I “So she makes me come here [to Montoni’s] every day.” We know the feeling, Funkman: over the last three months, the majority of strips have been set in the pizzeria, a.k.a., the Chapel of Love, a.k.a. Center of the Funkiverse. Since today’s strip won’t be online until midnight, as a “treat” I’ve scanned the strip from my newspaper.
I looked through the rest of the funnies to see how other cartoonists use Photoshop for their Sunday strips. No doubt they all use it at least to color the panels, and a few more employ Photoshop to add small touches like background gradients. Doonesbury and Get Fuzzy are a little more judicious in their use of digital enhancement: used sparingly, it gives the panels a little extra depth. Tom Batiuk, or whoever colors his Sunday strips, pulls out all the stops, and the result is scenes that appear artificially (and dimly) stage-lit. Observe the two-tone highlighting on Funky’s big head. Where’s that blue light coming from? Have hours lapsed between the daytime first panel exterior shot and the interior shot in panel 2? Interestingly, over at Crankshaft, Chuck Ayers has a much lighter touch with the shading.
16 thoughts on “Not the Retiring Type”
Comments are closed.
Son of Stuck Funky 
The whole strip today has a nightmarish, dream-like feel to it. It may be the scan, but the dim lights and shading look surreal. Also look at the shape of Funky’s head in P4 – stretched into a grotesque elongation, he looks like Sylvester the Cat hit in the face with a frying pan. By P5, Crazy Guggenheim there is also stretching his face and that little hair riser is in the middle of his head. By the last panel Funky’s head has begun to pulsate, It appears to be in the grip of some internal frenzy, twisting around multiple axes and bulging at the forehead.The dialogue is run-of-the-mill useless petty bullshit, but those ghastly visuals make me want to put on a Jefferson Airplane album and lie down for a while.
So that’s two main characters who have nothing to do but drive their spouses nuts all day. Lovely.
Actually, one of the few nice things I’ve had to say about Funky is that the Sunday coloring is often properly moody. Unrealistic, sure, but it gets the point across. Imagine if Funky graced our Sunday pages with flat, bright colors and detail-less fuchsia backdrops, like Garfield.
…Dude, that would actually be funny. And it would fit the level of substance.
Wasn’t there a Sunday strip a few years back about some other piece of Montoni’s memorabilia that was “out for repairs”? Some kind of beer carousel or something? Did they ever get that thing back or what? Don’t leave us hanging here, TB. As regular FW readers we need to stay informed as to the whereabouts of these priceless fictional relics.
Hopefully Funky was just being sarcastic and/or goofing on Harry because it seems unlikely that a guy who was almost bankrupt a few years back suddenly turned it all around fast enough to already be secretly retired. Especially when you consider how Montoni’s is one of Westview’s biggest employers, too. I’ll just assume he’s f*cking with Harry for the sake of it, just as I assume that Harry is that one guy in the group that everyone makes fun of all the time.
And if he is serious, it’s yet another wildly dysfunctional and sort of sick marriage in the Funkyverse, as Mrs. Bean prefers her obese, substance-abuse-prone husband to slave in a sweltering hell-hole than to be forced to endure having his old, fat ass around the house any more than is necessary. Not that I’m blaming her or anything, but still.
So, one couple outside sharing a pizza. One regular at the counter nursing his free cup of Folgers. You need income to save and eventually retire someday, Funky, if that’s the plan.
Harry: “That’s very witty, Funky.”
Funky: “….*…Harry, the sad truth is, it turns out our mutual disapproval and disdain of everything Cory did was the only thing keeping our marriage together. With him gone…we…we have nothing to talk about anymore. I can feel it, sometimes. The silent evaluation she does, every time she looks at me. Looks at me and sees a stranger. Oh gawd. Oh GAWD. I’m going to lose her. Then I’ll have nothing. Nothing but the exact same crummy pizza joint job I’ve allowed to devour my entir-”
Harry: “We got more comical books about Tarzan at the Komix Korner today! Comical books! Pizza Coffee!”
(Funky nods silently, his eyes brimming with unshed tears.)
**********************************
Man, am I ever tired of Funky Winkerbean characters reacting to the weakest, mildest non-jokes in the world as if they were mind-blowing masterpieces of wit. Just look at Harry’s face in panel five! He’s hanging on every word, just bursting ready to explode with laughter.
Epicus Doomus: Wasn’t there a Sunday strip a few years back about some other piece of Montoni’s memorabilia that was “out for repairs”? Some kind of beer carousel or something?
The pleasure was all mine, TF. I hope to help out sometime in the future as well.
I agree with Inkwell–the coloring in the Sunday strips is at least interesting to look at, and it masks the generally mediocre level of Tom Batiuk’s artwork.
I would agree that in this instance, the noir look is way overdone. This looks like a conversation taking place at three in the morning.
This strip makes me miss the wisecracking drunkard Funky from Act 2. Funky actually was funny then.
Thanks TFH, I was surprised to see how long ago that was. Almost three years…it must have really been broken, eh?
Mood, schmood. He compulsively drenches nearly every Sunday strip that isn’t a comic book cover “homage” in the same Creepy Blue Twilight (along with shiny reflective surfaces in each panel) to make FW stand out from the strips surrounding it in the Sunday funnies to remind readers the strip still exists.
So the joke here is that nobody can stand being near Funky for an extended period of time.
OT- Later Peanuts strips showed use of Photoshop. I’ve always wondered if Sparky actually did this himself or if it was an assistant. I seem to remember that Schulz pretty much did the strips all by himself even up to the end.
I’ve seen Edward Hopper paintings that cheerier than today’s strip. This strip is so expressive of such utter bleak dead end despair that one assumes that once this conversation is over both men will attempt suicide. And this being Funky Winkerbean, they will fail.
One of the write-ups for Batiuk’s Comic-Con panel mentions it was co-chaired by Alex Sinclair, who apparently assists with coloring. His comic book work does have a modern style, which is probably (mis)applied to Funky on Sundays.
Ah, Montoni’s… where the only things that don’t get sent out for repairs are everyone’s broken spirits.
Weird. I’m trying to vote comments I enjoyed up, but the hands keep doing this weird flickering thing, and suddenly my positive vote turns into a negative. 😦 What the heck? Is this happening to anyone else?