Wow, Jff continues to delve deeply into complete mania…over a comic book. I’m sure glad Holly didn’t give him two comic books, or we’d be looking at exploded brains all over the walls. And now we can see whose birthday, briefly glimpsed yesterday, is being celebrated (I had the idea that it was Jff’s birthday, and Holly had scribbled a message on the comic book in grease pencil). It’s Daisy Air Rifle’s birthday!
Good thing there aren’t any air rifles around, or Jff’s uncontrollable madness might result in tragedy.
Of course, it wouldn’t be a tragedy we would care about, nor would it be a tragedy that could help Funky Winkerbean. Because unless I miss my guess, this is the first Funky Winkerbean strip in which none of the actual Funky Winkerbean characters appear. So if all these people died, we’d still have Les, Dinkle and the other denizens of the Winkerbean Mythos. Damn it.
Son of Stuck Funky 
I’ve been reading FW (with a few lengthy breaks) since the 1970s, which means I must have read many thousands of them by now. In spite of that, I have absolutely no idea who the blonde woman is or who “Grammy Rose” is supposed to be. And I only know who Pm n Jff are because Batom made me. Isn’t the cast of characters already large enough? This strip has characters that haven’t appeared in years, I mean Becky’s mom is still stuck on a scissor lift for crying out loud and no one has seen Rana, Jinx or Rachel’s kid in years. There’s definitely no need or demand for Crankshaft cameos. This strip is getting so nonsensical and so self-indulgent that pretty soon it’ll just be nothing but TB self portraits in front of the Pulitzer shrine, 24/7.
Batiuk really seems to believe that women everywhere hate comics by default, unless they’re doing something nice for their son and get converted.
Jeff really wanted that comic. He made one feeble attempt to buy it on Ebay and then gave up. Currently, there are 19 up for sale on Ebay, including some with a “Buy it Now” price (no auction to lose).
@ Epicus Doomus: I think the blonde woman is Mindy Murdoch, first cousin of Jessica, whose father, John Darling, was murdered.
Yeah, it’s stupid. But sometimes you have to just let stupid be stupid.
Spode: Ahhh, John Darling. I’ve heard of John Darling, who’s occasionally John Darling mentioned in the strip. John Darling.
@Epicus: “Grammy Rose” refers to Jff’s (now presumably dead) mother, a complaining, bitter old battleax who was arguably the most hateful person in the entire household (and remember, this is a family that includes Ed Crankshaft). However, considering that her son has been completely unable to live a fulfilling adult life without knowing how this second-tier Silver Age serial ended, her disappointment in and resentment of him becomes a lot more understandable.
TheDiva: So the Crankyverse is a lot like the Funkyverse, only the characters are even older? If Batiuk keeps this up he’ll have to start using footnotes. And then we’re all truly doomed.
I know it’s a longshot but does anyone know which FW character has gone the longest between appearances? Check out the cast of characters on the official FW site, I see at least three or four that probably haven’t appeared in Act III at all. Sally Kearns? “Mooch”? The choir director? I mean come on, time to update that page already.
Crazy and Donna’s children seem to have disappeared (they had more than one, right?). We haven’t seen Rachael’s son in quite awhile, nor have we seen Rana, Wally and Becky’s adopted daughter.
Hey, at least the strip is staying true to the mandatory conclusion of death and tragedy, which is implied in the punchline. Honestly, this strip.
I’ll make allowances for things like Pam’s creepy thin neck, it’s not that easy to put a lot of effort into art that’s meant to be in something as small as a comic strip panel, but the blonde in panel 2 looks like something from a creepypasta.
And question for anyone else using Disqus. Can you use it to check to see what your alerts are currently? Because I can’t and I can’t tell if they managed to make their system even worse or if I have to allow even more scripts to run just to see the alerts.
Great. Three people we don’t care about talking about something we shouldn’t care about when other people who haven’t been seen in years are living more exciting lives. Self-indulgence, thy name is Batiuk.
Nice of Fishstick Annie to appear in the final panel today.
Batom Inc. shoud just get it over with and change the name of the strip to “Wow, Comic Books!” or “I Wanted to be a Comic Book Artist When I Was Younger!”
Good artwork today. You can really see the regret in Mindy’s face, as the long-festering realization that she never should have broken up with Mooch completely hits her for the first time.
“He’s on the outside…” she glumly muses. “Outside of the bubble, free to talk about sports, or musical theater, or breakfast cereal. Free to work outside of the pizza and education industries. Free from this unstable comic book-based currency. Free… and I could have been too…”
God the lameness of this – so it was the story not having the actual comic? And not only that it was the third story in the book? (i checked) i’m utterly gobsmacked that the Author thinks Jeff’s response is touching and amusing and not creepy and more than a bit barking mad.
Even if you want to use the “technology is evil” trope to elderly people. Jeff should be familiar with e-readers and pads since this effing thing is in the future!!!!!!!!
If Jeff wanted to find out how the plot ended, there are a bajilion ways he could a digital copy of the story. He could even get a reprint collection.
This is a nostalgia fail at the highest degree.
Serious question – Does Tom Batiuk even put the slightest bit of effort into his work anymore? I mean, I was writing more coherent and plausible stories when I was in the 7th grade.
“I’m sure glad Holly didn’t give him two comic books, or we’d be looking at exploded brains all over the walls.”
What would happen if Holly gave away TWO comic books at once? Based on this she would become a full fledged Scanner.
So this is two weeks in a row that TB has taken a whole week to do something that wasn’t really worth doing for one day. What will it be next week? Owen forgets his locker combination?
Sorry Batiuk, but in your effort to be obscure, you have made a mistake. Congo Bill was transformed into Congorilla starting with Action Comics #248 (January 1959) and the series became Congorilla running until #262. Action Comics #243 would be a Congo Bill story and it was not continued from Action Comics #242. If Batiuk had picked a number from 248 to 262, he would have been good.
Well, howtheduck, you are only half right. This was a Congo Bill story (not Congorilla), but it was continued from Action Comics #242 (“Safari From Space!”).
@bobanero – Fiftieth anniversary, man, fiftieth anniversary. You can’t make an omelet without taking a week to break each egg.
@howtheduck–for some reason i’m guessing the “payoff” will be a Sunday rip-off strip (much like beckoningchasm provided yesterday) of #243 with the lion-headed Superman that he has some specific gag for.
Also, he’s kind of lazy. And maybe obstinate (‘who are you going to believe, me or your lying database?’).
@hankgillette – Maybe tomorrow we will luck out and Jeff will say, “Oh. This is Congo Bill and not Congorilla. It’s been so long I forgot.”
@howtheduck and hankgillette, if you two start talking about pizza we’re going to know that you live in Westview 🙂 Nah, I know that’s not true you two actually know what you’re talking about and/or how to do research.
I just hope he’s not the one tto die smiling with a funny book in his hands…..