Not So Funny Papers

I was mentioning to Lina, after consuming the Sunday comics, how comics these days seem to be funny and cynical, or simplistic and silly. Or downright unfunny. Here is my take

My selection from best to worst, in the Lancaster Sunday News Comics:

Cynical yet Hilarious: Get Fuzzy, Dilbert. Some may dispute, as Lina did, that "Get Fuzzy" is cynical. C'mon, the dog is always getting abused, either verbally or physically, by that whacked wordsmith S & M cat.

Funny and Familial: (Zits, Grand Avenue, Baby Blues, For Better or Worse, Jump Start, Blondie, Dennis the Menace, Rose is Rose, Born Loser, Family Tree, Sally Forth). This is probably the strongest genre in the comics. I just like Dagwood. Some might put Blondie in the Lame section. The guy who does Jump Start is from Philly so he gets a push into this category. Sally Forth can be weak at times...

Lame: (Garfield, Ziggy, Marmaduke, Family Circle, Hagar the Horrible, Marvin, Beetle Bailey). A lot of these strips ceased to be funny sometime in the 1970's or 1980's. The same old jokes keep being reheated and served as leftovers. There must be a contingent of elderly loyalists that keep voting for these strips in Readers Polls. Ziggy used to be funny. Now he seems to be an anachronism, lost in time. Family Circle is just ready to go to its final resting place. It was a good run but enough is enough.

Hit or Miss: (Mother Goose and Grimm, Ollie and Quentin, F Minus, Born Loser). Both Lina and I were really down on "F Minus" but it seems to be hitting its stride. And, with a name like "F Minus" can we really expect that much? The cartoonist kind of beats us to the punch. Mother Goose and Grimm relies on too many wordplays but can strike gold.

Troubled: (Pearls Before Swine). Talk of killing zeebras by the gators over and over again as a theme is pathological.

Depressing & Suicidal: Funky Winkerbean.

More thoughts to follow this week on the Comics...

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