Sure, let's do a comics roundup! What's the worst that could happen?

Let's just jump into it.

As another summer fades into autumn, blah blah blah... here are some comics. Is it mostly Mary Worth again? Yeah, probably.

It's an old-fashioned summertime comics roundup! (Part 1)

Sadly Priscilla's Pop is not one of the strips covered in the following article.

Hey, y'all! How's your summer going? That's nice.

I don't know about you, but I'm in the mood to throw some more newspaper comics onto the rusted-out Weber barbecue grill in the backyard and char them to cinders. Does that sound like fun? Okay, then. Let's get to it.

Comics are fun for everybody! Let's read some now!

Batman is not in this article. This image is lying to you.

I know I just did a comics roundup a few weeks ago, but I figured it would be a nice change of pace to post something non-Ed Wood-related to this blog. So let's dive in and swim, huh?

Let's mess with Judge Parker a little today, huh?

Ah, now that dialogue seems a little more natural.

Retired magistrate Alan Parker (no relation to the director) is rarely seen in Judge Parker, the long-running comic strip that bears his name. Most of the stories these days revolve around handsome, wealthy, arrogant lawyer Sam Driver and occasionally around Alan's dull lookalike son, Randy, who is also a judge. But today, the original Judge Parker himself is center stage in Judge Parker. And it feels all wrong.

To be honest, I read the strip every day and can't really follow it worth a damn. Lately, it's been on some kind of spy kick. Randy is married to April, a secret agent (?) who is being double-crossed by the CIA or something and had to abandon her husband without warning. See that baby Alan is holding up there? That's Randy and April's newborn daughter (or at least I think so). Don't know her name, sorry. Let's call her Cinnamon Bun. Alan has been taking care of Cinnamon Bun while his daughter-in-law is busy with spy stuff. I think April is in custody and is telling her side of the story to the media. And, all the while, Alan has been -- for reasons I cannot explain -- way more knowledgeable about all of this than most of the other characters. So now Alan's wife Katherine is mad at him.

Got all that? Good, 'cause I don't. If you need to know, over at The Comics Curmudgeon, guest blogger Uncle Lumpy has given us an excellent rundown of the characters in Judge Parker.

Today's strip finds Alan and Katherine at home, embroiled in a spat. But it's more like half a spat, because Alan is perfectly oblivious while his wife is increasingly irritated. This kind of marital dynamic seems less suited to Judge Parker and more suited to Bunny Hoest's unkillable domestic comedy The Lockhorns. So I decided to take Alan and Katherine out and put Leroy and Loretta in.

You're welcome, I guess.

P.S. - The next Judge Parker strip also reminded me of another beloved pop culture character.

John Banner, you are missed.

2016: The year in uncollected comics parodies

My tribute to the sidekicks and second stringers of the comics page.

See that tab up there, the one that says "Comics Fun!" right under the main banner? Click on that, and you'll find all the various comics-related posts on this blog. Generally, these are little spoofs and mashups of long-running newspaper comics, including (but not limited to): Dennis The Menace, Garfield, The Lockhorns, Rex Morgan, M.D., Hagar The Horrible, Blondie, Marvin, Shoe, Six Chix, and Funky Winkerbean.

I post a lot of that stuff to Twitter and Facebook, but not all of it makes it to Dead 2 Rights. So occasionally, I like to do a little roundup of comics stuff I've done recently and semi-recently. That way, people who don't follow me on social media will get to read it. That's what this post is. I was going through the files on my computer, deleting a lot of mages that I don't need anymore, and I came across some of these comics parodies. I figured, this would be an easy way to get some extra mileage out of them.

Leroy victorious!

It had to end with one of them dying.

The comic strip The Lockhorns, originally created by cartoonist Bill Hoest (1926-1988), has been running since 1968. It is currently being continued by Hoest's widow, Bunny. The strip concerns two married, middle-aged suburbanites, Leroy and Loretta Lockhorn, who are constantly at odds over just about everything: money, food, alcohol, leisure time, etc. Despite the title of the strip, these two do not usually lock horns, i.e. argue vigorously with each other. Generally, one will just lob an insult at the other, who will just stand there and patiently take it. 

That's how it's gone for nearly 60 years. But what would a Lockhorns finale look like? That's what I tried to imagine in the following cartoon.

Let's fix 'The Lockhorns' today, huh?

(left to right) Their version; my version.

Leroy and Loretta Lockhorn hate each other, and their marriage is a miserable sham. They sublimate in various ways: Leroy drinks, Loretta shops. They both use words to wound each other. That's the way it is now. That's the way it was back in 1968, when The Lockhorns debuted. That's the way it will be when the newspaper industry completely vanishes in six or seven months. (I kid. The ol' gal will last at least another year and a half.) I thought a panel from today's strip was actually pretty great from an art standpoint, but the "joke" -- a really lame, forced pun on the word "thesaurus" -- ruined it. So I got rid of the joke and turned it into a quiet, contemplative moment: Leroy and Loretta wordlessly, sadly eying one another in a bookstore. For some reason, I like it even better when the image is flipped horizontally.

Peak Lockhorns.

And just for good measure, I created a little four-panel vignette using this artwork.

Sometimes, emotional cruelty needs no words.