“Chamber of Commerle?” Oh, Chamber of Commerce! Well, Funky is the president of the local chamber, so it makes sense that he would try and solicit John as a member. Just think of the networking opportunities with the many other businesses in town: Jitters Coffee Shop, Citizen Khan’s Deli, the Village Booksmith…oh wait, they’re closed.
Epicus Doomus
March 7, 2013 at 12:26 am
…in addition to being the slovenly middle-aged owner of a dingy little comic book shop, John is also an undisciplined, scheming, disrespectful lying little shit as well.
Undisciplined for sure, and you can add “clueless business owner” to that description. Business at the Komix Korner may have seen a slight bump with the addition of a comic book sommelier to the staff, but John clearly operates the place as a clubhouse for his teenage boy buddies, and thinks himself daring for refusing to interact with fellow business owners.
Son of Stuck Funky 
Based on everything we know about Westview, Funky and DSHJ should be the two most prosperous and successful business owners in town. First you get the pizza, then you get the comics, then you get the power…that’s how it’s always been in Westview. Yet Funky needs to work the counter 24/7 (and even had to go back in time once) to make ends meet and DSHJ openly admits that he has no real desire to succeed or to even run his business like an adult. He’s just content to hang around his creepy little store trying to impress dimwitted teenagers with his inane ramblings while pocketing their meager allowance money each week. “Working without a net”…more like “working without a real job”. Bring back Grab Bag Week: DSHJ is way overexposed right now and his whole schtick is getting especially grating.
“Chamber of commerce”….lol.
How much networking does the owner of a comic book shop (and the third largest employer in Westview after the school and the pizzeria) really need?
Oh, and “working without a net”… I’m going to assume that rather than trying to make a joke so lame Les wouldn’t have touched it, John is actually so dense that he does not know what the word “networking” means.
Epicus, is John anywhere near the “undisciplined, scheming, disrespectful lying little shit” that Funky is?
@ Epicus Doomus: Yeah, I’m thinking those two ARE the Westview Chamber of Commerce. Well, I guess you could add the mortuary, the Old Folks Hole, The Our Lady of Abandon All Hope Ye Who Enter Hospital, and Terrorist Khan’s Food on a Stick to the list.
Regardless, I’m not sure I get the joke, if in fact there is one. Is it a terribly executed pun involving “net” and “networking”? If so, then please do fuck off, Mr. Batiuk. And a double fuck off for Funky’s thoroughly crushworthy face in panel 2.
THAT SECOND PANEL.
Funky is dead.
Funky has been dead.
Is this a hallucination or is his corpse now a puppet?
“I do just fine enticing teenaged boys to my shop, thank you very much. Using a net won’t be necessary, but if you know of anyone who has a couple of spare dog crates they wouldn’t mind parting with, that’s a different story. But I don’t want to attract too much attention to my shop, lest parents should start to become suspicious.”
What has Batominc got for us this time? A smorgasbord of suck! Yay!
Our friend John Weber went way too easy on Batominc and DSHJ when he named FW the worst comic strip of 2012. Weber focused on DSHJ’s condescension towards the reader, but virtually everything about this strip is horrible, morally suspect, or intellectually bankrupt. Yesterday’s literally unconscionable installment was horrible in isolation, but in the context of DSHJ’s (charitably) unintentional creepiness, it reeks with the fetor of hellfire.
As you will recall, Batominc’s distortion of body parts fascinates me. I call it the War on Limbs, because a guy with a BFA from Kent State must be doing it deliberately, right? Panel 1’s rendering of DSHJ is the Thermonuclear Armageddon on Limbs, Torsos, Heads, Buttocks, and Clothing! And this is DSHJ, the Author Mouthpiece for the literary criticism of the serial art form! His entire body is rendered as if in some horrible space warp distortion field.
Inexplicably, of course.
Is it just me, or is DSH really TB? Someone please photoshop the toupee out, and I think we would find the resemblance quite striking.
La Chambre de Commerle sounds like some secret French BDSM club. Not sure why John isn’t a member already.
I admit to driving by car wrecks and not looking but I still continue to watch this strip every day. Does this make me a bad person?
BTW. I’ve never been to a comic book convention but if the organizers would ever commit to a discussion panel that included TB and Stephan Pastis I’d be there. It would be awesome!
No, he’s not interested because “networking” would involve interacting with ADULTS rather than young boys. And once they got a whiff of this guy, they might start looking into what’s going on in his little room above the pizza joint. Why else would he reject the idea so quickly? And look so nervous about it?
Other than in the name of very lame wordplay, how do you get from “networking” to “working without a net??” And in what way does Meatface work without a net? What does he mean? Is he this daring, yet successful risk taker? The ONLY risk he takes is going around LOOKING like a child molestation case waiting to happen.
Epic, monumental wordplay fail today, Bat Hack. Lesson learned: When Ayrhead’s snoring wakes you up in the middle of the night, go back to sleep. Don’t write your dialog.
John is coasting by on One Arm’s salary and sweet, sweet health benefits.
Hey SoSFers!
Are you uncaringly wealthy?
Do you know someone named Andrew?
Is their birthday/anniversary/bar mitzvah coming up?
Do you hate Andrew?
Are you willing to spend $18.54 above first class US postage to recieve a letter from the future?
Is your local post office still open?
If you answered “yes” to all of the above, the perfect purchase awaits you.
Also… Is my favorite FW character, Montoni’s ubiquitous green pitcher, no longer worthy of a tag? I especially like its performace today, where it understandably gets as far as possible from these two cads.
TFH sez: Great catch, BTS. Tagged!
So as much as John prides himself on his store being a “safe haven”, what’s going on up there now? Is it closed? Is Harry being a perv again?
Chamber of Commerce???? Who?? What is it three people meet every in Funky’s basement to shoot pool and drink Old Milwaukee??
Okay there’s Montoni’s, Toxic Taco’s & now Komix Korner. What other business could there be in this godforsaken town?
This is just a confidence scam by Funky, to fleece DSH John isn’t it?
This whole comic strip is a “Chamber of Horrors”
You know, the sad thing about Batuik’s art is he isn’t bad. (Yeah, I know, bear with me here.) Glorified blobs like Crock run in the papers every day, and Batsy here at least puts a basic amount of skill into drawing actual people.
But he doesn’t put skill into consistency, composition, or especially facial expressions. I don’t even know how you draw a monstrosity like panel 2. Which I maintain is a corpse.
Now now, I think panel 2 Funky is delightful! He looks as if he’s about to start serenading Gross John, or just break into a happy song from Mary Poppins or The Sound of Music or something.
And considering how Gross John probably smells*, that’s a victory right there.
*- (Probably a mixture of Febreze, mildew, urine, pork grease, swamp gas and body odor)
Yeah, join the Chamber Of Commerce and network, so your businees can thrive like Montoni’s, where they still can’t afford to replace their corded wall phone from 1979…
Re: The eBay item Billy linked to. Gonna get MY bid in! Why am I not surprised that Batshit thought it was 2990 when he typed that letter? Just see ANY discussion of the inconsistencies of his nutty “time jumps,” or how his characters variably age and youthen by 20 years from day to day. What the Hell year IS it in Wankerbeanland now? 2012? 2013?2023? Shit, maybe it IS 2990. Just don’t ask Swishy Tom. He has no idea.
$600 for the signature of a sub-par cartoonist plus $19 for shipping and handling? AND it has a typo in the date? I need to get in to the lucrative crappy-cartoonist-autograph market!
@billytheskink knocked it out of the park today. Two nice posts.
John: “I really like working without a net.” *suspicious glare*
Funky: “….um, okay.”
John: “I don’t like it when people suggest I do things, Funky. You know that.”
Funky: “Well, I -am- your landlord.”
John: “That doesn’t give you any rights over me!!!”
Funky: “Um, yes. Yes, it does.”
John: “Yeesh! Next you’ll expect me to start PAYING rent again!”
Funky: “Actually-”
John: “HMMPH! Just for that, I’m taking this pie up to my room where I will NOT eat it while looking at pictures of cartoon animals naked!”
Funky: “…who takes care of your kids again?”
I don’t want to be one of those Beady Eyed Nitpickers who get Swishy Tom so upset, but take a gander at how Creepy McManchild is holding his pizza in the last panel. Amazingly, that might be even more awkward than the way he held it in his palm before. In fact, looks like it would hurt. Batso’s war on anatomy rages on.
$599.00 for Batiuk’s autograph is just silly. Especially since you can just right-click it and save directly to your hard drive. Once you print it out, it looks every bit as meaningless as the original.