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Welcome to the 22nd Something Awful Comic Strip Megathread! What once began as a haven for haters of one particular Canadian cartoon has become the internet’s premier landing spot for lovers of comic strips good and bad, old and new. If you’re nostalgic for the days of rifling through the morning paper looking for the comics section, you’re among friends! Criteria for inclusion in the thread have been somewhat loosened over the years to include more than just newspaper comics. Straight up webcomics which exist purely within the digital space are usually verboten, but some exceptions can be made for internet-based comics that are hosted on syndicate websites, whose artists have a history in print, or that have been grandfathered in due to reader enthusiasm. If you’re interested in posting something new and aren’t sure if it fits the thread, just ask! Past Megathreads:
I’m taking a cue from Some Guy TT’s very thorough and informative OP last year to include introductions to many thread standards and regulars. Thanks to Alhazred, EasyEW, Giant Ethicist, Kennel, Medenmath, Samovar, and Some Guy TT for contributing their knowledge! --------------------------------------------------------------------- 9 Chickweed Lane was once a thread regular, but since it has devolved into a sad old man subjecting the public to his oddly pretentious spank bank, it has been banned from this thread. Any use of the term “gams” is probably a reference to this comic and its artists most obvious fetish. And He Did  A 1910s-era panel of unintended consequences. Andertoons  A reliably funny panel that gets a surprising amount of mileage from “chart in a meeting” gags. The Antique Dealer’s Tale  Maruoka Kuzo writes Uramachi Sakaba and a series of related comics set in its shared universe. The setting is nominally cyberpunk / post-apocalyptic, but as often as not the stories are about working-class people in mid-to late-20th-century Japan as much as anything futuristic. Bars and bar food feature prominently - "Cyberpunk Cheers" seems to be how people have settled on describing Uramachi Sakaba - and Maruoka is a master of leaning into a trope and giving you a story that is somehow unsurprising yet charming at the same time. Arlo and Janis  A thread favorite, A&J is known for its wholesome depiction of a long-married couple still in love and is not above some PG-13 innuendo. Arnold  New to the thread this past year, SA’s own Mister Beeg is working on restoring old versions of the strip to be reprinted in the future. A Sketchy Life  Not its own comic per se, but a catchall title for various old magazine cartoons. Bad Machinery  Set in John Allison’s “Bobbinsverse”, Bad Machinery chronicles the adventures of six mystery-solving teens in the fictional British town of Tackleford. Its cast has appeared in several other Allison projects both before and since. Ballard Street  A slice of life comic from a neighborhood populated entirely by rambunctious seniors and their canine partners-in-crime. Big Nate  A long-running newspaper staple, Big Nate has drawn some ire in the past for its namesake being a lovely friend, but modern Nate seems to have outgrown this habit. Bizarro  A daily panel characterized by strained puns and an arbitrary quota of hidden objects. Makes perfect sense when you understand that this is the original creator. Blind Alley  A webcomic drawn by an illustrator who works with The Globe and Mail, so technically thread-appropriate! Blueberry  A long-running serial by Belgian author Jean-Michel Charlier and French artist Jean Henri Gaston Giraud telling the fictional history of the American Wild West primarily through the eyes of its titular character: a roguish but good-hearted soldier. Boondocks  The most early-2000s comic in this thread, both in its W-era politics and its outdated social mores. You may recognize it from its Adult Swim adaptation. Breaking Cat News  Very mushy, beautifully illustrated strip based on the artist’s own cats and family. Brenda Starr  A once-popular soap opera strip which ended its 70+ year run in 2011. Buni  A mostly wordless comic that updates three days a week. Calvin and Hobbes  The classic that inspired a generation of cartoonists! Currently being rerun so we can catch gags that went over our heads as children. Cthulhu and Girl  Bubblegum in comic strip form, and about 148% more pure-hearted than it has any right to be. Aspiring idol Inaba Futaba inadvertently adopts Literal Cthulhu as a pet, and he works behind the scenes to propel her to stardom. Compu-toon  A comic about technology drawn by a man who doesn’t understand technology. Features oddly-shaped heads, computers, and pretty much everything else. Crabgrass  Set in the 80’s, Crabgrass follows two best friends from different sides of the tracks. A thread favorite that recently achieved a well-deserved syndication. Crankshaft  A comic based entirely on banal old-man malapropisms and general cantankerousness. Shares a universe with Funky Winkerbean - sometimes concurrently, sometimes ten years apart depending on which canon the writer remembered that day. The Creeps  An old thread favorite about two roommates where neither of them is the smart one. Curtis  Mostly known for its mundane “kids these days and their hippity-hop” style of humor, occasionally the artist swings for the fences, notably with his yearly Kwanzaa fables and Sunday strips featuring ostentatious church lady hats. Daddy Daze  A man and his amicable ex translate baby talk into… humor? I think? Dark Laughter  A staple of black newspapers through the mid-20th century, this lovingly illustrated panel satirizes Harlem society through its good-for-nothing main character Bootsie. Dark Side of the Horse  Simple and absurd, this Finnish creation has sight gags aplenty. The Demons of Baseball  Quoting user Kavak on this one: "In this world, is the destiny of a baseball team controlled by some transcendental entity or law? Is it like the hand of the umpire hovering above? At least it is true that man has no control, even over his own average. Man takes up the bat in order to shield the small wound in his heart sustained in a far-off time beyond remembrance. Man swings for the fences so that he may die smiling in some far-off time beyond perception." Dick Tracy  “Tiny Arms Tracy” from the 2000s Dick Locher era is a thread classic for just how good-bad it is. Dilbert is banned from this thread. We will reinstate it once Scott Adams has finished his affirmations to make it so. Dogbert  Set in the military, Dogbert was drawn by African-American comics page pioneer Morrie Turner. Dok's Dippy Duck  The story of a smartass Seattle-based duck hanging out on a street corner. Sometimes he picks fights, sometimes fights pick him. Dustin  Boomers vs. what boomers think millennials are. A well-drawn, award-winning hate read. Everyday Movies  A slice of life panel which ran from 1924 to 1954. F Minus  Simply-drawn panel that’s often good for a sensible chuckle. The Family Circus  Based on the family of original artist Bil Keane, this decades-old panel (circle?) has found innumerable variations of the theme “Kids, amirite?” The Far Side is banned for being just too good. That, and the DMCA takedown notice from past iterations of this thread. You’ll have to get your cow tools elsewhere. Fingerpori  If you love puns, but wish they were in a foreign language with inscrutable conjugation rules, Fingerpori is the comic for you! Viperless milk is the prototypical example. Footrot Flats  A New Zealand strip about a nameless dog’s adventures on the titular farm. For Better or For Worse  The comic that inspired it all! Now in reruns, “Foob” as it is “affectionately” known inspired the original thread and has been posted ever since. Artist Lynn Johnston’s attempt to portray a fictionalized version of her own family has become especially notorious for rewriting the actual lives of her children and portraying motherhood as martyrdom above all else.  Funky Winkerbean  Its 50-year run mercifully ended on December 31, 2022. Artist Tom Batiuk won much acclaim having a main character die of cancer in 2007, and he has been driving that good will into the ground ever since. “TomBat” has spent recent years extolling the virtues of small-town Ohio, golden age comics, and ignoring your current wife in favor of your dead cancer wife. Despite its original run finishing, I’m sure some masochist will continue posting in some fashion for years to come. Funny Online Animals  Webcomic artist KC Green got a newspaper comic. Garfield  Still loves lasagna, still hates Mondays. Aside from Jon finally getting together with vet Liz, not much has changed in 40+ years. Get Fuzzy  A strip from the early 2000s that rises above other “pet pest” comics through its skillful art. Gil Thorp  A sports comic where the sports are the worst part. Hagar the Horrible  As with the best horror media, the ruthless carnage of Hagar and his bloodthirsty Viking crew are largely left to the reader’s imagination. Heart of the City  A relatively long-running comic about kids doing kid things. Its new artist has a rare disability that prevents them from successfully forming punchlines. Heathcliff  The panel that used to merely be the other orange cat on the comics page has taken a hard turn into absurdist humor under its current artist. Intelligent Life  If the first season of The Big Bang Theory were a comic and even less funny. Into Ilves  A young bloke travels around the Finnish countryside helping those in need and distributing vigilante justice. Originally running 1949-54, we’re about halfway through as of this OP. Jucika  Not currently posted but a thread legend, this Hungarian strip from the 60’s somehow manages to be risqué and wholesome at the same time. Junk Drawer  A chuckle-worthy panel with an erratic update schedule. Kevin and Kell  One of three strips drawn by Bill Holbrook (along with On The Fastrack and Safe Havens), K&K has been running since 1995. The world features sentient anthropomorphic animals living together with traditional predator/prey relationships and all the horrible implications that entails. Try not to think about it too much - Holbrook doesn’t! K&K is notorious for its “species has characteristic” style of humor, and it probably has the highest body count of any thread regular. Legend of Bill  The only strip worse than Intelligent Life is this side project by the same artist. I deliberately did not post an example featuring the “sexy” female characters because some of you may be eating while reading this. Little Lefty  A Depression-era kid-gang strip which was literal US Communist counter-programming to the hyper-capitalist Orphan Annie. The Lockhorns  Just get divorced already! Luann  A comic about high schoolers aged up to college students who merely talk, live, and date like high schoolers. Infamous for its nothing main character and puritanical views on relationships. Macanudo  Ephemeral twee nonsense. Did you know books are magic?! Mandrake  A comic about a magician with wildly inconsistent powers of hypnosis. Showcases the dangers of legacy strips as its canon requires regular use of names like “Narda” and “Cockaigne”. Mara Llave: Keeper of Time  With only a handful of strips published as of the end of 2022, this newcomer is already winning praise for its gorgeous retro-styled art. Mark Trail  Mark Trail’s run under artist James Allen aka “Jamesallen” was notorious for its clipart approach and Allen’s own thin skin. Its current artist Jules Rivera has kept the tradition of half-assed art, but at least hers is original. Mary Worth  An older woman dispenses pearls of boomer-approved “wisdom”. Hapless friend character Wilbur is a thread-favorite punching bag. Modesty Blaise  A regularly rerun Bond-esque adventure which began in 1963. Most storylines feature henchmen who have no idea who they’re messing with until it’s too late. Monty  A man and his hairless cat do things. Mopsy  A panel from the 40’s and 50’s about a feisty young woman and her many suitors, jobs, and car accidents. Drawn by a former fashion illustrator and it shows. Mutt and Jeff  The granddaddy of all daily strips. Also the granddaddy of the zombie strips, as its current shuffle-play status at GoComics suggests. Mutts  A nicely-drawn comic your grandmother would love. Nancy   A legacy strip that became hugely popular and influential under creator Ernie Bushmiller, Nancy has recently been reinvented under new artist Olivia Jaimes. She replaced the ousted Guy Gilchrist, who mangled the strip into a vehicle for his own country-boy fandoms and turned Nancy’s Aunt Fritzi into a melon-breasted pinup. Gilchrist was eventually revealed as a sex pest and given the boot. Nekonaughey  Cat eats, is cute. Nothing more is needed. On The Fastrack  Another Bill Holbrook joint which appears to have been started to settle a bet for how many visual metaphors he could come up with. This riff on the modern office features Dethany (from On The Fastrack) who really, truly needs to get a new job already. Our Boarding House  To steal liberally from Doomykins, the adventures of a parlorful of 1920s hotheads sharpening their tongues on each other. Out Our Way  Cowboys. Machine shop workers. Early 20th century nostalgia. Moms. BOYZENDORGZ Overboard  Ostensibly about a crew of fun-loving pirates, Overboard mostly serves as an impressive museum of the wide variety of things the artist simply cannot draw. Peanuts   Love it or hate it, Peanuts left an unmistakable mark on popular culture over the course of its 50-year run. It’s currently being posted both from the first few years of its run, when Charlie Brown had self-confidence and Snoopy was still just a puppy, and from the 70’s after the characters and their personalities had solidified. The Phantom  This comic used to be about the titular Phantom, the latest in a long line of fearless guardians protecting the African jungle, but now it is about Savarna (we can only hope). Phoebe and Her Unicorn  Originally created under the far superior name Heavenly Nostrils, Phoebe and Her Unicorn is about the titular Phoebe who plays straight girl to a narcissistic, sparkly unicorn. Was this close to getting its own animated Nickelodeon show. Pickles  Depicts the lives of retirees who lovingly bicker with each other and mess with their grandchild. A true inspiration. Pondus  The most popular strip in Norway, Pondus is drawn by a literal millionaire. It revolves around the titular Pondus and his family, and it’s notable for being very progressive on topics like the LGBTQIA community. The art may not be for everyone. Pooch Cafe  Garfield with a dog. Popeye  This modernization of the all-time classic rotates through several artists. Prince Valiant   A beautiful serial from the days when comics were printed large enough to show off intricately detailed and expressive artwork. Drawn for decades by the brilliant Hal Foster, it follows the adventures of the titular prince of Thule and knight of the Round Table in a semi-historical, low-to-no magic Dark Ages setting. Posted both in its classic form (scanned from the excellent Fantagraphics collections) and modern iteration. Rae the Doe  A newer comic by a trans artist usually based around pain-inducing puns.  Retail  Posted in reruns after its conclusion in 2020, since retail hell is never-ending. Rex Morgan MD   A serial about the extremely slow-moving “adventures” of the titular doctor, and sometimes his daughter who wrote a kid’s book so gosh darn impressive it inspired a copycat. Posted in classic and modern forms. Rhymes With Orange  Another long-running gag-a-day strip. Rip Haywire  A throwback to old adventure serials, Rip has its own style going. Silly and heavy on the onomatopoeia. Safe Havens  Another Bill Holbrook creation. Just as Kevin & Kell ignores the implications of predators and prey living in a modernized society, Safe Havens ignores the ethical considerations of constant genetic testing and species-switching of sentient individuals. Operates under the shaky premise that “science” is interchangeable with “magic”. Sally Forth  The strip may be named for Sally, but Ted Forth may be the closest thing to a goon on the comics page. Scary Gary  A collection of not-so-scary ghouls and ghosts in a suburban neighborhood. Skippy  Similar to Peanuts, but instead of passive-aggressive, the kids are aggressive-aggressive with each other. Smokey Stover  A wacky old-school strip that packs as many jokes as possible into every comic. So It Seems  This extremely formulaic panel was a mere blip in comics history back in the 50’s. Solverl  Solver ages up Lottie from Bad Machinery into a young adult who can’t escape her old mystery-solving ways. Spiderman   Newspaper Spiderman has taken one too many bricks to the head, and the result is a comic that reads like a foreign knockoff despite being 100% legit. Gets posted from both its 1970s and 2010s run. Stephen Collins  A current British comic with an extremely British sense of humor, Stephen Collins is known for his simple but expressive style. Storefri (Lunchbreak)  A strip about a somewhat dysfunctional school whose teachers have wildly disparate levels of competency. Has a running theme of teachers enjoying their work more if there were no students. Take It From The Tinkersons  One of the more divisive strips in the rotation, readers will either love it for its gags or hate it for its artwork. Tegnehanne (DrawingHanne)  An autobiographical strip about Hanne who draws comics. Because the comic is based on the artist’s own life, it sometimes dives into heavy subjects like her son's chronic illness. Thimble Theater  The continuing story of a mutant sailor with an addiction to greens and his many hangers-on. Toonerville Folks  Rickety trolleys, town characters, and a proto-feminist icon who could snap a fool like a twig if she wasn't so good-natured. Wallace the Brave  A modern thread favorite for its energetic, detailed artwork and irrepressibly positive protagonist surrounded by a supportive family. Wee Pals  Notable for having a surprisingly diverse cast for a 1960s comic, Wee Pals was another Morrie Turner creation along with Dogbert. Willie and Joe  The titular characters originated in cartooning legend Bill Maudlin’s WWII frontline comic Up Front, and this continuation follows them after the war, reflecting the challenges veterans faced returning home. Zelda  Having recently returned to the thread after a hiatus, the titular Zelda (named for Zelda Fitzgerald, not Legend of Zelda) strives to be a good feminist but doesn't always live up to her ideals. The characters have aged in real time over the past ten years. Zits  A teenager and his parents try and fail to understand each other. Unlike Dustin, Zits usually doesn’t treat its youthful protagonist as an object of derision.
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Jan 1, 2023 03:06
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| # ¿ May 14, 2024 22:27 |
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Powered Descent posted:Bizarro When your dedication to having an arbitrary quota of waaaaacky secret items requires you to feature a piece of pie just sitting plateless on a bathroom counter.
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Jan 4, 2023 16:54
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Kennel posted:Dustin "All I want to do is pretend I'm as athletic as I was in high school and not 50 pounds heavier with knees of porcelain, I don't know why everyone's so negative!"
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Jan 7, 2023 00:10
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Strontium posted:Take It From the Tinkersons Colorist making a bold choice with what is apparently white, snowless grass in this one.
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Jan 15, 2023 14:48
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Hwurmp posted:we are meant to despise the waiter and wish suffering upon him aka the Inverse Ed.
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Jan 18, 2023 01:35
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readingatwork posted:
Given how much pride Schulz placed in drawing every Peanuts comic himself with no assistants, I have misgivings on how he would feel about new Peanuts with new artists.
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Jan 19, 2023 19:33
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riderchop posted:Overboard How do you gently caress up drawing a catalog so badly it looks more like an ice cream sandwich?
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Jan 21, 2023 15:55
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riderchop posted:Safe Havens Transforming yourself by choice: frivolous, absolutely forbidden Transforming others against their will: fine, dandy, the epitome of science
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Feb 17, 2023 14:54
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Crossposting from the meme thread:
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Feb 20, 2023 14:24
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riderchop posted:
Ah, so we're going to use our time travel to keep ourselves out of harm's way, not to warn anyone else about the eruption. Cool cool.
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Mar 28, 2023 17:53
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Kennel posted:Dustin If my main character was a lawyer, I wouldn't do a series on how lovely lawyers are. But that's just me.
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Apr 6, 2023 00:29
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Haifisch posted:This also gives us something specific enough that it's easier to explain why it's a bizarre expectation. That's the whole thing - it's not "you should have checked" because it was your specifically assigned responsibility; it's "you should have checked" because sleep on weekends is a waste time when you could have been doing something productive, like checking the sump pump.
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Apr 6, 2023 18:31
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slept late on the weekend.
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riderchop posted:
Nice to see Dethany has finally decided to look for a new job.
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Apr 10, 2023 13:10
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Powered Descent posted:Bizarro Is this supposed to be a pun or something?
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Apr 16, 2023 18:16
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Shaman Tank Spec posted:WHAT? Playing on the multiple meanings of "stars" as astronomical objects or celebrities.
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Apr 24, 2023 17:44
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Visual work metaphors are your other strip, Bill! Murdstone posted:
Good thing they're standing in chest-deep water then.
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Apr 30, 2023 01:06
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~Coxy posted:So I hear that Brooke is Back? Joke's on you - this is also Brooke's fetish.
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May 7, 2023 15:11
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Murdstone posted:
So we've gone straight from "Why try anything new?" to "Those young people and their gizmos!" If we're playing Boomer Bingo, the next strip will probably be Mary lamenting the lack of Perry Como in the jukebox.
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May 18, 2023 01:25
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Medenmath posted:Vintage Valiant (Jun. 23, 1957) drat that's a fine horse
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May 29, 2023 13:41
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riderchop posted:On The Fastrack It's always a good sign when your partner has absolutely no interests of their own, right?
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Jun 3, 2023 15:03
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Murdstone posted:Andertoons I can't believe we're talking about Mark Trail's taxonomy fails and not the fact that the Schaumburg minor league baseball team mascot is a Greater Prairie Chicken and not a common domestic chicken  Vargo posted:Wallace the Brave Absofruitly 
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Jun 5, 2023 23:37
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Doomykins posted:"81 - Jucika is Studying" Multi-purpose reaction face there in panel 2.
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Jun 15, 2023 18:20
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riderchop posted:
"Dog lying on top of water" has to be a new low for this strip's art.
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Jun 18, 2023 14:30
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EasyEW posted:Crankshaft But... movie theaters are still a thing. Some closed, but there are plenty out there, even ones that show old movies. This is like saying, "Rather than buying things online, we wanted to make a place where people can go shop with other people!"
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Jun 29, 2023 23:12
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Medenmath posted:Vintage Valiant (Apr. 06, 1958) There's truly nothing more heartwarming than the pure, innocent love between a man and his sword. 
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Jul 15, 2023 14:36
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CzarChasm posted:The details are still there, it's just the colorist doing a lovely job. The good news is TomBat is such a nerd it's probably driving him up the wall also.
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Jul 21, 2023 23:37
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Drimble Wedge posted:Scary Gary Way to make the most of that expanded Sunday format, Mark!
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Aug 7, 2023 18:42
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I look forward to Luann retconning all the way back to high school while still not bringing back Delta.
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Aug 19, 2023 15:33
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Huxley posted:A+J 
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Sep 8, 2023 18:38
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Hostile V posted:No Time To Get Rhino-Pregnant, It's Crimble-o-Clock 
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Oct 5, 2023 18:30
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Murdstone posted:Cough! Sputter! The classic random Mary Worth bolding is doing the unnatural first panel dialogue no favors.
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Oct 12, 2023 04:04
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Murdstone posted:Mary Worth How this would have gone down in the real world: 
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Oct 15, 2023 23:13
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riderchop posted:Overboard I wouldn't have thought that a strip ostensibly about pirates would be in competition with Macanudo for "most twee", but here we are.
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Oct 22, 2023 14:05
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riderchop posted:For Better or For Worse The only thing worse than baby talk is inconsistent baby talk. How come she can say the "L" in "ladybug" and "th" in "think" but neither in "Elizabeth"?
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Oct 30, 2023 14:14
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How are they flying kites in opposite directions with the same wind? 
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Nov 12, 2023 14:58
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riderchop posted:Overboard Overly realistic version: 
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Nov 13, 2023 14:48
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Doomykins posted:"391 - Jucika And The Children On Vacation" Wholesome Jucika is best Jucika Also, cross posting from the meme thread:
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Nov 18, 2023 15:20
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riderchop posted:Overboard I think we've reached a new low in failing to draw things. In what universe are snowflakes triangular?!
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Nov 25, 2023 15:30
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manero posted:Nancy 1943 Oh neat, I didn't realize Guy Gilchrist had redrawn this one: 
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Dec 3, 2023 19:39
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| # ¿ May 14, 2024 22:27 |
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It's getting close to new thread time! I'm open to creating the new one again for 2024, as I should have a little extra time over the holidays. However, if someone else wants to take a crack at it, they would certainly be welcome.
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Dec 21, 2023 19:29
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