I'm going to break comic blog taboo here and write about a strip I actually enjoy. I can explain my enjoyment of One Big Happy in no better way than to say that Ruthie is inexplicably adorable. She just is -- I'm not willing to contest this. That being said, there are three things I really enjoy about this strip:1.) The dis factor: Nothing like calling an old lady old and shriveled to her face. I hear they love that.
2.) The irony: There's a likable irony in trying to reveal mortality to a comic strip character. Of anyone, they are the most immortal. Ask Dagwood, who, assuming an age of 22 when introduced (not an improbable age) should be over 100 now (for pete's sake, the main plot of the early strips was that he was the son of railroad barons and married a flapper girl).
3.) The implication of terror: There's a reason Ruthie's "YOU" takes up a solid fifth of that last panel and is accompanied by sheer, wide-eyed horror. The thought of a creepy old woman haunting your mirror? Pretty genuinely terrifying.
And this brings to a close today's chapter of "I explain why I find a comic funny." Come back later today (and every other day) for "I explain why a comic is stupid."
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