When they talked about the sadism in children's "funny books," I suspect they had this in mind. Not only sadism, but bad physics. Not sure the angle of the gun is correct, and I doubt that shooting an iron made it fly up as though shot from a cannon. Also unsure whether a flimsy towel rack could hold a dame, especially if she was writhing in terror. As for the black marks on the fellows' backs, it certainly looks painful, but how did he get them to sit still for that? Here, lie across this ironing board. Your back is wrinkled. And shouldn't the ironing marks go the other way?

Finally: shooter dude has one hell of a big left hand.

No, not finally: note the green shirt. Apparently after he'd tortured everyone he was going to settle down to some actual ironing.