Hagar the Horrible: Why are we here?

This comic is hilarious because life is meaningless and marriage is miserable ha ha ha.

Daddy's Home: These school forms are ludicrous...

This comic is hilarious because Pete would rather let his son die of exposure to peanuts than fill out a form.

Family Circus: A stop sign always has eight sides.

While it's hard to ruin something that's already as terrible as a Family Circus cartoon, the attempt to color this stop sign nonetheless does a good job of illustrating why coloring black and white dailies is such a terrible idea.

Prickly City: It's going to be OK, isn't it, Carmen?

This comic is hilarious because Carmen and Winslow have at last decided to throw themselves off a cliff.

Beetle Bailey: Wait! You forgot your briefcase.

This comic is hilarious because General Halftrack has Alzheimer's Disease and will soon cease to be a functional human being and will then die.

Ziggy: Books for dummies.

Ziggy collections can be found in each section, of course.*

*Zing!

La Cucaracha: Yo, Kanye, who invited you to our comic strip?!

This comic is hilarious because La Cucaracha actually somehow is worse than Marmaduke.

Beetle Bailey: What's "naive"?! French for "stupid"?

This comic is hilarious because Zero is stupid.

Family Circus: Okay, I'm ready now. Go ahead and play your new song.

And Dolly's (adorable!) cruelty remains unparalleled, as poor Billy will never play the trumpet ever again.

Wizard of Id: Food time, Spook!

This comic is hilarious because Spook's life is monotonous and horrifyingly inhumane.

Betty: Whap!

This comic is hilarious because you should buy newspapers because you can't SMASH A FLY WITH A COMPUTER, NOW FUCKING CAN YOU?

Brewster Rockit!: Rescuing the doughnut people...

I can't decide whether the apparent continuity error regarding the importance of glaze to the doughnut people--it seems to be a fuel in Wednesday's cartoon and a vital bodily fluid in today's--is a lazy mistake or a typically absurd Tim Rickard joke. Either way, it's funny.

Family Circus: Since your new camera never runs out of film, does it run out of digitals?

This cartoon is hilarious because Dolly does not know how digital cameras work or what "digital" means.

9 Chickweed Lane: I'll be in my room. And I'm locking my door.

This comic is hilarious because Amos and Edda are going to fuck each other on the couch in the living room even though their roommate is there because they are rude, solipsistic douchebags.

Arlo and Janis: Dad, I think we should buy Gus' sailboat!

Since I've criticized Jimmy Johnson's drawing before, I feel I ought to point it out when I think he does a good job. This Arlo and Janis is funny, and it's almost entirely because of the way Johnson draws Arlo's reactions.

Born Loser: Sigh. I'm not good with computers.

This comic is hilarious because Brutus is so incompetent, he can't even download pornography correctly.

Family Circus: Mommy, am I finished with my bath?

Jaime Weinman tweets:

Who can explain Jeff Keane's compulsion to show his alter-ego's naked butt? http://joshreads.com/?p=4585 A psychiatrist? @JustinFowler? Who?

A psychiatrist is clearly in order, but here are a few theories:

1. As previously discussed on this fine blog, Jeff Keane is using the family cartoon as an outlet for his repressed exhibitionist--and possibly oedipal--urges.
2. Jeff Keane views his alter-ego's ass as some sort of Platonic ideal by which we should assess all other asses.
3. Jeff Keane is hoping that gratuitous nudity will distract readers from noticing his cartoon's obvious lack of artistic quality.
4. Jeff Keane is attempting to appeal to a new demographic.
5. Jeff Keane usually goes pantsless and is just trying to be true to life.

Any other theories, readers?

Pluggers: You know you're pluggers when you get bathed and dressed to go out, and you realize you're too tired to go.

And so pluggers only bathe on those rare occasions when they plan to go out.

This is not surprising.

Betty: One interesting thing about an online newspaper is access to past editions.

This comic is hilarious because Betty has just discovered the existence of the Internet.

Next time in Betty: Betty marvels at all the pornography.

Marmaduke: We don't have a three-second rule. Food's never on the floor that long.

From time to time, Marmaduke will reveal his true, demonic nature. In so doing, he also gives us a clue as to the setting of the cartoon. This is what Hell is going to be like, people.

Flying McCoys: Another tie! Me be glad when they invent paper and scissors so we don't have to play rock-rock-rock.

I liked this cartoon better when it was an incredibly famous installment of The Far Side.

Beetle Bailey: I fixed the meatballs for your party.

This cartoon is hilarious because something about Miss Buxley and balls and gaping.

Pluggers: The plugger detour.

This cartoon is hilarious because pluggers refuse to pay taxes for public services they utilize liberally.

Family Circus: Mommy's new blouse was made by two ladies--Polly and Esther.

This cartoon is hilarious because Dolly is naming her mother's breasts.

9 Chickweed Lane: ...Perfect. Just perfect.

This comic is hilarious because Amos and Edda are rude, solipsistic douchebags.

La Cucaracha: The Beandocks

Speaking of homages, here's La Cucaracha helpfully showing us what the The Boondocks would have been like had it sucked as much as La Cucaracha.

Frazz: Mostly I just like making the deal.

It's probably not worth pointing out every time Frazz homages Calvin and Hobbes seeing as Frazz's entire existence is basically a Calvin and Hobbes homage. But whatever. I always enjoyed the running gag in which Calvin would invent disgusting stories about his lunch and cause Susie to lose her appetite. Jeff Mallett gives us a decently clever variation on that here.

Lola: Morning, Mom. What's going on?

This cartoon is hilarious because Lola is depressed and might kill herself, and her son doesn't care.

Pickles: Hey, Earl. Do you have a rake I can borrow?

This cartoon is hilarious because Earl is a selfish asshole.

Family Circus: The only parts I don't like about school are the the subjects.

This cartoon is hilarious because the public school system has beaten Billy down into a shell of his former self ha ha ha.

Daddy's Home: Studying the Great Depression, huh?

This comic is hilarious because the Great Depression so totally was a swinging good time, what with all that poverty and starvation and suicide.

Pluggers: Pluggers believe that the "Greening of America" begins in their own backyard.

Today's installment of Pluggers is especially brilliant because one needs to break it into two parts to truly grasp its message. It also shows why it's so important to read Pluggers every day.

The first point this cartoon makes is that pluggers are lazy. This is illustrated by the length of the grass, suggesting that the bear has eschewed yard work all summer long. It is also illustrated, however, by the fact that this cartoon is nearly identical to one that ran last Sunday. That's just a little nod to the die-hard fans right there from Gary Brookins, from one lazy plugger to another.

The second point is what really raises the stakes though, recasting laziness, which some have labeled a defect, as a positive quality. After all, it is laziness, claims Brookins at his most audacious, that will save the planet from the threat of global warming.

That is, of course, only if you accept that global warming is an actual threat. Because Brookins is building a world here--surely you don't believe that Pluggers is just an outlet for his personal opinions!--he has demonstrated in prior cartoons pluggers that clearly disagree with the ethos of laziness. Indeed, one of them appears to be the dog in this very cartoon! The dog, having performed yard work, therefore must believe that global warming is a myth, given that he refuses to do nothing to stop it.

And this is why we read Pluggers. No other comic strip tackles the philosophical preoccupations of the day in more nuanced or objective a manner. We can only imagine the calm, reasoned, common-sensical debate taking place right now between the lazy bear and the hard-working dog. It's downright Aesopian. Except, of course, that Brookins is no cheap fabulist, and there are no easy morals here. Brookins just raises the questions. It's up to us, the bears and dogs of Pluggerville, to find the answers.

Ziggy: Oh, it's all right ... ... she's making TEA with a CATNIP mouse!

This cartoon is hilarious because it's okay that the cat has mutated into a giant, man-eating creature of destruction because she's making CATNIP TEA.

Family Circus: Mommy, guess what I've got behind my back!

This comic is hilarious because Jeffy is an enormous douche and a pathetic crybaby and, in general, just incredibly annoying.