The Dreamer
February 2, 2013 at 3:30 pm
Back in Act I, Fred was a divorcee. He had a previous marriage. Batiuk apparently forgot that and did a series of strips where Fred and Ann take Darin around to show where they lived as a young struggling couple. Now, Batiuk remembered and last week we had Ann remembering that they met as teachers during the strike at Westview, and had no ‘young’ past…This is obviously the daughter from Fred’s first marriage, which Fred never told Ann about…
Fred’s stroke sure has opened a closet full of skeletons! Turns out Annie was not the only gal to have her dreams crushed by the seemingly mild-mannered former principal. But hey, water under the bridge, right? If it’s not “pleasant”, then why even talk about it? What’s even more unpleasant is Darin’s elongated, potatolike head in panel 3.
Son of Stuck Funky 
Please, if nobody ever talked about unpleasant things in Funky Winkerbean, the strip would have less dialogue than Lio.
So…who was it who had the stroke, again? I do have to admire how he keeps churning out a daily comic strip nonetheless.
Thank God Bull hired Annie to co-coach the girls’ basketball team. Otherwise her “pleasant memories” count would still stand at a nice round zero. Unless she didn’t enjoy that either, which given the tone of this entire arc is entirely possible.
So what have we learned so far about the formerly relatively inoffensive and harmless Principal Fairgood? Well, let’s see: he was living too fast which caused him to stroke out on the toilet, he was a disappointing husband and mediocre father and he had a previous marriage that was so spectacularly awful that neither he or his wife dared to mention it for over thirty years. All of this raises a pressing question…what does Pulitzer (nominee) Tom have against this character?
Darrin: Where do you live, Kerry? New York? California?
Kerry: Westview:
D: Westv—? What?!? How long?
K: All my life.
D: All your –? Where in Westview do you live?
K: Right next door.
D: You’ve been living next door to my – our – dad all this time?!? And this is the first time I’m meeting you?
K: Well, you were living with that weird English teacher for a while. Then you moved above that pizza joint. In fact, I think this is the first time I’ve ever seen you at their house – and I’m here every day.
D: So what do you do?
K: I’m an attorney. Good thing I “helped” dad write his will recently. Between his savings and his Ohio educator’s pension, I stand to inherit a pretty penny.
D: **********!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Um….
Fishstink: “Your father had been married and divorced before we met.”
Darvon: “How come?”
How come what? I guess the underlying, unspoken question is, “Why didn’t you ever tell me this?” I guess. I’m not sure. The writing is so terrible that it’s hard to tell what the hell is going on here.
All I can figure is that, since it wasn’t a cute, rom-com breakup story, Fishtwat decided to withhold the information from her adopted son. Heh. Funny.
I think my version is better.
Yeah, Tombat never talked about it either!
No, you malignant tumor of a writer! You do not get to retcon your story every single day. You hack! Bachi-bouzouk! Tonnerre de Brest! Espèce d’analphabète!
Do you think maybe this is all a joke perpetrated by Batiuk and Lynn Johnston to settle a bet they had at a Hackmasters convention a couple of years ago?
Ah, so Fred once did an illegal Vietnamese immigrant a favor by marrying her so she could get her visa, then she turned around and stole him blind, right? Which turned him sour on all women, thus his reason for crushing the dreams of the next woman to come along by hurting her before she could hurt him. Tom, you make this so easy yet so stupid all at the same time.
Fred must have been a pretty great father to be awarded no custody or even visitation rights for the daughter. So let’s not talk about it, shall we?
Students, today’s lesson is you can pull whatever you want out of your ass if you just say, “Oh, we never talked about it before.”
“Your adoptive father did 20 years in prison for second degree murder.”
“How come?”
“Well we never talked about it.”
“Makes sense.”
Laziest. “Writing.” Ever.
By the way, Fishstick’s explanation confirms that Kerry is a NUMBER of years older than Drano. Forget that she looked like a college student when she first showed up on the porch.
Batty makes up for being a bad “writer” by also being a bad artist.
Batiuk sure is loading up his plate at the Plot Twist Buffet.
Worst writing ever….(well maybe 9CWL or Apt 3G)…but they do not claim to be 1/4″ comic strips and therein lays the difference.
Batyuck you take on issues with no sense of skill….you might want to be a great topical writer but you are a “hack”.
Pulling story lines outta thin air is call “just writing”..it’s called lazy.
TB can redeem himself here if what he tells what he teased in Sunday’s strip, a flashback to Kerry being kidnapped by coach Jack Stropp.
The ransom money was the one delivery Fred didn’t help with…
In two weeks, the Fairgood family has gone from one of the happiest families in Westview to one of the most egregiously dysfunctional families in Westview. In what fucking universe does a family not mention to their adopted son that he has a half sister, then casually explain that they just didn’t want to talk about it for thirty years. Derwood would be forgiven if he kicked his “mother” in the teeth about now.
Jimmy
“Do you think maybe this is all a joke perpetrated by Batiuk and Lynn Johnston to settle a bet they had at a Hackmasters convention a couple of years ago?”
And they way this story is going it looks like Batiuk lost big time. Heck, Lynn Johnston isn’t even working! Or does she have to ok reruns?
This has more holes in the plot than my favorite soap, the late Guiding Light.
Since it’s all about Shocking Swerve time (and I’m surprised that it hasn’t been added yet, given that it already has everything necessary. Ass Pull? Check. Character Derailment? Check check check), why not just have Annie pull a knife on Boy Lisa and attempt to murder him right here and now? You could even do a dialogue-less strip!
The only way this could be less realistic is if Fred’s first wife had died (of cancer) and Fred never mentioned it, having been heartbroken. Maybe Fred’s first wife killed John Darling?
So what was with the Sunday flashback with Fred and Bull back in Act I in Fred’s office talking about Bull’s ‘problem’? If Kerry is Fred’s child how does Bull fit in to this?
Darin: “I guess not!”
Ann: “Heh. Your brother took the news just as bad.”
Darin: “….my brother.”
Ann: “Oh, gracious! Silly me, that’s right. We never told you about -my- estranged child from MY first marriage. Probably because his father was an evil Reptoid from planet Dracon. But, hey, these things do happen!”
Darin: “….so…you and Dad never really loved each other, Dad crushed your dreams, Dad alienated and ignored a previous family to the point that everyone tried to pretend they never existed, and you at one point had sex with an alien lizard. Anything ELSE I should know about?!?”
Ann: “…huh. Would this be a bad time to say that the police just called with the news that Jess has just been murdered by John Darling’s REAL killer?”
Darin: “….*….”
Ann: “…guess it would. Then pretend I never said that, dear! C’mon! I’ve made creamed corn, creamed spinach, and creamed weenies!”
>>This has more holes in the plot than my favorite soap, the late Guiding Light.<<
Well, as Cracked told me, there was an episode where one of the characters actually becomes a superheroine. The closest we've come is Pete's delusions with him being a worse writer than Batiuk.
SIAP: Most depressing FW and Crankshaft is updated.
Chris discovered the comments section at Kingdom Comics.
Yeah, Marvel Comics and Guiding Light once decided to establish that they both took place in the same universe…which actually wasn’t all that odd.
1) Most monthly super-hero comics are action-oriented soap operas to begin with.
2) Soap Operas featuring overt fantasy elements have proven popular since the days of the original “Dark Shadows”. I’m kind of fond of the BBC’s “Being Human” myseld.
Man, Fred has more hidden offspring than a chameleon.
Well, to be honest, Batiuk wasn’t predictable in this one. Annie was like “everything was fine until Fred had a stroke”, then “we met at a school strike”, and we expected to see the “album corners” as there was a long retconned story of how Annie and Fred got together. There would be maudlin bits, smirks, and whatnot until Fishstick and Dipstick got the news that Fred was gone.
Cue awards from the National Center for Stroke Victims.
A HREF: What’s been updated? His remarks about the Comics Kingdom comments section were in the article as originally posted.
I’m actually curious to know how Kerry and Fred’s reunion is going:
Kerry: “Wow, Dad. It’s like you’re here, but you’re not.”
Fred: “….”
Kerry: “Then again, when were you EVER here? For me, I mean?”
Fred: “….”
Kerry: “Your son didn’t even recognize me! He had NO IDEA his father had a daughter! Do you…do you have -any- idea how that hurt me? And I thought you could never hurt me again. Guess I was wrong.”
Fred: “….”
Kerry: “Anyway, thanks for having Ann invite me over. Guess it took a STROKE for you to ACKNOWLEDGE YOUR OWN DAU….” *SOB*
(Kerry flees the room, red faced, racked with bitter, bitter sobs.)
Fred: *cries a single, perfect tear*
******************************************
Meanwhile:
Ann: “But why are you asking me about Kerry, Darin? Haven’t I made it clear these past few weeks?!? All that matters is ME. How your father has wronged and inconvenienced ME!”
Darin: “…oh.”
The only way this could work for me is if the entire strip takes on an abrupt tonal shift that sends it down the road to Crazytown.
“How is it possible that I was never told that my father had a daughter from a previous marriage? Or that he even had a previous marriage?”
“You never asked.”
“Why didn’t I ever meet my sister?”
“You were out every time she came over.”
At which point it drifts into Surreal Land where nothing is as it seems and someone might actually, for no reason whatsoever, keep from informing a child that he’s got a sibling when the sibling’s backstory is entirely mundane.
But as Batiuk petulantly demands respect as a writer, this is absurd. How could he even think he’s deserving of respect when he pulls something like this? How can he even demand that his stories be taken seriously when he believes that this sort of plotting is acceptable? Even Pearls Before Swine hews a line closer to reality than this. You hear that, TB? A cartoon pig in a limited continuity comic strip deserves more serious consideration as important literature than your writing.
We will be hearing more about the abuse scandel at “The Lighthouse” .
So here’s the deal – I’m sure it’s relatively common to have one of those short-lived, ill-fated marriages that is such a non-issue that you don’t bring it up for years and years. Could be almost as if it never happened.
But he had a DAUGHTER, ferchrissake. From what I think I understand, people can all but lose contact with these “forgotten” ex-spouses, but UNLESS THERE WERE SOME EXTREMELY UGLY CIRCUMSTANCES, you have some kind of contact with the children of that marriage. Am I right, or is my head screwed on crooked yet again?
In all the years Dillweed lived with The Fishsticks (estimated at about thirty), this daughter was not seen, heard of, or discussed within earshot of Blondie McPotatohead. That’s a very high reading on the Estranged Meter. This represents a significant amount of disturbing dysfunction. Yet BatSick thinks of this as nothing more than an “interesting” plot twist.
This guy is so tone deaf it’s scary. Maybe he needs to spend an afternoon outside him mom’s attic long enough to see how real human life forms interact.
I believe that a little over a year ago, TomBatTom woke up bright and early, ate a hearty breakfast, took a nice long shower, poured himself a hot cup of coffee, swallowed five Adderalls, went for a brisk walk around the block, went back to the studio and started working on next year’s batch of comic strips. 2012 was a real down year for Batom Inc., by the end of the year it was practically “gag-a-day” again. But I’ll be damned if he isn’t back with a vengeance in 2013. This is one of the downright weirdest arcs in recent memory.
My wild guess re: the last strip of this arc:
Boy Lisa (dazedly): “Gee, Jess, my parents sure were screwed-up.”
Jessica (smirking): That’s why you’re not in politics.”
Boy Lisa (smirking): “Gee, Jess, I’m sure glad I’ve been with you and only you for an indeterminate number of years.”
Jessica: “I make documentary films. (Smirks) That’s what I love about you!”
I’m starting a companion website to this one, and I’m calling it “Son of Funky Sucks.” Because Funky sucks. Tom Batiuk sucks as a cartoonist and a writer. “IT’S CALLED WRITING, YOU NO-TALENT HACK!!!!!!”
No, they never “talked” about it. Fred just slammed his enormous crank with the toilet seat every night and screamed bloody murder just to remind the ol’ Fishstickof the love she could never have and who once had it. It was a game they played.
Imagining Fred’s enormous, throbbing, bruised dong after having it slammed by the toilet seat for the fifth time that day. Eww.
I know the stroke has given him a permanent case of the mumbles, but he can still scream real loud, right? I mean, the clarity of his speech is trashed, but he can still crank up the volume, I hope. He can still do his favorite gag.
*WHAM!*
“Aaaaaaaauuuuuuggghhh!!!!!!!!”
“That’s my Fred!
“That’s my adoptive father!”
“That’s the guy who shut me out of his life for 35 years!”