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Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 9/2/17

Usually Snuffy’s brushes with the law are depicted with the same jocular gloss as the rest of Hootin’ Holler’s dysfunctional culture. The crimes are generally relatively low-impact stuff like bootlegging and chicken thievery, and Snuffy goes to jail for a few days and there’s tongue-lolling hilarity all around. Today … today is different. The Holler’s judge, the only real representative of outside authority in this lawless community, looks genuinely horrified by the case he’s just finished presiding over: has his previous indulgent attitude led to this? Even Snuffy and Loweezy look like they’re suffering true shame. My assumption is that the generations-old Smif-Barlow fued finally escalated to the point where Sheriff Tate stumbled upon a ramshackle cabin on the creek where Barlow corpses were stacked like cordwood.

Spider-Man, 9/2/17

Wait, Kala and Mole-Man were engaged? You know, for a gnomish, homely, nearly blind cave-dweller, he still gets his fair share of attention from the ladies! This makes Kala’s insistence that her husband not disrupt the Mole-Man/Aunt May wedding all the more poignant. Why can’t everyone in this strip be as emotionally advanced as her?

Pluggers, 9/2/17

It’s no “Rhino-Man hocks his TV,” but “pluggers feel overpowering shame over something that’s entirely harmless and increasingly socially normalized” is pretty high up there in the pantheon of Extremely Grim Pluggers Punchlines, in my opinion.

Judge Parker, 9/2/17

“To the CIA! Once we turn in your wife, we can stop worrying about this — and, here’s the best part, probably get a big reward!”

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GUYS! It’s the first Friday of the month and you know what that means: it means it’s time for The Internet Read Aloud, my monthly LA comedy show!

It’s always good and this month’s gonna be great! Here’s the Facebook event, for your calendar-marking pleasure!

And now … your comment of the week!

“Who, exactly, are we supposed to be rooting for in this strip? Ned, who is at worst, a philanderer, and best, someone with boundary issues? Jared, the sniveling, clumsy stalker? Dawn? Not with that haircut, honey. Maybe it’s the Narration Box. Is it the Narration Box?” –The Mighty Untrained FOOZLE

And your runners up! Also hilarious!

“This seems like an educational puzzle left over from when Spider-Man was on The Electric Company. ‘Okay, true believers, if an octopus has eight tentacles, how many would a dectopus have?’ ‘I don’t know, Morgan Freeman, how many?’ ‘None, because it doesn’t exist! Now, here’s Grover!’” –BigTed

“So. Even though Tyrannus was literally an ancient Roman emperor, he has never seen a gladiator contest or anything resembling one.” –A Concerned Reader

“I pity those readers who didn’t get to see the throwaway panels of this Curtis. They missed a beautiful sight: Curtis himself, isolated in some kind of lemon meringue purgatory, weeping and begging his mother for mercy that he will not get.” –Joe Blevins

“I don’t know if it’s Diane’s intention to raise a serial killer who garrotes people with a belt while wearing another belt with suspenders, but that’s the way she’s pushing things.” –Artist formerly known as Ben

“I like to imagine Lou in a back room of his greasy dive, swatting at stray cockroaches, a cigarette dangling from his lips, and one finger typing emails on his old food-stained IBM.” –Joe Momma

“It’s a world where clocks are set by the arrival of the train, where a guy named ‘Shady’ is paid in cash. Oh, the humanity!” –handsome Harry Backstayge, idol of a million other women

“Can you find five rail safety violations in this scene? Solution: 1) Station master is distracted during train movements 2) Train driver’s head extends beyond safe clearance zone of the locomotive 3) The station master is standing right on the platform edge 4) Being so close to horn while in operation risks hearing damage 5) An inaccurate clock is being used for dispatching, increasing collision risk. If you said ‘Max has been left unattended on a teetering pile of suitcases atop a trolley right on the platform edge,’ then you are incorrect, because no-one cares about Max’s safety.” –Schroduck

“I believe Shady Shrew’s contract was to ‘fix’ the clock, not to ‘set’ it, and he did just that, oiling the gears and replacing a few springs that were going bad and so forth. Setting the clock is the stationmaster’s job. Coming up tomorrow, ‘Slylock has just been served with a lawsuit for defamation, theft, and false imprisonment. How does he arrange for Max to take the fall?’” –Dmsilev

“I want to invest in Cosmo’s pocket-sized version of the HAL 9000. ‘I’m sorry, Dave, but this venture is too important to be financed through publicly traded securities.’” –Peanut Gallery

“Don’t parks usually have some kind of safety old tire rubber material under the equipment to minimize damage from falls? This looks more like an overgrown meadow that at one time held a park until the factory closed in ’83 and the whole town up and moved, leaving behind a ruin. PJ is about to be eaten (or raised) by coyotes.” –Drew Funk

“I for one wish PJ well in his new career as a Salt-N-Pepa backup dancer. Jeffy, of course, will need a shirt that says ‘It.’ Jeffy isn’t a dancer, these are two separate thoughts.” –Dan

“You know what else can cause damaging radiation? Improper use of the MRI machine. However, I applaud the doctor’s effort in coming up with a truly creative excuse.” –Here Come the Judge

“Of all the weird shit going on with Jared, I can’t get past wondering why he’s eating his microwave dinner with a shrimp fork.” –Tom the Sailor Man

“Hah! And that eBay seller said these 40 year old Star Wars Libbyland meals were no longer edible! Who’s laughing now, Wookielover69?” –Charles Nelson,Really!

“I really want to hear the story behind the decision to hire the duck man to advertise the french cafe. ‘Zut alors, Pierre! No-one ees buying our fine patés and softs cheeses!’ ‘You are right, Louis, perhaps we should try to attract zees Americans in a manner that appeals more to zem, like the moufler shop next door.’” –pugfuggly

“If it doesn’t count as a date night, then why is she gussied up for one? Hair all curled, trendily mismatched skirt and conspicuously chic yet wholly unflattering blouse, with a ‘cute’ purse if ‘cute’ were defined as ‘something a tween would dismiss as too saccharine’. The dude is in the standard bum uniform of unshaven, backwards baseball cap, t-shirt and sweat shorts. If there was another way to say ‘seventeen steps below casual’ without three day old underwear flapping in the breeze, he’d do it. Considering they’re going on a neighborhood watch, they’re the perfect mismatched-buddy-cop pairs in the making.” –Hogen the Mogen

“I haven’t been following Mark Trail, but it seems to have turned into a Western starring Lorenzo Lamas and Clark Gable, set in a claymation world where everyone’s been smacked in the face with a fencepost several times. A marked improvement.” –Applemask

“Kala has the most bored expression I’ve ever seen on the face of someone smacking a goblet of magical elixir out of her husband’s hand while threatening to divorce him over his murderous ways. You know they do this every week.” –matt w

Thanks to everyone who became a Comics Curmudgeon Supporter to get an banner-ad-free site, put some scratch in my tip jar, or backed me on Patreon! And as ever, we must give thanks to our advertisers:

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Mary Worth, 9/1/17

Dawn may be clueless enough to believe that Dr. Ned is divorced, but at least she isn’t so naive as to fail to recognize that Jared has been lusting after her for the entire length of this storyline. Probably that time he said “If you’re at your apartment alone, by yourself, I can show up at a moment’s notice!” was the subtle “tell” she picked up on. I feel like the way Dawn is holding her bagel in panel two is extremely relevant here: it’s completely ridiculous if she intends to eat it, but it’s a perfect grip to, say, hit chuck it at someone and hit them in the mouth at point-blank range if it becomes sadly clear that they’re about to confess romantic feelings for her.

Spider-Man, 9/1/17

Why do you think Tyrannus needs to take a sip from the fountain of youth before he orders Spidey and Mole-Man’s deaths? Upon my first read of this strip I thought he was going to do the dirty work himself and needed youthful strength, but no, he’s just going to order the Dectopus to do it. Does this ten-limbed beast from deep below the earth’s crust refuse to take orders from anyone who doesn’t radiate the vitality of a twentysomething? Has the surface world’s cultural obsession with youth penetrated even down to the subterranean realm?

Mark Trail, 9/1/17

I sincerely hope that what Sheriff What’s-His-Name is going to pull out of his saddle-bag is a bouquet of flowers and bottle of champagne, and we’re about to get a long, rambling speech that includes the phrase “See, the way to deal with a grizzly bear is you have to romance it” at least twice.