So what have we got here? A couple of Batiuk’s trademark touches, starting with the sign that says HAIR MAKEUP on the inside of the door. The sign isn’t scotch taped; the tape is reserved for those reference photos of Lisa (how did Mason convince Les to part with those?), which would be more helpful maybe taped next to the mirror where the stylist could see them as she works.
And you’ve got spoken dialogue stretched out over panels that wouldn’t make sense in real time. “Doing makeup takes time…” (places wig cap on head, tucks Marianne’s hair completely out of sight under cap) “But if you take the time to do it right…” (takes wig from stand, places it over the cap on Marianne’s head, straightens and styles it until the desired Lisa effect is achieved) “…the results can be amazing!”
It gets more amazing tomorrow, folks, when billytheskink takes over the reins for the next couple weeks! Thank you as always for hanging with us. Stay Funky, y’all.
Son of Stuck Funky 
Does it even matter what it is? It’ll be another stupid comic book cover, or some conversation with Cayla that ends with “you have to protect Lisa,” who’s been dead for 13 years and can’t be harmed in any way.
I bet you feel silly now that we’ve seen how through the magic of Hollywood someone has turned into Conan O’Brien of 1994!
Marianne does a pretty good job of capturing Lisa’s unique brand of bland sexless femininity. Now let’s see if she can nail that sanctimonious piety, though. If she can Cayla had better watch her back. And if she starts calling Mason “Spanky” I’m getting the f*ck out of here.
Is that supposed to be Marianne, made up as Lisa? Lisa was drawn so inconsistently when she was alive I honestly can’t tell.
Looks more like Conan here than did Burchette’s rendition a few years ago. At least the hair color is…closer…
Long night…I’m crumbling some Ambien into my martini. Thinking about high school, Can I overcome what I was?
Ah, just messing with you all. I barely remember high school.
And now this morning, I can’t remember what I did last night.
Don’ Bogie that pitcher of Ambartinis!
I make a nice drink. Ketel One and Noilly Prat.
Luckily, Marianne will get to sleep in once they shave her head for the later scenes.
Welp, he did it. He finally found a way to bring Lisa back to life again again. Seriously though, this is one of the most repellent things I’ve ever seen and I once had a summer job at a sewage treatment facility. You just know BatHam was boinging around that studio of his in glee after he saw the artwork for this one, as it’s pretty much his ultimate fantasy come to life.
Coming this fall: Les tells Cayla that while it’s been a decent run, there’s no way in hell he’s passing on New Younger And Hotter Lisa 2.0, so she’ll have to move out by the end of the week. He immediately begins work on the next installment in the “Lisa’s Story” saga…”Volume 4…This Shoe Fits Even Better”.
There is a very evil part of me that wants Les to have a fling with a Lisa look-alike so that Cayla can find out, divorce him, take him for every dollar this movie makes, and have a parting shot of “write a book about THAT, moth%$#@.”
That “evil part” of you would get most of us into Paradise. Or a very good job as Satan’s creative consultant. Where Les is concerned, either option would do.
Too complicated for this strip. Too much effort;
“You liked the movie, Les?”
“Yes, I enjoyed it.”
“And the actress who played Lisa, what did you think?”
“She was good.”
IMO even THAT is overly ambitious for a FW story arc. It will eventually be even duller and more uneventful than that, I guarantee it.
I think we finally have a shorthand expression for when someone here suggests a plot turn that would actually be unexpected and interesting, from a comment of yours the other day: WTAFTS (Way Too Ambitious For This Strip).
It’s FW Rule One: if it seems like it might be a little too ambitious or complicated for FW, it definitely is.
It’s easy to have an amazing result here when so many of the women are played by the Young Lad character.
Wait, what? Superstar Marianne Winters has to get used to “getting up early again” for a simple wig and make-up bit? Is that task really so demanding? Or does it take hours of prosthetic work to make her look sort-of human?
I’ll keep it simple. FU, Tom Batiuk.
Yeah his Lisa fetish is out of control.
My goodness, give up this Lisa nonsense already. It never was a compelling story.
So what are the odds that Les either breaks down crying or pops a boner as soon as he sets his sights on St. Lisa 2.0.?
Wait until he sees what make-up and a wig have done for Mason Jarre (I’m sure that’s him playing Les in the banner). At least Les will forget all about Lisa and Marianne Winters. As for marriage, “Third time’s the charm, Mason!”
@AmigoLupus: Yes.
Why not both at the same time? Think Anchorman…
I bet you dollars to donuts that Les has never popped a boner without crying.
I miss the lawn-sprinkler robot. Maybe six weeks of the lawn-sprinkler robot? Instead of, y’know, six more weeks of *this*?
Batiuk obviously wishes that he could walk back killing Lisa off, doesn’t he? Too bad he can’t.
He can have her wake up one morning and say “Les, what a wild dream I just had! There’s no place like home!”
It wouldn’t work out, of course, because he has no idea how to do a loving, happily-married couple. By the time he realizes that (around the middle of the century) he’ll end it by having Cayla wake Les. “Rise and shine, sleepyhead,” she’ll say, “We have to get ready for the premiere of ‘Lisa’s Story’ tonight.”
I disagree. This isn’t about wanting Lisa back, this is about wanting to kill Lisa again.
Every time Lisa is remembered, its in the context of her beautiful and tragic cancerdeath. Batty is just trying to milk the tragedy for every ounce of pathos. He resurrects her only to kill her, like some kind of horrifying punishment from the seventh circle of Hell.
Yep. All we know about Lisa is that she died and Les has teh feels about that. Her only value is in validating Les’s ManPain.
Lisa has been fridged so long she has freezer burn.
So is Les going to kill her, keep her in his basement, or kill her and keep her corpse in his basement?
Is this something that we the reader are supposed to be pleased with? As in ‘Oh my god Lisa is back.’ if so the Author has completely misread the effect of this strip . As the response is more like oh god more weeks of Lisa.
Last panel: make up artist in her voila moment has a full smile, but her reflection is nonplussed. Marianne doesn’t look all that impressed at the results as if she’s thinking “wtf does this mingey Less have against me? Hey-Zeus, I could’ve jumped off the H of the Hollywood sign and have looked better than this Lisa Beyatch?”*
*Not a question, but the inflection of uptalk..
As that must obviously be Massonne made up to be Less in the masthead, I have to ask the question…why in God’s name would the producers feel the need to make the actors up to look like people that NO ONE outside of Worstview would possibly know?
It defies logic. Oh, I answered my own question.
Oh, I thought that was supposed to be Stephen Colbert from an upcoming arc where Les and/or Masonne go on “The Late Show” to talk up the movie.
That’s some academy award-worthy makeup right there. You can’t even see the secondary mouth parts or the nictitating membranes.
Apparently Marianne is starring in that new Ted Koppel biopic.
So are we to believe that one of Les’ big problems last time was that the actors didn’t look like them?
As if anyone else in the audience would care about that.
The navel-gazing self-absorption doesn’t end.
Les doesn’t seem to have cared whether Mason looked like him, even though in the strip’s reality Mason is supposed to be a hot dreamboat action hero actor and Les was a non-athletic high school teacher with glasses. And Mason had said Les was a true hero, so obviously Mason’s judgement was totally reliable (in the strip’s reality).
But it was important to have Les’s fetish object correct in all particulars.
Batiuk missed the chance to do a sideways homage to one of the most infamous comic cover ever, “Lois Lane” #106:
“Are you sure you want to go through with this, Marianne? ”
“Yes, Mason! Close the body mold and switch on the power! It’s important that I live the next 24 hours as Lisa Moore!”
In the corner bubble, Mason tells Les he’s changing the name of the movie to ” I am Curious (Lisa). “
I’m mildly alarmed that I know exactly what you are talking about.
Hair is actually the most important item in an actor’s toolbox.
The way Telly Savalas transformed from Blofeld to Kojak with a different wig was freaking astounding.
So, the main point of today’s strip is that every female FW character essentially looks alike, the only difference being slight changes in hair color and style? Heck, we all knew that from 50-plus years of Archie being torn between the interchangeable Betty and Veronica!