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Crock, 11/8/22

As America’s #1 syndicated newspaper comic strip blogger, I probably have a better handle on the internal lore of many of the strips than their actual creators do. I’m not mad about this, it’s actually funny to me, but it does mean I’m compelled to point out that (a) Grossie and Maggot live in a tent, so it’s strange to think they have indoor plumbing complete with ceramic fixtures, and (b) Maggot’s job in the Foreign Legion is digging latrine pits, so it’s sad that this issue has become another source of conflict for them rather than something they can bond over.

Mary Worth, 11/8/22

OK, it turns out that Zak almost falling to his death did prompt Iris to change her mind about marriage, but not because she was faced with the awful realization of what life without him would be like and decided that she wanted to fully commit herself to their relationship. Nope, it was because the incident in which they worked together to save his life after he did something extremely stupid showed what a great team they were, and why shouldn’t those teammates get the tax advantages they have coming to them?

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Dustin, 11/7/22

Oh, I’m sorry, did you think that the syndicated comic Dustin was done airing its petty grievances about air travel? Well, you thought wrong, buddy. Today’s petty grievance: when people fly on a commercial airline, an experience during which they are generally dehumanized in various ways, why don’t they simply choose to dress in a manner that society in the year 2022 reserves only for our most formal contexts, like a court appearance or a funeral? Is it because they don’t want to feel even less comfortable than they already do while they’re crammed into a too-small seat for three to seven hours? Is it because, simply as a practical matter, the nature of air travel often results in the clothes you’re wearing getting wrinkled or sweaty or soiled? Is it because human civilization is falling into a state of barbarism? Probably the last one, right? Anyway, the first panel here gives you a good hint as to which airline’s negative vibes provided the material for these strips, but doesn’t spell it out because presumably large multinational corporations are better equipped to crush a syndicated newspaper comic strip’s creative team in court than, say, a Tampa-area Mercedes dealership is.

Funky Winkerbean, 11/7/22

I was wondering why Funky Winkerbean decided to tinker with its timeline, again, making the main cast’s recent high school reunion their fiftieth and pushing the characters from late middle age well into retirement territory. Now we’ve learned that it’s because of plans to change the setting to a near-future dystopia where accelerating climate change is increasingly impossible to ignore. Sure, the folks in Westview didn’t care much about famine-inducing disruption to agriculture in the tropics or the Colorado River basically drying up, but now that “climate damage” has somehow delayed the shipment of an anthology of comics that were published decades ago, we’re going to get to the bottom of this global warming business, by God.

Six Chix, 11/7/22

Someday I hope to have a meeting with a Hollywood exec with the promise of a “hot IP” and go in hard with the pitch that everything Franz Kafka wrote is now in the public domain. Sure, we all know Gregor Samsa died at the end of “The Metamorphosis” (actually, I had forgotten this, I had to read the plot summary for the story on Wikipedia), but what if he had instead left his depressing home and unloving family in Prague and struck out on his own to find his own way in the world? And what if he ended up as a stoner doorman somewhere in New York City? I think this would be a great eight-episode limited series on Paramount+.

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Mary Worth, 11/6/22

Welp, it looks like Mary Worth does have an important lesson to teach us about love, and it’s that if your gal rejects your marriage proposal, all you have to do is (literally) dangle the prospect of your death in front of her to make her realize what she could be missing. The best case scenario here is that we find out that Zak staged this whole incident and it throws their relationship into turmoil, but assuming they do get married, we need to start thinking about who’s going to make the biggest ass of themselves at the wedding. Everyone’s going to say “Wilbur,” of course, but I am begging you to not sleep on Tommy, who could quite frankly go in any number of erratic directions emotionally even if he stays sober.

Beetle Bailey, 11/6/22

I’m fascinated and a little saddened that Beetle, the laziest man alive, doesn’t even contemplating reading for pleasure in order to lull himself to sleep, and instead picks up a book that promises to teach him a skill! But all’s well that end’s well, and by “end’s well” I mean that in the end he’s finally imprisoned, for his many crimes.

Family Circus, 11/6/22

Look, I know we’re all upset that Ma Keane is talking about and describing “Not Me” directly, when we all know it’s supposed to be a little in-joke that’s visualized but never spoken about, but let’s not let that distract us from the most important thing here, which is that Billy is so dumb he can’t even count to six.