Few people remember how this legendary Act II arc ended up playing out. Dinkle did indeed stab Crankshaft, causing the bus to plunge into one of Ohio’s many ravines. A guilt stricken Dinkle rendered first aid to Crankshaft who managed to survive, but the entire band died of exposure while awaiting rescue. In one of the strip’s most harrowing twenty-two week sequences, Harry and Crankshaft resorted to cannibalism to survive long enough for Les and Lisa to rescue them. Some of TB’s most chilling (pun intended) work.
The fact that Dinkle is the one reciting this retconned story makes it pretty creepy if you ask me. He’s flat-out admitting that he once threatened to kill a school bus driver for refusing to drive children through unsafe conditions. While that sort of thing was considered hilarious back in 1976, now it’d probably result in that weirdo Dinkle being banned from the school for life, at least. And he’s telling this story to a woman who lost her arm in a car crash, no less. Surprisingly tone-deaf stuff from a guy so in tune with the issues facing young people today and (zzzzzzzz).
Son of Stuck Funky 
Does it really matter that it’s a director’s baton? “Baton between your ribs” wouldn’t have been sufficient?
Don’t get me wrong. I’m laughing, but not for the reasons Captain FTCA Batom® wanted me to laugh.
It’s obvious that Dinkle has deeply incriminating information on Nate Green and everyone on the Westview School Board.
Man, Dinkle really was such a better character back then. Act III is in such dire need of a violent single-minded psycho with no regard for human life. I’m serious, too. These Act III characters are all exactly the same, just a whiny smart-alecky bunch of mopes who exchange wry banter while waiting for the other shoe to drop. Old Dinkle threatening to kill Crankshaft isn’t just funny because we’d all like to see Crankshaft die, it’s funny because you rarely get to see a FW character threatening another FW character with violence like this. It’s something I’d like to see more of too.
Wow, when Ed Crankshaft has more regard for the safety and well-being of his charges than you do, you’re really not in a good place.
So the bus drove on, and was in a thirty vehicle pileup on the unplowed interstate. The good news is every kid on the bus lost an arm. Thus, an entire generation of high school band directors was born. Smirks all around!
Hey Mr. 1/4″ from reality with snow that deep and still coming the conference would have been rescheduled. If there had been a joke here that would have been one thing, but this is just plain sociopathic behavior.
While were on the subject, make up your damn mind. Either you’re against comic violence (Bull never bullied Les, Les’ hall monitor machine gun was a cardboard cutout, … retcons) or you’re for it.
What interests me is that Dinkle still thinks that he’s the victim here. It’s not about a trivial two feet of snow, it’s about an uncooperative old fool blathering about a non-issue trying to take his glory away from him. The fact that the visor of his hat ALWAYS covers his eyes has always suggested to me that he’s blinded himself to reality because his uniform has gone to his head.
Crankshaft isn’t any better, either. It’s reminiscent of the “Peanuts” gags where Charlie Brown wants to continue a baseball game despite the diamond obviously flooding because of the monsoon.
But in Crankshaft, Dinkle comes off as a complete sociopath.
@ComicTrek: That’s definitely not a baton. That’s a Batom®.
I know what greater New England’s favorite comic strip is today…
Crankshaft: “That’s NOT my ribs!”
Dinkle: “That’s not my director’s baton!”
The really weird thing about today’s episode (and today’s Crankshaft) is that Tom Batiuk is clearly trying to make Crankshaft sympathetic here, when his entire (cough) comic appeal is that he’s a hateful old grouch. Are some papers threatening to drop Crankshaft because it’s too unpleasant? Because this is the most baffling retcon of all.
I think I’m going to enjoy the Funky Winkerbean version of “Alive”.
It’s as if Dinkle’s nonexistent “hearing loss” retirement was a red herring; that this was the real reason why the Westview schools forced him to ultimately step down.
Oh wait. That involves WRITING.
@Nathan Obral: He certainly doesn’t seem to have a hearing problem so it is likely that he was relieved of duty for being so stupid and unconcerned with the lives of his charges that he made Ed Crankshaft look like Mahatma Gandhi.
as noted elsewhere – Dinkle is telling this story – “and then I threatened the life of the bus driver. Hah.Hah. Good times.”
Handy links for the current Crankshaft crossover
Monday
Tuesday
Wednesday
Thursday
@Nathan Obral: Hahaha! Batom. Those should be a hit in music stores everywhere!
@TFHackett: Heh. I was actually a bit amused by those last two strips. But the creepy part of it is, since the characters are “young” in the Crankshaft strip, what do you suppose is happening with Lisa at this point?
@ComicTrek: Assuming that Funky is still in real-time (which would make Owen, Cody and Alex the oldest high-school juniors in modern history) this probably took place in early 2000 Funky Winkerbean time.
Batom®, if you are upset because people don’t take you seriously for such a preposterous time difference, you have no one to blame but yourself. I highly doubt that Brendan Buford told you to do a second time skip after killing off St. Lisa the Cancer Chew Toy.
TFH: That makes it all worthwhile, thanks!
In total agreeance with ED that Dinklemeister is just creepy as hell today, confessing to threatening to murder someone because they didn’t want to put children’s live in danger. It’s right up there with Ol’ One-Arm welcoming her first husband back from the dead by offering him the American flag that had once covered his coffin.
The Tuesday Crankshaft is… is…
Of course Harry Dinkle and Ed Crankshaft worked together before… The Immolent Former Majorette Holly Budd has quoted Crankshaft’s ridiculous malapropisms multiple times!!!!
It shows you what a sad and contrary character Act III New Old Dinkle is. Now he’s this kindly old cackling “legend” who everyone loves, even as he tells an old war story that makes him come across as a lunatic. Just my opinion, but he’d be way more entertaining (or just plain “entertaining”) if he was always badgering and annoying Becky about how he used to do things. But instead he’s always just an affable smirking jerk like the rest of them.
The baton is a metaphor for old age, senescence, and death.
And cancer.
it’s called writing
It is one of those odd times when the strip coincides with the (real) world at large; although perhaps supposing a snowstorm the last week of January doesn’t really require much prognostication. The strip with Jim Kablichnik a couple of Sundays ago managed to be (accidentally) timely as well; several Facebook links came up that same weekend about a NYT article that called last year “the warmest on record.”
@beckoningchasm: “The really weird thing about today’s episode (and today’s Crankshaft) is that Tom Batiuk is clearly trying to make Crankshaft sympathetic here, when his entire (cough) comic appeal is that he’s a hateful old grouch. Are some papers threatening to drop Crankshaft because it’s too unpleasant? Because this is the most baffling retcon of all.”
If that’s the case, then I’d have to ask if any of those newspapers have ever read the strip before.