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Rex Morgan, M.D., 5/4/05

You people are all so clever and quick about this sort of thing that I can’t believe nobody’s mentioned this.

Buck’s real name is Charles.

Charles can be shortened to Chuck.

Who can unkempt pseudointellectual humanities students impress with their unkept pseudointellectuality more than high school girls? And what better way to avoid one’s paternal responsibilities than to sleep in the back yard of kindly local medicos, suturing up one’s own hand and muttering about lost Indian tribes?

As for the savage beating — I think Fence Post Frank is an innocent man. As if we needed any more proof, the evidence is now clear: don’t piss off Margo.

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The Phantom, 5/3/05

So it turns out that the Phantom is not going to defeat his enemies by shooting them in the back of the head. Instead, much more humanely, he’s going to avail himself of non-FDA-approved “Bandar medicine” to brainwash them, leaving them with shattered Manchurian Candidate-style psyches and glimpsed half-memories for the rest of their miserable lives.

The men at least are lucky: they’re just going to be dragged off to a filthy hut somewhere, be injected with the essence of God knows what quasipoisonous tropical root, and have their minds cleansed in a quick and business-like fashion. Mina, however, seems destined to first be brought (blindfolded, natch) into the Phantom’s waterfall-shrouded Love Cavern. Trust the Ghost-Who-Puts-The-Moves-On: no one will be harmed, but someone might have to listen to R. Kelly’s Chocolate Factory and deal with some scented candles.

A new artistic team recently took over The Phantom, and it’s good to see that they’re sticking to the strip’s proud tradition of baffling punctuation marks. Most people would have been satisfied with some wacky onomatopoetic noises in panel three, but I like the fact that they’ve rendered Sputt! as an exclamation, but Blubb!? as a question. “Blubb!?” Yes, Mina: blubb.

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Curtis, 5/2/05

Much as cruelly mocking Curtis has become part of my schtick here, I must give “props” where they are due and admit that I do love the strip’s vocabulary of hyper-exaggerated facial expressions. Take this installment, for instance. Curtis’ bug-eyed, dilated-pupil look might say “trippin’ on ‘shrooms” to the casual observer, but long-time Curtis readers (of which, God help me, I am one) recognize it as the strip’s symbol for “I’m assuming an extra-nice appearance to cover up something bad I’ve done.” The I’ve-swallowed-my-lips manuever in panel three makes Curtis look like a Warner Brothers cartoon character who has swallowed “Alum” (whatever that is), but in fact it’s Curtis visual shorthand for panic and distress. And it may look like Curtis is drooling for no reason in panel two, but … um, actually, I think he’s just drooling for no reason. No, scratch that, I guess he’s sweating. Most of us usually don’t do so much sweating in the mouth region, though.

Nice kicky beret on mom in panel one there, by the way. And lord knows where that sock is flying in from in panel four. It’s crazy chaos over there in Curtisville!