Q. Why has Harry Dinkle never been circumcised?
A. Because there’s just no end to that prick!
Me
Yesterday
Those of us here in the real world can freely express our joy over the fact that the Dinkles appear to be exiting the convention at last…
Yeah, I was wrong, we’re still at the convention. For once, Batiuk leaves exposition aside, trusting the reader to know that we are at Harry’s book signing (we don’t see a lobby card that says “‘I NEVER PROMISED YOU A ROSE PARADE’ AUTHOR HARRY DINKLE TODAY 1 PM”).
The first young person we’ve seen in two weeks meekly approaches the wise Dinkle (and hey, Harry gets no long line of adoring fans?). She expresses to Harry her desire to teach, and in the next breath reveals her crushing self-doubt. Harry parries by telling her to “err on the side of confidence”, which Sally Student clearly lacks. Finally, with a wag of his pen, Harry advises her that while she probably will fail, to make sure that she fails for the right reasons.
Son of Stuck Funky 
Well, TB and his characters can certainly lecture us about failure.
Please, I hope this is the end. But, realistically, this should be the dialogue:
Fawner: “Whatever whatever whatever whatever.”
Dinkle: “HUH?!”
Fawner: “Whatever whatever whatever whatever.”
Dinkle: “HUH?! I’m Deaf, ya see!”
Fawner: “WHATEVER WHATEVER WHATEVER WHATEVER!!!!11!!”
Dinkle: “Yeah, I LOVE Les Moore. Tom Batiuk, er, I mean, Les Moore is the greatest author EVAH!”
Because you couldn’t possibly get a degree in music education and use it for something like solo instruction or teaching choir or orchestra or theory or anything else. Oh no, you must aspire to be a marching band director like The Great Harry Dinkle or all your hard work will have been for naught. (And once again, we see that in Funkytown it’s not a question of if you will fail, but how you will do so.)
“A failure of timidity”, eh? He must mean like that time the scenery courageously “came out” at WHS’ 2012 senior prom, or the way Cayla’s hair straightened out because her afro was too difficult to draw consistently, or the way Dinkle himself cowered in fear when faced with Becky’s meddlesome old bag of a mother. All failures, lots of timidity.
Once again TomBat presents an author at a book signing as a wise, sage prophet, full of wisdom to dispense upon the great unwashed masses. 1/4 inch from reality, eh Tom? I’m not even going to try to figure out what sort of “convention” this is or why there’s a book signing going on there, as I doubt the author bothered to think it out that far himself.
The horror, the horror…
The utter, inescapable horror…
The knowledge that there is no other path, that there is no escape, that all the sacrifices and prayers we have offered are naught, and “naught” is the best possible outcome… That the hatred of the gods rain down upon us like acid from the digestive tract of the most terrible beast…Where death in all his dominions is the greatest bestow-er of mercy, where plague and disease are the ruling fates….
–oh, sorry, I was basing this all on the SoSF logo, where– where…
Serious Les looms.
Where Serious Les looms, doom and blessed death are sure to follow…to those considered worthy of mercy.
” O feelings of horror, resentment, and pity
For things, which so seldom turn out for the best;
The smirk, unobserved, escaped from the city
As the last of all hope died out in the west”
To those not blessed…Serious Les looms.
I…want to offer comfort, but I…I…(collapses into weeping before being devoured by flame.)
BECKY: [voice-over] I was going to the worst place in the world and I didn’t even know it yet. Weeks away and hundreds of feet up an aisle that snaked through the conference like a main circuit cable plugged straight into Dinkle. It was no accident that I got to be the caretaker of Harry Dinkle’s memory any more than being back in Ahia was an accident. There is no way to tell his story without telling my own. And if his story really is a confession, then so is mine.
Next week — or whenever this band convention/reunion/signing ends — Funky suddenly realizes he hasn’t seen Les in over a month. Since his last asinine argument with Cayla.
Funky goes over to Casa Moore to ask Cayla about it, and she tells him something about a last-minute book tour, glancing nervously at a patch of newly-disturbed dirt in the back yard…
“You can always intern at Westview High, young lady. We’re looking for someone with epilepsy, a missing eye, or lupus.”
I’m very willing to cut TB some slack on today’s lecture because I happen to somewhat agree with him – but only in relation to what one generation should pass on to the next. It is better to do and fail than to do nothing and succeed. More times than not, we regret the things we didn’t do more than the things we did do. So I’d agree with Dinkle’s advice to the young music teacher, in essence – go for it!
…. however when still being a failure of creativity at say…oh age 60 something, it’s best to just close the door of your attic studio and give it up.
Unseen last panel:
Hairband Hoodie-McBookclutcher: “But what I’m really afraid of is the old doofus who used to have the job will come back to follow me around and get up in my business, and school security won’t throw him out. How would you suggest I deal with that?”
Dinkle: “Oh, what’s the use. Girls can’t be band directors. Can you play basketball? NEXT!”
The really sad thing is that BatHack considers arcs like these to be his ‘lighter’ fare. Oh what a happy week (month?) we’ll have learning all the wonderful things that happen at educator conventions. And yet his (hopefully) final message is to fail couragously.
The mind whirls thinking what serious gloom and doom is lurking around the corner now that Less the Magnificent is back in action. Oh well, at least the snark will be better.
Oh crap, Les is gonna be back! Unless Cayla’s rupturing his spleen or is contemplating divorce, I don’t want to see him.
Wow. this might be the first reasonably attractive women to appear in Funky Winkerbean…in like EVER….
..it’s too bad Harry Dinkle appears to be ready to shiv her prison style in the last panel.
Coming next week – Cayla kicks Goatee Boy in the balls, slams his head into the coffee table and declares that becoming White is not working for her. She demands that Les, instead, becomes Black.
Hilarity ensues.
[img]http://img1.findgift.com/Graphics/Gifts/250/148/PR_207148.jpg[/img]
By the way, nobody mentioned this, but Dinkleberry’s wisdom is so effin’ profound (last panel), he can make the sun rise and set.
The cheesy “special effect” in the last panel is to make damn sure we know how wise The Greatest Bandleader In All Of Ahia is. Wooooooo….
Why couldn’t that meteor have hit Westview instead? Buddy the dog is about the only likable character in the whole strip.
I found this output from the BBGSU 3000 (Batominc Bathos Generating Sorrow Unit) in my printer tray this morning.
BBGSU 3000: You’ve gotta fail when everyone’s watching.
BBGSU 3000: Fail and always get hurt.
BBGSU 3000: Fail ’cause the Universe listens.
BBGSU 3000: And fail in this hell on earth.
Hey, if Batiuk hadn’t taken a faily risk and turned FW into a ludicrous soap opera strip 20 years ago, would any of us still bother to read it?
Beanie –
Thanks for the Kip image. Great job! I’ve also noticed the similarity between Les/Cayla and Kip/LaFawnda.
Except of course that Kip and LaFawnda are likable.
Somehow, I’ve never viewed Harry Dinkle in the context of an educator, despite his having been employed at a high school. Even in the strip’s glory days, I always viewed him more as a groundskeeper in the Carl Spackler tradition. Must have been all those performances in the midst of torrential downpours.
But I trust this boring arc has now come to an end. It feels like it’s been longer than two weeks, especially vexing when you realize that nothing has happened besides making lame music puns. Might have been nice to have been treated to some kind of exposition that revealed Harry’s book in advance, instead of suddenly discovering in the middle of the arc that he’s the convention’s guest of honor. Hell, since the arc began with John grumbling about being left alone for the evening, I naturally assumed Becky would be the focus of this arc. How silly of me. I could sure use a towel right about now.
[img]http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_l3fepOGyiK4/SEgvxxv5BpI/AAAAAAAAAMA/TNnSZKPL3Ng/s400/egg+on+face.jpg[/img]
First, I swear that the expression in the next to last panel is from DSH John–as if the real Dinkle and Pervhead switched places. Secondly, why is there a sun setting? I thought they were inside?
Helskor: The term “Soap Opera” came to my mind as well. It seems clear to me that Harry’s screed is Tom’s way of talking to us directly: “I take risks! I push the envelope! I don’t just rest on my laurels!” (Wherever those might be.)
Thing is, having characters die of cancer, lose limbs, develop PTSD, go (temporarily) deaf, etc., isn’t edgy or risk-taking. It’s an easy, lazy way to drum up cheap melodrama. But I guess when you’ve run out of anything genuinely funny or interesting to say, it’s the only option.
A soap opera has:
1. Emotionally charged plotlines that are relevant.
2. Continuity
3. Attractive Characters that you want to see make out.
4. Interesting Characters that you are emotionally invested in.
Funky Winkerbean fails at being a soap opera as much as it fails at being a funny strip.
Batiuk would argue that his plotlines are “emotionally charged”, though “attractive” and “interesting” characters are going to be YMMV.
But continuity? Soap operas yes, Funky Winkerbean no.
I’d call FW a “dope opera,” if anything.