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At least he doesn’t have a car to get towed

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Spider-Man, 7/2/09

After a few terrifying and disorienting days in which super-powered characters were locked in something resembling combat, Spider-Man has returned to its more reassuringly typical fare of whining and overblown anxiety. Like many a disappointed visitor, Wolverine is discovering that there are literally only two entertainment options in New York: feeding pigeons or seeing plays featuring the stars of direct-to-DVD superheroine films.

Meanwhile, Spidey is worried about Wolverine discovering that he’s married to Mary Jane for reasons that he can’t even bring himself to speak aloud as he web-slings his way aimlessly through Manhattan. Honest question, from someone less conversant in the superhero genre than you might think: do superheroes need to hide their secret identities even from … each other? I mean, did Superman and Batman hang around the Justice League and Batman would say, “You know what really bugs me? The liberal media! Like, have you read that Clark Kent guy? He’s so obviously biased!” and then Superman would say “Well, what about that jerk Bruce Wayne? Inherited all that money and is he doing anything worthwhile with it? He’s probably putting most of it into overseas tax dodges!” That all just seems awkward.

On the other hand, Spidey may just be worried that Wolverine will figure things out, and after seeing MJ’s latest wooden, unlikable performance, think, “Geez, Spider-Man married that no-talent hack? I think so much less of him now!” Don’t worry, Spidey: he can’t possibly think any less of you than he already does.

Apartment 3-G, 7/2/09

OK, Nora, we know it’s a woman’s prerogative to tweak her both the style and color of her hair on a whim, and normally I’d say that I like what those highlights are doing for you. But look, hair is literally the only way we have to tell Apartment 3-G characters apart, and so when a single character goes from a Marilyn Quayle flip to something short and spunky to this shaggy number with bangs here, it makes it hard for us readers to get our grip. Please, the men are already a lost cause; don’t encourage the women to become wholly unrecognizable as well!

Crankshaft, 7/2/09

Aww, did someone’s editor finally get a complaint from the syndicate’s legal department about his main character’s pyromaniacal tendencies? I think that, rather than annoy us with this pissy, passive-aggressive caption, the strip should have taught us a valuable lesson by showing us the consequences of violence, particularly if those consequences include the horrible, hateful Crankshaft being blinded, or at least losing a hand.

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In deep with the Squirrel Mob

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Rex Morgan, M.D., 7/1/09

Ho ho, it looks like this new RMMD plot will be about the adventures of Peter the Sex Chameleon! Currently, he’s blond-headed and white-suited, the better to match the fair complexion of his wife. But when we saw him attempting to bust a move on a sexy nutritionist on Monday, he had brown hair and a blue coat! My guess is that his hair and suit were fully black as he attempted to woo his raven-haired co-worker; when Becka surprised him, he began to color-shift involuntarily, and we caught him at a transitional stage.

Mark Trail, 7/1/09

It’s a sad but all too common story: man loses money gambling, man redirects waste disposal budget to his casino account, man hires lowest bidder to dump toxic barrels in nature preserve. Of course, Mark will have no sympathy for the gentleman; not only are his environmental misdeeds unforgivable, but Mark holds deeply Manichaean view of the world, in which everyone and everything is neatly divided into good (clean-cut, clean-shaven) and evil (beard, sideburns, and/or shaggy hair), so games of chance and probability enrage him into a distinctly punchy mood.

Mary Worth, 7/1/09

As she did with Lynn the skater who didn’t want to skate anymore, Mary is teaching Delilah that the greatest pleasure comes from ignoring and suppressing one’s own desires to fulfill the needs of others. The young lady is resisting, but she’s already begun to come around; in panel two, she’s finally acceded to Mary’s request and started wearing a drool cup instead of just dribbling defiantly all over the tablecloth.

Marvin, 7/1/09

So, if the choices are Marvin peeing everywhere or dogs talking wistfully about their castration, which do you prefer? Would dogs peeing everywhere have been a more palatable middle ground? Discuss.

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Billy achieves Keanevana

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Family Circus, 6/30/09

Let’s ignore for the moment the fact that Billy is too young to have a job and, assuming the real-life and Family Circus calendars line up, is on summer vacation, and therefore has every right in the world to lounge about lazily. Ignore too the fact that “nothing” is surely preferable to other things Billy could be doing — rotting his mind with TV, bullying his siblings, breaking things, or, God forbid, making adorable malapropisms. I think we should actually be impressed by Billy’s total commitment to doing nothing. He’s so intent on non-action that he’s gone into a room with no furniture and unadorned walls, and is just leaning there, his hands tucked behind him that so he doesn’t do something even accidentally. If he does any less, he’ll transcend to a higher plane of existence, which all of us should be hoping for, as then we won’t have to deal with him.

Gasoline Alley, 6/30/09

The current Gasoline Alley plot is stupid and irritating, so I’ll only waste four words on it — “improvised fake clergyman grift” — but today’s strip is noteworthy for what may be the most gratuitous drawing of a young lady’s rear end in short shorts that the comics page has ever seen. If this and this are any indication, beneath the family-friendly surface of this ancient legacy strip is a cauldron of randiness on the verge of boiling over.

Marvin, 6/30/09

Can Marvin not go 48 hours without updating us on the titular hell-infant’s habit of letting loose the contents of his bowels and/or bladder? Anyway, here’s today’s strip, in which Marvin urinates all over his mother, again. If there’s any integrity to this strip’s use of dialogue balloons, Jenny can’t hear her son’s little mental quip, so that look of horror must be a result of the piss she feels pooling on her back.

B.C., 6/30/09

I’m not sure why, but the revelation that the turtle half of B.C.’s turtle-bird pairing is named “John” is even more disconcerting to me than the discovery that the bird is named “Dookey.”