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Between Friends, 8/26/22

Between Friends mixes joke-a-day and soapy arcs about three middle-aged women and should therefore be called Among Friends, but that’s not important right now. Capable but paralyzingly insecure office manager Susan, passed over for promotion by manager Joan in favor of twentysomething incompetent rage-monkey Kyle, accepted an invitation to join former colleague Savreen’s startup, where the salary, benefits, perks, office environment, and culture are all incomparably better than at her old place.

But you caught that “paralyzingly insecure” part, right? Rather than face change, Susan lets herself get lured right back into the same old misery, where her manager will will give her a nominal promotion and add “disloyal” to a profile that already includes “neurotic,” “small-minded,” and “drudge.”

Sally Forth, 8/26/22

I can’t believe it’s taken five years for Jackie to come around to my suggestion that she take up money-laundering. And how you stand behind the counter at a shop like Small Wonders through a 42-phase pandemic without even considering SBA benefits fraud is completely beyond me.

Sure, Jackie, trinkets are getting more expensive—but imagination is still free!

Dick Tracy, 8/26/22

Dick Tracy‘s commitment to continuity is not so much tenuous as it is selective. “Drs. Tim Sail and Zy Ghote crashed the only remaining space coupe into Jupiter”? Nah, there’s a whole fleet of them, now equipped with big-ass Scrooch Guns. “Now that my people have left the Moon, I will serve them no more as Governor but as their Ambassador”? Nah, he appointed himself Governor again yesterday. But adorable little puffs of condensed breath to prove it’s cold there and Dick is a mammal? You bet!

Dennis the Menace, 8/26/22

“C’mon, Gina, you’re a five-year-old girl: show him how it’s done!”

Hi there! I’ll be sitting in through September 9 while Josh and his wife take a glam European adventure-vacation. Reach me at uncle.lumpy@comcast.net if you experience site problems other than comment-moderation issues (I get automatic updates for those). Enjoy!

–Uncle Lumpy

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FOLKS! You’re getting an early COTW because I, your friend the Comics Curmudgeon, am going on a li’l vacation! I’ll be back on September 10th but until then your favorite Uncle Lumpy will, once again, be in the driver’s seat, so be as nice to him as possible — significantly nicer than you are to me. He loves each and every one one of you too much to take sides and choose a comment of the week, but I have no such compunctions and offer you this, the slightly truncated week’s top comment!

“There’s something perversely impressive about the lengths that Marvin goes to in contriving setups for its scatological punchlines. An inquisitive reader might be tempted to question why the titular brat has been placed in time-out in his family’s backyard, of all places, but that would be missing the point. It’s like porn, but for poop jokes.” –Urlance Woolsbane

And your runners up are, of course, hilarious!

“I like the idea that between strips Slylock is constantly going before the police budget committee to fund another piece if machinery to keep up with Count Weirdly. ‘No, see it can’t just be a regular open-cockpit jet, we have to customize it to look like me! I don’t have the entire estimate yet but why don’t we just tack on another 500 thousand and call it a day, okay?’” –pugfuggly

“News that Prohibition ended has finally reached Hootin’ Holler, and Snuffy’s repurposed his moonshine distillery to produce green bio-fuels.” –Schroduck

“Dawn realizes that if she can keep Jared on the phone long enough, the approaching California wildfire will envelop his apartment. ‘Tell me,’ she says soothingly, ‘about Star Wars episodes one to three.’” –Little Blue Bicycle

“Maybe my knowledge of online auction platforms is lacking, but it doesn’t seem like a task that requires active supervision. My guess is that Mindy has discovered the digital age equivalent of going out for cigarettes and never coming back.” –Francisco Arrowroot

“Thank you for creepily emerging from the shadows just when I was at my most emotionally frail state.” –Cass

“I mean, I like bronze. I sometimes spend time sitting down and thinking about how well made bronze can be more molecularly stable than pure gold. And what it means that while it may outlast stars and galaxies and fucking proton decay, bronze is made up by people rather than the naturally occurring, pure elemental gold. The point here is that Jared’s mere existence is an insult to bronze.” —
Amelie Wikström

“I wonder if The Big Chill is playing at the movie theater that specifically caters to us.” –taig

“Holly talks a good game of needless despair, but her words lack the weight of confident action behind them. Meanwhile, Funky has already quietly unbuckled his safety belt and is patiently waiting for a tractor-trailer in the oncoming lane.” –jroggs

“So I’m thinking of getting a smaller mattress, maybe even a twin.” –made of wince

“Shoe and Mary Worth collectively agreed on the exact lighting choice to communicate ‘no sex tonight.’ And you know what, not a bad job.” –Dan

“For hurting the feelings of Saintly Jared, Dawn will be punished by having to spend time with Saintly Jared.” –Ettorre

“Maybe they want to die in a fire, Crankshaft, ever thought of that? Maybe living in your proximity is the inferior option, have you ever considered that possibility?” –Applemask

Remember: If you want an ad-free version of this site sent to you every day via email, for $3 a month you can become a Comics Curmudgeon newsletter subscriber! And if you never want to see banner ads on this site, and want to get cool comment-editing features to boot, for the same low price you can become a Comics Curmudgeon website subscriber! And if you just want to give me money directly, you can put some scratch in my tip jar, or back me on Patreon! Thanks to all for your support and readership!

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Crankshaft, 8/25/22

I love Jeff’s sly little smile in the second panel here. He seems to be saying “Ha ha, the ladies, amiright? Can’t live with ’em (because you’ll die in a fire), can’t live without ’em (because they have the keys to the storage unit).”

Shoe, 8/25/22

I love the Perfesser’s bird-lady date’s exhausted facial expression in the second panel. The dialogue here is “Ha ha, the ladies, amiright? They just love to argue for the sake of hearing an argument!” But her face tells a very different story, which is “Please let me die.”

Mary Worth, 8/25/22

“Do I want to what? No, see that’s exactly the opposite of what was supposed to happen with this … uhh [makes static noises with her mouth] uhhh you’re breaking up Jared, I’m going into a tunnel [static noises continue]”