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Hello, everyone! I must apologize for the brevity of this week’s COTW; I’m actually traveling this week and the next, which means you should be marveling at my ability to keep up the pace of posts! Unfortunately, I haven’t kept up with the comments as I should have; still, I offer to you this gem that I spotted that was undeniably hilarious:
“Tomorrow’s headline will read, ‘SPIDER-MAN SAVES DAY / Day Was in No Jeopardy Whatsoever.’” –Steve
And these runners up, which are also extremely funny:
“As a woman of a certain age, I applaud Gil Thorp for consistently making athletic young people look like eyeball-searing trolls. Hahaha, ugly GT young people! I feel pretty!” –Poteet
“I think Ziggy is trying to convey the essence of 1960′s casualness and cool in that ‘pad’ used to mean ‘hang-out’, or ‘residence’ as a square might say. We also know it’s a ’60′s reference since talking mice are only brought to us either by Disney or hallucinogens.” –Uncle Ritzy Fritz
“Now why don’t you cancel that leave of absence and let your grown daughter go to Italy by herself so she can sort her own shit out? See what I mean, Wilbur? That just came out, unbidden, and felt so right! I don’t think I can get that kind of spontaneous satisfaction from some contrived clockwork bullshit Ask Wendy column.” –Brook Esia
“So now Mark Trail is going to the cops with a soaking wet gum wrapper from his pocket.” –Hogenmogen
“The best part of today’s Ziggy is the fact the guy isn’t even a DNA scientist. He’s just revolted by Ziggy’s family history to the point of supporting eugenics.” –sporknpork
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Mary Worth, 6/15/12
Well, it looks like I need to stop making assumptions about people! I have always taken it for granted that Wilbur’s advice column was called “Ask Wendy” because there was in fact a “Wendy” persona — a smiling, attractive, late-middle-aged female avatar who served as the public face for the column. Moreover, I assumed that the few dozen elderly shut-ins who made up the column’s core audience would be made profoundly uncomfortable knowing that “Wendy” was really a man with a wispy combover who tucks his too-tight polo shirts into his jeans, and so Wilbur toiled on his column behind the scenes, getting no recognition for a job mediocrely done except for the huge paychecks that everyone in print media gets. But apparently Wilbur is well known to all as the brains behind Wendy, which is why another platituder can’t just be plugged in seamlessly while he jets off to Italy. Except that also means that the new fill-in Wendy will also be visible to readers at home, which means that maybe they’ll like her better, especially if Wilbur’s bold italicized JUST FOR THE SUMMER (…the summer … the summer …) is as foreshadowy as it looks. At least Wilbur has made one vaguely smart business decision: he hasn’t mentioned actually paying Mary anything yet.
(By the way, if you haven’t read this 100% amazing interview with Mary Worth writer Karen Moy about Dawn Weston yet, you really, really need to do so right now.)
Gil Thorp, 6/15/12
Sorry everybody, I just can’t get into this Gil Thorp teen pregnancy storyline, even now that it’s escalated to a mass team walk-off in support of their persecuted teen mom pitcher. I do want to point out that even the narration box has gotten bored and is now experimenting with sassiness. (“Um, not exactly…” is fairly low-level sass, but cut it some slack, it’s just a simple narration box.)
Judge Parker, 6/15/12
“Doesn’t the weather understand that rich people are planning on enjoying themselves outdoors? I’ll have my assistant call God at once and get this all worked out!”
B.C., 6/14/12
One of the things I think is funny and interesting in B.C. (is it on purpose? let’s say it’s funny and interesting on purpose) is its mix of sentient predator and sentient prey animals, actually depicted preying on each other, as with the ants and anteaters. I find today’s strip particularly intriguing on this score. If you don’t really think about it much and accept the outside-the-anthill perspective the strip gives you, it’s a silly bit about an anteater getting his tongue tied in a knot, ho ho! But take a minute to imagine the scene inside: the gathering of innocent ants, going about their business within the larger colony, when suddenly an enormous, slimy tentacle bursts through the wall of their home, slithering to and fro. Who knows how many hundreds of unfortunates were snared by foul mucus that covers the monstrous thing and dragged back screaming into its snout, where they will be digested, alive, in agony? The carnage continues until one heroic young ant defeats the beast using the skills he’s learned in his scout group; the monster retreats in confusion, but the colony members look around their shattered home, weeping for their loved ones, wondering how they’ll be able to put their lives back together.
Mark Trail, 6/14/12
“Well, we flew close to him and tipped over his canoe and probably he fell into a fairly calm river within easy swimming distance of shore. That should take care of Mr. Trail!” Bush pilot Mike Harris is the most half-assed murderer ever. Maybe someone should check in on Al Chavez, he might turn out to not be dead after all.
Ziggy, 6/14/12
Finally, Ziggy has been proven to be genetically inferior, with science.
Judge Parker, 6/13/12
There hasn’t been a lot of plot development or anything over the last few days in Judge Parker, but I did want to give you a good look at Sam and Avery’s hideous fishing outfits, if only to assure you that massive, unearned fortunes can’t buy taste.
Pluggers, 6/13/12
Pluggers are sneaky cheapskates who invoke their grandchildren in transparent attempts to get out of paying for things.
Spider-Man, 6/13/12
Sadly, hilariously, Clown-9′s statement in panel two is 100% accurate.
Marmaduke, 6/12/12
Oh, Dottie! I understand the urge to you have to revel, just for a moment, in your victory over Marmaduke, to let him know that you beat him, right before you plunge the obsidian dagger into his enormous heart and send his dark soul back to the hell-dimension from which it came. But his moments of weakness are so few and so fleeting that you can’t waste time gloating. In fact, one huge eyelid is already creaking open, meaning things are about to get very bad for you very quickly.
Dennis the Menace, 6/12/12
On the other end of the “committing violence against living things on your property” spectrum, taking out your aggression on plants has to be some of the least menacing business I can think of.
Apartment 3-G, 6/12/12
It looks like the offspring Scott implanted in Nina’s body is finally ready to burst out through her chest. Guess she was right to be freaked out about this pregnancy after all!
Slylock Fox, 6/11/12
“Hmm, yes, that is an interesting fact, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, about tadpoles not having legs. But did you know that adult amphibians, like Mr. Buford Bullfrog, breathe through their skin? Which means that they’d never smear ‘moisturizing’ gunk on themselves, because it would be a death sentence! So why would Mr. Bullfrog have stolen the moisturizer in the first place, hmm? It just doesn’t add up!” This is what Buford Bullfrog’s lawyer would say, if he had a lawyer, if defendants in Slylock-world were actually allowed decent representation. But no, they’re just dragged into court and forced to sit wide-eyed in terror as Slylock plays his little ratiocination games and everyone laughs. Then presumably comes the summary execution.
Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 6/11/12
Try as he might, Snuffy can’t break through the codes of sexual shame so prevalent in his community and tell his best friend that he was molested by a senator.
Mark Trail, 6/11/12
“Hmm, I just parted company with a bush pilot whom I openly accused of murder, though I’ve also made it clear that I’m the only one who knows about the evidence against him! Now a bush plane is flying low very close to me. I wonder what’s going on!” Thank goodness for Mark that our sporting killer only shoots people in the water.
Ziggy, 6/11/12
I have less of a problem with the mouse sitting on the pad than I do with the mouse sitting on the pad so … alluringly.