The Comics Curmudgeon

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Mmm … slop

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Blondie, 8/16/24

This strip may on first read seem entirely incoherent, but I actually think it nicely captures many people’s instinctive take on generative AI. Delicious, chemically infused slop dished up a vaguely burger-flavored form? Yum yum, bring it on! Uncanny valley content slop that you find when desperately searching for information or recipes online or looking at pictures on Facebook? Ugh, no, gross, absolutely not, kill it with fire.

Judge Parker, 8/16/24

Think I’m siding with mom here. Oh, you think your little underwater sojourn has helped you solve the mystery of the missing dad? Well, have you considered that the missing dad is going to be dead forever, whereas this party is alive and bumpin’ for just a few more hours? Why do you have to ruin it now, when we’ve already spent all this money on nice hors d’oeuvres?

Family Circus, 8/16/24

Sorry, Dolly, if you can’t even rope in your stupidest sibling, I don’t think your plan to declare yourself a God manifest on Earth and demand worship is going to work out.

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Thursday emotional roller coaster

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Dennis the Menace, 8/15/24

Spent a long time … no, that’s a lie. I spent like 30 seconds trying to figure if there was a “joke” here per se. Like, is it about … ice cream or something? Maybe? Eventually decided that there wasn’t. Mr. Wilson is just feeling better! Maybe he finally got on the right cocktail of psychopharmaceuticals, or maybe he just realized he has it pretty good and decided to rearrange his outlook on life. Either way, good for him!

Hi and Lois, 8/15/24

There’s no joke here either, but that’s par for the course in this strip now, and frankly I’m not complaining, because this is great. The little league team isn’t doing well, and Hi, who probably already feels like it’s kind of a thankless job, just got publicly insulted by one of the kids, while his son looks on in horror. It’s perfect! Keep it up, Hi and Lois!

Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 8/15/24

I’ve ruffled a few feathers by speaking some tough truths about comic characters — namely, the truth that the Lockhorns are Millennials. So here’s some more shocking real talk: probably most of you, based on their old-timey attire plus the fact that they look like wizened, ancient gnome-creatures, assume that Snuffy and Loweezy Smif are old people. But that doesn’t add up! As you can see here, they don’t see themselves that way; moreover, they have an infant child, and live in the sort of community where younger parenthood is the norm! We must therefore assume that they are at most 27 years old, and you know what that means: THE SMIFS ARE ZOOMERS

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Dennis should be into Charlie XCX, he’s been in his brat era since 1951

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Dennis the Menace, 8/14/24

Despite the fact that she’s a long-running fixture in a 73-year-old comic strip, I don’t think Margaret has a particularly consistent set of characterizations — she’s usually whatever she needs to be in the “vaguely prissy” range to annoy Dennis — but today’s panel honestly feels tonally off to me. I don’t buy that she would be expressing overt jealousy of Taylor Swift, and I don’t buy that she would just call her “Swift.” (I also don’t buy that as a drawing of Taylor Swift, but that’s neither here nor there.) Dennis in his interactions with Margaret similarly seems to take on whatever qualities are necessary to antagonize her, but I am intrigued by the implication that he’s set off Margaret’s rant because he’s such a dedicated Swiftie.

Gil Thorp, 8/14/24

Traditionally we have been treated to Gil Thorp’s thrice-annual ritual recitation of the names, so we can all pretend to know who the players are as their season develops. But in this new fast-paced era, the kids just get little floating labels instead. I’m particularly intrigued by “Torch,” who I assume is an X-Men-style mutant who has the power to control fire, or possibly just a notorious arsonist. Either way, seems like an exciting football season is ahead of us!

Alice, 8/14/24

A lot of middling comics could do a strip where two people talk about how modern appliances today have too many features and none of them work right, hur hur hur. But to have two people talking about how modern appliances today have too many features and none of them work right, while said appliance sits between the two people and makes direct and coquettish eye contact with the audience, with its weird creepy face? That’s the deranged Alice difference that keeps me coming back.