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Mary Worth, 5/23/23

We don’t know a ton about Saul’s past, but we do know that he was forced by his family to abandon his true love and enter into some kind of arranged marriage, presumably in order to consolidate their feudal landholdings and take advantage of agricultural efficiencies of scale. It was a loveless relationship and Saul bought a bigger tombstone for his dog than his wife, so I’m not sure how blessed any children would’ve felt being raised in that environment.

Pluggers, 5/23/23

I had a professor in college who once told me that “Ptolemaic Egypt was a theme park, and the theme was death,” a sentence I think about all the time. Anyway, pluggers are, like many of the Egyptian deities, half-man/half-beast creatures, although they lack pretty much any degree of those Gods’ dignity; still, it may be appropriate that they live their lives defined by an ever-growing army of the deceased.

Dennis the Menace, 5/23/23

I respect Mr. Wilson’s quest for perfect, unbroken silence, but I have serious questions about what exactly are in those things under the “Audiobooks” sign. Are they … CDs? Cassette tapes? Nobody actually listens to audiobooks off of physical media anymore, do they? Perhaps the Wilsons are shopping at The Big Warehouse For Old People Who Haven’t Figured Out What “Streaming” Is And Don’t Plan To In The Future, fighting against menacing changes in the media landscape the only way they know how (by keeping their VCRs working through dutiful maintenance).

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Gil Thorp, 5/22/23

Oh, were you wondering if the Great Vape Caper was still underway and still funding the Milford Athletic Department and/or the lifestyles of certain Mudlarks? Well, it seems that the kids are still in it just long enough to pull off one last score, which is too bad because Marty Moon has finally gotten bored enough to start following teenagers around and taking pictures to see if he can find any who are doing something interesting enough to put on his podcast before he gets arrested for it. Normally at this point in the season Marty would be very drunk most days and wouldn’t have the energy or initiative for this, and I don’t think Gil and the gang have reckoned with how their lives are going to be more difficult now that their main antagonist (media division) is sober.

Mary Worth, 5/22/23

Oh, were you wondering if the next Mary Worth plot would be about that couple at the Bum Boat who were looking at their phones instead of talking to each other? Well, too bad, it’s going to be about Estelle and Ed’s vet clinic, and about Old Man Wynter and his giantess girlfriend and their respective dogs. Those dogs better get a clean bill of health! I know I just made fun of Rex Morgan for having zero narrative tension, but I don’t want to see any god damn animal suffering in this strip! We do not need to see any more enormous dog tombstones, you hear me?

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Rex Morgan, M.D., 5/21/23

We all know that newspaper comics in general and newspaper soap opera comics in particular are being kept alive by a readership that skews old enough that it is imperative that everyone involved in producing said soap opera comics do everything they can to keep said readership alive, for their own sakes. The tactic Rex Morgan, M.D., has taken to meet this goal is to make everything as low stakes as possible, because even the smallest degree of surprise could cause unpleasant cardiac complications, which is why everyone is treating the fact that an attempted murderer has managed to escape custody and is now at large like a funny little “Oopsie! Ha ha, that’s our Rene!” This cruise ship is still at sea, which means that the killer and his intended victim are stuck together in a limited space, a premise that has powered any number of successful suspense films — but don’t worry, there’s no suspense here! It’s Rex Morgan, M.D. Everything is fine.

Beetle Bailey and Dennis the Menace, 5/21/23

I get and honestly respect that one of the biggest advantages of writing a syndicated newspaper comic is that you can run into one of life’s little modern annoyances and say to yourself, “Hey, you know who else probably finds this annoying? All the old people who read my comic strip.” Of these two examples of the genre, I have to say that Beetle Beetle is by far the more successful, in that it’s integrated the inciting annoyance into a character-driven joke, whereas Dennis the Menace just has Mr. Wilson yelling the things that we all, admittedly, want to yell.

Gasoline Alley, 5/21/23

Not to be a know-it-all, but the average price of a gallon of milk in the U.S. has been higher than the average price of a gallon of gasoline for 19 of the past 23 years! I’m also hung up on why Clovia says that gas AND postage is high and that’s why it’s cheaper to mail something than drive it. Still, I get that inflation can be a confusing economic phenomenon that doesn’t affect all regions or products equally, so I want to reserve my harshest criticism for Slim, who in the final panel reveals that he thinks an oil barrel is some kind of animal or maybe plant that, when properly fed and cared for, produces more oil.