The Annotated The Komix Thoughts

“The final Funky strip shows the future Lisa reading her great grandfther’s book, Lisa’s Story- The Other Shoe. The book had originally been titled The Other Shoe – The Complete Lisa’s Story.“

It’s both pretty funny and kind of sad how even his personal blog posts are full of pointless filler and careless sloppiness. No one cares less about his passions than BatYam does. Except for that freaking cancer book, of course, which he STILL cares about way, way too much.

Is there really a (former) regular FW reader who needed that last strip explained to them? I mean, come on. He relentlessly shilled, flogged, hawked and pimped that book for like sixteen years, there was no mystery or confusion present in that terrible, terrible ending. We all knew exactly what it was and exactly why it was there. So who does he think this is for?

Then (I don’t feel like linking to it, just go look at it yourself) he actually demonstrated the creative process involved in slightly changing the title of the cancer book, like it was interesting to someone, somewhere, in some distant alternate universe, or so I assume. Given how he just did the last strip, it would appear that the Annotated Ending series of blog posts are finished now, and we’re all poorer for it. If this is indeed the case, the last Annotated Ending post was every bit as anti-climactic and sad as the actual ending itself was, which is no mean feat. How DOES he do it?

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Author: Epicus Doomus

V.P. at SoSF. Does not approve of new WP layout at all.

31 thoughts on “The Annotated The Komix Thoughts”

  1. I think if you had shown the picture of the “transition” in changing the title, we’d all assume you had photoshopped it as a joke. The same exact font, just with the subtitle now the main title and the main title now the subtitle. Wow, Tom, how many nanoseconds did you spend working on that massive change? (Also: “grandfther”. Tom don’t need no spellchecker, consarn it!) (Also also: am I the only one having trouble with typing comments? It doesn’t seem to want to let me start a new paragraph right now. Weird.)

    1. I could totally see that happening, as it does look like something we’d Photoshop as a gag. “Then they put the new title right over the old one, like this”. It makes me wonder if he really even knows what “annotated” means.
      Who would have even noticed this detail? Sure, if he changed the title to “Lust For Lisa” and Lisa was on the cover posing seductively in her cancer hat, yeah, we probably would have taken note of that. But that? Meh, it’s just that damn cancer book again.

  2. How he does it is that he has no theory of mind. He reminds me of Lynn Johnston because she lacks patience with people who don’t read her mind as well.

    1. Tom strikes me as a first idea, best idea, kind of guy. And also someone who resists second opinions on his work. I know he’s said he takes advice from his wife, but the guy reeks of disdain for constructive crit.

      1. the guy reeks of disdain for constructive crit.

        Very true. We’ve long known Batiuk is thin-skinned, egotistical, and completely hostile to criticism. But this “annotated” episode is a new window into how little he thinks of other human beings. He really thinks we needed these things explained to us.

        “We see from the broken sign that the store is called the Village Booksmith.” Yeah, Tom, the sign had the words ‘Village Booksmith’ on it. And he posts the cartoon again, as if you might have missed this detail the first time. “This is the same book store that we currently see in Crankshaft – the book store run by Crankshaft’s next door neighbor Lillian McKenzie.” As opposed to some different Village Booksmith run out of a different attic in the same small town, I guess.

        Never mind how much time Batiuk spends on things that are only interesting to him: the comic book references, and the endless faux-promotion of Lisa. He has no concept what things a reader would actually want to know, like what started the book burnings. (And how the hell was it not Lisa’s Story?)

        It’s one thing to ignore critics. It’s another thing to think so little of your audience’s intellect that you write six blog posts to spell out things the original work already spelled out. It’s an insult to his readership.

        1. And he routinely insulted his readers time and time again over the course of FW’s run. Endless premise rehashing, ignoring continuity, all of it.

        2. It seems to be a common thing. Johnston, McElnazi, Batiuk, the Frenchman who created Miraculous Ladybug…..all of them think they outrank the people reading their stuff.

  3. Tom Batiuk’s audience is Tom Batiuk, and he is fascinated by all this. He finds it endlessly intriguing and illuminating. He looks forward to each post the way he looks forward to a new issue of The Flash.

    1. It’s like he can’t help himself. He comes up with a reasonable premise…”the annotated final FW sub-arc”…but instead of a genuine deep dive, he puts almost nothing into it at all. He did the same thing with FW, for decades on end.

      This one is really embarrassing, though. It couldn’t possibly be any more “low energy”. It reads like he suddenly remembered he was supposed to do this, then quickly half-assed it.

      1. It’s like he recently read an annotated comic book, and wanted to write his own “annotated Funky Winkerbean without having any clue why. There’s a lot about the Funkyverse that would benefit from an explanation, but he really just wants to talk about his comic book reference and promote Lisa’s Story again.

        I liked the “picture of Lillian on the wall” one. Umm, Tom, the book store is still in Lillian’s house and still has Lillian’s name on it. I think that was all the clues we needed!

    2. Exactly right. We got the same sniveling and sulking about amusing ONLY herself, everyone else be damned from StaLynn Johnston in her bio.

  4. Whenever I watch a video of a Tom Batiuk interview from his home office, my eyes always drift to see if he has his books prominently displayed in the background.

    Every time, without fail, he does.

    Batiuk: (hypnotically) Look at my books. You will buy my books. Look at my books.

    1. To be fair, I think that’s a fairly common practice among people who have something to sell. In fact, I wouldn’t doubt that it’s often suggested to them if they don’t arrange their stuff for maximum exposure. “Why don’t you have some of your books/paintings/sculptures/shrunken heads/victims displayed behind you when we film?”

      1. True, but I think Batiuk overdoes it. Seriously, ALL FOUR Lisa’s Story covers facing the camera, in unnatural positions on the bookshelf? And Lisa is somehow the central topic of every interview, despite her death being 15+ years ago now.

        He’s a weird example of a one-hit wonder, in that he WANTS to talk endlessly about the only noteworthy thing he ever did. Usually artists who had that career want to talk about something other than their one hit.

        Never mind that Batiuk’s one hit was less like “Tubthumping” or “Macarena” and more like “10-9-8” by Face To Face (#38 for three consecutive weeks in 1984).

      2. Oh. We’re being fair to Batiuk now.

        Sorry, I guess I missed the memo.
        😂

    2. I suspect he positions the books like that in his own home as a reflex at this point, one honed from years of shuffling Lisa books into prominent display at every bookstore he visited.

      1. BatYam did a blog post about the last strip in FW’s 50 year run, one that also featured the book he’s been carrying on about for the last sixteen years, and it consisted of three mundane, sloppy sentences. I’ve done 1,000 word posts on dialog-free FW strips I barely glanced at for five seconds, but Batty could only manage three weak sentences regarding the culmination of his entire life’s work. It’s kind of alarming in its own way. I just can’t imagine not giving a shit about something I care about so much. But that’s just me.

        Anyhow, yeah, rearranging copies of “Lisa’s Story” is purely reflex for ol’ TomBan at this stage. he doesn’t even consciously realize he’s doing it.

      2. I wonder if Batiuk keeps pictures of his books in his wallet/phone?

        Man: Here are some pictures of my grandkids. Aren’t they cute?
        TB: Here are some pictures of my “Lisa’s Story” books. Should’ve won a Pulitzer. Want to buy one?

  5. Have any of you GoComics readers read or heard anything about the impending Summer/September upgrades
    they blogged about last December?

    As a “Free Subscriber” I’m subscribed to the GoComics blog but haven’t read anything about the upgrade since then.

    Summer and September have come and gone. There have been no changes that I have noticed this year, except for increased moderation and the lame difficulty they placed on posting links (capitalize the “C” in .com, folks).

    There was a day a while back where Crankshaft mysteriously disappeared from readers’ “Comics I Follow” list and the GoComics A-Z title list. SoSF readers, including myself, speculated whether GoComics or Batiuk pulled the plug.

    Also, last month for about an hour, any title I tried to read was three white panels with a message box in panel three, “Coming Soon!” Perhaps these are side effects of the upgrade? 🤷‍♀️

    I’m willing to subscribe to GoComics, but I want to see the results of the upgrade before I do. After the Comics Kingdom debacle, I’m afraid it’s once bitten twice shy.

    1. Happy to link MopMan! Thanks for making the Strip Snark Blogosphere that much richer!

  7. Kudos to Tom for answering the burning questions all of us had after reading that final arc, such as:
    “Were the title and subtitle of Lisa’s Story reversed? How is such a thing even possible?” and “Who is this ‘Lisa’ and what is this ‘Lisa’s Story’? First I’ve heard of it,” and “I am legally blind, can anyone tell me the book author’s name shown in the last panel?”

  8. Since the comment box no longer allows me to insert paragraph or line breaks, I’m posting this test to see whether HTML tags will do the trick.

    This should be a new paragraph.

      1. Please tell me you didn’t just try to insert a “blink” tag. If you have, I shall foist my unstoppable army of 1997 Geocities gifs upon thee!
        (mumbling: “Ctrl-f, that’s “foist” right?)

        1. h1 Yes I did!

          Some tags are allowed I guess, but we can’t go Web 1.0 here. That would just be chaos. Some jerk like me would try to insert frames or something, just watch.

          Does anyone even hardcode HTML anymore? I do for my little thing but I’m a weirdo.

          And I’d rather have animated cursors than Crankshaft’s toenail, so I’m bracing for that now that you’ve asked for it over at gocomics!

          1. Oh, I hardcode whole websites full of HTML. I’m old-fashioned like that, though I do use PHP/JavaScript for the dynamic parts. I would never use >marquee< or >blink< though.

          2. HMMM! So, YOU, [O]! Your html is strong, but mine is STRONGER! You FAIL at basic tags with your pathetic h1 tags!

            You GHOST BUS DRIVER! (folds arms against mighty chest)
            Yes, I have seen a lot of old Shaw Brothers movies! WHY DO THIS ASK?! HMMM.

          3. A few years back I hardcoded HTML for a simple website that allowed my college friends to submit their picks against the spread for our college football pick ’em pool (which we had been doing via e-mail. I went full-on early internet too: frames, radio buttons, single color backgrounds, blue links, Arial text… It was glorious. Didn’t help me pick any better though.

          4. Hey billytheskink, I built almost exactly the same thing! I’m rebuilding it now to support all sports, and to get odds data from API.

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