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Funky Winkerbean, 2/15/22

Look, I have very little credentials to speak as a “Hollywood insider” of any sort, but I feel very confident in saying that box office failures that got zero promotion from the studios that produced them do not get Oscar nominations. They simply do not! Either the studio thinks there’s an Oscar-worthy performance in it, in which case it does promote the movie, at least as something art-house-y award-worthy, or the movie finds an audience perhaps unexpectedly and then the studios do some “for your consideration” lobbying as awards season approaches. Performances in movies nobody saw or liked (“nobody” here meaning both general audiences and film snobs/critics) definitely do not get nominations just out of the blue, buzz-free, no matter how moving they are or how much awareness of breast cancer they raise. Anyway, I guess Mason is saying she’s up for an Oscar nomination rather than she’s actually been nominated, so … maybe the studio is doing a late push, or something? But, overall, if the woman playing Les’s dead wife in a low-budget flop wins an Oscar, I will officially declare that less realistic than the time this strip burned down Los Angeles and created millions of refugees.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 2/15/22

The days in which people gave the Morgans heaps of money and free boats for no reason seem to be over, for the most part, but you have to admit that a jailhouse snitch derailing Rene’s likely-to-succeed lawsuit out of the goodness of his heart is functionally the same thing as giving them a bunch of money, if you think about it mathematically.

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 2/15/22

Would I have ever predicted that Snuffy Smith would meet his end not at the hands of Sheriff Tait or an aggrieved member of the Barlow clan, but would rather be torn to pieces by a dozens angry squirrels? No, but I’m not complaining about it.

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Mary Worth, 2/14/22

Toby story confirmed! Toby story about her working as a community college art teacher confirmed! I am very excited about the delights in store for us — do Toby’s students respect her? I feel fairly confident that they do not, and I dearly hope that the Etsy store where she sells her terrible figurines was discovered by everyone in her class by the end of the first week.

Blondie, 2/14/22

I dunno, man, I realize there’s a tradition of giving your romantic partner, like, sexy underwear for Valentine’s Day, but I feel like “Here’s something that feeds into my very specific fetish and it’s my Valentine’s gift to you” doesn’t seem quite right. I mean, I guess it’s working for these two crazy kids though? Sorry, Cookie and Alexander! Sorry they’re doing it right there in the living room!

Rex Morgan, M.D., 2/14/22

“My mistake. The thing is, I don’t want to talk to you, but if I had realized that my choices were either talking to you in person or talking to you on the phone, I definitely would’ve picked the phone.”

Gasoline Alley, 2/14/22

“We will celebrate it together, my dear! Have you seen my dad? That’s our future! We’re going to live forever, growing more wizened and aged, but never dying! We’re trapped in an eternal hell!”

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Crock, 2/13/22

“Trooper Megan” was added to the case of Crock years ago in an attempt to mollify the woke mob who threatened to cancel this widely beloved strip because its gang of scrappy, lovable French people imposing colonial rule on Algeria were all, sexistly, men. Unfortunately, we can see that true equality has not been achieved in the Foreign Legion, because Megan is primarily in charge of the occupation’s emotional labor.

Dustin, 2/13/22

Dustin is, of course, a strip about put-upon old people and the young people they have to deal with in their lives, who are, a result of their youngness, terrible. And you might ask: what are young people supposed to take away from this? Why should they get on board? Well, today’s strip makes it clear: there’s always someone younger and more terrible than you to look down on.