If there is a teacher at Westview High less competent than Les Moore, it’s Jim Kablichnick, the ostensible teacher of science, as today’s strip aptly demonstrates. And, argh! Is this the intro to the annual “school levy fails” arc? Have we had that yet this cycle (I can’t be arsed to check)? Let me tell you—I’m a dyed-in-the-wool liberal, but I’d vote against this band of nincompoops getting any more tax money!
“[T]he map” in Jim’s classroom “was so old,” he tells Linda, who fails to reply, “How old was it?”
“[T]he continents, which are major land masses surrounded by water, too large to be considered mere islands—the continents, I say—the continent of South America and the continent of Africa—those continents were still conjoined, united, and fitted together in some sort of ‘super’ continent, which would be a nice topic for a comic book,” Jim does not quite say, although Bantom cannot prevent himself from composing Jim’s speech in a loquacious manner, because—I don’t know—he’s never heard of The Elements of Style’s admonition to “omit needless words.” Also, Jim thinks his colleagues are ignoramuses who don’t know what South America and Africa are.
This might have been a mildly amusing joke if not for two flaws.
- The punchline should have read like one of these
- And the map was so old that Africa and South America were still joined together.
- And the map was so old, it only showed Pangaea.
- And the map was so old, it had “here be dragons” instead of Florida.
- And the map was so old, it had Amerigo Vespucci’s autograph.
- This image of a smartphone in Les’s delicate hands, from yesterday’s strip:
If only there were some way to see up-to-date maps in 2015! If only!
Strips like this drive me to drink, and for that, and that only, thank you, Tom Batiuk!
Here endeth my current stint as your guest snarker. Many thanks to TFH! The gloriously acid-tongued Epicus Doomus takes over tomorrow.
Son of Stuck Funky 
Meh, it’s not the worst FW gag ever, a little thin for an entire Sunday strip though. And I’ve always disliked Klabinchnik (or whatever). IMO it’s probably his snide negativity, although you could say that about any FW character other than Buddy.
Give the man a break. After all he has to work with Les and Bull everyday.
“It was then that I remembered that I was supposed to be doing a lesson on plate tectonics that day. But I need something to complain about, and that’s as good an excuse as any.”
Do schools still use pull down maps? From what I’ve seen it’s all smart boards and computers now. Heck, I think that’s what it was even when I was in school.
Linda looks so exhausted in that last panel she can’t even pull off a proper smirk.
If Kablichnick’s here, then there’s got to be a ham-fisted reference to global warming. Check and check!
One has to understand just how truly messed up Ohio’s method for school funding is (the state supreme court has ruled it unconstitutional multiple times, and the state legislature does nothing) to realize just how badly Brooke McBatom® The Misfit Cartoonist fails with strips like these, and with Jim KaVonnegutchik, no less.
Oh well. At least it isn’t St. Les the Righteous Smirker talking to The Immolate Holly Budd and Cindy Ted Baxter of The Invisible Channel 1 News about how he talked to Mason Jarr The Goddam Movie Actor!!! on the phone for the umpteenth time.
@Rusty: “Linda looks so exhausted in that last panel she can’t even pull off a proper smirk.”
Just remember how Brooke McBatom® The Misfit Cartoonist recently depicted Linda when the DUI offer came up.
At least they aren’t talking about Mason Jarr, the actor. (as opposed to mason jar, where we store last year’s zucchini ) And at least it isn’t Pluggers, which yesterday made a timely reference to wardrobe malfunction. It’s a daily battle with me: Which comic is going to be more stupid and backwards and offensively Midwestern than the other.
Ugh, what a way to start a week. To me, Loathsome Linda is worse than Creepy Les, which really says a lot. She’s downright horrible! Not that Creepy Les isn’t horrible (because he is), but at least he never says *such* astonishingly painful/stupid/disgusting/horrible things as she does. Neither does he make *such* ugly Westviewian faces as she does. The above strips are a great example. Oh, and remember “championship Ebola virus”?! (*shuddering*)
Worst. Character. EVER. She’s like Les times ten.
After reading this one again I take back my “meh”. “What sorts of things do you need for your classroom?” is one of the most awkwardly-phrased stupid questions ever. Teacher stuff, you f*cking idiot. God I can’t stand her stupid weary face. Just quit, flee or jump already, geez.
Then I re-read Jim’s little joke and it really ticked me off. You see, when I first read this one I was distracted and pretty much skimmed it and thought the punchline was a typical “our school is so underfunded that…” gag he’s been doing since forever. Pretty bad, but not really very noteworthy in any way. Then when re-reading it I noticed Jim’s little global warming remark (Jim is the strip’s resident environmental expert because science) and it really annoyed me. Not because of the remark itself or the topic itself either, but because now when BanTom is doing one of those cloying interviews of his the interviewer will include “climate change” as an issue FW has “tackled” over the years. And I will once again yell out “mentioning something and tackling something are NOT THE SAME THING!” like I always do when I read those interviews. And you all know I’m right, too. I don’t know who he’s trying to fool with his sneaky devious ways but it isn’t me, I’ll tell you what.
What bothers me most is the over-reach. A lesser hack would have gone for the more obvious “Our skinflint tax payers are so selfish and blind, we can’t afford new maps and must rely on ones that still have the Soviet Union on them” but we’re dealing with a hack sick with over-reach.
I understand Batyecch had petitioned the syndicate to allow this to be an 18 panel, full page episode including not only (the “tackling” of) global warming and under-funded schools, but also the school levy, evil Wall Street, evil wealthy corporate CEOs, “free” healthcare, lighter sentences for murderers and terrorists, and how wonderful unions are. But he backed off after he was told that Shrillary No-Last-Name wasn’t looking for a running mate just yet. I feel deprived.
Anyway, Jim Kvetchinandbitchin’s problems are small potatoes compared to mine. My classroom has a globe… and it’s flat.
*smirkkkkkkk*
Today TB also addresses the topical issue of continental drift.
Ooooooooooooooooooooooooooh! Offended a Shrillary No-Last-Name fan! Pop a Midol, honey. You’ll feel better in a few days.
No, saying this as someone who didn’t vote you down it’s just that the posts are kind of annoying.
On the comic, if it just for a gag then there are two problems. The first one isn’t that big, it’s just that it’s not really funny, which I don’t really expect from a gag strip written just to fill a day. The second and much bigger one is that I honestly can’t tell if it’s just for a gag because things even more ridiculous have been told with complete sincerity and seriousness.
Gyre, if ya don’t like my posts, don’t read ’em. No skin off my ass. I get paid the same either way. But I do love irony — Over on CK, even folks who basically agree with you get annoyed with your lengthy, “overthunk” postings.
There’s no way I can dispute your criticism. You know “annoying” better than anyone else here.
Kisses,
Hadda Mae
Complaining about down-voting is the number one way to get downvoted, by the way.
Hadda, that might be because I’m trying to actually point out why it’s bad, instead of going for typical ‘durr, this is bad and John is a pedo and Cayla’s gotta be sleeping with the principal because they’re black’ that I keep seeing there and is maybe the only thing that people trying to defend FW actually have to legitimately say about online critics.
By the way, the Midview School District actually does pass levies… and is building a new high school (standard operating procedure throughout the entire state, BTW).
Yes, there are many school districts throughout the state that have serious financial problems… but there is absolutely nothing that today’s strip is realistically based off of. It simply comes off as the product of Yet Another Crappy Luigi’s Napkin Gag that Brooke McBatom® The Misfit Cartoonist thought was funny.
BTW, I’d argue that KlaBLAHchink is Batom®’s author avatar regarding climate change. Which wouldn’t be an issue if Batom® didn’t direct KlaBLAHchink to blather about on a non-stop basis, or in this case, whenever his character makes an appearance in the strip. It’s pathetic and makes Batom® look like a total moron. [/soapbox]
I remember that around the same time Jarod was created there was this big thing in the story about how the school had to make cuts to extracurricular activities. And then that was just dropped. Much the same way apparently the town is really suffering economically, but all that amounted to was Khan being written out after he’d been completely irrelevant for years.
And I can understand that this story is driven by characters, so maybe the fans (and yes, somehow there are) wouldn’t want to read about the problems of the town consistently, but why not have the cast work to do something to fix the problems if you’re going to make big mention of them?
The thing that’s stupid about the Jim Dumbshitdick’s global warming line is how it’s such an unsubtle irrelevant-to-the-joke detail jammed into this strip like your standard Had To Take a Shit SoSF comment.
Sigh. I brought the Wrath Of SOSF upon myself by referencing pseudo celebrity Shrillary No-Last-Name. How was I to KNOW so many of you little boys needed a mommy figure? Please, though, don’t mind me. Go ahead and vote for her. She’s going to lose anyway. But that’ll leave her more time to wipe your bottoms and change your dipies.