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Judge Parker, 2/28/24

Judge Parker Senior’s wayward daughter Ann, having escaped her captor when he decided that Judge Parker Senior was too scary, has apparently decided to try to escape the loving embrace of her family as well. Specifically, she appears to be fleeing into the hedge maze that the Parkers maintain on their grounds, and I for one think it would be very funny if Randy attempts a flying tackle only to miss and end up waist-deep in the shrubbery.

Dustin, 2/28/24

Ring is manufactured by Amazon, and with the close collaboration between the company and law enforcement, I’m afraid that Dustin’s dad use of “police” as a verb here is anything but metaphorical. As a defense attorney, the man is probably already on the local cops’ shit list, and while I don’t usually root for the carceral state, after years of reading this strip I can’t say the thought of him getting violently tased for trying to sneak a midnight snack doesn’t warm my heart a little bit.

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Gil Thorp, 2/27/24

Under new writer Henry Barajas, Gil Thorp has introduced a more diverse cast, kept old characters around, and even rescued Gil’s children from whatever “Phantom Zone”-style limbo-dimension prison they had been exiled to. But are we ready to meet [record scratch] Gil’s brother? He’s got the Thorp chin, a normal haircut, and a kicky scarf, and he can effortlessly carry three coffees at once. He seems awesome! Watch out, Gil, there’s a new Thorp in town!!!!

Blondie, 2/27/24

It’s never exactly clear where the Bumsteads live, but I assume that the community is dominated by Mr. Dithers and his business cronies, leading to a deeply labor-hostile local media. That’s the only explanation for what we see in the first panel, where the news broadcast has eschewed the usual B-roll of people walking the picket line for this strike story in favor of just a close up on a human foot.

Gasoline Alley, 2/27/24

There probably aren’t a ton of upsides to being a 145-year-old cartoon character whose pleas for death fall on the unhearing ears of your cruel Creator, but at least your unnaturally addled brain can’t retain anything for too long. Can’t stay mad about things you can’t change if you don’t know what they are!

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Rex Morgan, M.D., 2/26/24

Every once in a while, the Rex Morgan, M.D., creative team remembers the “M.D.” part of the strip title and realizes they’re supposed to be doing medical or medical-adjacent storylines. Unfortunately, they hate that, so they make them as boring as possible to ensure that we don’t demand more of them. Healing is mostly sitting around and not doing anything, if you think about it, and is that what you want to read about in a comics strip? When you could be getting more juicy gossip about what sort of drama goes on within the roots country community? I think not.

Marvin, 2/26/24

Every once in a while, the Marvin creative team remembers that they do a daily strip where the primary joke is that the main character, a baby with adult-level cognition, pisses and shits himself constantly, and enjoys it, and worry that they might be put in jail for their many crimes, so they have to do an even more off-putting strip so that a few days later, when newspapers print a strip where a Marvin grins smugly after voiding his bowels into his diaper and everyone around him recoils in disgust, the average reader thinks, “Well, at least this one isn’t about a dog contemplating a human’s genitals” rather than picking up the phone and dialing 911.

Mary Worth, 2/26/24

“It seems he’s a bachelor no more … so amazing that he’s managed to have a 20-year-old daughter in a just a few weeks!” Toby is just 100% zooted to the gills.