Also, Kate Beaton kicks ass.

You bacon-lovin’ francophone.

(Just kidding, man. We still cool? )

You’re giving the New Yorker way too much credit. I’ve been reading their comics since I was a kid, and the older I get the less funny they are. Most of them are shockingly Duu-uumb for such an otherwise intelligent periodical. Often there’s nothing TO get–they’re just flat-out Not Funny, like the man said. Beaton, on the other hand, is plenty impenetrable, but–just like you explain– in a way that adds to the joke–the spectacle of seeing obscure, impenetrable historical figures making amusing, anachronistic remarks. And you’d think that the heavy Canadian-ness of it all would limit her audience, but then you look at the Alexa stats (as much as they can be trusted) and see that 80% of her audience is American, so there you go. Specificity, as always, is universality, and her comics are as specific as you get.