Yes, you were being stupid, Holly. Batiuk loves these little witty sayings that don’t really mean anything and aren’t really funny. It’s also extra weird and confusing because in this case, the mother bird flew out of her own nest decades later and moved into her daughter’s nest.
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Son of Stuck Funky · The web's premiere source for Funky Winkerbean snark
Son of Stuck Funky 
This is another one of those FW gags you really need to be a regular FW reader to get. Someone unfamiliar with BatYam and his off-kilter ways would most likely wonder a) why the senior citizens are talking about “leaving the nest” like they’re twenty-one and b) why talking about “leaving the nest” was supposed to be funny in the first place, as there’s no actual “joke” there.
But, being intimately familiar with BatHam’s often peculiar take on things, we understand that Holly still having a meddlesome old hen of a mother IS the gag. The mere fact that her mother is still alive and still haunting her IS the funny part. When you cut right to the chase, her mother’s refusal to die is the joke.
Along with Holly’s fractured leg, of course. The broken leg is like the cream in Batty’s joke Oreo here, exactly the kind of hilarious comedic premise he builds upon so well. Holly’s mom is still alive and still pressuring Holly just like in high school and as a result, Holly pushed herself too far and seriously injured her leg. I’ll stop now, lest anyone ends up splitting a side or slapping a knee too hard.
And it’s a good thing most people won’t understand this strip, because it’s practically an endorsement of toxic relationships.
Even if you believe that your relationship with your mother stays with you as an adult, this is not the form it should take. This is Mommie Dearest / I, Tonya levels of parental abuse. And it’s made even more sick by how old Holly and Melinda are, and how long it’s been going on.
One flew east, one flew west,
mom flew home to the cuckoo nest.
Once again, AGAIN, Batiuk drops something he thinks is profound and deep, and (oh thank you for the award) worthy of recognition in the outer world.
And the something is completely stupid. Anyone saying this in real life would be dismissed as an idiot.
I’m cutting this one out and posting it on my refrigerator.
At least it has a consistent theme with all his other faux profundity. And it’s “nobody ever attains adulthood.” You never leave your parents’ nest (which means you have do everything they say, even when it’s abusive, self-serving, and dangerous); high school follows you (which means trash a friend at his funeral because you can’t outgrow a childhood grudge); and comic books are the center of all culture in your life. Comic books aimed at 9-year-olds.
Arrested development, and the inability to outgrow anything, are constant themes in Funky Winkerbean. It’s gross.
Funky’s post-“punchline” thought bubble: “Well, that didn’t work. Why would it? It didn’t make any goddamned sense…Wait! I know!”
“Hey, Holly, at least you’re not on fire!” [SMIRK]
Hate to say it, but that was precisely Frau Budd’s “sympathetic” comment to her daughter during the “EMT vehicle” ride in Saturday’s strip. It was just as unfunny then.
You got the reference!
“At least you’re not on fire” should be another universal Funky Winkerbean punchline.
“Did she say anything?”
“She’s gone. Well, at least she’s not on fire.”
“The mother bird flies with you”? I hate to dredge up the past, Mr. Winkerbean, but Mother Bird Budd left for Florida years ago. It was Holly who insisted that you all should drive down South, pick up Mommy Dearest, and bring her back to your nest in Ohio. Where is Mom, by the way?
Also, when are we going to hear exactly what Holly’s injury IS? I assumed from the placement of the “CRACK!” in last Thursday’s strip that she fractured or broke her ankle, and that was what the doctor seemed to be examining yesterday. She had been sitting up in a wheelchair, yet now they have her laid out in what I guess is an ER bed.
Waiting for something to happen in this comic is indeed like waiting for bones to knit.
I can’t figure out why Holly appears to be headed for the O.R. either. I broke my arm sled riding as a child. The doctor didn’t need an operating room to reset the bone. It was a simple break.
If it was a compound fracture with the bone penetrating the skin, there’s a serious risk of infection. They’re not going to play around with 20 questions and risk Holly losing her leg. She’s going into surgery pronto.
Perhaps Holly shattered her ankle into a million pieces and the doctor needs to insert screws and a metal plate?
Perhaps Holly tore an ankle ligament or two?
Anyhoo, Batty prefers not to divulge such details because he doesn’t to expose his lack of research.
Perhaps the hospital is running a special this week. Visit our E.R. and receive a free appendectomy.
Could this be a separate hospital visit and Holly is finally getting her cataract surgery?
I’m not fully awake yet, and omitted a word. C’mon coffee, do your thing.
Anyhoo, Batty prefers not to divulge such details because he doesn’t WANT to expose his lack of research.
And how serious is Holly’s ankle fracture? From the look of things, she appears to have undergone surgery, which is usually reserved for breaks that can’t be set in the emergency room. Nothing revealed in the story thus far indicates anything that serious.
Guess how many results Grandpa Google returned for this “mother bird flies with you” phrase?
The exact same number of results it returns for “Grandpa Google” (excluding this website). Zero.
I can confirm your search results. Another example of Batdick spouting a cliche that doesn’t make sense, because it never existed in the first place.
Maybe Batiuk’s doing a side gig where he makes up aphorisms. If so, he’s about as good at is as he is everything else.
“You think you’re leaving the nest but a wet bird never flies at night.”
OK, apparently I was wrong on Tuesday. This whole storyline was about Holly’s relationship with her mother, after all. And the moral of the story seems to be, “you cannot escape the emotional scars of your childhood, you can only live with them.”
Note that I don’t say “learn to live with them.” Nobody has learned anything yet. Maybe tomorrow. We’ll see.
I’m watching paint dry!
Holly is showing an unusual amount of restraint–or is that because the blanket is hiding the restraints?
I see her hair cap couldn’t contain her cowlick. It had one job, and it couldn’t do it.
Wouldn’t surprise me to find out that Batiuk has no idea what the purpose of that is.
Hey Funkenstein!! You should have been talking your wife out of this stunt long before it got to this point… What the hell were you doing the previous two weeks?
But then again, it’s not like Holly ever tried to clue you in on the wisdom of getting on a goddamned treadmill while listening to your second to last original Sony Discman on the planet, so call it even, I guess
Seriously, an obese elderly woman goes out onto a football field to perform an elaborate majorette routine in the pouring rain and no one thinks for even a moment about how bad an idea it was.
And for what? To indulge in some boomer’s nostalgia about the time she was in high school, apparently the peak of her existence. It’s been downhill since. This whole massive homecoming football crowd is supposed to be interested in watching this, in the rain. Shouldn’t have expected more from Batiuk, I guess.
It’s even worse than that: to indulge some boomer mother’s nostalgia about when her daughter was in high school. While daughter’s husband tells her this smothering abuse will stay with her for life.
This is sick.
He’s drinking again, id’nt he?
Does Funky like big Budds and he cannot lie?
I can’t help but think back to Monday, when the medical assistant asked Holly if she felt safe at home.
You know, if Batty is actually going to hang up his funky felt-tip and collect his gold watch after 50 years, this story arc could have been a decent chance to tie up an old storyline.
Maybe I’m just a romantic, but wouldn’t Holly and Melinda patching up their relationship be a far better story than this? A mother and daughter end decades of animosity and hard feelings?
Batty does this all the time. This story arc was another halfway decent premise, and Batty bobbled it away again. Any decent writer could have done something with this. It’s like he invites me over to his house for dinner and serves me a PB&J sandwich.
Did Batty replace Melinda just to have Funky drop a few one-liners? Everybody loves reading the fat pizza man yuk it up. Are you kidding me? Every story devolves into eye-roll-worthy yuks and smirks.
What happened to Melinda? Did she jump on her broom and fly off to her coven? Did she turn into a pumpkin at midnight? Did she call Funky and tell him, “She’s your wife. You deal with her. It’s past my bedtime.” Any chance Funky told her off, and she slithered off into the darkness?
Today for the first time in a long time, I thought of my first boss out of college. He was a good boss, but he was kind of blunt. One time he rode with me in my car to a corporate meeting downtown. He voiced his displeasure at what was on my car stereo. He sneered and brusquely declared while shaking his head, “That’s crap. That’s crap”.
Mr. Batiuk, that’s crap. That’s crap.
And today’s Crankshaft is completely stupid.
In panel 1, one-armed guy, having just quit his job at the newspaper, says “Almost all of the institutional memory of the Sentinel is in my head!” No, stupid, the institutional memory of a newspaper is printed and published every day. That’s what a newspaper is. A newspaper collects information and prints it every day, so other people can read it, and to create a permanent archive of what it knows.
And the CEO is terrified of this. The CEO of an ownership company is not going to know thing one about some random local yokel company it holds, or even the industry that it’s in. It’s simply not their job, or what they’re trained to know. They wouldn’t even understand a threat like that, much less be influenced by it. A few ordinary morning stock price moves would gain or lose that man 10,000 times what some small-town newspaper is worth.
In panel 2, Skip says “the rest will disappear in that hard drive crash!” I can’t tell if he’s threatening to destroy the newspaper’s physical records, or if it’s a metaphor for his own mind being the hard drive. The latter theory would fit well with Tom Batiuk’s hatred of computers, which almost no purpose in the Funkyverse. Maybe Batiuk read Dune recently, and Skip is a mentat.
Panel 3, CEO guy says “I’ll see you in jail!” The threat “I’ll see you in X” only makes sense when you’re both going to the same place, like “I’ll see you in court.” Or is the CEO admitting that he is also destined for jail? He’s more transparent than a Captain Planet villain, so this could be the intention.
Second, if Skip is really destroying a newspaper’s company records out of spite, then yes, he probably is going to jail. And why does the story want us to side with him?
Third, Skip smugly says “it’s your word against mine.” No it isn’t, you goddam moron! An investment company office in a New York highrise is going to have security cameras all over the place! And in the CEO’s office, I would expect all audio conversations are recorded too. In the state of New York, they don’t have to get your consent or inform you they’re doing it.
And let’s say it is your word against his, Skip. Who do you think the court is going to believe? You abandoned your job, drove from Ohio to New York, showed up at a corporate office uninvited, got into the CEO’s office somehow, made financial demands of him, and quit your job as a threat. Threatening to destroying company property will not a huge leap. Especially after you can’t produce this material, and you’re the company’s only employee.
Also, this trial will be in New York, because that’s where the crime took place. The defendant, and their company, will be well-known to the community. You’re an angry, unhinged, beret-wearing hick who showed up uninvited with a grudge and started barking orders at a very powerful man. You’ll be lucky if you don’t get sent to Guantanamo.
And let’s not forget, folks, this is supposedly all part of the article that Skipper Ryle there wrote for the Sentinel AFTER he returned from his NYC odyssey.
Seriously, how upset would Wilson Fisk be if the paper’s “institutional memory” went bye bye? What is that, 70 years of City Council meeting minutes, high school football scores, gardening tips from the ladies’ horticultural society that Ed belongs to, and police reports about a rash of vandalized mailboxes? Is ANY of that necessary to continue publishing the rag, assuming that’s what Mordor wants to do, or to shut it down?
Battyuk is trying for a Frank Capraesque “the decent, upstanding small-town hero does battle against heartless, greedy businessmen” finale here, but he’s nowhere near sticking the landing. In fact, he’ll probably wind up with a broken ankle like a certain ex-majorette in another Ohio-based strip that shall remain nameless.
Skip is no George Bailey. George Bailey saved lives, made sacrifices, helped other people, tried to solve his problems the right way, and built institutions his town believed in.
Skip has never done anything for anyone. The newspaper is important to Centerville only because he says it is. Skip uses lies, threats, and extortion to get what he wants. And above all else, Skip isn’t owed anything! He doesn’t own the newspaper, and has no right to demand things on its behalf from the people who actually do own it.
Skip is just another detestable Funkyverse protagonist, like Les and Dinkle. He gets everything he wants, uses underhanded techniques, is never called out for his poor behavior, never has to overcome any challenges, never learns anything, never grows up, and is insufferably arrogant the whole time.
This enormous, powerful, many-tentacled (sorry Skip) hedge fund surely has the ability to lock ex-employee Skip out of the facilities before he gets back to Ohio. The newspaper clearly has already missed a couple days of publication (since Skip is the sole employee) and I’ll bet nobody’s noticed.
We’re asked to believe that a hedge fund would be heartbroken to find that, after all employees but one were removed, the sole remaining employee quits. Hell, that’s their dream: The employee quits so they won’t have to pay severance or face lawsuits over ageism or unlawful termination.
Others have pointed out the paradox of this whole story having been printed in the paper where Crankshaft is reading it.
I’ll just say that, even for Batiuk, this Skip arc has been shockingly idiotic, infuriating, and botched in every way imaginable, and some ways I couldn’t even have imagined.
Are we gonna need a “Daughter of Stuck Crankshaft” blog going forward? Because this level of clusterfuckery needs a dedicated discussion outlet.
Is Skip actually writing this full “your word against mine” exchange in the paper? Or is this the un-yada-yada’d version of Monday’s line, “My coversation with the head of Mordor Financial didn’t go well”? I’ll give Skip the benefit of the doubt and say it’s the latter.
If you think about it, the Butlerian Jihad is just the extreme version of “These kids today with their computers and their internets and whatnot!” Batiuk would be right at the forefront of it. (Unless it’s a Terminator-style robot rebellion and existential struggle, like Brian and Kevin say.)
Now, I’m just spitballin’ here, but wouldn’t it be the perfect cherry on top of this banana split of hilarious hospital hi-jinks if some technician mixes up Holly’s x-rays with another patient’s, and the doctors tell her that she has inoperable cancer?
Even better if the X-rays reveal that she has treatable cancer and the technicians mix up the films and tell her that she has no cancer at all, thus ensuring that she doesn’t get treated till it’s too late for anything but palliative care, which she refuses because Melinda tells her “it’s okay if she goes.” Wouldn’t that just be a Pulitzer-worthy irony?
Holly is clearly prepped for major(ette) surgery here. I’m holding out for a leg amputation — then we’ll be just one limb away from THE AMPUTATION MONSTER, the new Batiuk creation made from the arms, legs, corneas, etc, that were removed from Crankerbeaniverse denizens over the years!
Who will supply the BRAIN? Hard to say — there are so many in Batiukland that seem to be missing theirs!
A commenter at CK mentioned that Bull’s brain is in some jar being studied. I vaguely remember this, but can’t be arsed to look it up. I hope it’s true. Bull Bushka will have his revenge on Westview!
That was Bull’s intention, but the CTE story never clarified if he got his dying wish. Because, you know, storyteller.
Meanwhile, over in Krankenschaaften…
1. Sorry Skippy, but destroying 240 years of your hometown’s historical record archives out of pure spite doesn’t exactly make you the “good guy hero crusader” here… It makes you a vengeful douche and you’re only hurting your own friends, neighbors and relatives…
2. If you’re going to commit a crime, wouldn’t it have been better to just stay in Centerville and do it and then tell Mr. Big-Time CEO (who looks like he could be Chester Hagglemore’s long-lost brother) after the fact? At least then Skippy would have had a few days’ head start to flee or concoct some ‘plausible deniability’…
2a. Speaking of Chester Hagglemore, why not just approach him and get him to buy the Sentinel? Hell he loves throwing his money around on depreciated worthless “old timey” assets in Northern Ohio… For that matter, why didn’t that dumbass couple approach Chester about buying the Valentine Theatre? And don’t tell me Chester doesn’t exist in the Krankenschaaften universe, or that folks wouldn’t know how to contact him. Or forget Chester – Why didn’t Skippy spend his time, anger and energy on finding a fucking LOCAL buyer and/or investors for the Sentinel? Hell, make it a community-owned paper if you have to… I’m pretty sure Mordor Financial would have been ecstatic to have someone, anyone take the burden off their hands…
3. “It’s your word against mine…” DOESN’T WORK THAT WAY, GOD DAMN IT SKIPPY!! **YOU** are the disgruntled employee with an axe to grind stuck in the old ways and would rather burn it all down instead of trying to adapt and modernize… Mr. Big-Time CEO with the golf ball-sized pearl stickpin in his tie (because Batiuk thinks business titans still dress like it’s 1927) is the benevolent corporate steward who kept the Sentinel on life support and Centerville residents employed for years beyond the time the paper would have died a natural death… **THAT** is the narrative a jury will hear, along with the fact that you drove all the way to fucking Manhattan just to march into the CEO’s office like a petulant kid and threaten him with sabotage. Doesn’t really sound like a jury would see these as the actions of stable, rational mind, does it Skippy? Oh, and that’s BEFORE I get to the part where I mention Mordor Financial has the legal firepower to tie you up in court for years and bankrupt you on your attorney fees alone! This is what happens when you half-ass thorough something without thinking it through… Sound familiar??
Looking at Panel 1 of today’s Crankshaft prompts this question – Does Mordor Financial’s nod to Tolkien include hanging spiderwebs to simulate Shelob’s Lair?