The proofreading sucks, too! It should be spelled “ATOMIK Komix”
Still gotta question Mindy’s wisdom in engaging with this lunatic, particularly with someone else’s small child in tow. And what kind of shopkeeper would not immediately intervene in a shouting match between customers involving his comics professional friends for cryin’ out loud?
“The coloring” seems such a weirdly specific thing to like about a comic book, but there’s a creative achievement Eisner award for “Best Coloring.” A number of which awards have been earned by women, likely none of whom lucked into her career the way Min-duh did.
Son of Stuck Funky 
Sometimes it’s hard to be a comic book woman
Giving all your love to just one comic book man
You’ll have the inkin’, and he’ll have the writin’,
Doin’ things that comic book fans can’t possibly understand
But if you love his writing, you’ll defend him
Even from the hardcore comic stan
And if you love him, oh, be proud of him
‘Cause after all, he’s just a comic book man
Stand by your comic book man
Give him bad puns to cling to,
And defend him from the weirdos,
Insane fanboys and assorted beardos
Stand by your comic book man
And show the world you love his titles
Keep giving all the comic book support you can
Stand by your comic book man
… that ain’t no Hank Williams song!
We got both kinds, Centerville and Westview!
I get that reference!
“This is glue…strong stuff.”
Yet another of Batiuk’s comic-book fantasies goes on display here: comic books are so damned important that any disagreement over them must escalate at once to total thermonuclear warfare.
I halfway expect this argument to change when another KK customer says “Relax, they’re only comic books!” At this point Mohawk Guy will join forces with the Mopeys and launch a crusade against the infidel who doesn’t worship their holy books.
Look, Weirdness Guy, we can all jovially agree that the AtomiKKK Komikkkx covers stink. In fact, I’d go so far as to say they suck shit through a straw. But there’s no need to get all hysterical about it, especially in front of li’l Skylab and his stocking cap with the little crying beehive.
Clearly Batdick has some kind of agenda against some real or imagined antagonist, right?
Ah yes, the Browns. Geographically, and existentially, perfect for Westview.
Kid suffers enough having the parents he does. They don’t need to lump that on him as well.
Batiuk has an agenda against somebody at all times. He is perpetually bitter, thin-skinned, egotistical, and can’t let go of any perceived slight from the past.
He probably thinks he’s satirizing his critics, by portraying them as aimlessly angry people who say everything “stinks.” Well, there’s certainly no evidence that Atomik Komix don’t stink, because we’ve never seen an inside page or a story. The only things we do see, the covers, and character concepts, are uncreative and derivative at best.
And according to Tom Batiuk’s own Batom Comics backstory, the original company was sued back into a ball of dirt over their Spider-Man clone. So why is Atomik Komix following their business model to a T? They’ve got a Hulk knockoff, a Peabody and Sherman knockoff, a Thing knockoff, and now they’re cloning the rest of the Fantastic Four.
He probably thinks he’s satirizing his critics, by portraying them as aimlessly angry people who say everything “stinks.”
Don’t forget that he makes them weirdly ugly as well. Some people here have called his hair a mohawk, but I think that’s wrong. It’s as if he started balding and decided for some reason to pull out 80% of his remaining hair in response. You can only explain his hair through cancer or alopecia.
Although the main characters tend to be drawn as weirdly ugly, too, although I don’t know if that’s intentional…
“The only good thing is the coloring” seems…weird, really. You hate the writing, you hate the drawing, you hate the lack of editorial supervision…but you like the coloring.
It’s like saying “Artie Simek saved your work from being terrible!” In other words, it’s so specific to comic nerds that it means nothing in the real world.
Here’s the interesting thing, though. Based on everything we’ve seen and everything we know, those Atomik Komix comic books really DO stink. So perhaps this comic book weirdo is merely reflecting common public sentiment. And Pete, who’s lost in a world of bad puns, elderly malcontents and puppy love, is completely out of touch with what today’s comic book readers want. Maybe he SHOULD be back at the AK studio and putting in some honest work instead of dragging Boy Lisa’s slow-witted temperamental son around. Maybe the comic book weirdo is actually the hero here.
Pointing out the coloring as a saving grace is so weird.
I mean, coloring is SUPER important to modern comics. Different colors can alter the mood, and clarify what the area of focus should be. A splash page can take just as long, if not longer to color, than to pencil or ink. Just looking at a comic page before and after coloring makes this clear.
But it would be like praising the camera work in The Room. It could be true, but it isn’t going to save it. Bad coloring could ruin a comic, but I doubt good coloring could save a terrible story or terrible lineart.
And what was the first thing out of Travis Brickle’s mouth? The cover. The part of the comic book Tom Batiuk and Atomik Komix obsess over, to the exclusion of every other page in the book. I don’t get why “Travis” is supposed to be a bad guy; he has the exact set of narrow priorities that Batiuk tries to force onto the world.
I’m thinking that Travis has read the credits and knows that Mindy is the colorist, and maybe he has the hots for her and is trying to get on her good side.
If it wasn’t Artie Simek, it was Sam Rosen.
This is a lot like believing Alfred Hitchcock was sincere in saying that Simon Oakland’s performance as the psychiatrist Dr. Fred Richman saved “Psycho.”
Image Comics was founded in the early 90s by seven superstar artists, then working for Marvel. Freed from Marvel’s editorial constraints, we got to see what they could create on their own, doing their own writing and art. And, well… it wasn’t good, really. The art was generally okay, although the founders’ popularity was definitely not in proportion to their talent (30 years later, and Rob Liefeld STILL hasn’t improved his style). But it’s what was “hot” at the time. The writing… oof. I think only Erik Larsen and Jim Valentino had any experience with actual writing before that, and you could tell. Basically, you had subpar (at best) writing, with art styles designed to look flashy but not really suited to actually telling a coherent narrative.
But the one thing that most everyone could agree on: they had really good colorists. Yeah, the art underneath it was hot garbage, but the colors were well-done.
I have no idea if this is what Batiuk was going for, but the idea of singling out the coloring as the only not-crap part of the book actually has real-world precedence. Hard to believe, I know, but it’s true.
I see no lies in the first panel.
It’s almost funny that Mindy gets hyper-emotional at once, while Mopey shows all the emotional depth that you’d expect from the creator of the Inedible Pulp and the Lord of the Late. As for little Skylark, he seems to have realized he’s the designated adult here.
Women…just as quick to soak up a compliment as they are to explode in a furious rage. You know how THEY are, always with the emotions. That Pete sure is one lucky fella, amirite?
He’s luckier than his fiancé, that’s for sure.
TBF, Pete is established as more used to this kind of criticism. I mean, do you remember ‘The Amazing Mr. Sponge.” clone arc?
And that other garbage he used to write. Uberman, or whatever it was called.
1. In real life all the other patrons in the store would have their phones out and be livecasting out on TikTok or whatever… So Mindy should probably STFU before she says something she can’t take back…
2. Dude, last I checked this was still America (at least for a little while longer)… Whatever happened to “voting with your dollars?” If you hate AK this much don’t freaking read them, don’t freaking buy them and most of all don’t boost their visibility by getting into a very public shouting match with the head writer…
3. AK is still a small time boutique publishing outfit, right? It just seems really strange to see a grown ass man get howlin’ spittin’ fightin’ mad over something so insignificant… And why hasn’t this mook been kicked out of the store yet?
1. Luckily this is Komix Korner, which never has more than one customer at a time.
So the nepotism hire is the only one who’s any good at her job. Not the obscenely overpaid Pete and Darrin, neither of the two Comic Books Hall of Fame inductees, nor the resurrected Phil Holt.
That kinda checks out, actually.
I hate these comic book arcs. Ah well, at least today’s Mary Worth features a floating head. We haven’t had one of those in awhile.
And who wrote today’s Crankshaft? Just look at panel 1 and see if you notice anything odd.
“Centerville” wouldn’t fit in the word zeppelin…probably the only time that problem has happened in either strip.
That is inexcusable.
In Panel 1 the screen door is wide open, in Panel 2 the firefighter is holding it open a crack and in Panel 3 the screen door is closed… Brilliant.
And yes, only in the Funkyverse do firefighters get in full gear to make a welfare check
Gee, I wonder what that “C” on his back could stand for.
Clearly the “CFD” on Mr. Fireman’s jacket stands for “Clairvoyant Fire Department.” Yes, this week the Funkyverse ventures into Phillip K. Dick territory, as “Crankshaft” adapts “Minority Report.” Specially trained “Pre-Cogs” attuned to Ed’s brainwaves can announce when a backyard barbecue is about to turn into a raging inferno, when a single leaf in an autumn tree will lead to arboreal electrocution, or when a blocked chimney will force an entire house to be evacuated. Sadly, they are as yet unable to predict when innocent driveway mailboxes will be backed over and crushed into tin tortillas.
Guys. Stop bashing TB. Midway between Centerville and Westview is a town called Crestview. This firefighter has a speech impediment that makes him pronounce the town as Cwestview. Tom left off the initial C to enhance the humorous effect of the speech impediment.
So you see how once again you have wrongly impugned the Lord of Language. Now let the laughter commence.
Transmigrate, Timothy Archer! Else you’ll find yourself in a Martian time-slip and nothing will ever be the same…
I mean, yeah, we’ve already gone over in exacting detail precisely how and why AK sucks (the art might be good for all we know; we’ve yet to see an interior page) so if this is supposed to be a jab at us, I’m not feeling it since we clearly have the preponderance of evidence on our side.
It’s a classic case of Strawman Has A Point. Batiuk created this character as a personification of his “beady eyed nitpickers” for his characters to easily knock over, but he’s making a point that Pete and Mindy (and Tom Batiuk) can’t easily rebut.
Grandma loved colors.
This reminds me of a certain style of political cartoon that is inexplicably popular today. Instead of having an idea, or using satire, the cartoonist will depict someone who holds Position A as a giant, red-faced, frantically gesticulating lunatic screaming a huge word bubble. Someone holding Position B will stand to the right, normal-sized, normal-looking, uttering some dismissive phrase. People who hold Position A are lunatics, geddit? We, the ones on the side of the cartoonist, are the sane ones, amirite? Right? You KNOW it, brother! We showed ’em! High five!
It’s apparently a popular substitute for having, you know, visual ideas. I see Batiuk has caught on. Whee.
Well, I’ve found the use of colors on the covers to be rather mundane and boring – the most recent cover being a good example of that – a drab collection of blues.
And I’m not sure just how Mindy yelling “you’re wrong and you’re stupid” without saying or explaining why they are wrong or stupid.
“is going to help” sorry hit send before I finished my thought.
Mind Dull is developing mopey eye bags.
Mindy apparently aged 40 years between panel 1 and 2. She’s got that same withering disease that often afflicts Mason.
Anyway. “YOU SUCK!” “OH YEAH? WELL, YOU’RE WRONG!” I think we’re in for quite a ride, you guys.
Oh, wow! The gesture of throwing up one’s hands in exasperation over a comic in panel #1. That’s me. I perform that gesture almost every day!
Me: Oh my God! How is someone paying money for a strip like Funky Winkerbean?
Scenes we’d like to see (but will never happen).
It’s about time for Min-duh to talk up Mopey Pete’s pugilistic skills to the angry man. The angry man drags Mopey Pete outside the store and uses the metal stairs like a cheese grater.