Hey folks, Banana Jr. 6000 here stepping in, with the second entry in my hopefully educational TBTropes series.
One of Tom Batiuk’s crazy blog posts, from a couple years ago, was about his decision not to use fourth wall breaks anymore after Act I ended. He said:
I stopped doing that because, while it’s funny, you lose the investment and involvement of the audience. They know the characters are going to be just fine, and they don’t really care about their fate. By breaking the fourth wall, I inject myself into the story to wink at the reader as we share the joke. Now, however, I began telling stories where my presence was less intrusive and less needed.
https://tombatiuk.com/komix-thoughts/match-to-flame-160/
Batiuk doesn’t seem to realize what he also lost when he made this decision. Here’s the strip he used as an example:
Roland’s not even breaking the fourth wall here! His face is showing his disgust with Les’ statement. The whole scene dovetails nicely with these characters’ Act I personalities. Roland was a radical 70s teenager who wanted his friends to stick it to The Man. But the meek, easily bullied Les was here to do favors for The Man instead. (That sad face just before he has to answer the question is a nice touch.) If Roland’s not making that annoyed face, the whole scene loses its context. It becomes a garden-variety setup and punchline that doesn’t build on what we know about these characters.
If Tom Batiuk doesn’t want to break the fourth wall, fine. The problem is that he doesn’t give the reader any information any other way either. There are ways to convey information to the audience, without pulling them out of the story. It’s called “exposition”, and it’s one of the most basic elements of storytelling. You want to see some good exposition?
I love that line. It explained an important story concept to the audience, fit it into a natural conversation between two characters, and it took 11 seconds. The next ten movies should have never said another word about it.
Let’s look at another strip:
This is the big reveal of Becky’s missing arm, lost in a drunk driving incident involving Wally. Shouldn’t somebody be having a reaction here? Becky’s had her future destroyed in ways few people can comprehend, but she just matter-of-factly walks in and announces this, like she’d been furloughed from Toxic Taco or something. Corey seems to be thinking “Huh. That’s neat.” There’s no shock, no anger, no sadness, no pity, no nothing. And there never will be.
I’ve frequently compared the Funkyverse to The Room. And there’s a scene that’s almost identical to this:
Claudette babbles irrelevant nonsense about never-seen characters for 30 seconds, and then disinterestedly announces she has breast cancer. Which never came up before in the movie, and never comes up again.
The fun of watching The Room is trying to piece together what the hell the movie was trying to be. Which is entirely the fault of Tommy Wiseau’s hammy acting and bizarre storytelling choices. Why are they throwing footballs in tuxes? Why are there paintings of spoons? Why are Johnny and Lisa even together? What twisted kink is Denny there to satisfy? The movie shows you all this strangeness, and just acts like it’s completely normal.
Which is exactly what Funky Winkerbean does. Why is Les still mourning his dead wife after 15 years? Why does everyone go along with it? Why did Cayla marry him? Why do half the people in town have book deals? Why is every character obsessed with comic books in exactly the same way? Why hasn’t Dinkle been run out of town on a rail? Why does everybody like Crankshaft when he causes constant disasters, bullies children, and let his friend die so he could cause a traffic jam? Why did Tom Batiuk get away with this for 30 years? Why? Why? WHY?
Both works have the same central problem: they don’t tell you anything. They both claim to be realistic dramas, but they constantly defeat themselves with absurd, unrealistic, unexplained happenings. Some call this a tone problem. I think of it as the complete absence of tone. There’s nothing about the words they use, they way they use them, or the overall attitude of the work that tells you anything about the author’s intent. You’re left to guess.
And I haven’t even gotten to the worst example yet. Tom Batiuk’s one-time collaborator Gerry Shamray recently passed away. Batiuk made a blog post showing a new strip called Dick and Jane, which they pitched but was never picked up. I mean, I think that’s what happened:
When I was working on the teen pregnancy story arc in Funky, Gerry generously spent an evening with my wife Cathy and I going through strips that were spread across the living room from which we pulled four weeks from the nine or more that I had written. Pictured above is a strip pitch that Gerry and I had put together called Dick and Jane where he used himself as the model for the lead character.
https://tombatiuk.com/komix-thoughts/gerry-shamray/
If any of you can decipher that, let me know in the comments. Anyway, here are the two example strips he gave:
This looks like a parody of a sitcom within a show that’s already a parody, like the movies Troy McClure starred in. Or a parody we would write of Tom Batiuk’s writing.
What the hell was Dick and Jane supposed to be? Why the realistic art but the silly dialog? Why is the man reacting to his wife’s new pregnancy by adjusting his hipster fly-fishing hat? Why is the wife giving smart-ass answers to this life-altering news? Why did they dye their hair black and switch comic/straight man roles between strips? Why is she laughing at this punchline that isn’t even a response to what she said in Panel 2? Why any would publisher want this? Why would you ever show this to anyone?
I’m going simple with the TBTrope name:
Tonelessness
The tendency of a work to convey no exposition at all, or any information about the author’s intent. Comedy, tragedy, drama, and horror are all placed near each other with no contextual information.
Son of Stuck Funky 
“Hey, how’s it going?” Becky blithely said as she arrived at her dismal, dead-end job. “My future dreams of a trombone career are ruined, and my mom’s taking it pretty hard, but no biggie. And if you happen to see Wally, tell him I said hi, and let him know that I’m over the whole costing me my arm thing”.
You see it all spelled out like that, and you see how deranged it all is. Pretty much every FW story arc is the same way. In Westview, everyone is wryly resigned to their fate, and they’re cool with that, more or less.
Oh, we would have had a field day with “Dick And Jane”. The artwork alone could have supported an entire snark blog, and maybe even two. The idea of Batiuk running THREE daily strips at once just boggles the mind.
The idea of Batiuk running THREE daily strips at once just boggles the mind.
(everyone does a deep intake of breath) “MY FATHER JOHN DAR
If Dick and Jane was pitched between 1987 and 1990, it would have been four.
I always forget about JD. As did most Americans while it was running. It’s pretty funny how a guy who had THREE daily comic strips never stops complaining about “the business”.
Great post, Banana Jr. 6000
Definitely a lack of tone to Dick and Jane.
As one reads, there grows a question of how they possibly become pregnant? It had to be by medical means. He does not seem capable of breathing and inseminating at the same time.
So Dick and Jane isn’t supposed to look like a 9 year old parodying a Chick tract? Could’ve fooled me.
Also…
Apple Annie, real person?
Very interesting flashback, BJr6K, but I’m a little confused once again. Why is beloved Act III FW character Rolanda dressed like a dude in the first strip?
“Dick and Jane”! What a novel title. So Tom. Much Bean.
Also, am I the only one who remembers “Get Your War On” and the clip-art webcomics of c.2002? Dick and Tom’s Head seem to have.
TOM: “This looks easy!”
“No, Tom, you still need to write actual jokes!”
TOM: “Don’t tell me how to never do my job!”
“Dick and Jane”! What a novel title. So Tom. Much Bean.
This from the guy who throws a fit about not being able to call his strip Five O’Clock High. Really Tom, that’s your title? Dick and Jane was a 1930s reading primer, and its characters were a meme, long before the internet existed. Mainstream works had stopped referencing it by about 1990. (The 2005 Jim Carrey movie Fun With Dick and Jane was a remake of a 1977 movie.)
Also, am I the only one who remembers “Get Your War On” and the clip-art webcomics of c.2002?
That’s exactly what it looks like! The characters are so generic they look like they were taken from a 1975 Sears catalog. And the writing has a complete lack of tone or intention.
They also look like the Chick Tracts that BillyTheSkink mentioned. They have the same creepiness. Except Chick Tracts had a point. A tacky, mean-spirited, poorly expressed point, but even that’s an improvement over Dick and Jane.
And Gerry Shamray was unquestionably a great artist. His caricatures were of real people were 90% of the actual jokes in John Darling. John would spend 6 panels introducing the show, then the punchline is who he’s actually interviewing. Who were often real people or licensed characters, but Batiuk gonna Batiuk.
Between Shamray, Chuck Ayers, and John Byrne, Batiuk sure had some amazing artists on his team. Make me wonder how. It certainly wasn’t his talent or his people skills. Batiuk acts like a second-generation newspaper cartoonist without being one: mediocre, self-entitled, insulated from criticism, and with a ludicrously overblown idea of his own greatness.
Sounds like the greatest Batiuk self-insert character of all time was Brady Wentworth.
David Rees’ on-point absurdist cynicism was fab.
Also hilarious: his office-life clip-art strip, “My New Filing Technique Is Unstoppable”.
I’d forgotten that he had a little comics empire at one point! It didn’t have the global reach of “I Can Haz Cheezburger?!” but what does?
I remember first finding ICHazC?! when it was 8 pages long. For those unfamiliar, not is just every web “cute cat joke” was spawned by them, basically all memes are.
Cheezburger will be remembered. Funky is already forgotten anywhere besides here.
not is just every web “cute cat joke” was spawned by them
I was…using their syntax. Yeah, that’s what I did.
Also, google your granpda for “INVISIBLE BICYCLE”.
The tonelessness we see comes from his utter lack of a theory of mind. He knows what he means so to him, it follows naturally that bullies are bullying him by lying and saying that they haven’t the least idea of what he’s trying to say.
Great Calvin reference in the header, by the way. One of my all-time favorites, I’ve kept a print of it on the wall of my office for years as a reminder of how not to write (and because it’s funny). I can only imagine that Batty took one look at it, completely missed the sarcasm, said “Oh, hell yeah!” and adopted it as his mission statement.
Academia, here I come!
Speaking of Calvin and Hobbes references, Dick and Jane reminds me of this one:
This has realistic artwork and silly dialog, just like the Dick and Jane samples. But this strip is funny as hell, because Watterson knows what tone is and how to use it. The mismatched tone is intentional, because the scene is initially hiding something from us. And Watterson also knows how to tell a joke, so revealing the secret also serves as the punchline.
Dick and Jane – and the rest of the Funkyverse – jumps randomly back and forth between life-altering seriousness and unfunny jokes. “I’m pregnant! I’m going to have a pony! I think you’re in shock!” And there’s no information about how we’re supposed to interpret anything or what we’re supposed to take seriously.
And speaking of the Tom Batiuk’s intent being clear as mud, don’t get me started on this week’s Crankshaft.
Krankenschaaften: It’s funny because Ed is not only a constant danger to himself and everyone around him, he’s almost certainly paying the highest home insurance premiums known to western civilization yet nobody has the stones to tell him he can’t make fires anymore…
Crankshaft’s almost certainly paying the highest home insurance premiums known to western civilization
No, he’d have to move to Florida for that.
Specialized product. ‘Ed Crankshaft Umbrella Coverage’. Covers against acts of Ed Crankshaft for fire, explosions, water damage, home structural damage, yard damage to lawn and trees, and property damage (especially comic books).
If Batiuk had a sense of humor, he’d make Jeff Murdoch an insurance salesman.
Patrick Dennis’s Auntie Mame once quipped that life is a banquet, and most poor suckers are starving to death.
In Westview, you have the feeling that starving to death is a badge of honor, to which most of its citizens aspire.
(Give me money! cried Darrin Fairgood, and the Universe was silent.)
(Inspiration taken from Stephen Crane’s brief poem:
A man said to the universe:
“Sir, I exist!”
“However,” replied the universe,
“The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation.”)
Or if you prefer literature of an earlier vintage, remember Henry Thoreau’s *Walden,* in which “the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.”
In Westview, that’s the life to have!
(John Brown for Thoreau was an Angel of Light. Jerome Bushka would strike him as an absence of same.)
I seem to remember a “M*A*S*H” episode (“Morale Victory,” the IMDb tells me) in which Major Winchester helps a musician soldier with a crippled hand. Was there no one to try to help Becky find a way to compensate for her loss? (Honey, you’ll love directing the band. Repeat after me, cash…for…clunkers…) Lawrence Durrell’s Clea (who gave her name to Dr. Strange’s nine years later) was a painter who lost a hand; she discovered to her joy that her prothesis could paint!
Westview is not Alexandria, and I suspect it is a Dimension too Dark for Dormammu or Umar to want to rule.
I’ve seen videos of people with no arms playing with their feet. Sometimes quite well.
Tom would write “I Can Never Paint Again! I Got a Unibrow!: The Story of Frida Kahlo”.
Bill:
When I’m on the train, I read, and I keep track of what authors provoke questions from my fellow riders about what I’m reading.
(By far, the winner is Stephen King, no doubt because he’s so prolific, and if the rider hasn’t read what I’m reading, they’ve read something else of King’s and want to know how it compares.)
When I read Carlos Fuentes’s *Years with Laura Diaz,* at least four people asked me about the book, less because of Fuentes than because of the cover, which reproduced a Frida Kahlo painting. There are a lot of Kahlo fans out there!
When a Marvelite complained about Ross Andru’s artwork and closed the letter with “until Ross learns to draw, Make Mine Marvel,” the armadillo (it was always armadillos handling letter columns in those days) said that if that was what it would take to keep the correspondent buying, they’d insist on Andru drawing with his feet from now on!
I have never seen anyone reading a *Funky Winkerbean* collection on the subway.
I did once, on the Market-Frankford El in Philadelphia.
Well, he wasn’t exactly reading it. The guy opened his raincoat, and there was a copy of “Lisa’s Story” dangling from a chain around his neck and hanging over his nether regions. In fact, that, the coat, and a pair of sneakers was all he had on, as I recall.
I know what you’re asking, “Why didn’t you say anything to the train engineer?” Who do you think I’m talking about?
There are a lot of Kahlo fans out there!
I have a coworker with a 5-year-old daughter named Frida. I confirmed that yes, the child was named after Frida Kahlo.
Check out Mark Goffeney. Born without arms.
and there are plenty of people who are missing an arm that can play guitar
Andres Godoy
Some guitarists use their everyday prosthesis to play. Others have a special custom made prosthesis to hold the pick.
Tony Memmel uses Gorilla Tape® to hold a pick in a dimple on his elbow.
As I said elsewhere in this discussion. “People who want to get things done find a way.” A positive outlook like that simply doesn’t exist in the Batiukverse.
Andres Godoy
Some guitarists use their everyday prosthesis to play. Others have a special custom made prosthesis to hold the pick.
Tony Memmel uses Gorilla Tape® to hold a pick in a dimple on his elbow.
As I said elsewhere in this discussion. “People who want to get things done find a way.” A positive outlook like that simply doesn’t exist in the Batiukverse.
That’s a good point. A trombone is a two handed instrument. One hand steadies the instrument while the other operates the slide. Nobody can develop some kind of prosthetic or harness to stabilize the instrument?
Alternatively, can’t a trumpet be played with one hand? They’re both brass instruments. It shouldn’t be a difficult transistion.
People who want to get things done find a way.
I have no musical instrument ability, but as someone who studies technological history for a living it’s interesting that musical instruments have never evolved for one hand (keyboards can be played with one hand, but that’s not their optimum). Am I missing any significant instruments?
Harmonica.
There’s always the kazoo…
https://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0198.html
(And Rick Allen of Def Leppard lost an arm and still performed as their drummer, so there’s that.)
Oh, you beat me to it. I thought of Rick Allen on the way to work.
Rick Allen lost his LEFT ARM in an AUTOMOBILE ACCIDENT in 1984. Did Batiuk base Becky’s injuries on Rick Allen’s? Doubtful but what a coincidence.
Like Becky, Rick lost his arm at the shoulder. Def Leppard could have replaced him, but they never did. He’s a friend That’s total class.
BWOEH:
May I put in a word for Victor “Moulty” Moulton, the drummer for the Barbarians? He also had a hook for a hand.
The Ramones name-check him in “Do You remember Rock ‘n’ Roll Radio”?:
Will you remember Jerry Lee?
John Lennon, T.Rex and Ol’ Moulty?
It’s the end, the end of the 70’s
It’s the end, the end of the century
Do you remember lying in bed
With your covers pulled up over your head?
Radio playin’ so one can see
Marvel’s Nighthawk (Kyle Richmond) had a girlfriend named Trish Starr who was an accomplished musician. She lost her left arm in a car bombing (that’s what comes of having an evil uncle like Egghead).
I wonder whether Batiuk remembered Trish when he put Wally and Becky in that car.
They were a little pragmatic about it, though. Def Leppard had a secondary drummer for awhile, to make sure Allen could get back up to speed after the accident. Also he had some custom drum pedals made so he could do more things with his feet. Still a terrific story.
And one you’ll never hear in the Funkyverse. You’ll never hear anyone praise Becky for finding a way to continue in music despite her accident, and having her dream brutally crushed at age 18. She’s hard-working, persistent, and doesn’t whine about her lot in life. She’s moderately unpleasant and her rejection of Wally was awful, but she’s still the most admirable character in the Funkyverse. By far.
In his book “Adrenalize”, Phil Collen recounts visiting Rick in the hospital a couple of weeks after his accident. Rick told him he had already been working on playing the drums using his left foot and intended to use pedals for other sounds. He had been practicing from his hospital bed, evidenced by the pillow on the floor next to Rick. Being anything other than a drummer was never an option for him, so he was determined to figure out a way to make it work. Truly an inspirational story, and to watch him play is amazing…
@Anonymous Sparrow
Rock and rock and roll radio, let’s go!
Batiuk once wrote on his blog about a musician he enjoyed. The guy couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket. Most folks would not characterize what he was doing as singing. Crooning? Wailing? I doubt Batiuk listens to British heavy metal bands like Def Leppard.
It does seem more likely Batiuk remembered Trish Starr. Like musician Trish, Becky lost her left arm. I always picture Batiuk as a DC Comics fan. Is he a fan of Marvel Comics too?
Perhaps Batiuk killed two birds with one stone based on the same story. Becky lost an arm and Lisa got blown up.
Batiuk once wrote on his blog about a musician he enjoyed. The guy couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket. Most folks would not characterize what he was doing as singing.
You mean Johnny Dowd?
He looks like the 2010’s answer to Jan Terry. This song is what I imagine “Muddy Boots” sounds like. And I think Tom Batiuk himself wrote the lyrics.
In the universe where Natalie Merchant got Jewel’s career, this is Jim Carrey’s SNL parody of “Informer.”
Thanks.
(bwoeh points at Johnny Dowd from the witness stand) That’s him, your honor. That’s the man who assaulted my eardrums!
Unfortunately the video link is no longer available, but the name you provided allowed me to look him up. Which song of his did you did you post?
How do you do you always have these tidbits on hand? It’s like you’ve bookmarked numerous items, to be used against Batiuk “at a later date”? I searched the Batty blog but couldn’t find a name.
@BWOEH The song is “Betty.” Easy to find on YT by that name.
How do you do you always have these tidbits on hand? It’s like you’ve bookmarked numerous items, to be used against Batiuk “at a later date”?
Funny story: I bookmarked it unintentionally. I do that a lot since I often fat-finger Ctrl-D (bookmark in my browser) when I mean Ctrl-F, Ctrl-C, or Ctrl-S. There’s all kind of random stuff bookmarked, with titles like “bec” or “washiu”. But this one captured the YouTube page name, so there it was when I needed it.
And yes, the lyrics absolutely sound like Tom Batiuk wrote them:
(Act I Crazy Harry is using a pay phone)
Panel 1: “Hello is this Betty?”
Panel 2: “Hey Betty, guess who this is!”
Panel 3: “No, no, its Harry.”
Panel 1:”Betty please don’t hang up.”
Panel 2:”I just want to ask you a question.”
Panel 3:”By the way, how are you?”
Panel 1:”Betty, I just wanna know something.”
Panel 2:”You still have my leather jacket?”
Panel 3:”I just thought you might still have it.”
Panel 1: “I know where your kids go to school.”
Panel 2: “I know where your husband goes to work.”
Panel 3: “If you like, I can stop by.”
Panel 1:”it’s Crazy Harry.”
Panel 2:”You still remember?”
Panel 3:”Hello?”
Panel 1:”Betty, dont hang up.”
Panel 2:”I just want my leather jacket back.”
(last panel. Betty is on the phone)
Panel 3: “My name is betty, I have your leather jacket.”
That’s another problem with the whole Becky story. Having one arm would make it very difficult for her to do her job, because she’d have to demonstrate how to play instruments. Not to mention the day-to-day challenges, which the strip never once addressed. I’ve had a broken/disabled left arm three times in my life, and it’s surprising what you have to re-learn how to do. As much as the strip emphasized Becky’s handicap, it didn’t have a drop of interest in actually exploring it or telling a story about it.
Which would have also been a great way to keep Dinkle involved. Dinkle lost his hearing, but his arms still work, so he could be an assistant to Becky to help with certain tasks. Batiuk has no interest in that. Becky’s job is to stick her stump in the reader’s face and say LOOK SERIOUS DRAMA GIVE ME MY PULITZER NOW. Instead, Dinkle magically gets his hearing back and gets hired to run a church choir so he replay his Act I tropes in a place that wouldn’t tolerate his behavior. All for the realism.
A high school band director wouldn’t be as involved with demonstrating how to play the instruments because the students have already learned the basics. If she were a grade school/junior high band director though, then yes, she would need an assistant to help her teach-especially with the woodwind instruments. You definitely need both hands for those! As a part-time clarinet player, I can attest that one would need a really intricate prosthesis to play with only one arm because you have to both hit keys and cover holes with your fingers.
But it is a good point, though. I’m assuming that Becky went through school as a music education major, meaning that she would still have to have a rudimentary knowledge and demonstrate the ability to play each instrument. Did the school make accomodations for her? Somebody remind me-did she even go to music school? Or did she just show up at Westview and Dinkle handed her the baton?
And the one-arm reveal strip-wow. Her MOM’s upset about her not going to Julliard? At least somebody had an emotional response to Becky having her life derailed.
Batiuk incorrectly identifies a non-existent problem: “They know the characters are going to be just fine, and they don’t really care about their fate.”
Batiuk’s solution to the ‘problem’: “Get this! They will now know the characters will NEVER be just fine, and they still won’t really care about their fate!” (leans back, imagines home run trot)
Also, the fourth wall break is no different than a character responding to a dumb pun to say “that was a dumb pun”, which is something that he has continued to do from then all the way to the present day, and still continues to do.
Another very good point. The “bad joke smirk” is exactly the same thing. And given the example Batiuk used, I’m not sure he even knows what a fourth wall break is. In Panel 2, Roland is looking at the viewer, but that’s just a point-of-view shot. In Panel 4, you can see Les’ worried expression, just like Panel 5 shows Roland’s annoyed expression. None of these things is really a fourth wall break. It’s not like Eddie Murphy in Coming To America, where he made the girl bark like a dog and he looks at the viewer as if to say “do you believe this?”
Yup, it’s VERY clear Batiuk doesn’t know what a fourth wall break is. But Batiuk uses words in exactly the same manner as Humpty Dumpty: “When I use a word… it means just what I choose it to mean – neither more nor less.”
Y. Knott:
And it’s his own invention, too, at least when the White Knight is talking backwards and the Red Queen’s off with her head!
Forgive me: I was watching the Disney “Alice in Wonderland” last night and I’m still under the spell of Joseph Kearns’s Doorknob, Ed Wynn’s Mad Hatter and Sterling Holloway’s Cheshire Cat (qui n’est pas bleu, M. Moore!).
Not to mention pondering the “Very Good Advice” song from Alice herself:
I give myself very good advice
But I very seldom follow it
That explains the trouble that I’m always in
Be patient, is very good advice
But the waiting makes me curious
And I’d love the change
Should something strange begin
Well I went along my merry way
And I never stopped to reason
I should have know there’d be a price to pay
Someday…someday
I give myself very good advice
But I very seldom follow it
Will I ever learn to do the things I should?
Will I ever learn to do the things I should?
Today’s CS lets me ask the question: What’s the worst pizza?
I love today’s Cranker. It fully admits that Montoni’s sucked ass. It was the best pizza in town because there was no other pizza in town. The few rebels who dared to pass the Westview Borderland Wall were wished into the Children of the Cornfield where it’s be heavy soon because it’s June. (I may be conflating stories here. Or am I–CORNflating?!) [Is hit with lottery rocks; becomes jack-in-the-box and endless DTV sequels]
Domino’s tastes like they smeared the sauce on the box. But 25 years ago, we stupid dumb idiots were asked at the liquor store if, on Thanksgiving Eve–basically liquor store Black Friday–if we wanted an unpaid 30 minute lunch, or a pair of large pizzas we’d eat on the clock! We chose the latter; we liked money. It was from a place that had just opened in our state. We each greedily devoured the 1st slice. We all slowed down during our 2nd. I said “Is this ham even cooked? This is really pink for ham.” It looked like a slide from PowerPoint called “How to Recognize Trichinosis.”
We had 1.5 large pizzas left at the end. The struggling single mom and her daughter could’ve eaten for days off of that. The ‘zas ended up in the dumpster. We poor people passed on free food.
On Xmas, we were given the same offer. We all chose “unpaid break with food from home” rather than Papa John’s again.
My worst pizza was while at a ski resort in Canada. The closest pizza shop was 20 minutes away. There was no menu at the resort, so the shop had to tell us over the phone what was available. We ordered the deluxe pizza and they delivered.
The crust had the consistency of an English muffin. The sauce was brown and more like barbecue sauce than pizza sauce. The cheese was tasteless and waxy. The toppings included Canadian bacon, shredded chicken, raw red onion slices, green olives, pickle slices and… broccoli? 😝 YUK!
It was as if the person who made it had no idea what a deluxe pizza was. We left it on top of the television for days. We joked the radiation from the television might mutate it into something better.
Perhaps that’s what passes for pizza in the mountains of British Columbia. There were a few slices missing at the end of the week. We assume the resort staff helped themselves.
Housekeeping: Oooh. Free pizza!
I think that somebody in Westview put up a Papa Johns-like restaurant and somehow made it even shittier than Montoni’s ever will be
So Tom’s got a new blog post, and new banners for his signings.
https://tombatiuk.com/komix-thoughts/on-the-road-again-akron-comicon-2023/
And he’s got this doozy of a quote.
I… what? “Immortally wounded”? What does that even mean? I feel like it should go in the Batiuktionary, just as soon as anyone figures out what the hell he’s talking about. I mean, maybe it’s just me, but that doesn’t sound like a good thing?
Don’t ever change, Tom.
(The banners are fine, at least, though I don’t know if I would have chosen to go with Old Man Funky like that. Maybe a group shot, or the various Funkys throughout the years, or something a bit more than “old guy in an apron”, but… whatever. It’s adequate, I guess, it’s not like anyone’s going to his tables who doesn’t already know who he is anyway, right?)
He’s used “immortal wound” in the strip before, when Batton Thomas was gushing about Flash #123. He must really like that one.
The moment he came up with “immortal wound” was probably also the moment he came up with Les’ home run trot.
I look at that Funky banner, and all I can see is that his stomach is hanging down to at least mid-thigh by the way the apron is drawn. It’s so noticeable next to the (relatively) body-accurate Crankshaft.
This bit got my attention:
“An update of my con banners has been long overdue, and, what with the pandemic and all, I wasn’t even sure if the place I had previously gotten my banners from was still in business.”
How lazy is this man? He couldn’t pick up the damn phone, send an email, or check the company’s website or social media? And what does the pandemic have to do with anything? Printing and design companies can work contact-free. And they probably could have used the business at the time!
Ah, the Akron ComicCon. I remember so many episodes of the Big Bang Theory with the guys making that trip.
‘Immortal wound’ is definitely one for the Batiukionary.
immortal wound / immortally wounded:
Used in both Crankshaft and in Tom’s blog to signify a moment (presumably in childhood) when a comic book makes a lifelong imprint on one’s psyche. Something like ‘scarred for life’, but apparently meant in a positive way, as in this example: “To me, reading old comic books is like getting in a time machine to the past, taking me back to when I was immortally wounded by them.
The term is an attempt to play on the phrase ‘mortal wound’ or ‘mortally wounded’, which itself is never used in a positive context.
I think TB is making a roundabout reference to 1963’s Flash #137, “Vengeance of the Immortal Villain.” The Barry Allen and Jay Garrick Flashes team up for the third time to battle Vandal Savage, a Cro-Magnon who received the gift of immortality after bathing in the glow of a crashed meteorite millennia ago. It’s a key Silver Age story because it also marks the first appearance in 12 years of the Justice Society of America (Atom, Dr. Mid-Nite, Green Lantern, Hawkman, Johnny Thunder, Wonder Woman), who the twin speedsters free from Savage’s captivity. And yes, I’m proud to say I own a very nice copy of the book. Was I “wounded” by it? No.
Um, gang, regarding the Monday 10/23 ‘Shaft:
Oh, for the love of…you SHUT DOWN Montoni’s in the other strip last October, Batiuk! Did you FORGET that already? You devoted several days to talking about it closing and FW auctioning off all the memorabilia! Lillian even got her Tiffany lamp back!
And incidentally…you had Mopey Pete ALREADY PROPOSE to Min-dull several YEARS ago! Did you forget the carinval engagement tiger. Tom? Did you forget how they went over to Bedside Manor to share the news with a wheelchair-bound Ed and…
Oh, is that it? Harley the Time-Traveling Janitor absorbed all that with his Chrono-Mop and now you want to start fresh with the old “She heard proposal, but he was talking about something else altogether” misunderstanding trope? Oh, boy, can’t wait!
Also, a boyfriend’s saving pizza for his “big moves” is a detail no woman should share with her mother.
AND just three days ago, Ed lamented that it was a pizza box that caused the conflagration at his house, because “the pizza from this new place is a lot greasier than Montoni’s used to be.” That clearly implies that Montoni’s no longer exists and Ed had to switch to an inferior pizzeria.
(How any pizza could be inferior to Montoni’s is a question for the ages.)