TheDiva
April 2, 2013 at 12:13 am
There’s a Lone Ranger movie coming out this summer, so for once Batiuk is (a year and) three months ahead of the time. I’m sure this is entirely coincidental, though.
I’m thinking coincidence too. It’s more likely that someone who thinks that Flash Gordon is still timely would expect teens to find the Lone Ranger relatable.
There is more to the Lone Ranger’s Creed, and it’s actually not too bad as far as creeds go. It doesn’t really apply that much to Owen’s situation, however, but that’s the kind of counsel you get when you go to the comic book guy for advice.
Son of Stuck Funky 
Love the banner, TFH and Bad Wolf!
I can’t disagree with the message Bunky’s trying to convey: standing up for the bullied is good. But why do all his characters lift their wisdom from pop culture? I’ve taken messages from stories before, but this is a story. Instead of having them admire other characters, why not have them be those admirable characters? Right now I have a stronger liking for the Lone Ranger than I do Cowen or DSH.
And once again, Batiuk addresses a serious real-world issue with all the complexity, insight, and helpfulness of a thirty-year-old after school special.
Why is a man with no friends spouting off about being a friend?
Leave it to BatBuck Jones to involve 40’s nostalgia in an arc about middle-aged goth chicks…er, I mean high school bullying. I guess that’s the price you pay when you write your strip seventy years ahead of time. You end up sacrificing a certain…topicality, let’s say. Luckily for the reader though, DSHJ is there to ponderously drone yet again…I mean explain it to us.
Coming tomorrow: Capt. America and his pal Nazi-Smasher join forces with The Andrews Sisters to offer Owen some sound, sage, totally non-cliched and original advice about dealing with those bullies with the oddly-shaped heads.
Here’s what bugs me about this. First, Smelly Wool Hat Boy should be talking to an actual responsible ADULT about a serious issue like this. Parent? Guidance counselor? Teacher? Even excessively folksy Principal Nate (when he’s not banging Cayla in the Vendos Room). Instead, he goes to that creepy man-child who you never see with his wife because he’s always hanging with young boys. And instead of having a serious conversation, speaking directly about the issue of bullying, Skunkhead rambles about some fictional character. I mean, WTF, Batso?
It’s scary that Bats thinks Pervy John is some quirky, but otherwise normal adult. It’s bad enough that the kids encounter him when they get together for video games or browse comic books (assuming kids today still do that). But should they be going to this guy for personal advice? In real life, the thought that a “man” like this would have gained that much of my kids’ trust would make me awaken screaming in the night.
Well, this confirms it for me. Tom Batiuk knows that Les Moore is so hated that accurate measurements cannot be taken. He finally understands that Les is “toxic” with a capital “T” and offering a gift certificate for free decontamination is not going to square that circle again.
So, he has taken the next logical step.
He’s chosen a new avatar – Dead Comic Book John.
Read (if you have the Ipecac, or Syrup of Squill in a sufficient dosage) the last few months and tell me I’m wrong.
Why does Owen feel guilty about not stepping in to defend somebody else being bullied when he’s clearly unable to keep HIMSELF from being bullied (and doesn’t even appear to be trying; but of course blaming the victim is only acceptable in the odd-numbered strips, where bullying is being played for laughs, and not in the even-numbered strips, where it’s a Serious Social Issue)?
How about that…Dead Skunk Head, the one who speaks English as a first language and Vulcan as a second, got one right. It needs to be noted, however, that he couldn’t do this without delving into the world of masked crimefighters.
Douche.
How long will the Pervy Pseudo-intellectual John Show continue this week? Because it’s just a matter of time before he works horseshit like “hidebound literalist” into the conversation.
Thanks TFH! Achievement Level: “Banner” Unlocked
Last week i realized i hadn’t done any remixes in a while… i’m sure that had nothing to do with how mind-numbingly, soul-killingly boring the go-nowhere arcs have been for the last few (?) months. Anyone else get the feeling after the wedding it’s been…. 6 months of filler?
Ha! Dead Skunk Head is setting Owen up for a righteous ass-beating! Good times!
Number 8 in the Lone Ranger Creed: “that sooner or later…somewhere…somehow…we must settle with the world and make payment for what we have taken.” Presumably by contracting cancer or having a stroke or losing an arm.
Even if John was the “quirky but harmless” character or even a “lovable loser”, he is not the person you would go for advice.
Yes, we all have to stand up when Jerri Blank is being bullied.
Man, those movie producers choose the WRONG comic strip to use for cross promotion!
When Dear Abby writes “talk to a trusted adult”, this is not what she meant.
Here’s what bugs ME about all this: Why even change the traditional WWJD to the Lone Ranger in the first place? The answer is the same either way, right? I’m not religious so it doesn’t bother me from that perspective. But why complicate things for no reason?
I think Batiuk’s point is that John’s religion is comic books.
Wouldn’t Jesus turn the other cheek? Chullo head does that everyday.
@bad wolf “Anyone else get the feeling after the wedding it’s been…. 6 months of filler?”
I started reading the strip around the time the Gay Prom Arc was ending…say, nine months or so. During that time, I can think of only four* things that have happened:
Les went to Mount Kilimanjaro.
Cory joined the Army.
Les got married.
Fred had a stroke.
Each one of these things was handled in the dullest, most perfunctory fashion possible. The Kilimanjaro trip should have been really spectacular, instead it was all Les smirking and Dan being a bozo. Same with the other threads–all peripheral talk with none of the important parts highlighted at all. Fred had a stroke? Let’s retcon him into a real bastard who crushed everyone’s dreams.
I really do think it’s time for Batiuk to put the strip out of its misery.
*As I was typing this I thought of a fifth: Crazy Harry got fired. Again, handled both implausibly and uninterestedly–to the point where I’d completely forgotten about it.
“Crazy Harry got fired. Again, handled both implausibly and uninterestedly–to the point where I’d completely forgotten about it.”
Of course it made no sense. He probably had enough seniority to bump someone. Assuming the worst, Harry would have been RIF’d, in which case he would have gotten severance pay. Of course, there could have been buyouts or early outs also.
But that would not have worked in the story.
How “Chemo Sloppy” for todays snark banner.
Cancer makes for a better stroy arch then a stroke according to Batyuck.
will we ever learn about “fred’s pre-fishstick” adventures?..and what readdly did happen in that “Lighthouse” group home.
I honestly can’t think of an interesting storyline. Even ones that could’ve been interesting suffered from terrible pacing…I’m sure that the Les wedding arc had huge swathes cut out of it–we speculated for months that it would involve Dead Lisa somehow–but it didn’t.
I think the strip would be funny if Owen said one of these three lines:
1) “Well, she WASN’T a man…at least, I hope not.”
2) “Actually, she wasn’t one of my classmates. She snuck in.”
3) “Bull****!”
I myself like “that a man should make the most of what equipment he has.” I’m glad, however, that Gross John didn’t get that far.
I’m also very very CROSS about the logic he employs. He’s an idiot, so there’s that, but there’s also the fact that Batiuk doesn’t think he’s an idiot. “[Making] a better world” doesn’t really have any obvious connection to busting in and trying to stop bullying one witnesses. It certainly doesn’t create the obligation to act that Gross John seems to think it does. Heck, Owen could follow that creed simply showing kindness to the next person he sees.
Clarifying this, and countering Batiuk’s shallow-minded and faulty logic, is doing my part to make this a better world.
—Here’s what bugs ME about all this: Why even change the traditional WWJD to the Lone Ranger in the first place?—
Maybe he’s worried about offending his non-christian readership.
He doesn’t want to offend the one jewish reader he has in the condemned building in Brooklyn, New York by catering to the only three christian readers that live in the basement of the church in South Bend, IN.
Hey, you gotta keep circulation up you know!!
John: “So, did reciting the moral code of the Lone Ranger help you out?”
Owen: “….who’s the Lone Ranger? I mean, I heard some Johnny Depp movie will be about him, but seriously, I am SO lost.”
John: *sigh* “Very well, how about following the example of Superman?”
Owen: “String the woman I love along for decades, then dump her for a hot Amazon?”
John: “…perhaps a poor example. Spider-Man! Now there’s a hero!”
Owen: “…make a deal with Satan so I can avoid the consequences of my choices?!? I dunno…”
John: “Rassin’ frassin’…BATMAN, dammit!”
Owen: “….*…you want me to dress children up in tights and expose them to extreme danger while I cosplay as a small furry mammal and beat up mentally ill people?”
John: “GAH!”
BeckoningChasm: ALL of Act III has been filler, every bit of it. He’s been on cruise control ever since Lester wept in the rain. Every Act III arc has been a glacially-paced bunch of go-nowhere crap-ola, even the big “prestige” arcs. Within the last few years it’s been meandering even more aimlessly than before, which is really saying something. IMO he’s completely out of ideas and even when he does come up with something he has no clue what to do with it, thus arc after arc of mindless babble, ridiculous retconning and flaccid, pointless time-killing nothingness. If FW ever featured an even remotely interesting story it’d die of loneliness.
Maybe it’s the infrequent interviews that give me a false sense of movement. Six months ahead of time we hear about Kilimanjaro, or the Gaymageddon, or Cory’s collecting Starbuck Jones covers. Then we wait, and look for hints or foreshadowing in the text itself (result: there almost never is any), then eventually something happens in the slowest, most random way possible.
Somehow it felt like there was some narrative movement towards the wedding, then suddenly it dropped off into riding around looking at houses, Crazy Harry, stroke, some more DSH John, uninspired high school jokes… none of which really seem to have any energy at all.