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Slylock Fox, 11/3/08

Oh, today’s Slylock is a cavalcade of delights. I love Shady’s early-20th-century finery, and the Fat Cats dressed in various period costumes — we’ve got Roaring ’20s Plutocrat Cat and Bespectacled Early ’60s Cat, along with a more contemporary counterpart. Plus there’s Shady’s framed “Inventor of the Year” certificate, which was obviously created in Print Shop. Mostly, though, I like Shady’s invention, which bears a suspicious resemblance to an always-cool pillow gadget I thought up in junior high, when I had even less engineering knowledge than I do now. If only I had had a pair of stripey pants, I could have gotten venture funding!

Mark Trail, 11/3/08

Sue, Charlie isn’t going to be able to leave you alone if you keep slamming the door into his chest. “Go home, Charlie! [SLAM] We’ll talk [SLAM] in the office [SLAM] tomorrow!” “Eargh, Sue, I think you just broke my sternum! Please stop! [SLAM] Aarrrrgggh….”

Meanwhile, Sneaky is heading out for his date with dog-drowning destiny. Realizing that he may need to be identified later, he pauses between panels two and three to put on his collar.

Spider-Man, 11/3/08

“We know who did it! It’s the guy who’s unconscious and immobilized at the scene of the crime, where the stolen goods are nowhere to be seen! God, I love being a cop! It’s so easy!”

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Gil Thorp, 11/1/08

Ha ha, at last the big fall Gil Thorp plot twist has been REVEALED, and it’s every bit as insane and asinine as “Elmer gets to stay in America as a bilingual publicist, even though that doesn’t match up with his visa and he doesn’t speak Spanish” and “Tyler bludgeoned himself.” You see, for the first time ever in Gil Thorp history, the fact that a panel was drawn with word balloons coming out of a random building was a deliberate attempt to create ambiguity, rather than a ploy to avoid drawing human hands and/or hairstyles. In fact, Matt the Hat’s ticker is perfectly healthy, whereas the ‘Czak truly does love gettin’ naked with other dudes more than life itself. And now that the doctor has arrived, we’re all going to learn a valuable lesson about why medical professionals should ideally write things down. As punishment, Matt will be forced to have Jeff’s heart attack for him.

In panel three, Matt reveals that after his time in this two-bit comic is over, he’ll be moving on to bigger and better things, portraying Will Eisner’s The Spirit.

Mary Worth, 11/1/08

I’m hoping we get beyond the dull “Frank is an overbearing stage parent” story here and go right on into “Frank is a paranoid schizophrenic.” “The judges are always watching! They have a network of spy satellites and bugs, and can see out of any sign painted red! They put tracking devices in fillings, which why we never go to the dentist! If I hadn’t covered the house with tinfoil, we’d never have a moment’s peace!”

And let’s get a quick precis of Sunday’s comics, via the opening throwaway panels!

Panels from Curtis, 11/2/08

Oh, Curtis, are you really stooping so low as to borrow narrative techniques from Herb and Jamaal? Still, I have to admit that we’re certainly being set up for excitement here. Something of value, you say? But what could it be? I am on tenterhooks!

(True fact: it turned out to be a toilet.)

Panels from Judge Parker, 11/2/08

“The angle at which the body crumpled, the blood splatter pattern, the powder burns — all aesthetic abominations! Usually murder scenes are things of beauty, or at least have something to keep you engaged. This … this was just a big disappointment.”

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Jeez, a guy can’t go away for 24 hours before getting frantic emails about huge chunks of the comments section acting like jackasses. (Those of you in the non-commenting “silent majority” can ignore this.) I will tell you all right now: quit it. I know it’s hard in the lead-up to an election to avoid political diatribes at all, but please be respectful towards one another rather than launching epithets at your politically divergent fellow commentors. Because you know where else you have to get into this kind of flame war? The entire rest of the Internet.

Anyway, high passions can and will be forgiven; I probably shouldn’t have mentioned any of the major candidates in a post before I left of the weekend anyway, though my point was just horror at the Family Circus trying to make itself relevant. I actually had intended to set up an election day go-at-each-other thread on Tuesday to let people get it out of their system. But let me tell you something that will earn you an immediate banning: posting nasty stuff under the name of another commentator just to make them look bad. Seriously, that is 100 percent not kosher and only my actually trying to enjoy my weekend trip prevents me from wading into the back end of the comment machinery to root out the offenders right now.

Anyway, did anything good come out of this spat? Perhaps. While flicking through in horror, I came upon this gem, posted by faithful reader Mr Snrub: “Does Taft/Roosevelt slashfic exist?” If it doesn’t now, I order you to expend your political energies on this thread creating some. “Ever since Taft had returned from the Phillipines, TR found himself going out of his way to spend more time with him talking about the situation there…” Go!