Disturbed Edition (May 7)

Worst:
A kind of disturbing drawing backing a rather weird joke. I don't wicking clothing works quite like that anyway.

Runners-up: Blondie, Brevity, Family Circus, Frank and Ernest, Mutts, Pearls Before Swine, Speed Bump

Best:
Is Bucky a psychopath?

Runners-up: Agnes, Dilbert, Frazz, Lio

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

Potty Mouth Edition (Mar. 18)

Worst:

I hate Rhymes with Orange. The art is terrible and it's not redeemed by the jokes.

Runners-up: Curtis, Dilbert, Family Circus, Frank and Ernest, Garfield, Mother Goose and Grimm

Best:
I enjoyed this send up of a comic strip convention.

Runners-up: Agnes, Big Nate, Brewster Rockit: Space Guy!, Doonesbury, Mutts, Zits

Absurdity Edition (Mar. 10)

Worst:
Rhymes with Orange consistently makes jokes that are meant to be clever, but they rarely are. The joke here is that skunks are black and white. Of course a skunk has no need for a passport, so the premise is absurd. Absurdity can be funny (as Stephan Pastis proves well), but it's hard to cross absurdity with reality and not lose something.

Runners-up: Baldo, Blondie, Brevity, Curtis, Family Circus, Garfield, Hagar the Horrible, Mother Goose and Grimm, Red and Rover


Best:
Lio is probably the best example of how absurdity can be funny. Of course everything in Lio is absurd, which helps make it work. We do not get distracted by the fact that Death is hitching a ride because it's Lio, and we're used to anything happening.

Runners-up: Dilbert, Get Fuzzy, Pearls Before Swine, Watch Your Head

Good Parenting Edition (Mar. 3)

Worst:This is another of those what the heck strips. The thought process must have been something like: Jimi Hendrix looks funny. Poodles look funny. What if I cross Jimi Hendrix with a poodle?

Runners-up: Baldo, Beetle Bailey, Blondie, Brevity, Curtis, Dennis the Menace, Family Circus, For Better or For Worse, Hagar the Horrible, Mother Goose and Grimm, On the Fastrack, Pickles, Speed Bump

Best:

Zits, for once, shows good parenting. Connie consistently over-indulges Jeremy, and then whines when he acts spoiled. Protecting kids from consequences only leads to risky behavior.

Runners-up: Agnes, Pooch Cafe, Sally Forth, Sherman's Lagoon

So much wasted potential (Feb. 22)

Worst:
This does not make sense unless the speaker is an epic idiot. Anyone who puts an unwrapped piece of candy in with their ipod would need to be. The living isn't as much healthy, as it is stupid. The art is bad, which is typical of Rhymes with Orange. In the second panel, it looks like the woman has a tennis ball in her back pocket instead of a butt.

Runners-up: Brevity, Family Circus, Mother Goose and Grimm

Best:
I love Bucky's line in the last panel, it's the best insult I've heard in a long time.

Runners-up: Doonesbury, Garfield, Pearls Before Swine, Pooch Cafe, Watch Your Head

Bonus Comics Note:I have an intense dislike for Red and Rover. It's generally a mix of trying to be cute and bad jokes. Unlike the legacy strips, it has no glory days to look back on, which might serve as some justification for it's presence in the paper. Today's strip, however, filled me with a sense of hope. The strip, for once, had a chance to transcend it's position as a (very) poor man's Mutts. We could have had a story involving Red and Rover wandering around in a rough neighborhood, which would be rife with potential, both comic and profound. Instead, the next day brought us...
...another dumb joke. Brian Bassett could have run with this story for a week and actually made something worthwhile with it, but he stuck to the formula.

Comics of the Day

Worst: I don't really get this one. Why wouldn't people be able to successfully get off the ski lift even if the attendent was sleeping? I also don't understand why this is supposed to be funny. Is it the juxtaposition of the Spanish idea of a siesta with snow? Is it meant to be based on the visual?

Runners-up: Baldo, Dennis the Menace, Family Circus, Garfield, Hagar the Horrible, Single and Looking, Tank McNamara, Zits

Best:

I enjoyed the art, and the off-beatness of this joke.

Runners-up: Cul de Sac, Frazz, Get Fuzzy, Lio

Comics of the Day

Worst:I disliked this strip because of the set-up. This is not a conversation I could ever imagine myself having. First, who plays in dart tournaments? Second, why would all the other teams name themselves after musicians?

Runners-up: Family Circus, Frank and Ernest, Hagar the Horrible, Mother Goose and Grimm, Prickly City

Best:
Runners-up: Brevity, Candorville, Curtis, Dilbert, Frazz, Lio, Mutts, Sally Forth, Watch Your Head

Comics of the Day

Worst: This is an absolutely horrible pun. First, schouter isn't really a word, or if it is, it's not one I have ever heard used. Second, shouter and chowder don't even sound that alike. Even if you were four, you would have to be an incredible idiot to make this mistake.

Runners-up: Beetle Bailey, Brevity, Curtis, Hagar the Horrible, Rhymes with Orange, Single and Looking, Speed Bump

Best:

This was just sweet, and it had a solid joke at the end. Poncho's excitement was very enjoyable.

Runners-up: Agnes, Brewster Rockit: Space Guy!, Garfield, Get Fuzzy, Lio, Pearls Before Swine, Piranha Club, Zits

Bonus Visual Runners-up:
I had a very hard time choosing between these two strips and Family Circus for worst. Speed Bump falls into the trap of thinking random equals funny. Rhymes with Orange uses a horrible pun that makes no sense. I made the mistake of clicking on the Rhymes with Orange strip when I was saving the image, and I got sent to a description of the strip. It starts "Rhymes with Orange is a smart person's strip...it's about the little details we all live with." I am a smart person, and I hate this strip. This is also not a little detail that I, or anyone I know, live with. I have never been pulled over for having too many cattle in a cattle drive. It's like the people who promote this strip want to convince us it's actually worth reading or something.

Comics of the Day

Worst: Rhymes with Orange is in serious competition for the worst strip in the Post. Along with Mother Goose and Grimm, this strip almost never has a day where it rises to the level of mediocre. It should be replace by any other strip, and the section would be improved.

Runners-up: Beetle Bailey, Blondie, Close to Home, Dennis the Menace, Family Circus, Garfield, Hagar the Horrible, Mother Goose and Grimm, Mutts, Non Sequiter, Red and Rover, Sherman's Lagoon

Best: Viva la cheese.

Runners-up: Get Fuzzy, Lio, Pearls Before Swine, Pooch Cafe

Comics of the Day

Worst:

Runners-up: Family Circus, For Better or For Worse (it's not fair to whine about lifestyle choices that you make)

Best:

I like to think that the expression on Pig's face in the second panel is one of abject terror.

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

Comics of the Day

Worst: I looked at this for several minutes, and I just don't get it. Is there some proverb or something about the hair of the dog who bit you? Absolutely don't get it.

Runners-up: Candorville, Close to Home, Curtis, Family Circus, For Better or For Worse, Frank and Ernest, Hagar the Horrible, Mother Goose and Grimm, Non Sequiter, Red and Rover, Speed Bump

Best: I'm rooting for Get Fuzzy or Lio to move into the top spot, because I think they are the most artistic and best comics out there. Pooch Cafe keeps winning though.

Runners-up: Blondie, Frazz, Lio, Pearls Before Swine, Prickly City, Sally Forth, Single and Looking, Watch Your Head

Comics of the Day

Worst:Some movies have the names of foods in the title. It's not funny though.

Runners-up: Frank and Ernest, Blondie, Dennis the Menace, Red and Rover, Mother Goose and Grimm

Best:

No great comics today. Pooch Cafe had a pretty good pun, so I went with them. Someone's got to win after all.

Runners-up: Dilbert (this is what Dilbert is capable of, a joke that does not revolve around the stupidity of Dilbert's co-workers), Beetle Bailey (actually uses the military setting to be topical!), Baldo, Garfield (I liked the visual of Odie demonstrating the clean and jerk motion, the silent penultimate panel loses points though)

Comics of the Day Catch-up Post

So between Christmas decorating and work, I'm a little behind on my comics of the day. I'm going to try to catch up today.

Worst:

As usual, a joke about technology falls flat. What does Tigger have to do with text messaging? What does TTFN stand for (I'm only 27, and I don't know)?

Runners-up: Frank and Ernest, Blondie (I still don't understand the joke), Baldo, Brevity, Red and Rover

Bonus Visual Runner-up:

Hagar the Horrible might be consistently the worst strip in the Post. It's become one of those strips that uses a one off joke each day. The characters have no personality to drive jokes with. The jokes are often incongruous with the setting. This strip really has no redeeming features to it right now, and it's probably time for it to be put out to stud.

Best:

Pastis does a good job explaining the human condition (although he probably just wanted to draw a rat with a napkin on her head). It's not a nice place inside any of us, and dealing with that is one of the major questions of human existence.

Runners-up: Watch Your Head (love the third panel), Candorville, Zits (I like that Connie comes out on top of this technological interaction for a change), Frazz, Big Nate (my little love huntress is a great, great pet name), Mutts

Bonus Visual Runner-up:

Today's Lio is a good example of what makes a strip work. The joke is driven by the character's personalities. The father has typical dreams of living vicariously through his son's athletic pursuits. Lio needs to deal with a monster. Another great thing about Lio is the question of fantasy or reality. Mark Tatulli, like Bill Watterson in Calvin and Hobbes, never resolves the question of what reality is. We are left to speculate whether the monster in the third panel is real, or solely in Lio's imagination.

Random Comic Note:

I work with kids, and this strip illustrates well one of the challenges of managing kids. Barry makes an inappropriate comment, but the father reacts to Curtis' reaction. Obviously, Curtis' reaction is inappropriate, but if the father had disciplined Barry for his comment, Curtis would likely be satisfied that justice had been served and could temper his reactions.