The Lockhorns: C or D

I kind of dig how relentlessly hateful and bleak it is!

http://logo.cafepress.com/5/226003.88565.jpg

Every time I read a Lockhorns strip, I wonder why they are still married.

haha

Big YES to this thread

their makeup sex must be out of this world tho

It's all in what he uses the upper lip for.

http://joshreads.com/images/10/06/i100625lockhorns.jpg

It's drawn by a woman (Bunny Hoest) who used to write it with her late husband, Bill Hoest, and it's now drawn by Bill Reiner. Anyway, this strip was written by a married couple! How the fuck does that work! Did they work out Harold Huge together over breakfast, and when one of them couldn't come up with a good enough gag about the giant dog, they took to petty bickering, translated the bile into a Lockhorns strip, and then had angry hate sex on the table?

haha xp to slocki!

http://joshreads.com/images/09/10/i091020lockhorns.jpg

You can tell this comic is from the '60s, but I like that unlike Family Circus & some others started around the same time, this one kept the drinking.

http://logo.cafepress.com/3/226003.88553.jpg

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/6/60/1960s-era_Family_Circus_cartoon.png

wow dad of family circus looks fuckin blitzed there

You kinda want to believe that beneath their bickering is some tender understanding + maybe even love they've developed over decades of a hellish marriage nightmarescape, but you know deep down that beneath their bickering is the tragic knowledge that there is nothing good for them in their lives, that they are suffering daily and even if they understand each other's suffering like no one else could, that is the best they can hope for. They once dreamt of love and success and now they console themselves with the fact that at least their daily routines are recognizable -- and presumably cowed by the fear that divorce would be more stressful and unsettling than just continuing to hurt + die slowly.

Any strip where Leroy is embarrassing his wife by flirting is claqssic because of how insanely different the sex objects look from Loretta, they could practically be different species.

http://www.snee.com/bobdc.blog/img/lockhorns20051030.gif

took me a second to get they were at a costume party there

http://joshreads.com/images/0607/i060710lockhorns.jpg

http://joshreads.com/images/10/06/i100625lockhorns.jpg

What the hell happened here?

yeah pls explain i'm dumb and don't understand

always think of these guys when i read the lockhorns (ie EVERY DAY)
http://www.cs.fredonia.edu/szocki/projects/spring_09/14/images/frank_estelle.jpg

xxpost -- The backwards glance says it all.

Clearly Leroy thoughtlessly invited a couple over for dinner without informing Loretta, who then in spite proceeded to entertain for the entire evening without changing out of her curlers, slippers and bathrobe. The other husband was blissfully unaware that Leroy's wife is a psychotic lunatic who would sit with company dressed like that just to make a point, but really you'd have to be pretty unconscious to want to have anything to do with the Lockhorns at all. He's smiling, so possibly some have speculated that he is in the midst of a tryst with the curly-smiling Leroy. Idk, it doesn't seem likely, but Leroy DOES look smitten...

Guys there is an official Lockhorns store...look at all the pain you could share with the world on a T-shirt, mug, or tote bag.

threesome xposts

kinda lol but mostly ew?

http://logo.cafepress.com/5/226003.88555.jpg

http://images5.cpcache.com/product/442078995v4_350x350_Front.jpg

This says "...too old! Happy birthday" on the inside.

-_-

"They are twice your size! We are in hell. Happy birthday."

I have never heard of this strip.

lol @ roast rage, tho. I've made roasts like that.

http://joshreads.com/images/jla/0409/i040924lockhorns.gif

This one takes the freaky emptiness of their casa into a void where it erases the bodies of their guests.

I like the guest with a body though...he is like a middle class Klaus Nomi!

they're in some weird singing limbo

http://img547.imageshack.us/img547/2623/lockhornslds.jpg

that is SO weird and lazy though... like they are being judged by some floating disembodied spirits... why do they need simon cowell

threesome xposts

― dayquil babies (crüt), Saturday, September 25, 2010 1:51 AM (4 minutes ago) Bookmark

Ok so, he invited a couple over, had a threesome with them and the wife discovered them?

The smiles are what really befuddle me.

lol Viceory..."Worldliness"
my dad is about political cartoon levels of sophistication that way.

It explains why he has a water instead of a martini!

I guess the joke is that he invited people over and she wasn't ready. Like she couldn't stay upstairs, or else put some clothes on?

http://images6.cpcache.com/product/442078996v4_350x350_Front.jpg

Lockhorns anniversary card has to be some kind of curse! Like it should come with divorce papers inside.

I guess the joke is that he invited people over and she wasn't ready. Like she couldn't stay upstairs, or else put some clothes on?

― kenan, Saturday, September 25, 2010 1:59 AM (5 seconds ago) Bookmark

Yes but why are the men so happy about it?

roast rage one becoming incrementally more lol with repetition

The Lockhorns are two sociopaths who don't sexually gratify eachother because the only thing that gets either of them off is grisly murders. They hang out strictly with other psychos or loser parasites, whom they corrupt into the world of jaded crassness and sleazy sexual and business dealings.

I love that the Lockhorns are constantly seeing a marriage counselor. He's either the most talented counselor alive (for keeping them married for 50 years), or terrible (for not recommending after everything else has failed that they get a divorce).

Yes but why are the men so happy about it?

Cocktails were served.

its like they're constantly... locking horns... with each other

omg

DROPS COFFEE CUP AS MUSIC SWELLS

http://dummr.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/7-6-09-lockhorns.jpg?w=480&h=405

The reason their marriage counselor "works" so well for them is they both completely mask the depth and despair of their problems by presenting him with only superficial tiffs, which he solves handily...gazing into their actual marriage would mean D. Pullman (not a Dr.?) would do suicide.

http://www.wigderson.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/11/lockhorns.bmp

i dont think i see the problem there

"you're a viking and you're... cheese?"

xxpost -- What the hell, talk about sudden Upper Midwest focus there.

The Lockhorns both live in Hell, which is why they yearn for the upper midwest (it's cold).

lol, it's a football ref. he's a vikings fan and she's a packers fan (famous rivalry)

xp It's a football thing

I was late to that observation, I think.

haha wau, bcz one is a vikings fan and the other the packers how tempestuous. these occupy a pretty great space in the spectrum of terrible.

Maybe this explains everything. They were just plain passive aggressive but him being from Brainerd and her being from Stout turned it into open war.

someone shop favre's head on the counselor

Hahaha

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_zw8HSx1AByg/TB9SN_rhKkI/AAAAAAAABgk/-ub79H-K_90/s1600/Lockhorns.gif

http://img580.imageshack.us/img580/7843/lockhornsdrugs.jpg

xp That's actually kind of great.

IDG the "too big to fail" one for some reason.

it's an American economy joke

Aha that wd be why i didnt get it!

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_zw8HSx1AByg/TAeNQj88gMI/AAAAAAAABeM/3G63Tve11e4/s1600/Lockhorns.gif

Dr. H. Blog M.D.

Hate Blog

http://www.collider.com/wp-content/image-base/Clubhouse/T/Too_Big_to_Fail/Andrew%20Sorkin%20Too%20Big%20to%20Fail.png

^ fun read btw

I like that Sunday Lockhorns is just five regular Lockhorns in a box

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_zw8HSx1AByg/TAJUM5GSDtI/AAAAAAAABdk/MgYeyObvHx0/s1600/Lockhorns.gif

(bottom right one is !!!)

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_zw8HSx1AByg/S_0mYJFjFVI/AAAAAAAABdE/Lq87mgLEAPs/s1600/Lockhorns.gif

That's all Loretta has in life...one-upmanship.

thread rules so much - this summer I was kind of obsessed with the concept of Bunny Hoest after reading my crappy hometown newspaper for the first time in ages

like seriously is there someone out there who eagerly awaits the new Lockhorns or Howard Huge ever week?

xxpost -- Agreed there but the contrast between grinning death clown and fast food shlub also A+

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_zw8HSx1AByg/TAJUM5GSDtI/AAAAAAAABdk/MgYeyObvHx0/s1600/Lockhorns.gif

This is also freaking me out because everywhere in the world is detailed & normal, except the interior of the Lockhorns' house, which is an empty infinite expanse of woe.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_zw8HSx1AByg/S9bBxOmIVwI/AAAAAAAABY8/0g2LjT54W7c/s1600/Lockhorns.gif

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_zw8HSx1AByg/S8LzweKcySI/AAAAAAAABW8/jxcW_yS1UdE/s1600/Lockhorns.gif

Oh my god!

It's become self-aware!

*husband slowly turns head towards 'camera'*

like seriously is there someone out there who eagerly awaits the new Lockhorns or Howard Huge ever week?

yes, Ziggy Nation

Have yet to find a lockhorns tattoo on the internet

there is porn though, for sure. probably incorporating howard huge somehow

jeez after 30 years or so I'm actually finding this funny.

There was a huge hit radio show back in the (before my) day w/ the same premise:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bickersons

Yeah, I'm surprised at myself for laughing at a couple-few of these cartoons. There are some decent zings!

Also lol @ "It's become self-aware!"

In that Sunday strip, where did Leroy get the podium?

Acme Podium Company, of course.

Ha, as a kid I found them REALLY unsettling and depressing, and now I like them okay. Same thing with jokes like Mr. Roper on Three's Company never wanting to have sex with his wife; it was super-confusing to me as a kid that anyone wouldn't want to have sex with his wife,* but now I at least get the premise better.

What I never understood was how, every time they went to a party, Leroy managed to chat up some young hottie. And it wasn't presented like he was bothering them -- they seemed to like talking to him. He's a short, pot-bellied, bald, bitter-as-hell, middle-aged man: why are these ladies interested? And how do the Lockhorns get invited to these parties in the first place? The only explanation the text supports is that Leroy is a REALLY entertaining drunk, what with the lampshades and all that.

* Especially on Married with Children -- no idea what Al's problem was

Ha, as a kid I found them REALLY unsettling and depressing, and now I like them okay.

Me too! Between the Lockhorns and Andy Capp, as a kid I thought marriage was this scary alcoholic nightmare that no one would willingly enter into.

roast rage

loretta is an underrated style icon

as a child the sharp edges of her miserable-old-crone hair was up there with jewel staite in space cases for unattainable hair inspirations

her hornlocks are rad, true

* Especially on Married with Children -- no idea what Al's problem was
― oɔsıqɐu (nabisco), Saturday, September 25, 2010 11:38 AM (3 hours ago) Bookmark

I still don't get that gag. It only works if the woman the jerk is married to is unattractive, and Katey Sagal was certainly attractive to my young peri-pubescent self.

i think that was nabisco's point. i remember being confused by that, too.

she always wore leopard prints, people

http://leroyandloretta.blogspot.com/:

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_vheloFCFy9I/TJ6g9Xz4Y6I/AAAAAAAAAaU/hxlxKD5pEms/s1600/2010_9_24.jpg

I always thought that Al and Peggy were very much in the Ralph and Alice Kramden mode--an affectionate couple who showed it by insulting each other. One of the best sitcoms of its time, definitely.

Yeah but Ralph and Alice were clearly fucking all the time, whereas Peggy actually begged Al for sex and didn't get it, right?

All of the time! Why she didn't hook up with Ted McGinley I will never know.

I suspect that she was really asking for sex that lasted longer than it takes to melt butter in the microwave. :-) But, yeah, that is a major divergence from the formula.

http://i54.tinypic.com/xckgzs.gif

http://joshreads.com/images/0609/i060920lockhorns.jpg

O_O

http://www.joshreads.com/images/0412/i041222lockhorns.jpg

This may be the best thing on the modern comics page.

That last one is flat out brutal!

Mordy I'll put your edited strips up on my blog if you use a more appropriate font for the captions.

No kidding, these are much funnier than I remembered -- certainly way above the comics page median, right?

ya man the last one is like "I fucking hate you."

It's so incredible that they have so many friends and get-togethers. The friends often look kind of bemused, too. If I knew people this cutting, I would have a hard time hanging around them.

And in a house that occasionally hosts floating heads, and has nothing filling its empty space...all these parties.

shit, i used to do Lockhorns with my own "I've never had an orgasm" captions in like 12th grade ca. 1997, before I even had access to the internet. Should have turned it into a successful tumblr years ago

i dunno if anyone else on this thread has had the same embarrassing realization just now that 'The Lockhorns' is a pun.

I hope Leroy's the anorgasmic one!

I would attribute it to the SSRIs but he seems like the kind of guy who would spend his mental health copays on strippers.

I feel like I should have started a partner strip on Hoard Huge but Howard Huge is boring as fuck...if 'The Lockhorns' is a joke name, is 'Howard Huge' a pun on 'Howard Hughes'?

http://i54.tinypic.com/xckgzs.gif

^^ see, look at the lady Leroy's talking to, with her finger in her mouth and whatnot. how is he impressing these women? we have to assume that when Leroy turns on the charm, he is actually an amazing and entertaining enough guy to justify all these parties they get invited to. it's just that he completely checked out on his wife over a few years of bad dinners, and everything went downhill from there.

what would happen if they split up? I get the feeling Leroy would be out drinking and picking up chicks and painting the town red, but Loretta would be happier, just sitting calmly at home, reading a book or chatting with friends, thinking FINALLY, I AM FREE

Leroy would hit rock bottom on his own in a classic AA style.
That would be a good Lockhorns, Leroy telling Loretta that their marriage is his "rock bottom."
Lord let's pray this sort of thinking never infects my marriage.

Haa no they are sitting on a big boulder looking at a sunset and loretta says:
"I guess we've hit rock bottom."

the joke being that their bottoms literally on a rock!

*are

btw, as a child I thought the Random Hot Chicks at Lockhorns parties were really impressive, but now I'm wondering how much that's because they're usually almost twice as tall as the "normal" characters and drawn with a great deal more care.

somewhere between my memory and my fingers, loretta turned into a cereal mascot:
http://canvaspaint.org/c0ae.png

also sorry the random hot chick has turned into a collagen-lipped carrot top

That is fantastic!

Loretta's hair kind of makes her look like Woodstock.

fwiw drawing characters with exaggeratedly different proportions for humorous effect is called "cartooning"

Somewhere Rob Liefeld is blushing.

crut when I said I found the Random Hot Chicks "impressive" I meant that 9-year-old me thought they were really foxy (not anything about the art), and that adult-me now sees how the cartooning contributed to that

I mostly just want to know in what universe a woman who looks like that will watch eagerly while a chubby middle-aged bald man half her height makes a muscle.

maybe he reminds her of her father?

phil can I post that on my blog thats fucking great!

and if so how should I credit you?

"by Rob Liefeld"

And in a house that occasionally hosts floating heads, and has nothing filling its empty space...all these parties.

Hahah I can totally see/hear you saying this with a hint of faraway, horrified bafflement ^_^

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_vheloFCFy9I/TKEp7VsEM-I/AAAAAAAAAak/yMhgU4b1tyQ/s1600/2010_9_27.jpg

here ya go phil:
http://leroyandloretta.blogspot.com/2010/09/guest-artist-panel.html

I mostly just want to know in what universe a woman who looks like that will watch eagerly while a chubby middle-aged bald man half her height makes a muscle.

― oɔsıqɐu (nabisco), Monday, September 27, 2010 7:05 PM (28 minutes ago) Bookmark

I don't know if she's THAT hot; from the looks of her, I kind of think she's the Lockhorns-equivalent of Jennifer Coolidge or something...

ha, the Lockhorns universe seems to be one in which the Random Young Hot Chicks are assumed to be vapid, brainless, and pretty easily led. back in the day the drawings seemed to be shooting for like "young Loni Anderson," but yeah, by this time that is less of a good look.

this pic reminds me a lot of the lockhorns

http://27.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lc3ylc4o2a1qbw37po1_500.jpg

Just needs a nine foot tall blonde in a minidress.

oh man i let my fake lockhorns blog die. i am so bad with blogs!

http://www.reuben.org/ncs/members/bios/Hoest.jpg
kind of curious about "Bumper Snickers"

OMG at giant exophthalmos sex figure

<3 this stuff. so bitter

http://joshreads.com/images/10/11/i101115lockhorns.jpg

Not sure I can take them living in this century.

http://joshreads.com/images/10/11/i101128lockhornspanel.jpg

but if the priest is celibate, how would, oh nevermind

Maybe he's Episcopalian.

yeah that's a total fred basset vicar

http://joshreads.com/images/07/04/i070415lio.jpg

the Hateachothers

I remember years ago Conan O'Brien summed up the comic pretty nicely

http://youtu.be/XD3HdHGiSaE?t=6m7s

Always love Ruben Bolling's Super-Fun-Pak Comix takes on the Lockhorns, Marital Mirth. And on this one, there's a bit of Howard Huge in there too. There's been better ones, but this one's a good example at least.
http://boingboing.net/ttdb/20110126/comic.jpg