The power is out again at Atomik Komix in today’s strip?! Oh no! That means we have to read a comic about the power being out again…
There is a lot in this strip, and it will make your head hurt if you actually think about any of it. So please don’t, that is the burden I have chosen to bear this week.
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Is Atomik Comix in such dire financial straights that Chester didn’t pay the electric bill? Was it because he couldn’t part with any more of his gardening catalog collection?
If the electricity in the old Batom Comics building is so unreliable that it goes out weekly…
– Why doesn’t Chester move his 3 employees to a few hundred square feet of space in one of Cleveland’s many affordable, functional, and maintained office buildings?
– Why is there no generator or other back-up plan to maintain power?
– How does this building pass city inspection? Even Cleveland has standards.
Why doesn’t Mindy know what to do? Not one week ago, she met a deadline while working from a coffee shop.
How does Mindy not know what Dr. Martin’s is? Yeah, I get that the average person doesn’t know what it is (which really weakens the Dr. Martins=Doc Martens joke) but she is paid for her apparent artistic talent and she’s never used physical ink or been into an art supply store?
Does Chester really think that ink he found in a box of unused supplies from Batom Comics is still usable for professional-quality work? For reference Batom Comics shut down in 1972.
How does Durwood’s face manage to get even longer?
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There, I’ve though about all of that for you. I have determined that there are no satisfactory answers and that this whole story arc is asinine, so don’t even think you need to worry about it. Carry on and have a nice Saturday.
Son of Stuck Funky 
Holy crap, Darin’s face is possibly the worst drawn face I can remember in this strip, which is really ,really saying something.
SAY, DARIN! WHY THE LONG FACE?
Yeah, the artwork is especially bad today.
Durward lets Mindy use his pens?
“I’ll take ‘Durward lets Mindy use his penis for $200, Trebek.”
“Those pens he likes.”
Fixed it for ya!
Pete isn’t even trying to hide his excitement about the power being out. He’s like a sixth grader celebrating after the TV news reports a snow day.
Scott Adams has got to be jealous that TB has created a pair of characters who live for avoiding work even more than Dilbert‘s Wally.
Lemme guess- the gang discovers doing things the olde-fashioned way is really neat-o and Atomix Komix goes on to great acclaim as the comic book publisher that does things the way they used to “back in the day”. PS- whoever drew Durwood’s face should be ashamed.
I think you nailed it. They’re going to start producing “artisanal” comic books.
Hopefully they will go under once the supply of carbon paper runs out.
Remember, you can’t say “artisanal” without saying “art is anal.”
Ambergris, zippy-zaps, Doc Martens…I’m 95% certain that every once in a while he throws an arc like this out there just to see if anyone’s paying attention yet. Surely he realized that his useless old-timey comic book lingo would be baffling and completely uninteresting to 100% of his readers, so what other explanation could there be? That this nonsense means something? That this is going somewhere. Ha. This was a test to see if the CK “editor” is still sleeping. Apparently, he is.
Coming soon: Atomik Komix’s antiquated and obsolete steam-powered comic book machine breaks down, forcing the gang to install a comic book waterwheel on the nearby Ohio River. After the river freezes solid during the annual early-February pre-huge blizzard blizzard the gang learns how to create comic books by rubbing two sticks together.
Gigantic honkin’ UPVOTE for the entire second paragraph!
Ha ha. Mindy is such a dumb chick because she doesn’t recognize an esoteric art supply company (one that I never heard of unitl minutes ago).
Well, to Batiuk, not knowing obscure trivia is worse than buying an old building with faulty wiring.
I wonder if they make the Funky Felt Tip…….
Wait a minute- if the image she’s working on is in a digital format, how does the fact that Chester scored almost half-century old ink solve anything?
@Gerald – yeah, how is a box of ink going to help with digital art? She’d have to print it out, and since there’s no power for the printer…
Is she going to smear ink on her screen, take a picture with her phone, and use that?
Way to not think things through, Batiuk.
“So you see, my fine fellows, one needn’t rely on uncooperative phenomena such as electricity to produce our holy and sacred BOOKS! We can use Doc Martin ink and amberlith, just as Batom Komix did in the 1950’s! We’ll still meet our deadline!’
“What ‘deadline’? Anymore, nobody has bought any of our BOOKS yet anyways.” *
“SILENCE, VILE GIRL! YOU HAVE NO MORE LINES TODAY!”
“You mean WOMAN.”
( * – Yes, I speak Ohioan.)
I guess they could just continue working at that fancy coffee shop? You know, the one with the waiter.
And the functioning electrical system……
Hell, I don’t know why they don’t work from home in the first place. It makes no sense to torment them like this just because Batiuk was stupidly outraged when Stan Lee said that the Marvel bullpen was a face-saving metaphor.
The worst thing is that TB didn’t wrap up this story line, so it’s going to go on for at least another week. 😦