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Six Chix, 3/24/21

One thing I really respect about Six Chix is that it’s not afraid to “go there” when it comes to cryptid erotica. Usually, of course, we’re talking weird Bigfoot smut, but sure, let’s give mermaids a spin! This strip is frankly pretty grim: our poor mermaid is being encouraged to adorn her perfectly normal and healthy single fluke in a parody of the “sexy” garments worn by the land-dwellers on their doubled lower extremities, and is also simultaneously being taunted with the instrument of her own enslavement.

Funky Winkerbean, 3/24/21

Oh, great, one day after I finally work myself up to write a 500 word essay on how putting Harry Dinkle into the current Crankshaft storyline violates the 10-year separation between the two Funkyverse strips, we find out that in fact despite her protests Lillian has been toiling as church organist for more than a decade and the separation is still in place after all! This is clearly an attack on me personally. Anyway, never forget that Harry had to quit his band teaching job because he went semi-deaf, so hopefully this church will be rewarded with some real sub-par organing.

Gil Thorp, 3/24/21

Gotta admit that this basketball season plot about Vic and his MC-ing ways didn’t really hold my interest, but now that Doug Guthrie and Corina Karenna, probably two of the top five more interesting characters currently in this strip, are planning to team up and overthrow the government through a series of daring assassinations, I’m back on board!

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Funky Winkerbean, 3/23/21

Real Funkyheads, which include both non-ironic fans of Funky Winkerbean and Crankshaft and those of us who feel compelled to read both strips every day, possibly due to a curse placed on one of our ancestors who offended a cave-witch, know that there is one iron law of Funkyverse time, which is that Crankshaft takes place ten years in Funky Winkerbean’s past. It wasn’t always like that, of course, but after Lisa died Funky Winkerbean jumped ahead ten years to allow Les time to come to terms with that, emotionally (lol), whereas Crankshaft didn’t. This time disjunction (disFunktion?) has been exploited for narrative effect multiple times, the most recent being just last summer, when a Crankshaft-era character mused that he’d love to visit the setting of his favorite silent movie, and then simultaneously (but ten years later) did just that over in Funky Winkerbean. (Naturally, achieving this longtime dream almost resulted in his death.)

But wait! Remember a few weeks ago, in Crankshaft, when the organist died and Lillian resisted taking over as her replacement? Well, they put an ad in the classifieds for a new organist, and since virtually nobody reads the classifieds anymore, the only person who answered was … Harry Dinkle! Over in Funky Winkerbean! Which is … not ten years in the future anymore, I guess? Even thought Crankshaft is as full as vim and vigor as ever over in Crankshaft (if occasionally glued to the furniture) but is a wizened husk in Funky Winkerbean? Anyway, they’ve been building this Dinkle crossover up for like a week now and every day I’ve been forced to contemplate the question of whether I care about this flagrant casting aside of established Funkyverse chronology, and I’ve finally decided that I do! I do and I feel compelled to blog about it! This too is no doubt part of that sinister crone’s ancient curse, under which my whole family line has suffered for so many generations.

Dick Tracy, 3/23/22

Speaking of convoluted comics plots, I’ve never quite gotten a handle on what Pouch’s whole deal has been over the course of this current storyline. He’s thought-ballooning a recap for us to kick off the week, and I still don’t understand it, but I do appreciate the effort.

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Dick Tracy, 3/22/21

OK, just going to admit that I do not get what Dick means by “not without 5G” in panel three. I’m assuming he means the wireless telecommunications technology and this isn’t some piece of cop/gangster/Dick Tracy-specific slang, but, even so: I don’t get it. I guess he could be making a little joke, like “With all the new 5G phones and great wireless plans they have out now, it’s never been easier to reach out to a loved one or drop a dime on your underworld associates.” But maybe it’s more “We’re not going to get him to talk unless we turn up the 5G mind control rays, and those libs at the CDC say we’re not allowed to do that anymore now that we know they cause COVID.”

Gil Thorp, 3/22/21

Oh, man, I haven’t been updating you on the Gil Thorp plot, have I? Well, good news: the Mudlark girls’ basketball team made the playdowns! [five minutes later] We regret to inform you that the girls’ basketball team’s magical playdown run is over.

Gasoline Alley and Mother Goose and Grimm, 3/22/21

God damn it, we went through all the trouble of setting up the shared “What hoary old joke are you going to use in your syndicated newspaper comic strip today?” Google calendar, but it doesn’t work unless everyone updates it!