The big dramatic turning point in Author Guy’s big “Lust For Lisa” arc is Les remembering there’s a “kill fee” clause in his contract. A lazy writer writing a lazy story about a lazy writer who’s found a loophole enabling him to collect money for doing less work. Welcome to the Funkyverse, where indecision and cowardice are attributes and Les Moore is a paragon of virtue.
Le Chat returns from out of nowhere to deliver some of the most cringe-worthy dialog ever…”happy off the table”…”the bipolar express”…dear God that is atrocious, just reeking of “try-hard”. After two weeks of pointless meandering crap he suddenly wants to get all faux-angsty again? Over a guy who’s pleased as punch to have found a way to quit his job and still get paid? Via that irritating imaginary cat? Les isn’t “bipolar”, he’s just a selfish jerk who basks in the misfortunes of others, that’s all.
And yikes, he’s just incredibly punchable today, strutting around and smirking because he’s ready to ruin everything for everyone just because he can. It’s rage inducing to say the least. If TB is trolling us and going for peak Les objection-ability here, well f*cking done indeed, my man. If not, well, wow.
Son of Stuck Funky 
Oh, Les. Dear, sweet, face-punchable Les.
Bravo, Mr. Bat Guano! Your brilliance is shining with the luminosity of a thousand suns! Leading us through quagmire after quagmire on order for us to actually experience the dressed soul that is Les. With each new cri de butthurt we peered a little deeper into the psyche of Disturbed Writer Guy. Such a pathetic creature! Brilliant! The sudden appearance of Le Chat Blech, fresh from Les’ fevered imagination really delivers the goods and let’s us all in on just how sick in the head Les really is. Also, what a brilliant twist of fiction that is contract law in your world. The notion that Les’ agreement with Hollywood would allow Les to arbitrarily pull the plug on the entire project and get paid a fee for doing so is nothing short of remarkable. I am left breathlessly awaiting Monday’s installment – spent, like Lisa in a van…
*depressed soul* damn spell correct shit thing.
So, if I’m understanding this correctly (and I may very well not be, considering that Batiuk has yet to explain what a ‘kill fee’ is), Les is pulling the plug on the production, with no regard for all the other people who are working on it. After all, what do their jobs matter when compared to the importance of preserving Les’ image of sainted Lisa?
You know, by the 1970s, Christopher Lee was sick and tired of playing Dracula, but he put his own feelings aside and kept on making the movies because so many crew members depended on them for their livelihoods. Now, I know Christopher Lee isn’t as “highbrow” a figure as Pavarotti, but I think the anecdote is much more relevant. (And I said it in one sentence instead of stretching it out for a week.)
Happy was off the table?! (Never mind that in the Funkyverse, there IS no table…!) Anyhow, what could Less possibly have to be happy about? Oh, yeah: wretched, maudlin tome turned into a movie for a substantial sum of money, put up in a luxury hotel, etc., etc.- we all know the litany of Less’ “sufferings” by now!
Hallucinatory cat talking to Les without any kind of explanation or relevance to the plot that couldn’t be replaced by a mirror. Following my drinking game, take a drink. To cope with this excuse of a plot.
Seriously, it’s been at least a few months since we last saw that idiotic sign of Les Moore’s growing insanity. Why did Batiuk think it was a good idea now?
Among the twitter comments in the column at the right of this page is one from August 15 by Kelly Gerow that says it all: “Seriously. What is going on with Funky Winkerbean these days? Are we just waiting for all the characters to die?”
So I guess Les won’t be paying back his advance to kill this production? And if he does get to pull the plug on this, why waste the time “advising” the actors? The only thing I really enjoy about Batiuk’s rendering of his author avatar is how physically awkward he appears.
How could anyone think Les is bipolar, given that the closest he gets to happy is “smug while acting superior to a student or friend”.
Great. The damned thing shows up just when he’s going to be a smug, sadistic, selfish creep pissing in the soup just because he can…and it doesn’t stop him, it just makes him feel bad about being the smarmy jerk he is. He puts me in mind of the German word “Backpfeifengesicht”: a face badly in need of a fist in it.
You know….”pull the plug Les”, after-all he & TB have had plenty of practice….. How many story arch’s and characters have had their plugs pulled on them?
As if a first-time writer has the power to stop production. As always, whenever I read this crap “comic,” I want to poke my eyes out. The horror!
@Paul Jones. Thanks for teaching me the new German term. Highly appropriate for Les. What’s strange is that I know someone who looks and acts just like Les, he’ll refer to his “superior intellect” in group company so people like Les really exist ;(((
drawing this strip is like masturbation: the one doing it gets pleasure, anyone watching gets sick,
I just had me an epiphany as to why Misery Cat doesn’t want Les to share the wealth. On the one hand, misery isn’t as valuable when it’s spread around and on the other, he doesn’t want Les to realize that unlike what he might think, the world isn’t loaded with people laughing at him because they’re having a better time than he is. If he were to figure out that most people live lives of quiet desperation, he wouldn’t be a special misery snowflake and that’d be unfair.
@CRM114: You have my pity.
Did TB really just nonchalantly suggest that Les has bipolar disorder?
Any other mental illnesses you want to belittle, TB? With the recent news of Robin Williams, you can try Parkinson’s! And I won’t even suggest that that would be in bad taste, because it’s obvious that that means absolutely nothing to you! Hell, that may make it more attractive to you!
You know I thought yesterday’s comic said “the Kill Feel!” instead of “the Kill Fee!!” (which is somewhat understandable as I read words in my southern twang where fill, bill, feel and wheel all rhyme)
Anyway…my God this arc is the biggest stupidest mess ever and BORING!
Interesting that The author’s use of a ‘kill fee’ to shut down the production and save Les’ masterpiece is in trope language an “ass pull”.