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Panels from Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 5/27/18

To be somewhat serious for a minute: when I joke about the grinding rural poverty in Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, which I do a lot, I hope I’m making it clear that my intention is make fun of the callous contrast between actual rural poverty, which is still very real and very grinding in the year 2018, and the weird “funny” play-acting version of rural poverty in Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, much of the iconography of which was developed during the vogue of hillbilly humor that was at its peak when this strip’s action pivoted from the big city to Hootin’ Holler in 1934. The characters are for the most part relatively untroubled by their circumstances, and, in a tradition that goes back through Sanford and Son all the way to ancient Greek comedies, are often depicted as being wiser and more content than their more sophisticated and less impoverished contemporaries, when they occasionally encounter them. Every once in a while, though, in some of the incidental background gags of the strip, you get a glimpse of something really depressing, like the fact that the Smiths live in a single-room shack with different ad-hoc living spaces created by patched curtains hanging from the ceiling. Or today, where the “joke” of the throwaway panels is that the Smith home has a leaky roof and so on rainy days their children are wet and miserable, even when they’re inside. That’s not a joke at all! It’s actually incredibly sad!

Mary Worth, 5/27/18

[earlier that week, in Mary’s apartment, Ian and Toby are reading off of scripts Mary has provided]

TOBY [haltingly]: Congratulations. We love … reading your work.

IAN [extremely sarcastic]: Fabulous news, my friend. I especially like your “Success Stories.”

TOBY: And I…

MARY [interrupting]: No, Ian, it’s “Survival Stories,” not “Success Stories.” We have to make him believe you actually read it. Do you want him to throw himself off a cliff?

IAN: Honestly, I’m of two minds about that, Mary…

MARY: Zip it. You’re going through this charade or I post to the local Nextdoor everything you’ve confided in me over the years. Capisce?

[sullen silence]

MARY: OK, take it from the top. And it wouldn’t hurt to smile a little.

TOBY [way too loudly]: Congratulation! We love reading your work!

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Blondie, 5/26/18

There’s really no circumstance under which this joke would’ve “worked,” but it would’ve not worked less if Dagwood had been wearing something vaguely cool or even interesting. Still, as a not-particularly-hip incipient old person myself, only the extreme out-of-touchness oozing from every pixel of this image prevented me from briefly wondering if wearing polo shirt tucked into black slacks had, against all odds, suddenly become fashionable.

Hagar the Horrible, 5/26/18

It’s kind of interesting that Hagar’s reputation as an illiterate precedes him, and not, say, his reputation as a wanton, destructive plunderer.

Beetle Bailey, 5/26/18

We interrupt our usual military antics for this nightmare vision of the human race as nothing more than a buffet of flesh and blood to be devoured by eager, ravenous parasites!

Pluggers, 5/26/18

If I’m interpreting this correctly, these plugger dudes are definitely going to have no-strings-attached sex on that filthy, filthy couch.

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Hey guys, real quick: my monthly comedy show in LA? That you know and love? It’s happening week from today in LA with a superstar lineup, don’t miss it!

And now, real quick: your COTW!

“Those ominous black dots on my cheeks are freckles! And those two black parallelograms floating around in my hair? Those are my eyebrows! That bulbous, snout-like appendage between my black, soulless eyes? That’s a nose! I’m adorable, understand? A-dor-a-ble!” –Joe Blevins

Equally speedy and funny runners up!

“Me after getting a single like on a tweet.” –Devi, on Twitter

“Unlike Mary Worth readers, Wilbur’s readers don’t have pictures of Wilbur thrown in their faces.” –Kevin Keeney, on Facebook

“Hal of Hal’s Haberdashery is sunning himself at some tropical location in early retirement.” –Kevin On Earth

“I’d think bringing the late CEO’s child with you to a board meeting would be kind of a bad-ass power move. I would start by saying, ‘Has anyone here seen the movie Boss Baby?’” –BigTed

“I query ‘AUGH!’ as the proper response to THWACK. I would have gone with ‘OW! Fuck!’” –Ukulele Ike

“So that first panel shows Mara running towards Rusty and Cherry with her front shadow-free, but the same aspect on Cherry and Rusty (i.e., their backs) are in full-on shadow. Mara may only be five feet away, but apparently the Trails are in some sort of enclosure, perhaps a hunting blind, looking out through a two-way mirror? Maybe they are there to furtively hunt for a mate for Rusty?” –The Mighty Captain E

“I’M BACK, WORLD! AND SLIGHTLY BETTER THAN WHEN I WAS HAVING SUICIDAL IDEATIONS!” –Dan

“Ah, nothing like a young homunculus’s first romance with a forty-year-old pre-teen.” –TheDiva

“Okay, I’ve see this black cross-hatching many times in Crankshaft and always took it to be a representation of shadow. This time, though, it’s just raked across the cloudless blue sky behind the strangely-despised Lena’s back. Hmm … kind of like formless wings of black smoke, like an angel that had its ability to soar the heavens ripped away by divine command. Lena … LENA … Lucifer eternum nunquam ascendunt … okay, time to go out for some fresh air.” –jroggs

“Sadly, Jughaid was buried alive in the family plot once the picture was taken.” –Snuffed Smif

“I read this as ‘where to CUCK,’ and I thought, well, bonus points for trying to keep up with today’s lingo, and even more bonus points for remaining on brand by being totally incoherent.” –Nekrotzar

“The troops are getting younger every year. We thought it was a blessing! Ten years ago I was an old man, paunchy and balding. But the sun scorches away the years, and five years ago I found myself newly in the prime of life, healthy and hale. But the troopers grow younger every year. Yesterday when I got out of bed I found that my feet no longer touch the floor. Today I found a baby tooth under my pillow.” –bunivasal

“Ha, normally the inspirational speech at the end of a story would be about the hard work and struggle the protagonist went through, but not in Rex Morgan, baby! ‘I got this company through marriage and corporate conniving even though I’m completely unqualified to run it. Now I’m going to go home and let you eggheads worry about the boring stuff and leave you with some vague threats about intervening if I feel like things are not to my liking.’ Fuck I love this strip!” –pugfuggly

“And let me be clear about the Avery Aerospace legacy! My husband’s last coherent wishes were that we continue to use the finest linen and dope in covering wing surfaces, and that cockpits should be open so that pilots could have a proper feel for air conditions! As for this rocketry silliness, he said satellites were just a fad and nothing would come of those goofball Telstar and Tiros ideas!” –Schrödinger’s Droopy

“Ironically, the hospital staff give Slim TLC while wearing ‘no scrubs’, and Slim catches a preventable nosocomial infection.” –Schroduck

“Why doesn’t Slim call the icon of Baphomet from the hood of his truck to cure his condition?” –Pozzo

“Alice is trying some negative reinforcement to cure Dennis’ desire for cookies. Once his hands heal from the burns, he’ll think twice.” –Kevin On Earth

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