The modern era is no longer constrained to one medium. Someone who wants to make a deep point can do so through a movie, a blog, a cartoon, a meme, and even a comic strip. We’ve compiled some of our favorite comic strips that find that perfect balance between making us laugh and making us think. If you enjoy this list, be sure to also check out BruceNBert Comics in our DTD Originals section.
Lobster 1: I’m telling ya! They’re going to throw us into a boiling pot then eat us!
Lobster 2: Seriously dude, you need to lay off the Glenn Beck.
-A.F. Branco-
I wonder if other people will be able to see the beauty in this wreckage, or if only I, an amateur photographer and part-time model who grew up in the suburbs of New Jersey and has never had a job in his life, can truly appreciate it.
–Emma Hunsinger–
You will live a long and healthy life if you abstain from anything that brings you joy.
-Amy Hwang–
Caged Bird: So then I had them build me a cage, and I really like it! Now I’m safe from cats, and no one can sneak up and hurt me.
Free Bird: But now you can’t fly . . .
-Unknown-
Teacher: Birth —> In Between Stuff —> Death
Student: That’s It?
-David McElroy-
Boat! Land!
-Unknown-
Boy tweets on his phone while girl stares at (twitter) bird on a tree branch.
-Unknown-
Hobbes: I suppose if we couldn’t laugh at things that don’t make sense, we couldn’t react to a lot of life.
–Calvin & Hobbes–
Calvin: As my artist statement explains, my work is utterly incomprehensible and is therefore full of deep significance.
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: Becoming an adult is probably the dumbest thing you could ever do!
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: If people sat outside and looked at the stars each night, I’ll bet they’d live a lot differently.
Hobbes: How so?
Calvin: Well, when you look into infinity, you realize that there are more important things than what people do all day.
Hobbes: We spent our day looking under rocks in the creek.
Calvin: I mean other people.
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: It’s not denial. I’m just very selective about the reality I accept.
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: Isn’t it sad how some people’s grip on their lives is so precarious that they’ll embrace any preposterous delusion rather than face an occasional bleak truth?
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: History is the fiction we invent to persuade ourselves that events are knowable and that life has order and direction.
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin’s Mom: Life could be worse Calvin.
Calvin: Life could be a lot better too.
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Hobbes: Is it a right to remain ignorant?
Calvin: I don’t know, but I refuse to find out!
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin & Hobbes Street Art
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: Here I am, waiting for the bus, eleven more years of school to go, then college, then maybe graduate school, and then I work until I die.
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: Let’s say life is this square of the sidewalk. We’re born at this crack and we die at that crack.
Calvin: Now we find ourselves somewhere inside the square, and in the process of walking out of it. Suddenly we realize our time in here is fleeting.
Calvin: Is our quick experience here pointless? Does anything we say or do in here really matter? Have we done anything important? Have we been happy? Have we made the most of these precious few footsteps?
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: Oh greatest of the mass media, thank you for elevating emotion, reducing thought, and stifling imagination.
-Calvin & Hobbes-
I suppose it will all make sense when we grow up.
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: Almost everywhere you go, you can hear people, radios, and all kinds of engines.
Calvin: When you’re actually confronted with the stillness of nature, it’s kind of startling.
Hobbes: Why, you can even hear yourself think.
Calvin: This is making me nervous. Let’s go in.
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: Given that, sooner or later, we’re all just going to die, what’s the point of learning about integers?
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: I wish I could just take a pill to be perfect and I wish I could just push a button to have anything I want.
Hobbes: The American dream lives on.
Calvin: Why should I have to work for everything? It’s like saying I don’t deserve it!
-Calvin & Hobbes–
Hobbes: What a busy day! I’m pooped!
Calvin: Mom says the roads are pretty clear, so school will probably open again tomorrow.
Calvin: Now I wish I’d done my math homework instead of playing outside all day . . . or I wish I’d done it before dinner . . . or after dinner . . . or instead of watching TV . . . or before bed. But now it’s too late.
Calvin: A day can really slip by when you’re deliberately avoiding what you’re supposed to do.
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin’s Sign: A swift kick in the butt $1.00
Hobbes: How’s business?
Calvin: Terrible.
Hobbes: That’s hard to believe.
Calvin: I can’t understand it.
Calvin: Everybody I know needs what I’m selling!
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: The only skills I have the patience to learn are those that have no real application in life.
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: Dad, how do soldiers killing each other solve the world’s problems?
Calvin: I think grown-ups just act like they know what they’re doing.
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: The problem with people is they don’t look at the big picture.
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: Life is like topography, Hobbes. There are summits of happiness and success, flat stretches of boring routine, and valleys of frustration and failure.
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: How old do you have to be before you know what’s going on?
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Calvin: I’ve decided to stop caring about things.
Calvin: If you care, you just get disappointed all the time. If you don’t care, nothing matters, so you’re never upset.
-Calvin & Hobbes-
Chasing money until you die
-Unknown-
Dilbert’s Dog: You’re working hard. I’m doing nothing. In a hundred years we’ll both be dead.
-Dilbert-
Dogbert: The secret to good relationships is to be a huge phony.
Dogbert: Let’s practice the three fundamentals: Loud, Simple, Smiley
Hey, how about that low pressure system huh?!!
Dogbert: Again, but this time say “weather.”
-Dilbert-
Dogbert: As you head to your horrible job, remember these inspirational words . . .
Dogbert: In the long run, we’re all dead.
Dilbert: That feels like an oversimplification.
Dogbert: I skipped the part where you suffer for 90 years.
-Dilbert-
Pointy-haired boss: Laurie’s our new engineer show her the ropes, Dilbert.
Dilbert: *Shows her a noose*
Pointy-haired boss: I meant figuratively.
Dilbert: This is your anti-productivity pod.
Dilbert: It’s equipped with a little device that rings anytime you try to concentrate.
Dilbert: The top is open so none of the background noise is inadvertently muffled.
Dilbert: And you’re on the main aisle, so you’ll be haunted every minute by footsteps behind you . . . step . . . step . . . step . . .
Pointy-haired boss: We need to talk.
-Dilbert-
Dilbert: What fantasy will I use today to stave off madness?
Dilbert: Maybe I’ll be, “The man who changed an industry with his powerpoint slides.”
I have a report of unauthorized happiness inside of a head.
-Dilbert-
Catbert, Evil Director of Human Resources: People are complaining that you’re antisocial.
Dilbert: I only dislike the people I get to know.
Catbert: Then why do you get to know them?
Dilbert: It happens by accident when they talk.
-Dilbert-
Dogbert: You can compensate for your lack of knowledge by talking too much.
-Dilbert-
Patient: Doctor, I don’t feel well and I’m not sure why.
Doctor: I want you to meditate for 20 minutes, twice a day, exercise for at least 30 minutes a day, avoid processed foods, eat plenty of organic fruit and veg, spend more time in nature and less indoors, stop worrying about things you can’t control and ditch your T.V. Come back in 3 weeks.
-Unknown-
Shop for a new tie. Make macaroni. Do cardio. Don’t let the existential dread set in. Don’t let it set in. Vacuum the rug.
-Unknown-
Go play outside, you’ll regret spending your childhood staring at screens all day
Pffft . . . yeah right!
20 years later
*Stares out window*
-Dustin Interactive-
A fact is discovered. The buyers swarm in and peck away at whatever piece can potentially satisfy their customers. Each buyer then concocts a secret formula based on their chosen piece of fact. The news dog is ready for consumption. Joe “consumer” eats his news dog. Joe starts to get a tummy ache, the digestion process begins. The news dog is slowly being converted into a fecal-like matter. This matter is finally flushed back into the atmosphere.
-Dustinteractive-
Ebola!!! Obesity: 300,000 deaths per year. Tobacco: 450,000 deaths per year. Alcohol: 88,000 deaths per year.
-Jack Ohman-
Teacher cutting off the circle thought bubbles of students to the square shape of the school’s liking.
-Unknown-
If dogs acted like humans part: whatever
Frank, be honest.
Uh, ok.
Am I a good boy?
No.
You’re only good so that people will say that you are. You’re super problematic and you think that everything’s about you.
*Silence*
You told me to be honest.
No one actually wants honesty, Frank.
They just want the part of the truth that makes them feel good.
You also don’t take criticism well.
You look like a baked shoe.
Hey now.
-Egg & Bee Comics-
Pets are the 1% of animals.
-Epiphenus-
When you wait for a waiter, you become the waiter.
-Epiphenus-
Every picture of you is you when you were younger.
-Epiphenus-
When you introduce different friend groups to each other it’s your life’s crossover episode.
-Epiphenus-
The entire point of golf is to play the least amount of golf.
-Epiphenus-
Crispy is just crunchy but thin.
-Epiphenus-
CBD is the non-alcoholic beer of marijuana.
-Epiphenus-
Farmacist: Take one a day with tomato and cucumber.
-Dan Piraro-
Hello! You are alive now!
Hello what was I before?
Nobody knows. Oh. You better get to work!
Work? If you want to be alive you have to work!
What does it mean, to not be alive? Nobody knows! But you’ll find out if you don’t work!
But there must be more to this existence than—
Get to work!
-Feffley-
It must be boring to be a fish. Just floating around in your bowl. Looking at the same four things all day. Barely moving.
-Chris Hallbeck-
Do you ever think, perhaps, there’s more to life than eating?
You mean, like, sleeping?
-Unknown-
I’ve heard the rhetoric from both sides . . . time to do my own research on the real truth.
Google Search: Literally the first link that agrees with what you already believe.
. . . jackpot.
-Kris Straub-
Fish 1: Whoa! Half empty! Definitely half empty!!
Fish 2: Just listen to you! Always the pessimist!
-Bradford Veley-
Why should I go to college? So you can get a degree.
Why? So you can get a good job.
Why? So you can make more money.
Why? So you can pay back your college loans?
-Gary Varvel-
I have my whole life to figure things out.
Everything will fall into place when I’m older!
Forty is the new twenty heh heh.
There’s still time to figure my life out.
Ha Ha.
Oh Well.
-Unknown-
Daughter posts photo with mom on Instagram as mother vacuums underneath her.
-Unknown-
The American Way
Guy makes less money than you: Get a real job, slacker!
Guy makes more money than you: So you think you’re better than me?!
-Chuck & Beans-
Refugee: We brought him so people would care what happens to us.
-Steve Sack-
I’ve just got to buy this! How to stop impulse buying.
-Chris Madden-
I applaud your success . . . provided you are slightly less successful than me
-Unknown-
I hate driving my car but I need to get to work somehow.
I hate my job, but I need to repay the loan for my car somehow.
-Unknown-
I will be a famous someday
I will be a famous poet
No, I will be a lawyer
I will be a lawyer poet
No I will just be a lawyer
Oh well time to die
-Unknown-
What’s the magic word to get what you want? I’m offended!
-Unknown-
I’ve spent twenty years creating a life that others envy but I hate.
I wish I could do that.
-Mark Stivers-
In your haste to secure this world you have killed what made it worth securing!
-Unknown-
It keeps me from looking at my phone every two seconds.
-Liam Walsh-
That reminds me of the thing I was going to say next regardless.
-J.A.K. Comics-
Thought Bubble: I can’t wait to say my thing.
-J.A.K. Comics-
Let me interrupt your expertise with my confidence.
-J.A.K. Comics-
Sports . . . He Sports . . .And . . . He . . . Sports!
Sports!
Sports?
Sports.
-J.A.K. Comics-
Now remember kids, life isn’t a competition. I mean, apart from for grades, jobs, partners, wealth and status.
-Oliver Emberton-
Look at that new car..
If only I could afford a car.
I wish I had a bike.
He can go wherever he wants.
-Unknown-
Look at these people. Glassy-eyed automations going about their daily lives, never stopping to look around and think! I’m the only conscious human in a world of sheep.
-Unknown-
Look, he’s giving us all money, just like he promised!
He has your wallet.
-Roger L. Maynard-
Sign: Don’t worry about what other people think.
Thought Bubble: I hope this gets a lot of likes.
-MADEbyJIMBOB-
Counterculture.
-MADEbyJIMBOB-
WTF! I shared this like ten times. Why isn’t the world changing?
-MADEbyJIMBOB-
I just want to openly discuss ideas.
That’s fine. As long as they aren’t dangerous.
-MADEbyJIMBOB-
What do you think of this concept?
I’m so afraid of what it means about me if I consider it!
-MADEbyJIMBOB-
C O E X I S T
Unless you disagree with me
-MADEbyJIMBOB-
And then I realized that the world owes me nothing for simply existing.
-MADEbyJIMBOB-
To Do List: Outrage, Share Post, Blame, Use The Word System, Outrage, Praise Opinion Of Celebrity, More Blame, Think For Myself . . .
-MADEbyJIMBOB-
It took me four years, but now I know what the education bubble is.
-MADEbyJIMBOB-
Okay Children. It’s story time ! ! !
Up is Down & Down is Up, if you disagree you’re a bigot ! ! !
-MADEbyJIMBOB-
Doctor: It’s called outrage . . . A common virus, easily cured by cutting down on social media and exercising independent thinking
-MADEbyJIMBOB-
No, too polarizing. Let’s go with the idea that makes everyone feel equally indifferent.
-Tom Fishburne, Marketoonist-
Weekly routine.
Of Existential Crises
Repeating Ad Nauseam
Killing Our Souls
-Mo Welch-
Why does “making a living” make me feel dead inside?
-Mo Welch-
Mother’s Day . . . Other Days . . .
-Unknown-
It has freedom to explore this entire space.
Yet prefers the confines of a tiny box.
Inexplicable.
What a curious creature.
-Nathan W Pyle-
Just one of those days . . . yeah
Just one of those weeks . . . yeah
Just one of those years . . . yeah
-Unknown-
We encourage our employees to think outside the box
Anyways, this is where you’ll be working
-Unknown-
Maybe I don’t have to be so tough.
Maybe I can be vulnerable sometimes.
*Gets Punched*
Never again.
-Shen Comix-
Charlie Brown: Some day we will all die, Snoopy!
Snoopy: True, but on all other days we will not.
-Peanuts-
Lucy: I’m intrigued by this view you have on the purpose of life Charlie Brown . . . You say we’re put here on earth to make others happy?
Charlie Brown: That’s right.
Lucy: What are others put here for?
-Peanuts-
Charlie Brown: This song always depresses me. It brings back such sad memories . . . you know what I mean? I’ve never heard another song that depresses me the way this one does . . . Play it again, will you?
-Peanuts-
Charlie Brown: Boy am I ever depressed.
Charlie Brown: Somebody else is depressed too, I see.
Charlie Brown: That’s the only thing that could possibly have cheered me up!
-Peanuts-
Lucy: Boy, I just saw the best cowboy show, Charlie Brown. It was all bout this guy who . . .
Charlie Brown: I haven’t seen a cowboy show for some time . . . The last one I saw was about three weeks ago . . . It was pretty good too . . . I remember one scene where . .
-Peanuts-
Charlie Brown: Sometimes I lie awake at night. And I ask, “Where have I gone wrong?” Then a voice says to me, “This is going to take more than one night.”
-Peanuts-
Pharmacist: Each capsule contains your medication plus a treatment for each of its side effects.
-Randy Glasbergen-
That concludes tonight’s debate. Tune in tomorrow morning and we’ll tell you how to think about it.
-Charles Beyl-
Sure, he’s Satan, Prince of Darkness, King of Hell, Lord of Lies, The Deceiver, bringer of evil and temptation, but he’s not afraid to say what people are thinking.”
-Unknown-
Puzzle piece cuts a portion of himself off in order to fit in.
-Cone Candy-
Happiness is just around the corner: Work Harder
Happiness is just around the corner: Earn More Money
Happiness is just around the corner: Buy More Things
Happiness is just around the corner: Keep Going
-Polyp Comics-
Remember son, if you work really hard, you can achieve a compromised version of any goal you set your mind to.
-David Ferrier-
That’s awful. Someone should do something.
Why can’t you be that someone?
-Richard Duszczak-
Are there more bad people than good people in the world?
Nah, I think the bad ones just make a lot more noise than the good ones.
-Savage Chickens-
Life in eight easy steps. Repeat steps 1-7 until death occurs.
-Savage Chickens-
So, what’s your greatest weakness?
I have many hobbies, but nothing stirs my passion. I constantly attempt to impress people who mean nothing to me. I’m exactly smart enough to know I’ll never quite do anything great.
Oh geez, not your psychologically crushing weaknesses. Just like, tell me something that implies you’ll work overtime for free.
Sometimes I get so into paperwork that I lose track of time.
Welcome aboard.
-SMBC Comics-
Dad, why do you sit at this computer all day when it just brings you stress?
Well, the world generates a certain amount of stress each day.
People agree to absorb some of the stress, in exchange, we are given money so that we can have houses and food. It’d be sort of like if you had a mouse in a box with a food pellet dispenser that also delivered electric shocks at random intensities.
That sounds awful.
It’s not so bad.
If you make sure to get your shock and pellet every day. Toward the end of your life you can just eat off your saved pellets.
Do you have a lot of pellets saved?
Well, first I have to pay back the pellets I borrowed so I could be allowed in the box.
-SMBC Comics-
I am not biased. I am prepared to believe any side of any argument. That said, I do have certain standards for evidence.
People who don’t agree with me must provide at least six, fifty-year longitudinal studies, with 10,000 participants per study, with each study completed in the last six months.
People who do agree with me must provide the headline from a tabloid article, or a cartoon in which the people I dislike are depicted as pigs with fangs.
You don’t understand what bias is.
That’s because I’m the only one who never experiences it.
-SMBC Comics-
I want each of you on the way home tonight to stop, look up, ponder the heavens, and consider how insignificant our second-quarter loss really is.
-Leo Cullum-
Hey, Mom – Who’s more open-minded? Liberals or conservatives?
Most people are open-minded about ideas they already agree with.
What the heck good is that?
-Stone Soup-
$tudent Debt . . . As I look to the future.
-Bob Englehart-
At last! The sword of truth!
Sword of truth! Give me your wisdom!
You came on this quest to avoid confronting your problems at home.
-Swords Comic-
Do Something, Thoughts & Prayers, Do Something.
-Paul Kinsella-
Three Internet Delusions: If I like her post, then she’ll have sex with me. If people like my posts, then my opinion must be important. If I make fun of people with a comic, then they’ll change their behavior.
-Pear-Shaped Comics-
Young, Adult, Old.
-Unknown-
When I make eye contact for the first time, I want it to be with the right person.
-Drew Dernavich-
I’m wasting my life! All I do is goof off. I need to accomplish something or I’ll always regret it.
I’m wasting my life! All I do is work. I need to start enjoying myself or I’lll always regret it.
-Chuck & Beans-
Welcome to ‘All About the Media,’ where members of the media discuss the role of the media in media coverage of the media.
-David Sipress-
What do you want to be when you give up?
-Joe Dator-
What is the meaning of life?
I don’t know. The computers are down.
-Robert Gumpertz-
Where did you find that? I’ve been searching for it everywhere.
I created it myself (Happiness).
-Unknown-
Yes, the planet got destroyed. But for a beautiful moment in time we created a lot of value for shareholders.
-Tom Toro-
You get a job, so you can afford to have a life. But then you spend all your time at work, and end up with no time to live the life you’re working for.
Any questions?
-Unknown-
Who wants change?
Who wants to change?
-Unknown-
Deep Thinking Daily 