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Blondie, 7/1/20

Today is a day when we get a particularly good look at Dagwood’s flesh-turtlenecky, which is a thing I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about over the years, like wondering if Dagwood has skinned another human being and turned their flesh into a ritual garment, or if this is a Portrait of Dorian Gray situation except instead of a painting aging it’s Dagwood’s torso that becomes increasingly wrinkled and leathery while his face and arms remain smooth and youthful. Anyway, the whole conversation in today’s strip seems really unlikely — why wouldn’t Dagwood say the actual name of the sportscaster he supposedly resembles, for one thing — and it seems more realistic to me to imagine that what’s really bothering him is that someone asked him “Hey, what’s up with your fuckin’ neck, man?”

Funky Winkerbean, 7/1/20

“Also, I’m not really retired! I mean, people say I am but I keep showing up to work so I must not be? So I don’t think I’m the right guy to answer this question for you.”

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Gil Thorp, 6/30/20

I have to admit, I honestly appreciate that Gil Thorp has refused to pander the usual narrative conventions of the slobs vs. snobs sports battle and has instead delivered the actual inevitable outcome, which is that the snobs would win handily, but also there’d be no hard feelings all around. But if it the effort manages to get at least one Mudlark and one non-Mudlark laid, won’t it all have been worth it?

Shoe, 6/30/20

Man, Shoe really is just all about “OK, we’re doing pandemic jokes now, it’s what’s going on in our readers contemporary lives and we’re gonna talk about it!”, isn’t it? Too bad that by alluding to our current epidemiological situation the strip used up all the up-to-date references it had available, with none left over when it came time to think up a musical act to use in this joke.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 6/30/20

Welp, June has grown tired of Rex’s failed attempts to make the story of how they met interesting, so she’s seized control, and on day one, Rex has horribly injured himself! I am immediately riveted. Go on, June! Tell us more! Spare no (literally) bloody detail!

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Baby Blues, 6/29/20

I don’t want you think that I’m constantly raging against Marvin’s incessant piss and shit jokes is because I’m against bathroom humor per se. It’s the “incessant” part that really gets me; of course some judiciously applied poop humor is an important part of any comic strip with child characters. Today’s Baby Blues genuinely made me laugh, for instance! I particularly like the expression on the dog’s face in panel two. He just wanted to poop on his walk like he always does, safe in the assumption that his owner would clean it up, and now he’s embarrassed! He never asked to be part of this!

Gasoline Alley, 6/29/20

You know what didn’t make me laugh? Today’s Gasoline Alley, which is about desperate homeless people breaking into circus animals’ cages to eat their food! I’m not even going to bother describing the plotline we’re in the middle of here, because it doesn’t actually provide any context for today’s strip, which, I can’t emphasize enough, is about people so poor and hungry that they need to eat circus animal feed to survive, Jesus Christ.