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Luann, 3/18/06

Let’s not be negative Nellies, everyone! I know you’re probably near-insane with aggravation at the endless, awful Brad-Toni-Dirk triangle of hate. But let’s get positive by giving suggestions on how this storyline can be made not soul rendingly painful to follow.

I’ll start: What if it turns out that Dirk is, in fact, a great guy? And that Brad is in fact paranoid? Perhaps we’ll be treated to week after week of Brad’s slow descent into madness. Wouldn’t that be peachy?

In my continuing effort to look on the bright side, I have to say that the image in panel three of evil, perpetually shaded Dirk lovingly hugging a kindly old lady is pretty funny — and right in line with my suggestions!

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Crankshaft and Funky Winkerbean, 3/17/06

Again, due to relentless pressure from my readers, I have begun reading twin strips, Crankshaft and Funky Winkerbean, years after my last acquaintance with them. I have fond memories of FW from my youth, having been a dorky band dork, though I was perhaps too far removed from the marketeer-coveted cranky-old-guy demographic to care much for Crankshaft. As promised, both strips seem to have been transformed into well-drawn but plodding quasi-soaps at some point in the course of my young adulthood.

I’m featuring Crankshaft today, which takes place at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, for two reasons:

• It makes a totally-not-subtle joke about cocaine.
• It makes a totally-not-subtle joke about cocaine and it’s funny.

This Funky Winkerbean, by contrast, seems to me to exemplify all that’s wrong with the retooled strip. I used to love the FW episodes about the megalomaniacal band teacher and his Glengarry Glen Ross-level mania for selling band fundraising trinkets. It was way, way over the top, as was everyone else’s terrified reaction to it. But here in the new, hyperrealistic Funky Winkerbean, blond boy’s busy selling to an gender-indeterminate mark who’s possibly the most depressed person in the history of the comics, including Charlie Brown. He (let’s call him a he, what the heck) looks like this unwanted intrusion is the final push he needs to download those painless-suicide-by-carbon-monoxide instructions from the Internet. Hopefully he’ll buy some candy first.

Meanwhile, Dr. Troy has finally outed himself … as a Canada-loving commie!

“You know what I’m for, Troy? Freedom! Freedom and anal sex. Now shut up and let’s ‘play golf.'”

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9 Chickweed Lane, 3/16/06

So after a year and a half of entreaties on the part of my readership, I’ve finally started following 9 Chickweed Lane on a regular basis. I’ve been reading long enough to have a feel for who these two characters are, though not long enough to actually explain them. It’s a very slow-moving strip, but unlike the soaps, which feel like they’re just padding things out endlessly, 9CL has a definite rhythm that really works for it. This strip made me laugh out loud, largely because it had been properly teed up by the long lead-in.

Also, this will be the last time I tread upon the territory of Matt over at TSPPW, but: a silent penultimate panel and a silent antepenultimate panel? Bliss. Maybe Matt didn’t mention it because it’s not SPP abuse: it really helps with the timing of the strip. (Update: A commentor correctly pointed out that Matt actually did feature this strip. Whoops! Sorry.)

Also, while the antics of the freakish enormous talking animals in Mark Trail generally kinda bore me, I am a little bit in love with this potentially heartbroken turkey. For some reason this particular bit of dialogue sprouting from his back is poignant and moving to me.

There, there, big fella, don’t fret: all your troubles will pass away come Thanksgiving, I promise.