Blowback
Blowback
A clean, well-lit place to vent
Please feel free to contribute to this frequently-updated forum, which posts selected commentary on our favorite comic strip. If you'd like your critique to be posted, please note that civility, if not approbation, counts. Click here to submit a comment.
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INTERESTING
The Classic strips give us an interesting look back. Everyone is fallible. But, as we know, Mike moved on more successfully. One hopes that the product of this couple will not end up like J.J.
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IMMIGRANTS
Perhaps some immigrants are useful after all? (I had never noticed that Duke's sunglasses were effectively one-way mirrors -- spook specs.)
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IMMIGRANTS
Perhaps some immigrants are useful after all? (I had never noticed that Duke's sunglasses were effectively one-way mirrors -- spook specs.)
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FAKE NEWS
When it comes to fake news, Zonker was about 45 years ahead of his time.
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HEARD SOMETHING
I can't be absolutely certain, but I'm pretty sure I heard something in the strip posted on Thursday. Faintly, in the background, Mike's voice was saying, "I did not have sexual relations with Nicole."
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ME FIRST
I've evidently missed some of the episodes of this comic... I thought Alex's mom J.J. was the self-centered one, but realize my assumption was unfair. (For starters, her mom Joanie abandoned her when she was a kid.) Now Mike is seeming like the less mature of this couple. I'm not real impressed with Nicole either. It's nice that everyone is being honest, but it's all "me first, my feelings; you are responsible for your own." The onset of the trump era! Or possibly a preamble.
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SHUT UP
Mike, as your attorney I advise you to shut up...
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UNEXPECTED PROSPECT
I have so missed that ragged helmet! You brought a smile to my face, coupled with the awful and unexpected prospect of seeing the helmet move up a place.
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SEA OF REPERCUSSIONS
Today's strip: A great comment on the sea of repercussions awaiting Donald Trump and his band of Republicans hell-bent on destroying all that Obama did for our country!
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GOOD ONE
It is only perfect that Trump has a photograph of himself on his desk. Good one.
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WITH CHILD
I know a guy who did just what Mike describes in today's strip -- when he found his wife was with child, he reregistered as a Republican, started drinking scotch, and bought a "really cool" minivan.
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ALEX
So cool! Today's Classic strip, which originally ran on May 4, 1988, was our first awareness of Alex! Alex is a little younger than my daughter, it turns out. My daughter was about 2 months old at that time. They were both kicking the collective butts of the boys at all the computer games like Doom, Quake, and others at the same age. And they were both shopping for colleges at the same time, so Alex must have skipped a grade somewhere.
When we were shopping for colleges, it was spooky. Alex was sending off her applications exactly at the same time we were, and she heard back literally on the same day we did. My daughter, like Alex, got accepted to a lot of colleges, some of whom were quite aggressive about having her. She settled on Alex's maker's alma mater: Yale University. Even though Alex went to MIT, there was an ongoing similarity to their lives. I once wrote Blowback asking where the hidden camera was, (jokingly) certain that GBT had been spying on us for the Alex strips. They've gone different directions now, but it was fun raising my daughter while Mike and JJ were raising Alex. To think that it all started with this strip!
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MOMENT
For those of us who have been in long-term relationships, legally married or otherwise, yesterday's Classic strip definitely provides an LOL moment. Thank you, GBT.
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WOW
Oh, wow. I didn't realize that Roland has a real-world Twitter account, @realRBHJr, until just now. I particularly liked the one about the Chinese hoax that is causing cherry blossoms to come out three weeks early in the DC area (due in actual fact to warmer climate).
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NO SHORTAGE
First Trump accused Democrats of attacking him to cover up for Secretary Clinton's loss to him in the Electoral College, now he's accusing President Obama and his administration of leaving intel behind in Russia on him, and wire-tapping Trump Tower during the campaign. There will be no shortage of material for GBT while The Donald is in the White House. I look forward to Trudeau's take on Steve Bannon.
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SUBTLE
Ooooh, subtle! Roland tweeting about 'Falafel Boy' while in the shower is neatly done. (Chuckle.)
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OH MY
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ABOUT TIME
Wait! Roland Berton Hedley, Jr., has someone he sleeps with? Or at least shares a bed with, while tweeting out his gratitude for the latest news cycle? It's about time something truly good happened to Roland, given all the thankless gigs he's accepted over the years, from Vietnam to FoxNews, et al.
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BMZKLFRPZ
President-for-life Bmzklfrpz was never one of my favorite minor characters. In previous storylines I assumed he was used to convey the depths of Duke's and some PR firms' depravity. It seems now, however, that his time has come. He will fit right in with our new administration.
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THE MOST REAL
For my money, GBT has always been the most real, and the most relevant, when he walks us through the lives of the long-graduated (and dropped out) Yalies (uhh, Waldenites?). The 1988 reunion has highlighted the wisdom and sensibilities of Trudeau -- at that time within spittin' distance of forty. No doubt Zonker is right to say that Boopsie has matured to become more appealing than she was as a "college woman." Twenty years has not added any rose-colored fondness for him and B.D. A new suit certainly does not "make" him anything other than the same old fun-loving, let-it-hang-out "hippie" (though a haircut and shave might render him un-recognizable). And Mike confesses marital doldrums to the Rev -- all leading up to Nicole as a "dramatic turn-of-events." It's Shakespearean rom-com 400 years later, one strip at a time.