Horrible Poetry Edition (May 1)

Worst:

Runners-up: Argyle Sweater, Baldo, Brewster Rockit: Space Guy!, Close to Home, Curtis, Family Circus, Garfield, Hagar the Horrible, Mother Goose and Grimm, Non Sequiter, Rhymes with Orange

Best:
That's how you tell a joke.

Runners-up: Agnes, Baby Blues, Pearls Before Swine, Pickles, Single and Looking, Speed Bump

Hello Kumquat Edition (Apr. 30)

Worst:
Is a fart joke really the best we can do?

Runners-up: Argyle Sweater, Baldo, Blondie, Candorville, Curtis, Family Circus, Garfield, Hagar the Horrible, Mother Goose and Grimm, Red and Rover, Sally Forth

Best:
I enjoyed the dialog here.

Runners-up: Agnes, Big Nate, Dilbert, Frazz, Prickly City

Poorly Political Edition (Apr. 29)

Several weeks ago, Scott Stantis published some bold strips condemning torture. Here, Mike Peters' demonstrates the wrong way to approach torture. Comparing a bath to waterboarding trivializes the impact of torture. If you're going to send the wrong message, at least make it funny.

Runners-up: Baldo, Beetle Bailey, Dennis the Menace, Family Circus, Hagar the Horrible, Pickles, Red and Rover

Best:

Runners-up: Baby Blues, Big Nate, Brewster Rockit: Space Guy!, Frank and Ernest, Frazz, Pooch Cafe, Speed Bump, Watch Your Head, Zits

Comics Note:
The bargain that Dolly has made isn't that different than that made by a housewife. In return for the validation of having a boyfriend, she is doing his work for him. A housewife, in return for the validation and support of a husband, does his work for him. Hopefully Thel will sit Dolly down tonight and read the Feminine Mystique to her, but I wouldn't count on it.

Metanote: For the first time in a month I am caught up. If you're lazy and intermittently committed, I would recommend not starting a blog that needs to be updated every day. Hopefully I will do a better job of keeping up, although I have a vacation in June that will set me back about a week and a half.

Welcome to the Club Edition (Apr. 28)

Worst:
I threw up a bit when I read this one.

Runners-up: Family Circus, Garfield, Hagar the Horrible, Non Sequiter,

Best:
Sherman's Lagoon falls into the category of solid strips in my opinion. Every once in a while I think it's really good, and Jim Toomey rarely puts out any really bad strips. The characters all have interesting points, although they sometimes get a little repetitive. Rarely brilliant, rarely bad, which makes it better than most strips in the paper.

Runners-up: Agnes, Candorville, Lio, Watch Your Head

Pathos Edition (Apr. 27)

Worst:
Dagwood is from a rich family and has a white-collar job. Does anyone like that actually bowl? Maybe in the 1950's, but it seems pretty unlikely here in 2008. It's an awful lot of set-up for a bowling joke.

Runners-up: Argyle Sweater, Family Circus, Garfield, Hagar the Horrible, Prickly City, Rhymes with Orange, Sherman's Lagoon, Zits

Best:
Andy exists purely to create pathos, I enjoy it.

Runners-up: Agnes, Baldo, Brewster Rockit: Space Guy!, Cul de Sac (based on Dil's line in the last panel), Dilbert, Get Fuzzy

Visceral Reaction Edition (Apr. 26)

Worst:
This image just bothered me. Combine that with the illogical situation and we have a winner.

Runners-up: Baby Blues, Blondie, Close to Home, Curtis, Dennis the Menace, Family Circus, Frank and Ernest, Garfield, Mother Goose and Grimm, Non Sequiter, Red and Rover, Rhymes with Orange, Zits

Best:
Darrin Bell wins for the third day in a row. Like Darby Conley, Bell gets a lot of mileage out of a small set of characters.

Runners-up: Dilbert, For Better or For Worse, Get Fuzzy, Lio

I Read a Week of Lousy Set-up and All I Got Was This Lousy Strip Edition (Apr. 25)

Worst:
We finally have the denouement in Curtis after a week of very awkward set-up. Ray Billngsley has been setting us up to think that Curtis has been dealing drugs, but since this is Curtis, we know it won't touch on anything remotely threatening. Instead of a series that touches on the seamier side of urban life, we're left with penny ante capitalism. This could have been great, and it's mediocre.

Runners-up: Blondie, Brevity, Dennis the Menace, Family Circus, For Better or For Worse, Garfield, Hagar the Horrible, Mother Goose and Grimm, Prickly City, Speed Bump

Best:
I really enjoyed how Darrin Bell rendered the glow of the torch. The joke was good too.

Runners-up: Brewster Rockit: Space Guy!, Dilbert, Lio, Sherman's Lagoon

Racist Edition (Apr. 24)

Worst:
Grimmy is apparently racist, but I'm more concerned with the horribleness of this pun.

Runners-up: Argyle Sweater, Baldo, Curtis, Family Circus, Hagar the Horrible, Non Sequiter, Piranha Club, Red and Rover, Rhymes with Orange


Candorville is one of the better strips in the paper, and is well worth reading on a daily basis. Darrin Bell uses his character's personalities to set-up his jokes, and he does it well.

Runners-up: Dilbert, Frank and Ernest, Zits

Family Dynamics Edition (Apr. 23)

Worst:
A beautiful woman marries a clown, this could be fertile ground for a therapist in a few years. This play on words hurts my brain.

Runners-up: Baldo, Blondie, Curtis, Garfield, Hagar the Horrible, Mother Goose and Grimm, Red and Rover, Rhymes with Orange

Best:
Gotta love the detailed knowledge of Star Wars minutiae. It's interesting that you can watch a movie dozens of times without thinking about questions like this.

Runners-up: Brewster Rockit: Space Guy!, Frazz, Get Fuzzy

Earth Day Edition (Apr. 22)

Worst:
Learning Place? Schoolhouse Earth? This could have been better if the kids were pictured near a big rock, and the caption read "This is my favorite place to learn, Schoolhouse Rock." Then it would be mildly humorous in addition to the intended goal of sickeningly sweet.

Runners-up: Argyle Sweater, Dilbert, Frank and Ernest, Garfield, Hagar the Horrible (everyone looks horrified by the giant except Honi who looks on adoringly, there's a story here...), Mother Goose and Grimm, Red and Rover

Best:
Lots of Earth Day cartoons, some good, some bad, some bizarre. I liked this one best, as it was fairly clever. Scott Stantis does a good job using setting in his strip.

Runners-up: Big Nate, Get Fuzzy, Zits

And You Thought Pearls Before Swine had Dark Humor Edition (Apr. 19)

Worst:
So we have a nagging mother-in-law who attacks through he daughter, a wife who takes her mother's criticism and uses it as a reason to nag her husband, an alcoholic husband who would rather drink than be with his family, and a relationship with no healthy, viable communication. What fun.

Runners-up: Baldo, Beetle Bailey, Blondie, Close to Home, Daddy's Home, Dennis the Menace, Family Circus, For Better or For Worse, Frank and Ernest, Garfield, Mother Goose and Grimm, Prickly City, Red and Rover, Rhymes with Orange, Speed Bump

Best:
Agnes' bizarreness was enough to win on a fairly weak day.

Runners-up: Lio, Mutts, Pooch Cafe, Single and Looking

My Eyes Edition (Apr. 16)

Worst:
This is unspeakably awful.

Runners-up: Beetle Bailey, Blondie, Brewster Rockit: Space Guy!, Frank and Ernest, Garfield, Hagar the Horrible, Mother Goose and Grimm, Mutts, Prickly City, Rhymes with Orange, Speed Bump

Best:
As someone who works with kids for a living, I enjoyed this interplay between Frazz and the students.

Runners-up: Daddy's Home, Dilbert, Get Fuzzy, Piranha Club, Pooch Cafe