Snark It Up, FuzzBall!

Okay! It looks like Rex has finally decided to enjoy his vacation, eveyone’s happy, and this cruise to the Bermuda Triangle or the Bahamas or the Sea of Weeds is just about to get underway.  Set a course for adventure and your mind on a new romance, not to mention spontaneous little heart-to-hearts with sassy young daughters!

I can’t believe it! mr. bats :[ accused me of inserting the “Woo! Woo!” into the following panel.  It was in the original one, no kidding! (Not that a ship’s horn sounds anything like that…)

…a whole cadre of proctologists would have to be kept on retainer, he’s such a little a-hole.

The Black Friday edition of FC featured a non-funny of Billy telling a “friend” about his uncle.  The conversation was one-sided with Billy doing all of the talking.  Not content with a word balloon, however, Billy commandeers a sub-caption as well.  The result. No funny.  Sure, his little pal looks interested, but then, so does Daddy when he’s got his inch-thick Coke-bottle-bottom specs trained on his son — maybe he’s just trying to focus the sun’s rays on Billy, hoping he’ll combust (hey, it works on ants, doesn’t it?)

Blather away, Billy.  We know what everyone’s thinking…

[Note that even Billy’s friends’ heads aren’t as deformed as those of the Keane kids. Go on — measure!]

Talking squirrel from over at Comics Curmudgeon suggested that Billy and Sarah Morgan (who’s been getting a lot of panel time for the past few weeks) get together for a rousing match of obnoxious kidlets.  The premise is sound, but there are limits even for precocious little darlings:

Oh, and we mustn’t forget know-it-all Dolly.  Cripes, set up against the Keane Klan, Sarah comes off as all sweetness and light, hardly a whit of snottiness around her.  This is a scary, scary thought.

Well, it looks like we’re on our way to the Caribbean, and in the world of Rex Morgan, that means new, wacky adventures are bound to pop up around every corner. Of course, this is providing that Rex doesn’t strangle Sarah in a jet restroom…

This particular episode isn’t very exciting, unless you’ve got season tickets for Exposition Theatre.  Still, information has to be passed on, and a number of folks at CC were quite intrigued by Dixie Julep’s true identity.

(WHAT?! She said Dixie Julep was her real name! How dare she lie and impugn the good name of strippers everywhere!)

It could’ve only been better if the writer of Judge Parker had dared to call her April Patterson… (“Sure, Lynne, sure!  Using one of your characters’ names is bound to increase traffic and rebound syndication numbers of your new piece of crap “re-imagining”!”)

Did Rex cave? Is he letting June and Sarah and Lenore walk all over him as far as sailboat ownership is concerned?  I think not.

And what about the wise witch-doctor Yoda Guran?  Is he going to let the Phantom call the shots as far as who he prefers to treat? Ditto.

Rock on, Rex.  Rock on, Guran.  Cast off the chains of those who would make you fight a rabid raccoon oppress you!

Oh, I just liked this.  For once, Jeffy isn’t the butt of a joke.

I’ve tried to not sink to other people’s levels in making (too much) fun of The Phantom’s less-than-subtle hero outfit.  But his damned high-and-mighty morals just look like so much holier-than-thou-and-especially-you-little-pygmy-guys platitudizing.  Imagine Mary Worth in purple spandex and stripey Depends.

Okay, don’t imagine that.

I’m just fed up with Kit’s ‘tude (“I need your help, Guran. No, wait. I don’t need it now.”).  Hey, Kit, you do realize that there were plots to assassinate Hitler, too, because he was a Bad Guy, rather than waiting to “bring him to justice.” Guran should hop on his pony and never look back–let you and Klaatu slug it out when Klaatu recovers and you’re bleeding from all of your bodily orifices…

And now that the crisis has been averted, Kit thinks a little “Truth or Dare” would be in order. Leave Guran alone, you goober!  Why don’t you go and fly your fancy-dancy plane off of a cliff or something…

…no, wait.  That really wouldn’t work, would it? Eh. Just leave Guran alone.

Well, you have Dixie Julep, Pole Dancer get dressed and leave; Sam Driver, Showering Attorney, get dressed; and Heidi Roberts, Homicide Investigator, get dressed in a sexy outfit for dinner with Sam — and then change into Crime-Scene Coveralls (albeit at least one size too small)…  I’ll admit it, I lost interest.

And then, all the talk talk talk about the guy who killed the publisher commiting suicide but not with the gun that was originally thought to have killed the publisher which is apparently still missing unlike the missing cell phone which was found by the computer that contained the would-be assassin’s suicide note so that the real killer of the publisher and the would-be assassin is still on the loose and what the hell is going on

Crap. I’m as confused as Sam, so I’ll just make fun of a double entendre:

The Sunday editions of Mark Trail are given to nature studies of animals, plants and conservation issues.  Fun (and educational!) stuff indeed, but perhaps the real reason for it is that when Mark charges up the Right Fist o’ Justice, the possibility of our being overwhelmed by his sheer might and righteousness could be overwhelming to those with delicate constitutions.

In Mark’s latest adventures, he accosts a passle of hillbillies (I believe that is the correct venery term for such a group) who are anticipating a raccoon vs. hound-dog smackdown.  We knew Mark was fixin’ to punch hisself a hillbilly, but imagine the joy and delight when Mark punches the hillbilly the next day–TWO PUNCHES!–to say nothing of Mark’s manly wading into a brackish stream, while evil hillbilly has festooned himself in hip-waders and glove. WUSSY!

The action was thoughtfully distributed over two days. Could we have handled all of it in a single day? You be the judge! (Read with caution.)

(Thanks to CC’s Amateur for Sneaky’s squeal of delight and the inspiration for this silliness.)

WHEW! Are you still breathing?  You might want to put your head between your knees for a few moments, because the Monday strip shows that in Real Life, things don’t end with just a couple of punches.  There’s White-Collar Villains to consider!  Paparazzi! Indignant logs!  I’m sure that Mark can handle all of them, but we’re far from the end of his Wetlands Adventure!

Although all of the ‘action’ involving the Turkey Shoot Regatta is long past (and more time seems to have been spent patching up Ollie Tweaks), the story lingers, more so than usual.  Why is this?

My theory is that because Lenore Foster is a REAL PERSON (no kidding! really!) and a friend of Woody, the Rex Morgan artist, there’s some amount of twitting going on between the two of them.  It’s also my understanding that some original RMMD art is/was going to be auctioned for the Hospice coffers as well, and I have to admit that there’s been a bountiful beau-coup buttload of great faces and facial expressions in this story arc.

Here are some of the wonderful panels and expressions.  Sure, we snorked and laughed about some of them (and some of the dialog has been changed — the patootie panel is its very own self!), but this is top-of-the-line cartooning:

A lot of them are more that a little suitable for framing, and I’d kill for (or, well, I’d love to have) a piece of genuine RMMD art. In the meantime, here I am screwing around with a great portrait of Rex:

(Boy, this was a pain in the patootie to do! I think Warhol had it right with a silk screen, soap-and-water, and changing the colors that way.)