Comic Strip Week in Review
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Monday
It’s always great to get a laugh when reading The Funny Pages and that is mostly a guarantee with The Duplex. Eno and Fang have moved toward the top of my favorite, must-read comic strips.
What’s not laughable is the truth in Monday’s Tank McNamara.
I have spent the last few years watching my youngest grandchildren play in organized soccer little leagues and except for the “private training” cone (both parents train and coach the kids, the mother being an excellent player in her youth) the costs of the other goal keepers amaze me. (Did my parents have such hefty fees when I was in Little League baseball?)
Not the least of those “other payments” is the time, but being out for the day with your children is time well spent. Yesterday was the last game of the Spring league, while the Autumn league scrimmages for the girl is just starting, and, time and costs allowing, the boy and girl will both start other Autumn leagues soon after school starts next month.
But as I said, there are worse things than parents spending Saturdays and Sundays with the little ones.
Tuesday
Well the Dollar Stores are also a thing of the past now. Being a Plugger I can remember the five and dimes where one could still get penny candy and nickel trinkets. But they were mostly full of more expensive necessities like needles and thread, watches, shoelaces, and a host of other items costing more than a dime.
Wednesday
Just like his comic strip alter ego Lalo Alcaraz spent the week at the San Diego Comic Con.
And isn’t it a shame that what used to be an enjoyable side hustle for an award winning cartoonist (RFK, Herblock) is now part of a necessary income generator because of the piss-poor reward cartoonists receive?
Which brings up a Wayback Wednesday installment with an Evan Dorkin comic strip via Bob Temuka:
In other wayback flashbacks – there was a time that Broom-Hilda was the chain smoker.
Yeah, Russell Myers has been doing Broom-Hilda solo for over 56 years now!
Thursday
Good timing by M. Fry and T. Lewis having a runaway robot the same week the news of A.I. going rogue broke. The Over the Hedge bit started Monday before the A.I. story broke. Where’s Magnus when we need him?
Friday
Friday’s Rosebuds brought to mind one of my very favorite memes:
Saturday
I couldn’t help thinking that Rob Harrell was playing to the plugger newspaper-reading demographic with his reference to Don Rickles. I doubt any of my grandchildren would know who he is.
I thought the same with Saurday’s Off the Mark and CowTown.
I can’t figure why Michael Jantze would posit such a falsehood. I’m sure he is aware of that little red-haired orphan with the “blunked out” eyeballs who appeared 11 and a half years before The Phantom.
By now we all know that the current Frank and Ernest consists entirely of old Bob Thaves panels reworked for today’s newspapers and internet. And it pains me to say this but… the modernized version of the above is a vast improvement on the original – the colors yes, but the drawing, the staging, the expressions, the background. It all works wonderfully.
Sunday
The news this week is that FurBabies has returned to GoComics and that’s a GoodThing.
After the item about Nancy no-nos earlier this week I was taken aback by the use of the term “hobo” in today’s Barney & Clyde. I guess hobo is better than “tramp” and “bum.”
Though according to Wikipedia Clyde doesn’t fit the definition of hobo:
Hobos, tramps, and bums are generally regarded as related, but distinct: a hobo travels and is willing to work; a tramp travels, but avoids work if possible; a bum neither travels nor works
GoComics’ about page calls Clyde a “street person.”
Hi and Lois brings us to the earworm of the day. “Everybody’s so different, we haven’t changed.”
feature image by Evan Dorkin
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