Comic Strip Conversations: A Quote from Garfield

Here are nine lines from nine different Sunday comic strips; we hope you enjoy them:

1) "Do you like pie, Earl?" (Pickles, Aug. 2nd)

2) "So what are you guys going to do tonight?" (Zits, March 29th)

3) "I forgot my Kindle!" (Blondie, Aug. 9th)

4) "He fell into a black hole of narcissism" (Brewster Rockit: Space Guy, Aug. 9th)

5) "Are you still single?" (Garfield, Aug. 9th, pict. top)

6) "Yeah, but the worst part is being invisible." (Doonesbury, March 29th)

7) "I've gotta hit the little boys' room." (Crankshaft, May 3rd)

8) "How should I approach your dog?" (Mother Goose and Grimm, May 3rd, pict. center)

9) "There's lasagna in the oven," (Sherman's Lagoon, March 29th)

http://www.gocomics.com

http://www.comicskingdom.com

Top Ten Comics from the Roanoke Times: Hair Force One

Once again, Garry Trudeau brilliantly lampooned the Donald Trump presidential candidate run for the Republican Party nomination which makes me think that one Paris Hilton will make a play for the Oval Office as well in his comic strip "Doonesbury." In his strip, which got first place this week, Trudeau also makes fun of two other Republican candidates with zero political experience in Carly Fiornia, a former Hewett Packard CEO, and Ben Carson, a retired brain surgeon from Baltimore, Md.

Second place goes to "Zits"in which Jeremy, a boy who has been a teenager since the days when Nirvana was in its heyday, is depicted as a large massive head which his parents try to push along.

"Speed Bump" also finished in our top ten, and this week Dave Coverly's strip had a Roman man in a toga with son who was also dressed like John Belushi in "Animal House" looking up at the sky and noticing birds flying over them in a V-formation which makes the boy ask his father: "Why do birds fly in a five-shape?"

Here is our top ten:

1. Doonesbury

2. Zits

3. Jump Start

4. Agnes

5. Garfield

6. Pearls Before Swine

7. Get Fuzzy

8. Funky Winkerbean

9. Speed Bump

10. Dilbert

http://www.doonesbury.com

http://www.gocmics.com/speedbump

http://www.gocomics.com/zits

http://www.gocomics.com/agnes

Our Favorite Comic Strips from the Sunday Roanoke Times (Oct. 12th edition)

Greetings to our blog readers in New Zealand, Kenya and Argentina as well as our domestic friends in Alaska, Hawaii and Kansas.

We are taking a H.G. Wells time machine back to last Sunday as we did not get around to posting our favorite comic strips from a week ago Sunday, but we have them for your consumption right here; for the latest survey go to our sister blog "The Daily Vampire" at: http://www.nocturnalguy38.blogspot.com

There is a major surprise in this survey as we rank "Zits," a comic strip about a teenage boy who hasn't aged since Bruce Springsteen's 1984 album "Born in the USA" came out and that was well, first when I was a teenager! (Actually, we just researched and "Zits" actually debuted in 1997). In the Oct. 12th issue, Jeremy, the kid who never gets passed the wonder years is seen loading textbooks on a conveyor belt as he takes them out of a '70s VW van (top image). This is perhaps the funniest "Zits" strip we have seen in ages.

The silver medal goes to American swimmer Michael Phelps (we were just trying to see if you were paying attention). It actually goes to "Doonesbury," right-wing comic talk show host Dennis Miller's favorite comic strip (yeah, I somehow doubt that since "Doonesbury" is brilliant progressive satire). which makes fun of how our government makes back room deal with Middle Eastern dictators. Since the dictator in the strip is a fictional character who looks like Saddam Hussein of Iraq, we went with an image of sheep for the comic strip (center image; these are actually sheep in Turkey).

In this place, we have the always funny Stefan Pastis comic strip "Pearls Before Swine," which features Pig offending two blue birds which leaves his frenemy Rat to come to his comfort.

Here is our top ten:

1) Zits

2) Doonesbury

3) Pearls Before Swine

4) Dilbert

5) Get Fuzzy

6) Speed Bump

7) Garfield

8) Non-Sequitir

9) Agnes

10) Jump Start

http://zitscomics.com/

http://www.gocomics.com/pearlsbeforeswine

http://www.doonesbury.com

http://www.dilbert.com

http://www.dennismillerradio.com/

http://www.michaelmoore.com (web site for Michael Moore, we try to abide by the 'equal time' rule)

PS: Dennis Miller will be performing live in Colorado Springs, Colo., a right-wing evangelical enclave that's also home to the Air Force Academy; I imagine he will have a large crowd there.

Sunday Comics Roanoke Times Survey: It's Another Great Week for Funky Winkerbean

There are 21 comic strips in the Sunday edition of "The Roanoke Times" and so far this year, even "Family Circus" (one of our least favorite comic strips) has cracked the top ten, but "For Better or Worse" never has, and that streak continues this week as well.

But, why focus on comic strips we'd like to see dumped for "Sherman's Lagoon" when the newspaper which has a circulation of about 100,000, does have some splendid comic strips as well as ones which are surprisingly good at times, "Dilbert" and "Garfield" are both good examples of comic strips which have come back from the dead, well at least that's the case with the one about a 36-year old cat.

Here is our top ten:

1) Funky Winkerbean (see top image of a "Swamp Thing" comic book): We simply love it when the strip's writer/artist Tom Batiuk designs his own versions of retro comic book characters with Starbuck Jones. In this week's strip, Starbuck Jones is seen fighting off a saber-toothed octo-shark. Yikes!

2) "Pearls Before Swine" (see middle image of Ron Cey): Perhaps the usage of former Los Angeles Dodgers great Ron Cey won't be understood by readers of Stephan Pastis' strip in Manchester, Sydney or Hong Kong, but we loved this week's strip which also features an homage to "The Godfather." Pastis never fails to surprise us.

3) "Speed Bump"

4) "Get Fuzzy"

5) "Zits" (see bottom image): This week, "Zits," a comic strip focusing on a 16-year-old boy who never ages, has Jeremy's mom using a Polaroid camera, one of our favorite Casualties of Modern Technology, which is like 'so totally' lost on him. Images/hallucinations of Fred and Wilma Flintstone add to the hilarious effect of the strip.

6) "Dilbert"

7) "Agnes"

8) "Garfield"

9) "Mutts"

10) "Doonesbury"

http://www.roanoke.com

http://baltimorecomiccon.com/

http://www.funkywinkerbean.com/

http://stephanpastis.wordpress.com/

http://zitscomics.com/