Wizard of Id has succintly portrayed the difference between Early and Late Medieval modes of warfare: while his Dark Age companions are boldly dying for their feudal lord, the canny Sir Rodney treats war as a profession. He is akin to the condottiere who would dominate later Italian warfare. That sly look and crooked smile is that of a man who sees human corpses as nothing more than money in his purse, arguably far more barbaric than his predecessors. But trebuchets suck for hitting single guys so we're probably about to see Sir Smarty Pants' insides in spite of his historically progressive role.
Could Gil Thorp’s summer insanity at last be belatedly getting underway? That crazed look in Jimmy Hughes’s eyes in panel two is strangely reminiscent of what you’d see in the origin story of every supervillain ever. Are we about to learn that the cult hero status that comes with being on an extremely minor league baseball team is too much power for any man with legal permanent U.S. residence to handle? Will the prospect of toiling in the Tigers’ farm system for the next six years instead of getting a college education and a job with a 401K drive young Mr. Hughes mad with glory-lust? Will Gil step in to set Jimmy on the straight and narrow path back to humdrum normalcy, or does the five-minute walk to “Java Jive” represent the limit of how much he’s willing to care about his students during the off-season? Hopefully we’ll get answers, before football practice starts!
Gasoline Alley, 8/5/08
I’m quite proud of myself for successfully ignoring the Gasoline Alley storyline that just wrapped up, which featured painful hillbilly stereotype Rufus tangling with a painful French stereotype during the filming of a cat food commercial. I’m looking forward to the upcoming plot, though, as it appears to be ripped right from today’s headlines. Four dollar gas has driven our rustic protagonists to desperate measures! Perhaps Rover will be able to tweak his Eisenhower-era pickup so that it gets an incredible eight miles per gallon.
For Better Or For Worse, 8/5/08
John has obviously been spending way, way too much time hanging around his teenage daughter. For one thing, he’s slipping into adolescent Canadianisms like “hafta”. For another, he’s squirming and whining about putting on nice clothes like a fucking twelve-year-old.
So, your COTW is coming in a moment, but there is a truly EPIC amount of material from faithful readers and others to wade through before we get to it. We must begin with the Web site that has the entire Mary Worth-reading community buzzing: Enormoushop.com. It’s where Toby shops for second-rate birthday gifts for her third-rate husband, and now you too can enjoy the savings at the Internet’s most enormous shop! I have no idea whatsoever who created this brilliant thing — please stand up and take a bow, sir or madam!
Next! You might recall the Protectors of the Earth video I posted a while back, in which Mary Worth, Mark Trail, Rex Morgan, and Garfield join forces to fight crime! Have you been patiently waiting for a part two? Well, your wait is now over!
These videos are the product of a newly-moved-to-LA comedy collective called Your Girlfriend.
And! Speaking of funny YouTube videos, I have been remiss in not drawing your attention to faithful reader Dingo’s fantastic “Mary Worth: Dancing Queen.” Watch it with someone you love!
In addition! Longtime readers may be wondering whatever happened to Lucky the Beaver, the wayward semi-aquatic rodent who got caught in a trap, was nursed back to health by Mark Trail’s ward Rusty, released back into the wild, found true love with a lady beaver, then was menaced by some mustachioed ne’er-do-well before earning his respect. Last we saw, he had knocked up his beavermomma, and it was open to question how he was going to support his growing family. Well, faithful reader gnome de blog just found the answer, and it ain’t pretty.
Also! What would an excessively long COTW post be without some shameless merchandise promotion? Here we have faithful reader AMSTERDANG, sporting a THE URGE shirt. (His URGE involves eating s’mores, apparently.)
These shirts came out just before Al Scaduto passed away, so I haven’t really been promoting them much, but perhaps they provide a good way to remember the good times. The visible stains are, I hope, the fault of AMSTERDANG and not of CafePress. (If you’re a new reader and have no idea what this is about, I urge you to peruse the They’ll Do It Every Time archive post-haste!)
And finally! Faithful reader commodorejohn has set Mary Worth’s favorite aphorisms to music! Enjoy the funk genius of Mary Worth Told Me To.
And now, after all that jibber-jabber, it’s the comment of the week!
“You want excitement? Try counting how many different necklines Toby’s top has had since Monday. I count four.” –flodnak
“You know, a detective is as great as the foes he defeats. Sherlock had Moriarty, and apparently Slylock has the most petty criminals with the lowest IQ. Way to keep your standards low, Slylock.” –Foolster41
“Also, Cathy is offering a week(s?)-long object lesson in why we shouldn’t necessarily be too annoyed at Herb and Jamaal’s notorious nonspecificity. Or, if I can put that another way, Cathy: Shut the fuck up about the Prius already.” –One-eyed Wolfdog
“‘Paperwork’ = Forging the signature on the consent form to medically castrate Jeff.” –Tweeks_Coffee
“Hoo! I’m gonna hafta say April’s lingo an’ hairstyle are creeping me out.” –Moss_Moses
“Toby seems to be browsing in the “Documentaries About Other Countries” section (which includes such blockbusters as England, Japan, China, Italia…) So that movie on the far right in panel 2 is probably supposed to say Greece. But I prefer to assume that someone has mistakenly shelved the 1950s-nostalgia musical Grease in this section. Clearly that is what Toby should buy her husband. Ian would have a blast pointing out its inadequacies, while secretly thrilling to songs like ‘Summer Lovin.'” –Mollie
“‘Now let’s see if they sell my husband’s desired DVD.’ Damn, Toby, you need to start talking out loud. Thinking your words doesn’t seem to be working for you.” —WeaselBoy
“This is, of course, buildup to the epic scene where Grandma has a heart attack and her grandkids, despite her repeated cries for aspirin and an ambulance, stand around hugging her.” –Mariko
“I’m waiting for Eric to realize he’s spent the last few months at the Morocco Pavilion at Epcot in Orlando instead of Lhasa, Tibet. ‘Gone? Gone where?!’ ‘Who can say? Maybe he’s taking his break in the employee lounge.'” –Duckman30
Mary Worth: “I’d go to the ends of the earth for my man, and if not the ends of the earth, I’ll at least plunk my perfect ass down in front of my computer to order up that deadly dull documentary I’m fixated on.” –nomoho
“Is ‘mother of the bride’ the same as ‘shoplifted from a rummage sale’?” –dale
Special thanks to those who put money in my tip jar — you true heroes know who you are! And we gotta give some love to the advertisers:
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Whoa there, Francis! Unless “cheese I can serve my buds” is code for “bud I can serve whatever cheep floozy I bring home tonight” and the gentleman behind the counter is the nattiest drug dealer outside of Apartment 3-G, you have officially lost your spot as the comics’ number one “bad boy” — I don’t care how cheap you are about it. Of course, everything else about this comic is puzzling as well. For instance, even the elitists at Whole Foods will sell you cheese for less than $14 a pound that would be wholly acceptable for a party with your loser friends in your filthy apartment. Then there’s the question of why the deli man offered you the cheapest kind in the first place, and … oh, wait, what was that? I’m sorry I’ve just been informed that the amount of time it’s considered healthy to think about Momma in any given 24-hour-period has long since elapsed. We’ll be moving on now.
For Better Or For Worse, 8/4/08
Just FYI, the long, turbulence-ridden, nausea-inducing flight towards the Lizthony union of souls is beginning its final descent. Do you like weddings? Do you like it when people realize that adventure is for other people and the best thing to do is be exactly like their boring parents? Do you like passive-aggressive emotional adulterers with clammy hands? Then the next three to eight weeks are for you, my friends.
Family Circus, 8/4/08
“And the brown liquors are best for numbing the humiliation you feel every time your freakish melon-headed grandchildren open their fool mouths!”
