Some people skip the funny pages. These are the times we wish we were such people.
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Dethroning Moment of Suck. - No ALLCAPS, no bold, and no italics unless it's the title of a work. We are not yelling the DMoSs out loud.
Series with their own articles:
- Dynamite XI: Baldo got dethroned when the major character Smiley abruptly transformed from a likable Tomboy to an unlikable Alpha Bitch within a couple of days, which apparently was used as an excuse to write her out of the comic strip. Never mind that Smiley was literally a Girl Next Door, and yet still hasn't been hasn’t been seen or mentioned in the comic since 2006...
- jaredthedecimator: Peanuts is my favorite comic strip, but there's one strip that bothered me. In one storyline from the summer of 1965, Charlie Brown meets a lonely kid named Roy at camp. The two quickly become friends, and it seems like Charlie Brown has finally found someone who is just like him. But this is all thrown out the window when Roy writes a letter to his father. In his letter, he states that he never really considered Charlie Brown as a friend, but only pitied him. In my opinion, this was a very cheap way to throw out a new major friend for Charlie Brown. Even worse, after this storyline, Roy quickly faded away, with his only other appearance of note being the strip that introduced Peppermint Patty.
- Clam15: For me, it was the July 24th, 2011 Blondie (1930) strip. In this strip, Dagwood's boss goes nuts. He furiously berates Dagwood for asking for greater health care while, and at the same time, he delivers a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown. Such hypocrisy has presented itself in prior strips, but never in this fashion. I only hope that this is a happy accident and such strips won't present itself in the near future. But, still... ugh.
- MadMan400096: This
◊ Mother Goose and Grimm strip. Basically, Grimmy gets annoyed by a guy saying "No problem" instead of "You're welcome". Forget the fact that it's an incredibly petty reason to complain, he actually attacks the poor bastard for saying it again. That's right. A dog physically attacking a person for something that only bothers a small percentage of people. I mean, it's established the Grimmy has Jerkass tendencies, but that's typically only because of his being a dog. This was just being a dick. It's pretty much the same kind of comedy you'd find in a later episode of Spongebob Squarepants. - Blackbird Mizu: For me, it's the March 16, 2012 strip of Luann. Gunther is scared of getting romantic with a girl and Luann suggests he might be gay. Which wouldn't be so bad, hell, would actually be pretty good to suggest such a thing in a non-condemning way. But then one part of her line of reasoning was that he was an only child raised by his mom. Really, Luann? Really? That's a moronic and offensive thing to suggest, a person's sexuality has nothing to do with how many parents they have or what gender those parents are.
- Bjshipley1: Luann just outdid itself with the July 2012 storyline, turning the whole Luann/Quill Will They or Won't They? thing into a "Shaggy Dog" Story. The very minute they decide to get romantic, his phone rings and he has to move back to Australia, likely never seeing her again. I've always preferred the Brad storyarcs to the Luann ones; this just proved why. A complete slap in the face to anyone who sat through the whole storyarc.
- Tuckerscreator: This moment indeed. Worse considering the author has done this twice, the first time being Aaron Hill. They subscribe to the Shipping Bed Death trope. And why, considering they're successfully portraying a relationship with Brad and Toni?
- KrisSimsters: I would like to add another Luann dethroning moment of suck to the mix, Luann and Quill's breakup arc. They took a really long time with this breakup and adding in Pru as to make it seem Quill was going to leave Luann for Pru. First off, these two have been having problems of their own for years now, ever since Quill came back to America from Australia (and even beforehand). Greg Evans has made Quill out to be a bad guy and Luann out to be the girlfriend who complains instead of talking things out. Its later revealed during the post-breakup arc that Pru is a lesbian, something that Quill might have known beforehand and decides to not tell Luann. This makes Quill to be more of a bad guy than he already is and at this point, the Quill hating as gotten to the point that I want to possibly drop this comic series for a while.
- Retro Geek: The "Tiffany trying to seduce Kip" Summer 2023 arc. Short version: It's not funny, not interesting and nothing's going to happen. Long version: Stef's boyfriend Kip is staying at Tiffany's poolhouse for the summer for stupid and convoluted reasons. Tiffany is perving on Kip as he swims the entire summer, (seriously he doesn't do anything else), while she displays token signs of guilt over it. Luann gets wind of it, and she and Bernice are invited to a supposed "pool party" hosted by Tiffany. Now, this could be interesting. They could teach Tiffany how to swim (remember when they brought that up once when they were in high school, then never referenced that again?) or have Ox interact with her (who Tiffany would be better off being with anyway), but nope! When they get there, it's just them staying in Tiffany's room while they perv on Kip! I just pray for Stef to come back so they can end this stupidity.
- Bjshipley1: It could be argued that the summer of 2023 itself was one big moment, considering the Gunther/Bets storyarc going on at the same time. Essentially, in 2023 Gunther and Bets bought an old van and were set to go on a road trip. After weeks of buildup the arc ended right as they were departing, but a message from writers Greg and Karen Evans urged the readers to check their website where updates about the trip would be posted while the strip itself moved to a new storyarc. However, the only update ever shown was a drawing of Gunther and Bets in the Comic-Con parking lot. Then, months later, a new update: the story of the trip would in fact be told, but in novella form that the readers would have to buy separately. A novella only available for purchase for less than a week, and shipping only to addresses in the United States (no digital version available either.) Also 3-5 weeks for shipping, before which time Gunther returned from his trip having been dumped by Bets who continued the road trip without him. The next arc showed Gunther moping about the breakup, but when that arc took place the novellas still hadn't shipped, meaning that readers had no idea how or why the breakup happened.
- Bjshipley1: Luann just outdid itself with the July 2012 storyline, turning the whole Luann/Quill Will They or Won't They? thing into a "Shaggy Dog" Story. The very minute they decide to get romantic, his phone rings and he has to move back to Australia, likely never seeing her again. I've always preferred the Brad storyarcs to the Luann ones; this just proved why. A complete slap in the face to anyone who sat through the whole storyarc.
- Deckard Canine: We usually put up with Frazz when it gets preachy, but it got a lot of complaints when Frazz surreptitiously swiped the batteries from a student's handheld game console in order to force him to enjoy his vacation in more traditional ways. That's not just militant; that's petty theft. And in Real Life, in all likelihood, neither the kid nor his parents would appreciate this loss of diversion.
- Candy Cane 14: (sigh)... I hate how in the comic version of U.S. Acres, Wade Duck's the pointless Chew Toy 'for the Lulz', but I'm trying to explain how a December arc was spoiled because Wade was the pointless Chew Toy. The Christmas arc from 1988 (2012 in Garfield.com). Most of the strips in the arc were cute and funny but Wade's role in this was sickening. In one strip, Wade looked up the chimney to see if Santa's there, and then this happens.◊ Oh, ha... ha... ha. Next Wade goes up the roof to see if Santa's there and Santa and the reindeer haven't landed yet (even though in the very last strip, we saw his bag go down the chimney!) and one of the reindeer lands on Wade, crushing him...◊ ha... ha, my sides are splitting. Not! O.K., there's two things majorly wrong with this. One, having an innocent character like Wade, get hurt for the hell of it. Not Funny! Two, the former ruined the whole last strip of the Christmas arc, where the farm animals were waiting for Santa.◊ If the Christmas bag fell on Wade wouldn't the other animals already know that Santa's here? And they recently made the chimney so it left a huge plothole! Also, how come the Strip doesn't have Wade hang out with the other gang except for the first and last strip of the Christmas arc? He wasn't even acting afraid through the whole arc so there was no point of why Wade didn't participate helping them, make the chimney or figuring out what to leave for Santa. And the final strip of this arc was so heartwarming too... they shouldn't have made Wade such a senseless Chew Toy in the comic, and (if they ever decide to make new strips) they should tone it down like they did in the cartoon version.
- FoxTrot
- philipthepatsy: FoxTrot is one of my favorite comic strips, but there was one story arc that really made me dislike Paige. In it, Paige gets an "autographed" photo by her favorite boyband, The BackSync Boys (autographed is in quotation marks, because Andy said there was only one signature of the band's name, meaning that, more than likely, none of the band members signed it at all.) Paige obsesses over the stupid thing, until Andy convinces her that she'll watch it while Paige is at school. Of course, this being Foxtrot, Quincey escapes from his cage and eats it. Paige comes home and throws massive tantrums, leading Andy to do special favors and spoil her for forgiveness, such as buying her expensive things and give her shrimp cocktail for dinner. That is, until Andy gives Paige a bunch of copies of the autographs from the mail, saying that Paige must have sent in a dozen requests (and furthering the fact that it's probably just a forum letter). In the end, Paige asks for forgiveness, which Andy gives her without any arguement or disdain. While it's nice for Andy not to hold a grudge, she shouldn't have broken down and spoiled Paige like that. It's pretty out of character for Andy, who would have normally given a long lecture to her kids if anything bad were to happen. The fact that she did all of those nice things for Paige is just poor parenting. Sure, she promised to watch over the stupid "autograph", but she's only human. It's not like she can watch the damn thing at every waking moment. Sure, she could have kept it out of Quincey's reach, but even so. Paige may be a Bratty Teenage Daughter, but she's hardly ever a spoiled brat.
- Koopa Kid 17: A mid-90s strip had Jason thinking that Paige left her breakfast oatmeal unattended. What does he do? He spits in it. Holy hell, something is wrong with this kid if he hates his sister this much. I would have loved to have seen Peter (since the oatmeal was his) beat the crap out of him.
- immortalfrieza: While Andy is frequently a hypocritical and criminally oblivious Jerkass I can usually let it slide, but the whole arc of Grandma Fox's first visit is the first time I truly grew to hate the character. Andy is passive aggressive and constantly complaining about and insulting her mother behind her back because... get this, she's TOO perfect thus everybody loves her so much so Andy is jealous. That Andy decides to get jealous over the fact that her mother simply happens to have the talent and drive to be good at practically everything and the genuinely good and caring nature to be good with people would bad enough but tolerable, but Andy's own actions throughout the series make it into one of these. Andy is jealous because everybody loves her mother instead of her, but Andy has gone out of her way to not let anyone like her and ignore anyone's complaints about her abilities and relationship with her family to avoid bettering herself. Andy is rude, hypocritical, condescending, and completely and likely willfully ignorant of her own faults. She feeds her family awful health food that they go out of their way avoid eating which she ignores their constant complaints about, belittles and insults their hobbies and interests while often attempting to actively prevent them from doing them even when they have no reason not to be able to like homework, gives them terrible "practical" gifts that they couldn't care less about instead of things they might actually want, and so on. Duh Andy, of course everybody you've ever known likes your mother more than you! Not only does your mother genuinely deserve that admiration but when's the last time you so much as tried to get anybody to like you, much less cared if they did? Get over yourself Andrea Fox!
- Radical Ed: While I've never liked Rex Morgan, M.D., an arc that is pissing me off more than anything else is the subplot in which Sarah, who isn't even a pre-teen, can apparently walk into an art museum, show the curator something she wrote, and immediately get it published. There was no effort, no struggle, just "I want to write a book... I wrote a book! Now you can publish it." It's essentially a giant middle finger to anyone who has ever struggled to get their written work out there, saying "Look, this kid can do it, that's how easy it is to get published." While Rex Morgan has irritated me before, nothing in it until now has ever made me quite so angry as this little brat getting everything handed to her with strip after strip talking about how she's so smart and is going to get her book published with such ease.
- heartauthor: I originally had another Baby Blues strip as a DMoS, but then I remembered another one that shows how entitled Wanda can be sometimes. In a series of two strips, Wanda gets angry because a cashier at the grocery store asked her if she (Wanda) worked or if she was "just" a mom. Now, we're supposed to see Wanda's anger as justified, as it's clearly shown that her "job" as a mother isn't always easy. However, there are a couple reasons why it doesn't work. For starters, the cashier in question was a young, pleasant girl who was clearly just trying to make conversation...you know, the way most cashiers are instructed to interact with the customers. Second, when Wanda gets home and tells Darryl what happened, he tries to make her feel better by saying all the things she does every day makes her "just" incredible; Wanda's response is to grumpily say "That's the kind of comment that makes it possible for your species to survive." Wow; way to thank your husband for the nice compliment, Wanda! I know some people used to complain that Calvin's parents could come off as Unintentionally Unsympathetic because of their sarcasm, but at least they never talked to each other like that!
- Dag84: The August 15, 2015 strip is what did it for me. In it Wanda gives Wren (a messy baby) Darryl's vintage Star Wars collectibles to play with. Even if you don't know anything about Star Wars it doesn't take a genius to figure out that vintage figures are easily worth hundreds if not thousands of dollars.
- Austin DR: Normally I like the comic strip Drabble, but I just absolutely loathed the recent August story arc in which Ralph was competing with his nemesis Steinbauer in a golfing tournament. When it seems like he won, Steinbauer informs the host that Ralph used an extra golf club, since his son miscounted. It then seems like they fix this problem by having Steinbauer get penalized for having a cellphone, and it automatically made Ralph the winner. However, Steinbauner then has him penalized because he also had a cellphone on him. But the absolute worst part of the story arc is that a single-shot golf player ends up winning the tournament even though he had 104 points. Couldn't they have let Ralph win just once?
- Trpoers/legomaniac90: The Calvin and Hobbes story where Calvin tries to join a baseball team, with predictable results. The DMoS comes when the rest of the team gets mad at him for an honest mistake to the point where one kid asks if he can hit Calvin with a baseball bat! But that's not the lowest part. The lowest part comes when Calvin asks the coach if he can sign off and the coach says, "Ok, quitter! Goodbye." I know this strip runs on Kids Are Cruel and Adults Are Useless, but at least Calvin's parents, his teacher, Rosalyn, and Susie are somewhat likable, and even Moe gets his comeuppance once in a while. These guys? Utterly unlikable Karma Houdinis.
- Wilde Oscar: At the very least, the coach should have punished the other kid for threatening to hit Calvin with the bat. (Also, how come no girls wanted to play baseball?)
- Koopa Kid 17: Calvin and Hobbes is one of my favorite comic strips, but the arc where Calvin has Hobbes tie him to a chair made me shake my head. Every strip has a reasonable interpretation for the Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane situations of Calvin's fantasies and Hobbes being a stuffed tiger except this one. Throughout the story, Calvin becomes understandably agitated because his parents are calling him down for dinner. Hobbes grabs the Jerkass Ball, going as far as blaming Calvin for any wrongdoing. The conclusion is the worst part where the first thing Calvin's dad does when he opens the door is shout "You tied yourself up??". Keep in mind, it is humanly impossible for a six-year old to tie himself to a chair and his father shows no concern whatsoever when he frees Calvin. While Hobbes sticks out his tongue in the final panel, it's heavily implied that Calvin's dad spanked him. Even worse, although Hobbes got Calvin in that mess in the first place, he accuses him of lying anyway. I know Calvin is often on the receiving end of Butt-Monkey moments but all he did was ask Hobbes to tie him up. Other than that, he did nothing to deserve such treatment by his father and Hobbes.
- youwantit: In one strip, after fantasizing about space, Calvin tells his dad that he wishes he could go to the moon. For me, the low point of Calvin and Hobbes is his dad's reaction, "I wish you would too." Sure, Calvin's dad is a huge Deadpan Snarker, but telling your own son you want him to go to the moon with barely anything to warrant it isn't just sarcastic; it's flat-out abusive.
- Mr Media Guy 2: There's one story arc where a bee lands on Calvin's back, and Calvin is unable to move for fear of the bee stinging him. Hobbes not only refuses to help Calvin ("And have it come after ME?"), but he takes advantage of this situation by taking Calvin's comic books, coming back, and spoiling the plot twist in one of them to Calvin! But the ultimate kicker occurs at the end, where Hobbes says the bee is gone, so Calvin moves, but gets stung. Hobbes claims it's Opposite Day, which is why he lied about the bee being gone. I know Hobbes can be kind of a jerk sometimes, but his antics in this arc just crossed the line from funny to cringeworthy.
- Kenyastarflight: Cracked pointed this out in an article some time ago, and as much as I don't like them I have to agree with them — Bill Watterson cutting Calvin's Uncle Max out of the strip after a single story arc was a mistake. His reasoning behind it was that Max could never call Calvin's parents by their first names, but that feels like a weak excuse, and I actually found Max to be one of the better adult characters in the strip — it was nice to have an adult who could put Calvin in his place and even outsmart him on occasion. For all I love Calvin and Hobbes, dropping Max from the strip means a lot of potential for future stories and jokes was sacrificed for the sake of dehumanizing Calvin's parents.
- Grotadmorv: In this comic◊, Calvin neglects to do his homework because playing outside will make better memories in the long-term. Not only is this unconvincing because we know Calvin hates doing homework and is probably making an excuse to get out of it, it sends the message that procrastination is okay for the sake of instant gratification. You can still have time for fun without neglecting important things you need to do. Also in the short-term will be Calvin's punishment for refusing to do his homework and getting a bad grade, and good memories won't help there.
- Dialga X: Doonesbury has some genuinely funny satire but Garry Trudeau's March 23-28, 2010 comics about open carry isn't funny. His depiction of gun owners as Dumb Muscle, Trigger-Happy rednecks isn't a cute parody or a satire; this time it's just plain insulting. It is quite clear that his anti-gun bias is on display.
- Rabid Badger 1632: I personally believe that Pearls Before Swine is one of the best Newspaper comics out there. However it still isn't without duds. In the earlier days of the strip, there was a running theme of story arcs where Pig would befriend some talking inanimate object, only for them to be killed by Rat in one way or another. Even as a Black Comedy fan, I never really liked any of these series (save for the one time it was subverted), as most of them come off more depressing than funny due to poor execution. But the nadir of these strips is the "Tootie the Gingerbread Man" arc. It starts off with Rat eating the head (yes, only the head) of the aforementioned gingerbread man. The rest of the story is just Tootie slowly dying while Pig continually tries (and fails) to cheer him up. But that's not the worst part. Right before Tootie dies, he tells Pig that his last request is that Pig promise to look after his house and his wife. Cut to a panel of Rat eating both his house and his wife. Not. Freaking. Funny.
- jmparker78: An arc from the early 2010's had Stephan Pastis's comic counterpart getting left by his wife, handling it extremely poorly. For those who don't read the strip, Pastis frequently shows up in his own strip, often the butt of a self-deprecating joke, but while he stresses that the character is not really him, not only does he draw himself to look like himself, he is also married to a woman named Staci, as is the comic counterpart. So when comic Pastis was going through a divorce, using his wife's real name in all the comics, readers weren't sure what to think. Most thought he really was getting a divorce, in which case he was airing his and his wife's issues to the world, but the revelation that only comic Pastis was getting divorced didn't help matters. It just looked like he was trying to make the world think he was getting divorced, and probably making his friends and family wonder if everything was okay between he and Staci. Either way, it was in very poor taste.
- Nyuk Nyuk 2000 : While I like Rip Haywire, I hate the character derailment of Cobra Carson. Sure, she's never been completely good, but making her completely evil is just plain wrong, and a huge mistake. (We're talking "Jump the shark" huge mistake here.) Would it kill Dan Thompson to just portray her as an anti-hero like she used to be?
- Freezer: To me, it's Thompson having Rip push an in-story Reset Button to avert a world-destroying catastrophe. This was supposed to come at great cost, as it would reset time back to a time long before Rip and Breezy had even met, wiping out their marriage and unborn child. With Breezy and the rest of the cast subsequently reintroduced with little change (with only Breezy not knowing Rip, but he knew her), it was clear the reset was strictly for the purpose making Rip a bachelor again and re-establishing the Rip/Cobra/Breezy Love Triangle. It was so jarring, especially given Rip's Angst? What Angst? reaction to it all (not to mention the STRONG tonal resemblance to One More Day)I dropped the strip completely.
- Light Tiger Peace Grail Race : This made me lose all my respect for Dog Eat Doug. It features the Loch Ness Monster-esque character talking to Sophie about taking selfies and putting them on Instagram. Then she says she's got a Snapchat Q&A in ten minutes. It essentially glorifies iPhones, Selfies, Instagram, and Snapchat, all at once! I just don't understand why old-running cartoons suddenly decide they need things like iPhones to stay with an audience. It's just not funny, and it won't be funny unless you had an expert on satirizing modern day elements, like Pearls Before Swine. Otherwise, it's just insulting.
- Mr Media Guy 2: Phoebe and Her Unicorn is up there with Calvin and Hobbes and The Far Side as one of my favorite comic strips. Unfortunately, an August 2016 storyline has a low point in the form of Marigold playing "PoHumon Go". Dana Claire Simpson, I greatly respect you as a cartoonist, but making jokes about current trends rarely works, and usually ends up dating the strip when the trend inevitably becomes less popular in just a few years. Thankfully, Dana seemed to realize just how lazy this idea was, and ended it after just three strips.
- Motivate Me: The entire storyline in Retail where Marla goes to bat for Brice to get him a store manager position at the New Hampshire store to help him escape Delman's was ruined by this strip right here. Yes, I know Brice was an ass when he left Grumbel's. I can see why Marla would still harbor some bitterness toward him. But coming out and saying "I'm a better person than you" to someone who is clearly contrite and trying to make amends is so rude and elitist that I lost all sympathy for her, even considering what Brice had put her through. Coupled with the storyline where she lies to get out of a managers' meeting, Marla is starting to seem not so different from Stuart Suchet.
- Galaxithea: The Big Nate comic where Nate complains about Mrs. Godfrey sending him to summer school, followed by two panels of his father giving him "The Reason You Suck" Speech and drilling it into his head that it's his fault, and his fault alone. And, to top it all off, the comic ends in the most soul-crushing moment in comic strip history since the Calvin playing baseball arc: Nate lying in bed late at night with an utterly helpless expression on his face, able to do nothing but think "Oh, how I hate her." Although his father's technically correct, I saw literally no reason for this strip to be written. It wasn't heartwarming, it wasn't funny, it wasn't awesome or otherwise emotionally meaningful in any way, shape or form. All it likely did was give readers unpleasant memories of times they were yelled at by their parents. If you stand back and squint a little bit, there's a little humor in Nate being so immature that he refuses to accept responsibility even after it's all been spelled out to him, but that's already been rammed into the ground by earlier, similar comics. I'm sick of the overused "Nate gets screwed over for three panels and ends up thinking "Oh, how I hate her"" "punchline", but this particular one has to take the cake.
- Maths Angelic Version: On 25 August 2018, Republican Senator John McCain passed away about a year after being diagnosed with brain cancer. Ben Garrison's reaction was publishing this incredibly tasteless cartoon that not only celebrates McCain's death and makes fun of his painful illness, but also has the gall to mock him because his plane was shot down during the Vietnam War (which led to him being captured and tortured). While I don't believe the dead should be exempt from criticism, this was just a mean-spirited low blow.
- Valiona: I once saw a The Family Circus comparing TV, radio and books, which was posted on the wall of my English classroom. The point of the strip is that TV broadcasts images and sounds so you don't have to think, radio is just sounds, and books are more thought-provoking because you have to imagine what's on the pages, a rather Anvilicious message that New Media Are Evil. At the time, I thought this was insightful, but as I got older, I realize that it isn't the case. First, there are great movies and TV shows and terrible books; obviously, Citizen Kane is superior to Twilight. Second, the quality of a work depends in large part on how the creators use the medium; a shot of a character's expression shifting can convey more than an entire paragraph talking about how they feel. Last, why would Bil Keane extol the virtues of books in a comic strip, of all things? This shallow, preachy and poorly thought-out strip is my personal low point for a terrible comic.
