COMICS: They read the comics so I don't have to

I've said before that if I had more time -- and more importantly, if I still got a daily newspaper -- I'd like to carry on the tradition of the Baltimore City Paper's Funny Paper column. Funny Paper was a weekly column which humorously summarized and commented on the previous week's comic strips, ripping on repetitive themes, comedic errors, and just plain unfunniness. For example, from the April 18, 2001 entry:

"CATHY: Monday: Cathy is obsessed with food. Tuesday: Cathy is ignorant and incompetent at tax time. Wednesday: Cathy is ignorant and incompetent at tax time. Thursday: Cathy is ignorant and incompetent at tax time. Friday: Cathy is ignorant and incompetent at tax time. Saturday: Cathy is ignorant and incompetent at tax time. Sunday: Cathy is ignorant and incompetent at tax time."

Or, in a trademark fit of pique, dated October 8, 2003:

"KUDZU: Monday, Doug Marlette dusts off the old '668' joke. You know--668: The Neighbor of the Beast. Only Doug Marlette doesn't make it that elegant, opting to render it, '668 is the sign of the guy who lives next door to the Beast.' Doug Marlette doesn't make the jokes; he makes the jokes worse! Die, and go directly to hell, Marlette, you worthless sack of joke-stealing garbage."

Anyway. If I were ever going to get off my ass (or, I guess, spend a great deal more time on my ass) and create a blog in the Funny Paper mold -- well, my window of opportunity has passed. Because Joshua Fruhlinger's I read the comics so you don't have to is doing the job quite nicely. Damn it.

In an early post, Fruhlinger insists he'd never heard of Funny Paper before starting his blog, even though the title of his blog is almost exactly the same as Funny Paper's motto, "We read the comics so you don't have to." Okay, I'll take his word for it. But there's no mistaking the similarities*, from the title/motto, to the unconcealed hatred of strips long past their expiration date (Fruhlinger: "Tune in tomorrow as I call for the death of whoever it is who draws Marmaduke, and possibly for the death of Marmaduke himself"), to the similar permutations of the Phantom's nickname ("the Ghost Who Walks") as a commentary on the strip's art or story (Funny Paper: "the Ghost Who Can Single-Handedly Commandeer a Nuclear Sub," "the Ghost Who Is Never Properly Lit;" Fruhlinger: "the Ghost-Who-Ruminates-Aloud," "the Ghost-Who-Watches-Television-In-His-Hotel-Room"), to the pointing out of similar gags in different strips on the same day, to... oh, lots of stuff that's probably unavoidable if you set out to do something like this.

Where they primarily differ, I think, is Funny Paper ran short items about every strip for the week, whereas Fruhlinger runs longer items on a single strip daily. But where they again draw similarities is in the way they both make me laugh, they both reflect my obsession to analyze comic strip minutiae, and they both make me wish to hell I had done it first.

I read the comics so you don't have to is great. Funny and incisive, it makes me wish I knew the author so I could discuss the comics with someone else familiar with both their triviality and their importance. Good, good stuff.

---

*Including, as further research reveals, the fact that the creators of both sites get their comic strip fixes from the pages of the Baltimore Sun! How's that for a coincidence?