Commenters of the world unite! You have nothing to lose but your chains! And please, delight in the hilarity of this week’s comment of the week!

“Ex-wives, am I right? First they’re not interested in your old junk because they’ve broken all attachments to you and are trying to move on from the emotional disruption of the divorce, but then they are interested in the regular payments you still make to them as compensation for the financial disruption caused by the divorce. This is a funny juxtaposition of two inconsistent positions … ? Because they’re women? Am I … am I right?” –Stuart F

The proletariat should also enjoy this week’s hilarious runners up!

“Ah, yes, Glenwood’s ‘Old Town.’ A couple blocks of boarded-up shops interspersed with a few dank watering holes where down-and-out traveling salesmen can run their scammy side gigs without being bothered by the near-catatonic denizens. Do they sell postcards?” –But What Do I Know?

“I’d like to think that Hollywood Update Live is actually Access Hollywood, the real-life entertainment-news show that was just canceled after 30 years. Maybe someone there thinks this could be the one big story that somehow keeps them on the air. ‘Hey, remember that actress who disappeared? Well, some guy knows where she is and what she’s doing! No, she wasn’t kidnapped. No, it’s not drugs. No, it’s not porn. Well, she’s been living in her house, and now she’s working as a waitress. Oh, and get this — she gained some weight! What, you say no one will care much about any of that? Darn, I guess I shouldn’t have offered this tipster all the money in the fund for our severance pay. I guess I was as bad an intern as everybody kept saying!’” –BigTed

“Grimm and Ralph might be having a pretty disturbing conversation, but don’t judge them too harshly: according to the label on those cans, they are surrounded by innumerable containers of preserved dog flesh, a situation bizarre and morbid enough to drive even the most stable canine to madness. Frankly the fact that they are confining their desire for revenge on the human race to their traditional enemies is a prodigious act of restraint.” –Vulpes

“Charles makes the rookie mistake of thinking today’s meeting with the king was on medieval Zoom.” –Hibbleton

“This king knows damn well Vikings eat their peas off their knife, just like any other working member of a war band. He’s just casting aspersions to cover up his degenerate adoption of that Italian innovation, the fork.” –I’m Not Cthulhu, But I Play Him On TV

“Arriving at Guantanamo at 02:00? Just enough time to watch The Grudge! Obviously The Ring would have been first choice of early 2000s supernatural horror films, but it runs a little longer and you don’t want to get stuck wrapping up the ending while people are already deplaning.” –pugfuggly

“‘Real Love’ being the name of the terrible Partridge Family tribute band Sharon and her hub have forced the children into. Harvey’s tambourine skills get put to the test!” –A Grave Mind

“In the fairy tale, Snow White doesn’t employ the dwarfs — she’s just a peasant girl and they’re just some strangers who let her crash in their cottage in exchange for light domestic work. But in our fallen world, sure, I guess Snow White can be a hard-hearted efficiency-maxxing capitalist in charge of a mining conglomerate. Do you think she employs dwarfs because she’s technically registered as a disability charity for tax reasons, or just because you can force them into smaller holes than other people?” –Schroduck

“He may be ripped off and heartbroken again, but I won’t have to watch it.” –MKay

“When will Lonnie accept his destiny and become a middle school woodshop teacher? He has all the prerequisites: the glasses, the mustache, the haircut, the wardrobe, the posture, the general demeanor, etc.” –Joe Blevins

“I’m guessing the back story is that this guy wanted a shirt like Charlie Brown, but a zigzag stripe was too outlandish for his personality.” –nescio

“If this were the old Dick Tracy, this would absolutely be setting up a scene where Mumbles gets crushed to death in a sea of hugs during a suit parade at Midwest FurFest.” –Anonymous Furry

“Note Lillian’s stiff posture in the first panel. She’s come out from behind her table only to find herself confronted by … a fan? She’s heard of such people, and she’s sure they must exist, since against all logic her publisher keeps paying her to write books. But her deep (and not undeserved) sense of self-loathing forbids her from fully accepting the idea, and she tenses up, waiting for the other shoe to drop. But whew! By the third panel she’s relieved to find that the only threat this woman poses is her weak facility for ‘wordplay.’ This, she can handle. She’s known Ed Crankshaft for DECADES. She’s got this!” –Doctor Moreau (Not a Doctor)

“The narration box tells us that Toby is calling Mary, which we can see happening, to ease us into the final shock of Mary saying that she is already packing her bag when she is not literally doing so.” –matt w

“Look at that anteater smile in the first panel. It knows it’s going to ruin some days by making people think about anteaters in the B.C. universe having their tongues in their noses. B.C. ANTEATERS HAVE NOSE TONGUES!” –Tabby Lavalamp

“In an interesting philosophical twist on comic conventions, Gertie does not have an idea in the first panel, but instead merely thinks about an idea. But does thinking about an idea actually bring that idea into being, and thus she actually has an idea but has not realized the idea is there yet? Much to discuss about the nature of existence in the Old Lady NASCAR strip this week.” –Drew Funk

“Let’s all put Ritz crackers over our eyes and meditate on loneliness.” –76VDubber

“Roz’s facial expression is the highlight every time she appears. Deep loathing with a tinge of resignation. Like she just watched the humans below take their cat into the house, once again denying her the sweet release of seeing Shoe and Cosmo, or today’s emotional-pain devotee, becoming the feline’s chew toy.” –Tonio

“Mr. Freaky is my father! Please, call me Steve!” –Old School Allie Cat

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The Phantom, 5/1/26

Look, I’ll admit it: I’ve taken something of a shine to this sailor in his service whites, who’s mildly bonking the Nomad on his head with a nightstick and has decided that he’s got way too much dignity to say “Ignis Vindicta” aloud so he’s just going to call the dude “Mr. Freaky.” I mean, he’s a guard at Guantanamo Bay, so I’m very much not going to look into his opinions about human rights, but I am enjoying his vibes today.

Andy Capp, 5/1/26

I think it’s very funny that Andy Capp, a guy who’s usually badgering his friends and acquaintances for enough money to buy exactly one beer, has apparently also been doing the same thing at the local bank for who knows how long. I think the fact that he hasn’t been hit with an ASBO banning him from getting closer than 100 meters of the bank entrance says a lot about why the UK isn’t the financial industry behemoth it once was.

Shoe, 5/1/26

When you start in on this one, you think, “Uh oh, are we going to learn about the Shoeniverse’s bird-person BDSM scene?” But then you get to the second panel and realize that this is just a joke that was built backwards from an extremely thin bit of wordplay, which comes as something of a relief. Anyway, this guy only likes being emotionally abused!

Mary Worth, 5/1/26

“Mary Worth thinks loneliness and horniness are the same emotion” feels like it’s the key to unlocking a lot of stuff. Not quite sure of all the implications but I’ll be meditating on it all weekend, that’s for sure!

B.C., 4/30/26

I guess I hadn’t really given it a ton of thought, but before today, if asked to describe the relationships between the various character species of B.C., like the humans and mid-sized animals and the ants, I would’ve described them as operating on different planes or scales of existence, largely unaware of each other’s sapience. The idea that the anteater, say, would stick his tongue into an anthill not merely driven by instinct to find food but fully aware that he was devouring alive a group of children who had come together to learn outdoor survival skills and experience fellowship is a deeply upsetting one. But it turns out that’s the reality of this disturbing universe.

Gearhead Gertie, 4/30/26

You can tell that this guy has been Gertie’s neighbor for years. He isn’t just saying “Hey! What the heck? Why are you ramming into my riding mower with your riding mower?” Instead, by necessity he’s embarked on a journey of self-education, learning all sorts of NASCAR minutiae simply to understand this old lady’s actions and motivations.

Mark Trail, 4/30/26

DAMN YOU TRIXIE!!! STOP ENTRANCING THE HORNY OLD MEN OF THE COMICS WITH YOUR AI-ENHANCED CLEAVAGE

Mary Worth, 4/29/26

I was briefly excited that this Mary Worth storyline was going to end with Mary and Toby enjoying a self-congratulatory spa trip rather than Mary and Dr. Jeff enjoying a self-congratulatory dinner date and boat ride, but then I realized that probably we’re going to get a self-congratulatory spa trip followed by a self-congratulatory dinner date and boat ride during which Mary relays to Jeff an excruciatingly detailed recap of both the storyline that’s just wrapped up and the spa trip.

Dick Tracy, 4/29/26

Look, I’m open minded, I cheerfully accepted “Dick Tracy is canonically aware of the existence of furries,” but, hmm, “Mumbles, the iconic Dick Tracy villain who was first introduced in 1947 and was played by Dustin Hoffman in the 1990 Warren Beatty Dick Tracy movie, is canonically a furry, and told Dick this himself,” boy, I dunno. Anyway, the MCU is on the tail (haha, get it) of Mumbles and his pals after their dramatic prison breakout, so I guess we’re going to see the cops staking out [extremely heavy sigh] fursuit shops or something.

Hi and Lois, 4/29/26

I’m really enjoying Lois’s facial expression in the second panel here. “Ah shit ah fuck the 22-year-old realtor influencer on TikTok who won’t shut up about ‘boosting revenues with concierge services’ did not say anything about this,” she appears to be thinking.

The Phantom, 4/29/26

I’m also really enjoying the facial expressions on long-time Phantom antagonist Eric “The Infamous Nomad” Sahara and his Gitmo guard as they give Ignis Vindicta a once over. “Is this an … actual alien guy, or some dude in a mask from Spirit Halloween, or what?” they’re both trying to figure out, with varying degrees of confusion and contempt.

Crankshaft, 4/29/26

I’m really not enjoying the facial expression on this lady in panel two, but I accept that, for denizens of the Funkyverse, “I’ve awkwardly set up a truly terrible bit of wordplay and now I’m about to unleash it” is an all-too-common scenario, and they need a visual signal to let people know that it’s about to happen.

Rex Morgan, M.D., 4/28/26

Lonnie may be a failed salesman, but he still has an advanced grasp on economics. He knows that what has value isn’t his knowledge of Mae Mae/Lorna’s identity, but his ability to take actions revealing that identity, and he’ll be assessing the various bids he’s soliciting to determine the most lucrative way to exercise that ability.

Mother Goose and Grimm, 4/28/26

What I love most about this strip is the composition. A more literal and pedestrian artist would’ve worked to not cover the Prince’s face with Snow White’s word balloon in the second panel. But in doing so, they create dramatic ambiguity as to the Prince’s reaction to Snow White’s confession. Is he shocked by her callous attitude towards the friends who took her in when she was in danger? Does he respect her ability to make hard but necessary choices in the face of fiscal crisis? Leaving this to our own imagination heightens the reading experience. Truly we’re getting a comics master class here.

Dennis the Menace, 4/28/26

Now, you’re probably thinking that Dennis pointing out the inherent unfairness of gendered divisions of labor isn’t menacing at all. But once you take in Mr. Wilson’s corpse-like vibes and realize that “retired” was a last-minute editorial substitution for “died,” everything falls into place.

Mary Worth, 4/28/26

“The vague affection that all of us ghouls at this cursèd condo complex vaguely expressed towards you? That’s not real love. We’re not capable of real love. We’re not capable of feeling anything at all.”