Snark It Up, FuzzBall!

…that’s when newspapers (and even online comic sites) are TOO DAMNED CHEAP to print the first “throw-away panels” of a Sunday comic strip.  To see the online throwaways, you often have to click and beep and bounce and sneak through ads and miscellaneous crap in order to be rewarded  (HINT: if there’s a “Buy a Print” option button, click on it — it usually shows you the ENTIRE strip, often in a much larger (readable) format).  Of course, these extra square inches may only serve to prolong the agony of a non-funny strip, but for God’s sake, let the reader be the judge!  And if you get your Sunday comics by paper, you just might be SOL.

Sometimes, these panels are unexpectedly poignant, or slyly humorous, or just a lark on the cartoonist’s part, often to the benefit what might otherwise be considered a trite, tired comic.  Sometimes, the bit of extra space helps round out a long build up to a very satisfying conclusion.  9 Chickweed Lane often uses long, wordless Sunday panels to a successful effect (Edda and Amos running around, swimming and diving, or playing musical instructions, Edda and/or Seth dancing, Solange doing very feline things).  And, yes, this is credit where credit is due.

15 September’s Hi and Lois, one I rarely read, has a great intro (yes, I was coaxed into “checking it out”):

Even in the non-thowaway first panel, you can see a tiny Charlie Brown and a tiny Hagar walking away from church.  Cross-over comic strips are a kick (not only do the Brownes and Walkers include their familys’ strips (Beetle Bailey and Hagar the Horrible), but also Marvin, Zits, Dennis the Menace, Tiger and Peanuts. (I dunno…maybe Charlie Brown is one of those Browns, too.)

Okay.  I love crossovers in comics.  I love sneaky bits.  And so I bow to Hi, Lois and their creators by mashing them unmercifully.

And on a Sunday yet!

In church!

Thanks!

…once a pissyface, always a pissyface.

Prince Valiant continues to please with beautiful illustrations and entertaining and logical stories (in your face, 9 Chickweed Lane!).  Still, Val isn’t as young as he used to be, and it seems a little crankiness is creeping into his outlook on life.

…I don’t deal with Spiderman very often.

And with very, very little added/changed to today’s strip, it should be kind of obvious why.

It’s a middle-of-summer-dear-god-it’s-so-hot Comics Curmudgeon meme.  That’s about all you need to know because I haven’t the foggiest idea how to explain it.

…but there have been so many pee, poop and fart jokes in the comics recently (well, there’s always Marvin,  but Baby Blues just did one, and that’s a comic I wouldn’t have expected, even featuring three kids), so I’m not so much immature as following the curve.  Ride the wave!

Oh, and if we have to acknowledge bodily functions, NO ONE does it better that Paul Trap’s Thatababy:

…and Brooke MacEldowney can be forgiven a lot of things because of his cats.

…and the tiny gato reminds me of Bete Noire in the old Gordo comics.

(Well, it was my birthday yesterday.)  I got lots and lots of wonderful birthday wishes.

And I even got some Very Wonderful mashups! Can you believe it?  From Nehemiah Scudder and our favorite green-skinned Mad Scientist:

And a really scary one (Count Weirdly’s a piker when it comes to nigh-on horror): Amos Snarkadder risked many pixelated paper cuts to produce this beauty!

When I was little, some of the banks downtown had lovely mural inside their lobbies, filled with scenes of Arizona history and vignettes of the desert landscape.  Maybe it was the era (early 60s), but I think this montage, “Ad astra per aspera” (To dessert through adversity. is a rough translation) would’ve been a natural there, up on the tall walls amongst the  spooky-looking kachinas…

THANK YOU, EVERYONE! I’ve got crazy fabulous friends!

I think this is what happens after I have Jughead have conjugal relationships with a turkey leg and Rex’s rollicking buttocks…the Cosmic Muffin provides NO mashable strips.

Properly repentant, here’s the last of my “for later” stash.  At least it’s one that I like a whole bunch:

(or, 100% Turkey Leg-Free!)

Sure, we laugh at Jughead dire pronouncement at a piece of food and snicker at Dr. Fleurrie’s apparently court-appointed attorney, but THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS when real Legal Eagles like Alan Parker and son, Sam Driver, and other members of a respectable cartoon law firm disappear!  Justice becomes a mockery!

Although it’s becoming fairly evident that Fleurrie has all the common sense of a bean burrito…