs with some longhair, while Senator Bad Senator’s heart is going south as soon as he realizes that arrest and/or punching might be in his future.

B.C., 4/21/10

Ha ha! The bird is afraid of being killed and eaten, but the snake thinks that the bird is afraid of being sexually assaulted!

Marmaduke, 4/21/10

Yeah, so, uh, this happened. Let’s never speak of it again, shall we?

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Apartment 3-G, 4/20/10

Oh, goody, Apartment 3-G is revisiting an important plot point from Sunday that I neglected to mention, namely the “private psychiatric facility upstate” into which the so-called “sane” characters in this strip are bamboozling our poor Bobbie. The Professor, of course, was the one who was prescribing pills to Bobbie and screwing her, possibly not in that order, so he’s the most suitable candidate for disposing of her in a way that’s convenient for everyone, without the pesky police getting involved. One wonders who’s paying for this fancy private facility! Martin, with his alimony checks? The Professor, out of guilt? Actually, if my suspicions are correct, it may be the sort of institution where she can earn her keep just like Margo did.

Crock, 4/20/10

Oh, look, Crock is trying to capture that awful yet moving vibe of yesterday’s Hagar the Horrible. Unfortunately, the sort of little grace notes that made that other strip work in spite of itself are wholly missing from this one, and the details that are present are just jarring and wrong (vultures do not have teeth, for instance). But mostly a steaming, bloated corpse being picked apart by a grotesque scavenger bird just doesn’t have the same grim majesty as a good burning at the stake, I’m afraid.

Gil Thorp, 4/20/10

Against all odds and logic, teen alt-country sensation “Slim” Chance has decided to spend his spring afternoons with the losers and yahoos on the Mudlark baseball team, possibly because he hopes to use their pathetic dreams and broken lives as material for his songwriting. He’s already blowing the kids’ minds with his crazy musical stylings; I’m assuming one of the major spring plots will involve his teammates, who have grown up on a diet of the terrible rap-metal, learning about good, wholesome music, like this country standard about adultery and murder.

Marmaduke, 4/20/10

Marmaduke is the last creature one would expect to see engaging in the sort of nonviolent passive resistance that Gandhi and Martin Luther King used to effect social and political change. It’s more likely that he’s hoping to lure unwary passersby close enough for him to kill and eat.

Mary Worth, 4/20/10

Tobey is overjoyed that Mary has at last made another friend, which takes the pressure off her, and is thus trying to minimize any potential flaws Mary might see in her. “Oh, she’s a big shopper? Is that all? That’s no reason why you two shouldn’t be thick as thieves and spend all your free time together. Whoa, is it 1:30 already? Gotta go! Later Mary! Say hi to Bonnie for me!” In panel two her hand is shaking in anticipation of freedom, sweet freedom.

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No fuss, no muss this week: just your comment of the week.

“I know we all get to that point with Pluggers where we think, ‘These man-beasts are based on real people, which is so sad it’s almost unbearable.’ I just wanted to let everyone know, I got there today. And when I did, I had myself a little giggle at the ‘bear’ pun I made in my head. Unbearable … haha. Then I got sadded out again.” –Maggie

And your runners up as well! Very funny!

“[Crankshaft says something.] [Somebody asks him a question about it.] [Crankshaft makes a weak pun-like statement.] Oh, I forgot to say: SPOILER FOR CRANKSHAFT.” –[Old Man] Muffaroo

“The only way this could be more deflating is if Margo suddenly developed the capacity to love.” –Nekrotzar

“Sam was shocked and surprised for so long I was beginning to get worried. I’m glad to see him back at the top of his game. Whichever game it is that requires him to be a smug dick.” –Darkefang

“I would totally read the Mark Trail spinoff series ‘Ranger Buzz Gets Laid,’ in which Ranger Buzz travels to remote locations that are always fortuitously populated by young, attractive single ladies. He introduces himself as the improbably named ‘Ranger Buzz,’ they are inevitably smitten, and then they do it. While the local woodland creatures watch.” –Revenge of Chesnut

“I eagerly anticipate the end of this Mary Worth storyline, where ‘Bonnie’ turns out to be Wilbur Weston in drag, and ‘Mary Worth’ turns out to be David Bowie.” –Steve S

“Wow, that’s a lot of text for a Pluggers comic. I wonder if their readership made it all the way through.” –JD

“When you’re a plugger, Big Mouth Billy Bass is apparently a bedroom aide.” –BowToTheBard

“For Margo, guns are as common as neckerchiefs in whatever hell hole Lu Ann claims to be from.” –skullcrusherjones

“This is actually a reworking of the original submission, as ‘Pluggers think Ice-T is that cold tea beverage that you drink, with ice, and not that rap guy/TV sex crimes investigator’ was deemed too clunky even by Pluggers standards.” –Violet

“Josh, do not fear the hammer. Fear the hammer handle. Obviously, we have not witnessed the same porn movies.” –Dingo, the Essence of Purity and Virtue Incarnate™

“Jeffy should respond to this disappointment like he does all disappointments, by shocking his mother with nudity.” –Naked Bunny with a Whip

“I too read Tiffany’s line in panel 2 as referring pretty straightforwardly to a vibrator. Then I realized that that would have been a reasonably snappy sarcastic response to Gunther’s creepy, vaguely insulting question, and was therefore unlikely to have appeared in a Luann strip.” –perchingpath

“So the Random Luann Romance Generator finally threw out Gunther and Tiffany. And I keep waiting for it to be Bernice and Delta’s turn.” –yellojkt

“On the (reasonably lengthy) list of things that high school boys absolutely do not say, ‘I think if we talk about our issues, we’ll both feel better’ constitutes at least one in every three of them.” –One-eyed Wolfdog

“Hey waitaminute, Dave: Lily’s lost a very big part of her retirement savings? Must be one helluva prenup.” –Uncle Lumpy

“That second panel of the Phantom is fantastic. The glum but grim face of the Phantom as the narration box practically screams the word DEAD at him, while he stands just outside his creepy skull cave taking a sad, forlorn leak. ‘I will avenge you, Diana, after I’m finished draining the PYTHON.'” –Taquelli

“Frankly, I love Falk’s transformation in the third panel. He just went from erudite professor to bad-ass: he sheds the extra-lame ‘book’, adds a piercing glare, aqua bowler hat, menacing skull beating-stick, and a real zebra-skin coat draped over his right arm. Aww yeah, it’s Pimp time, bitches.” –Margaret

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