Link To Today’s Contrivance
So let’s take a moment to recap this idiotic reunion arc. Cindy usually organizes the reunion, but she can’t this year, so she inexplicably gives Les the job. At no point does she specify “anywhere but the gym”. Les meets with the rest of the reunion committee and they spend the entire meeting fooling around with that stupid cancer book. At no time does anyone on the committee discuss a venue or mention the fact that Cindy does not want to use the gym. Then, after doing nothing, Les suddenly realizes there’s no venue for the reunion. He panics and sulks.
After Cayla suggests the school, Les discovers that Bull is running a sports-related activity in the gym that same day. So apparently Les will use his “friendship” with Bull to convince the moron to f*ck over the basketball campers so he can use the gym for the reunion. The dreams of young aspiring hoopsters put on hold so Les and his obese pals can waddle around the gym, all because Les was too lazy and mopey to find a more suitable venue. What a dick.
And now, obviously, Cindy will get all upset and berate Les, then she’ll be forced to apologize on his porch after it’s the Best Reunion Ever. That horrible dick with ears will be the f*cking hero again. And it sickens me, it really does. This mess is going to take weeks to play out, guaranteed.
Son of Stuck Funky 
I have to imagine that when doing one of the myriad of interviews he does within a short drive of his home, Batiuk tells the interviewers ahead of time he’s not going to talk about the current strip. I would love to see him on a local news show, after bragging about the Lisa Saga, explain how Les is now freaking out over a tiny bit of work for a reunion. “Really. How interesting. And now to the weather!”
And of course Les needs to remind Cayla who Bull Bushka is, because it’s not like she works at the same school with him and sees him practically everywhere around town along with the rest of the cast.
SpacemanSpiff85: I’m still not really sure whether he specifically tells them not to mention the current strip or if it just never comes up. You have to admit, both scenarios are very plausible.
Like BChasm mentioned yesterday, this MIGHT have almost been a coherent story if he’d bothered to put a little thought into it BEFORE he filled in the word balloons, stuffed it in an envelope and shipped it off to the Syndicate. But alas….
The official FW blog has been updated with everything you ever wanted to know about the IPPY awards, FYI.
Another way to look at it is that Les is saving a bunch of innocent basketball enthusiasts from the teachings of the legendarily stupid Coach Bull Bushka.
It is the day of the reunion in the Gym. The reunion committee has decorated the building and the DJ is setting up his equipment. Alums are starting to arrive with their spouses or friends.
Les is smirking proudly, silently congratulating himself on a job well done. The reunion will be a smashing success and, for once, he will garner the respect of his old high school classmates.
Cayla, seeing her husband standing alone, walks up to Les and pats him on the back. “Good job, dear! Everything is just about ready. All we need is the food. When is the caterer supposed to arrive?”
There is a long pause. Les suddenly turns pale as blood drains from his face.
“Ca-ca-ca-caterer?”
Actually, now that I think about, Les is probably just assuming that the basketball camp attendees can help set up chairs and speakers and do the catering. Since that’s how Bull operates, apparently.
I have not been able to read the latest installment of this dredge. Not that I am physically unable, or that i cant read it on my screen, I just can’t guarantee I that as a functioning adult that I could bear witnessing what happens next.
Given that there are any number of empty buildings in Cancerview, why didn’t he simply book it in one of them? The post office is probably big enough.
There are young people in Westview? Imagine that!
Wait What?!? Not-Lisa was in the same graduating class as Les? When was that mentioned before? And is there anyone left in town who wasn’t in that class? Perhaps all the other folks were smart enough to get out or lucky enough to die before the arrival of the Dick King.
So many question for which we will never get answers.
The Blondie reference in the title made my day.
Three panels of Les in profile today has given me a terrifying mental picture of a video game in which Les’ disembodied head floats through a maze and eats tiny, round pizzas while being chased by 4 ghost Lisa heads.
TFH: Thanks! I couldn’t resist, I was wondering if anyone would get that reference. I suppose you need to be of (sigh) a “certain age”.
Les: “Apparently, someone forgot that I -work- at Westview High, and thus do not need to clarify Bull by his last name, nor that he’s a member of our class, nor pretend that this was something so very difficult for me to research.”
Cayla: “-Our- class?!? I didn’t go to school with you, dude!”
Les: “Apparently someone forgot that, too. So, give me five?”
Cayla: “Okay.” **CLAP**
Les: “No, I meant five DOLLARS. All this work has left me feeling peckish. I want to grab a Double Dough Extra Grease special from Montoni’s.”
Cayla: *Mutter Mumble Mutter Gripe*
This could be the perfect ending to the strip: reunion at the gym, the never identified post office bomber sets his bombs, and the whole strip gets blown to pieces. The readers live happily ever after.
And once again the solution of a problem for Les is HANDED to him without him having to even bloody stand up.
I didn’t watch the interview because I’m sure it’s the same old stuff. Whenever you see Tom Batiuk at a convention or some such, the images projected behind him are always Act II Les and Lisa. I’m close to assuming that for him, the strip died when Lisa did and he’s just going through the motions until the 50th.
Can’t drink booze if it’s on school property.
I don’t quite understand the point. Is it that Bull is in charge of the school while the camp is in session, thus Les only needs to clear it with him? That Bull would cancel the camp to make way for the Looming Reunion as a favor for Les? That because the school is being used for a basketball camp, it somehow leaves the facility free to be used for the reunion? I’m just confused by this whole thing, and I know it’s just too stupid to bother figuring out. Not that it’s necessarily going to make sense anyway.
Like BChasm pointed out a few days ago, if he’d centered the story around Les booking the gym without realizing it was Cindy’s worst nightmare, it COULD have made a LITTLE sense. But instead it’s an afterthought. And it took him a few weeks to even get that far.
DOlz wrote: Not-Lisa was in the same graduating class as Les? When was that mentioned before?
It never has been mentioned before. As others have been pointing out for awhile now, Cayla not only didn’t graduate the same year as Les, she didn’t even go to the same school. This is just one more example of Batiuk’s superior writing skills, in this case the 5,678th incidence of lack of continuity.