Vic Lee’s “Pardon My Planet” with a demented twist on a common phrase.This feature varies between social commentary and this kind of surreal foolishness, with the unifying principle being Lee’s ability to show silent reactions that are often funnier than the punchline. Note that the couple in the background combine body language and facial expression […]
Stuart Carlson is one of many cartoonists commenting on New York’s legalization of same-sex marriage, but one of the few who didn’t simply shout “Hurray,” most with some variation on the “I love NY” icon.Carlson does a nice job of contrasting the exuberant nature of the change with the irrational fear that resists it — […]
Before “Pros & Cons” was called that, it was called “A Lawyer, A Doctor and a Cop.” Here we see the first and third of them in not much of a conversation.Kieran Meehan has a merrily twisted view of reality, but it doesn’t keep him from having created characters with well-established and consistent personalities. Stan, […]
A landmark moment in one of my favorite strips, as Marla, the beleagured assistant manager in “Retail,” gets married.Retail has always maintained a level of reality that makes its occasional moments of whimsy that much more ridiculous. Its hallmark is the undercurrent of fury that creator Norm Feuti clearly carries for the combination of exploitation […]
Are we at the point where I can just say “Michelle,” the way we once just said, “Jackie”?Michelle and the girls have been visiting South Africa, and it’s hard for anyone over 50 not to recall JFK’s quip, “I am the man who accompanied Jacqueline Kennedy to Paris, ” except that the president didn’t even come […]
On Tuesday, Gannett laid off 700 people at their papers around the country, in an attempt to save money and maximize short-term profits. Although this sort of short-staffing handcuffs local papers and makes it virtually impossible for them to matter to the people in their own communities, it does have other benefits. In this case, […]
Today’s Bug had me right at the first panel. You don’t get a lot of space to introduce a topic in a comic strip. This is subtle, yet effective. The jack-in-the-box makes it.But the insanity of that abrupt intro masks the fact that the strip makes a profound historical argument: Whatever happened to Occam’s Razor? […]
Harry Bliss, in his eponymous cartoon, touches a nerve.A good friend moved to Japan to teach at a university there. He said that most Japanese colleges don’t really do a lot of actual instructing so much as they provide a venue for students to meet each other, make contacts and prepare for life after […]
And you thought Richard Thompson only dredged up long-suppressed memories of pre-school!Today’s Cul-de-Sac explores the last day of big-kid school by bringing back tortured memories of the locker bay, with comicdom’s favorite neurotic kid epitomizing the neurotic kid we all become when we think too hard about lockers. It’s a salute to Petey’s limited savoire […]
Steve Kelley on the annual “Boy, Our Kids Are Stupid” scandal, in which we wring our hands over how little our kids know about history and then go back to talking about the important topics of the day. This year, it is Anthony Weiner’s weiner, which continues to resonate throughout the media.(In the news cycle, […]
Joe Martin’s Mr. Boffo is one of several cartoons he does, each a different expression of a very funny world view combined with a talent for build-ups to punchlines like this. The unifying principle is the bland assurance that the speaker is perfectly sane and normal. Even when it’s predictable, it’s funny.And I’ll admit I […]
As KAL notes, the campaign has started.I moved to New Hampshire so late in October, 2008, that, before I left Maine, I voted there by proxy, since I didn’t know any of the local issues in my new home-to-be. I wasn’t in the Granite State long enough to get new plates for the car […]
(Dealing with a computer crash. In lieu of a new cartoon, please enjoy this article and a contemporaneous cartoon on the same topic. Apparently, it’s always been hard to monetize a medium once it has become established as a playground for geeks.)Sarnoff says public will not pay for radio programs(December 28, 1923)With the general trend […]
You can tell the family in “Baby Blues” lives in a newer neighborhood. This is part of an ongoing story arc in which Hammie severs the cable while digging in the yard. If it were set here, he’d have to have been, I dunno, playing with a chain saw or something. And taking down a […]
Okay, Sarah Laing’s Let Me Be Frank is now officially on the list of Comics I Have To Avoid Citing All The Time. (And you have to click on that link, because this is only the first of three panels.) I can’t resist the way she combines simple art with a voice that I would call […]