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Gil Thorp, 2/23/06

See, now this is why I never wanted to play sports in high school. To catch up those of who don’t follow the Thorpmeisters: Ted Pearse (he of the Mary Tyler Moore ‘do) has just this week had his big secret revealed in a very public fashion by the legendarily vile Marty Moon. It seems that his laid back “man of mystery” demeanor covered up the fact that he lives in a homeless shelter with his out-of-work mom. He kept mum because he was terrified that his chums would reject him if they found out about his hobo status; this is the second time in as many days that he’s used that “being homeless isn’t contagious” line. But in this heartwarming strip, his teammates show their love for and acceptance of him by this little stunt — it’s like when a child goes through chemo and his classmates all shave their heads in solidarity — and Ted’s so happy that he looks like Jimmy Stewart at the end of It’s a Wonderful Life.

Except that they’re showing their love and acceptance by playing to his worst fears and pretending that homelessness is contagious. It’s as if that little kid’s classmates didn’t shave their heads, but instead covered themselves with ghoulish makeup and held up signs that read YOU HAVE CANCER AND YOU’RE GOING TO DIE. I mean, Jesus, if this is how they treat their friends, I wonder what they do to people they don’t like. Presumably the wet towels will come out in a minute and the savage ass-whippings will commence. All in good fun, of course.

Ted’s homelessness was correctly predicted weeks ago in the by some smarty in the comments of this very blog, who should step forth and take a bow. One thing I should note about Ted is his collection of deeply groovy retro shirts. Presumably he’s been able to get these at the thrift stores to which his poverty condemns him because mega-squaresville Milford is utterly lacking in the sort of slumming, underemployed hipsters who would snatch them up in the big city.

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Momma, 2/22/06

Ah, Francis, hero to layabouts everywhere. Nothing says “I’ve given up on life” like looking at Internet pornography while your mother is right there in the room. I do like the evocative triptych of middle panels, which helps us grasp the flow of time in the strip’s narrative. “Not porn … not porn … not porn … hello!”

Who do you think would be the heavy hitters on “Lady Prime Ministers Gone Wild?” Here are my top four:

Edith Cresson (Prime Minister of France, 1991-1992)

Tansu Ciller (Prime Minister of Turkey, 1993-1996)

Kim Campbell (Prime Minister of Canada, June-November 1993)

Benazir Bhutto (Prime Minister of Pakistan, 1988-1990, 1993-1996)

Yes, I am a huge dork. I admit that for a minute I believed that the strip actually intended us to believe that Francis was looking at “Lady Prime Ministers Gone Wild.” It was like the time I thought I saw the guy at the video store renting a porno called Specs Appeal and I assumed it was all girls wearing glasses but then it turned out that it was just Pecs Appeal and he was gay.

Speaking of hot, hot parliamentary democracy: Holy socialized medicine, everyone, Paul the Mountie just grabbed Liz’s ass!

OK, so I guess technically he’s holding her up by her ass, but there’s still palm-to-heinie contact. I’m not sure which of today’s comics I expected to see grabass in, but For Better Or For Worse wasn’t it. I guess I should be thankful that it wasn’t Momma.

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Dinette Set, 2/21/06

Ballard Street, 2/21/06

So like I said, I’ve been reading a bunch of new comics on the Houston Chronicle’s Web page, and goddamn some of them are weird. It goes without saying that the market for off-kilter one-panel comics exploded in the wake of the Far Side’s success, but some of the efforts in this space have been more fruitful than others. This Dinette Set, for instance, seems to think that a collection of potentially funny elements, connected by a liberal amount of free-associative logic, together create a coherent whole; sadly, it is incorrect in that assumption. After much scrutiny, I think that this is supposed to be some sort of commentary on America’s energy-inefficient ways: the papaya-headed protagonists (The Dinettes?) scoff at attempts to use our dwindling fossil fuels more wisely, while enjoying a film sponsored by their utility company with a suggestive title. (They’ll be “paying” their gas and electric bills “forward” because they have that enormous picture window! Get it? GET IT?) Potentially less relevant is the presence of Some Like It Hot atop their VCR (a reference to the sky-high heating bills they won’t like paying?) and their guest’s attire. I want an “I Heart Sour-Dough Bread” t-shirt as much as the next annoying thirtysomething hipster does, but it doesn’t really fit in with anything else happening here, and only adds to the impression that the panel is flailing around waist-deep in humor-like material, desperately trying to grab onto a punchline that is nowhere in sight.

Today’s Ballard Street, on the other hand, while also not funny in any conventional sense of the word, is much darker and more wonderful in its utter opacity. In the Dinette Set panel above, you can kind of see where the jokes are supposed to be coming from, which makes them all the more pathetic when they fail. This Ballard Street, on the other hand, seems to come from some strange alternate universe; it’s entirely self-contained, and I feel like it would be totally hilarious if only I were grounded in the completely alien set of cultural assumptions from which it arises. Is that a mechanical dog’s head? If so, how is it emitting spittle? If not, why the crank? Either way, why the megaphone? And why is it apparently vibrating? And the gloves? Why is Bob wearing gloves? Nothing is explained, but I still somehow feel like it’s my fault for not getting it. The fact that the caption is in the present tense somehow only adds to the weird feeling of dislocation about it.