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Mary Worth, 9/6/08

Dear Mary Worth,

Thank you so very much for your narration box dated 9/6/08, which read, “After hanging up the phone with her bank, Toby continues to reel in shock.” It really put a smile on my face, which is no small feat in these troubled times.

It may seem greedy to ask for more, but can you please add a similar narration box before every single one of Toby’s future appearances in this feature? For instance, after having lunch with Mary, it could say, “After having lunch with Mary, Toby continues to reel in shock.” Or, after greeting Ian on his return from work, we could get, “After kissing her husband on the cheek, Toby continues to reel in shock.” Of course, she’ll have to continue to reel in shock, but since she apparently finds basic interaction with society completely discombobulating, I don’t think this will be much of a stretch.

Your fan,
The Comics Curmudgeon

Family Circus, 9/6/08

So it’s come to this: the Family Circus characters have declared themselves to be gods. Moronic, irritating, melon-headed gods.

Dick Tracy, 9/6/08

“There’s no way the police will be able to stop me now that I have a CB radio!”

Dennis the Menace, 9/6/08

Mrs. Mitchell is looking suspiciously smug here. I’m guessing that this “picnic” is going to climax with Dennis being sold to hillbillies or fed to a bear.

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Rex Morgan, M.D., 9/5/08

Oh, Rex Morgan, M.D.! You send us into the weekend with a double dose of delight! Should we snicker at the image of Rex headed down to the docks this evening, offering up his middle-class body to the rough affections of those salty sailors, just off the boat and ready for action? Or should we giggle at the thought of Lenore tying Rex to the bedposts in the “captain’s cabin,” demonstrating just the sort of submissive attitude she demands of her cabin boys? Darn it, this is America, where you can have it all, so I choose both.

Ziggy, 9/5/08

Ha ha, remember a few months ago, when Ziggy picked up a seashell and got a virus alert? Or three weeks ago, when he picked up a seashell and discovered that it was a podcast? Well, uh, it turns out that today it’s a push poll. What will it be tomorrow? Tune in to Ziggy to find out!

Herb and Jamaal, 9/5/08

Every once in a while, I think, “Do I make fun of Herb and Jamaal a little too much for being nonspecific.” Then I see stuff like this and think “No, no I don’t.” Now see here, Herb and Jamaal: I know that thirty years from now, we might use something entirely different to remove hair from whatever surface future fashion dictates be depilated, so you might try to just deploy some generic and nonexistent word that means “object that shaves” to avoid any future anachronism, but: they’re called “razors.” Razors, damn you. Razors.

Oh, it’s also called “cripplingly strict adherence to prescribed gender constructs even when they interfere with your everyday life.”

Gil Thorp, 9/5/08

So it turns out that the aforementioned athletics-kiboshing ailment is [music sting] a HEART CONDITION! I wonder how Matt’s heart will hold up when he finds out his girlfriend is a seven-foot tall drag queen named “Candy LaChance.”

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My Cage, 9/4/08, and New Adventures of Queen Victoria, 9/3/08

I never claimed to be some kind of paragon of integrity or anything, so, here you go, comics artists: if you mention me by name in your strip, I will acknowledge it in my blog, because I’m a whore like that, though sometimes I’ll be a day late. This is the New Adventures of Queen Victoria, a pleasingly wacky vaguely-historically-themed public-domain-clip-art-based strip that is on the GoComics site (and maybe in newspapers?). It’s usually not as meta as this installment, though you know I love meta. It’s far enough away from the traditional daily strips that I mock here to get regular attention, but I did finally pop it into my RSS reader. Take a look, won’t you?

Speaking of meta, the characters in My Cage are coming perilously close to recognizing their own fictional nature. Hopefully it’s not my site serving as the locus of their eternal torment when the Cartoonists turn their back on them.

Family Circus, 9/4/08

Speaking of those rejected by their Creator, we have Jeffy desperately trying to get the attention of the benevolent God that he still believes to exist, despite the evidence of his own torment. It doesn’t matter how loud you shout, Jeffy! You’re always going to have to debase yourself with awful puns and wear the hideous purple union suit, because that is His inscrutable plan.

Apartment 3-G, 9/4/08

And speaking of whores, Apartment 3-G continues its policy of darkly hinting at the lows to which drug abuse can bring you without actually spelling anything out. “Time to get out there and make some money … at my job as a middle manager in the accounts receivable department of a mid-sized corporation! Oh, there’s no level of depravity I won’t stoop to so I can get some more of that sweet, sweet dope!”

Herb and Jamaal, 9/4/08

You’ve probably missed it what with all the nonspecificity rampant in this strip, but the place where Herb and Jamaal crack vaguely wise with one another each day is a soul food restaurant that they own and operate together. Thus, the fact that Herb has dragged his ennui-inducing diet lunch to the restaurant to eat ought to tell you something about the stuff that our dynamic duo serve to their customers. “I mean, a carrot and juice is pretty bland, but God knows I’m not eating the horror that we cook here. I’d be dead of colon cancer within the week.”

Rex Morgan, M.D., 9/4/08

A casual observer might think that Rex and June are gently mocking Lenore in this exchange, but longtime RMMD readers know that they’re actually seeing who can inflict the most passive-aggressive wound on the other here. June taunting Rex with the prospect of sex with a woman, Rex boasting of his future “cabin boy” antics … good times. I have no idea what Rex’s plan for that thing in his right hand in the third panel is, and I’m not sure I want to know. The best we can hope for is that he’s going to stab himself in the throat to end his misery.