Banana Jr. 6000
October 14, 2022 at 11:19 am
On Monday, Funky said “Let’s fix that (meaning, throw Les the ball) and show these kids how it’s done!” They did exactly that. So why are they suddenly beaten down and laughed at? We’re left to guess. Batiuk basically makes you write the story for him. He thinks he’s being subtle by not telling you anything.
“Let’s fix that!” strikes me as a mantra for the latter half of Act III Funky Winkerbean. As this 50-year old comic strip approaches its twilight, Batiuk is busy retconning (and/or outright forgetting) established themes. Bull never really beat Les up; he was actually protecting his nerd friend from the real bullies. Yeah, the kids all picked on Wicked Wanda, but as adults they would be made to seek her forgiveness. Sure, those New York know-nothings at Marvel and DC snubbed an aspiring comic book artist from Ohio, but he would go on to create an (imaginary) comics publishing company with an all-star roster.
Anyway, “the two grandpas” walk back to their cars, duly chastened (despite having run at least one well-executed play) and the teens, no doubt still laughing, resume their game. Yep, they showed them alright!
Son of Stuck Funky 
As if Les didn’t comprehend the physicality of football until now. And he’s supposed to be the smart one. Let’s face it, the football arcs are gonna be tough without Bull to kick around.
Les used to get knocked around and have his glasses broken playing basketball at the YMCA back in early Act II. What, did he think football was less physical?
Les and Funky are members of Generation Supreme, because they would never have got turned touch football into footbrawl. Or if they did it’s been retconned away.
Funky throws a good, deep pass to Less, who actually catches it. And…they walk off the field humiliated and laughed at. But…we readers know they kicked ass!. Batdick can’t bring himself to let them humiliate themselves. No. They did great. It’s just these crappy youths that can’t appreciate the wonderfulness of his older characters.
One swallow does not a summer make. It’s going to take creepy Les and the Funkman weeks to recover from this, while the teens are going to finish the game without them.
Someone with better Photoshop skills than me (which is to say someone with any Photoshop skills at all) could cobble together a pretty good Sunday strip using the strips of just the 10th, 13th and 15th. Just put ’em together in that order, and you’ve actually got something. Maybe not an amazing something, but at least something that makes sense and resembles humour.
Plus, Les still has his bowles shattered in this version, so there’s also that!
Y. Knott: why not?
Thanks, TFH!
It IS much better paced this way, isn’t it? It eliminates the silliness of grandpas and Magic cards, tells the story and gets to the punch line. It works.
Thanks, Mela (and thanks to TFH for actually making the conceptual real!) As much as we deservedly harp on Batiuk’s manifest inadequacies as a storyteller, I guess this goes to show that with an actual editor doing their actual job — i.e., the antithesis of King Features ‘editor’ Tea Berry-Blue — this still could be a moderately well-done strip.
Mind you, it would take work. After all, it took six days worth of material to edit this into one (Sunday) strip. Which means that year-long backlog of unpublished Funky Winkerbeans-to-come could soon dissipate into about six scant weeks worth of finished strips….
Always great to see a Nick Lowe shout out.
I’m going to see Nick’s old bandmate Billy Bremner playing a house concert in Ringwood, NJ next month!
Cool! Nick and Dave got all the press (and deserved every accolade they received), but Billy was always Rockpile’s secret weapon. Should be a great night!
Oh, from the most recent BattyBlog entry … after a long-winded explanation of what he was doing with a particular sequence of strips, it ends with: “In short, I liked it. In short, Funky’s readers hated it.”
Indeed. Surely Batiuk knows that this also covers any sequence of strips from the last thirty years or so of Funky Winkerbean….
“Over lunch at the Plaza…”. Sigh.
Move over, Eloise.
Goddamn, Batiuk with his blogging skills can sure get his head up his own bowles.
Batiuk never has a clue what the interesting part of the story is, whether it’s a fictional one in FW or a real one he’s retelling.
He drones on about the art style for 400 words, and then casually drops that bomb. I want to know more about the negative reaction to the story. But we’ll never get it, because Batiuk is so averse to criticism he won’t inquire any further. He just files it under “the audience wasn’t ready for my genius” / “there’s a rule that you have to be funny in the comic page” and moves on to his next onanism.
The man’s blog is nothing but a gigantic monument to his own ego and self-delusion.
And a monument to nonexistent website skills. Can’t he hire somebody who knows how to program?
The old site was plain but functional. I still maintain that the only reason he upgraded was for the virtual spinner racks brimming with Batom comics.
He’s pathetically obsessive about the spinnner racks.
BJr6K, IMO the spinner-rack monomania is another point in favor of TB being on the spectrum, as you suggested last week.
You are correct: the focus on needless minutiae is another trait of autism. Spinner racks aren’t just irrelevant to comic book fandom. They’re counterproductive, because they tend to damage the books.
What the H E double hockey sticks is going on? A FW strip that shows action instead of just telling about it? Heck must have frozen over! This is what I expected to see:
Mopped Up Thorp featured a great Gil Thorp/FW mashup on 10/13. https://moppedupthorp.wordpress.com/
Wait a minute, there are two snark blogs dedicated to Gil Thorp? I was only aware of This Week in Milford.
Test comment
Testes, testes, one, two… three?
Teacher: and now I’m going to give you one of my little quizzies.
Student: can we have one of your little testies instead?
I miss the old, extremely square, bad art Gil Thorp. And the Gail Martin thing with Kaz was the ne plus ultra for it.
Tarzana Nights! Whooooooo!!!!
Gil Thorp is making the same mistake Mark Trail did. Its oldness and squareness was a big part of its charm. Giving it a “modern” reboot inadvertently throws out much of its appeal.
So we’ve spent a week watching Funky feed the misery junkie. “I never played and it was terrible” turned to “I actually played and it was terrible.” Les can’t find the joy in life because he’s an idiot.
Backstairs Story?
Les was probably expecting Funky to run the Les Special (the play Les called when he had to coach the football team when Bull was away for some reason…in the conference championship game): the QB runs in the opposite direction, the entire defense runs after him for some strange reason, and he turns around and throws it to a wide-open Les.
1. Eve, I was 100% truthful.
2. We have just witnessed history.
Mr. Batiuk had an arc that had a beginning, middle, and end. It was good. It pleased all the readers. Les got his. It was everything FW used to be. It was readable. It was pleasurably photoshopped by our experts. TB should retire today on a high.
3. Watched HULU’s PREY. Tremendous flick. Well done characters. Great villain. I would only change one part. Make the fight with the bear longer. Going in, I only had one fear: they would make the girl a Woke heroine. For example in the Avenger movies, Black Widow is a highly trained fighter. Easily accepted by viewer. However, Captain Marvel is a Woke heroine, designed to be a copy of silver age Superman. Kevin Feige said she can move planets, yet is afraid in a gunfight, but easily overpowers Thanos.
Fox went believable on Naru in Prey. She struggles. Thinks. Struggles again. Very watchable. I recommend.