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Spider-Man, 5/10/09

Against all odds, Spider-Man actually managed to defeat a super-villain! Naturally, this unheard-of triumph came because Spidey exploited Electro’s love for his son, not because he bested him in super-powered combat. Humbled by the fact that his mad scheme to make extort a fortune by cutting off electricity to millions caused his son a relatively minor injury, the moronically clad baddie will now meekly submit himself to imprisonment.

The greatest thing about this strip, of course, is the final panel’s NEXT! box. For while Electro was willing to face years in prison just to make sure his boy was all right, Peter dumped Aunt May unceremoniously in the parking lot of the hospital after the blackout caused her to have a minor heart-based freakout. Hopefully the next few days will feature Peter going about his business while the NEXT! box prompts him with increasing urgency: “NEXT! No, seriously shouldn’t you be checking up on her?”

Mary Worth, 5/10/09

“He’s a Nigerian gentleman! It seems that he was an official in the military government that held sway there in the mid 1990s, and has access to a Swiss bank account that contains millions in oil money! He says that he needs my help to get it out, and that he will donate most of it to charity, but that I’ll get a cut for my assistance … doesn’t it sound exciting?”

Crankshaft, 5/10/09

Crankshaft and Rose try to give their grandchildren a coded plea for help about the hell of elder abuse that their life has become, but the kids are too dense to pick up on it.

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Family Circus, 5/9/09

It’s far too lovely a Saturday for me to spend time hunting through the archives to confirm this, but: is it just me or have more and more Family Circus cartoons involved the four children traveling around the house in a tight pack-like formation? I much prefer installments where their rage and stupidity are turned against each other, but now it appears that they are forming some sort of hive-mind so that their limited cognitive ability can be pooled. A group Keane Kids organism, with eight flailing arms, four runny noses, and almost-human intelligence is a terrifying prospect, and Ma Keane is right to warily hold that spoon ready as a weapon.

Mary Worth, 5/9/09

Ha, ha, deliciously awkward. “I … I have to get back to … no, really, I’m a doctor and I’m very busy … OH GOD PLEASE DON’T TRY TO EMPATHIZE WITH ME NO NO NO”

Slylock Fox, 5/9/09

I was initially going to say that my first reading of this cartoon — not “aw, a cute Mother’s Day tribute” but “HOLY CRAP LESBIAN DWARF OCTOPUS PORN IN SLYLOCK FOX” — marks me out as a bad person, but it’s worth noting that without that kind of impulse, this blog wouldn’t exist, and we wouldn’t want that, would we?

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Mary Worth, 5/8/09

Good lord, I don’t think I’ve ever seen any comics character as devastated, as gutted, as Adrian looks in panel two here, staring off into space, that half-eaten cupcake like ashes in her mouth. Then again, her father is nattering on about how they’re going to have dinner with Mary Worth next week and she’s going to offer her “perspective” and it’s going to be so awesome, the only legitimate response to which is a rapid descent into total despair.

Herb and Jamaal, 5/8/09

“You see … uh, Jamaal and I were … um … he wanted me to put my … uh … no, wait … I mean he asked me to do something that I’d wanted him to ask for so long … er … that is, when a man and another man love each other very much … look, it’s not cheating if it’s with another dude, OK?”

Beetle Bailey, 5/8/09

If you think Plato looks intrigued now, wait until Beetle explains the concept of a “safe word.”