Gee Bill, you said you’d be entertained, and yet your comments at the site don’t really say that at all.
I think even Bill underestimated how stupid the PBM appearing this year would be…
(shrugs) “It’s a living.”
Hey, remember when Mindy was all smug about being proposed to?
Oh, if only the Pizza Box Monster was Mooch Myers. He’s come to exact revenge on his ex-girlfriend Mindy and his ex-best friend Pete by ingratiating himself to Pete while in disguise and then setting fire to Montoni’s during the grand re-opening… laughing maniacally as the ex-es who crossed him burn before realizing in horror that the fire is spreading beyond Montoni’s. Thus begins THE BURNINGS.
Hey, it wouldn’t be the first time Mooch set fire to a Westview institution, nor would it be the first time a costumed Batiukverse character reappeared after a long hiatus and set fire to Montoni’s.
Never have I been sorrier to be right.
Is this upending the PBM canon, such as it is? Are we gonna find out who is in that ferkakte getup? Will this be forgotten tomorrow? Does Batty know what a “silent partner” is in the restaurant biz — someone who puts up money and shares in the profits, but doesn’t participate in running the business?
Anyone have a prediction about who is in that costume (assuming this thread continues)? I’m afraid to guess because I hate being right.
I’ll say it: Batton Thomas.
Kevin, wearing stilts.
Zanzibar, also wearing stilts. (We can only hope.)
Kevin, standing on Zanzibar’s shoulders. (Or vice versa.)
Frankie. (Again, we can only hope.)
Mitchell Knox.
Timemop.
That guy who hung around the Komix Korner and actually bought Atomik Komix, even though he thought they sucked (which, to be fair, they do).
The ghost of the ghost of Phil Holt. (If you come back to life, does your ghost become undead? Lots of room for philosophical questions here!)
The ghost of the ghost of Tony Montoni. (Why WAS he a ghost, anyway?)
Sadie Summers.
Chien.
Rolanda.
One of the Gay Prom Dudes.
The other Gay Prom Dude.
Mystery Gay Prom Attendee. (This could be really efficient, Batiuk could use one strip to reveal the answer to TWO mysteries that no one cares about!)
Peter Mossman.
Marianne Winters’ Academy Award.
Man, coming up with stupid answers to this is a lot more fun than the comic itself, that’s for sure.
It’s going to be the water-cooled Maxim machine gun hall monitor Les used that turned out decades later to be a cardboard cutout.
The entertaining thing about PBM is that we never found out who it was. So, of course, Tom’s gotta ruin that. The Force: was it better as a vague energy field, or when it was midi-chlorians? Was the series better pre- or post-JarJar?
Since Daveykins was recently mentioned here, did you know he wrote a novel–yes, a full novel–about Peter Pan (who was Davey)? His explanation on how Pan could fly was not pixie dust or large quantities of meth, but that his blood was filled with keratin. “That’s what feathers are made of!”I thought “His blood is made of fingernails?!</i?" Why not have him just drink jet fuel?
After today’s reveal, Pizza Box Monster simply has to be Les.
– He’s already been seen in Crankshaft.
– Because Lisa’s Story such a global media phenomenon, it’s plausible that he has enough money to start a restaurant.
– CBH’s breakdown of possible suspects did not eliminate Les.
– He has nothing better to do with his time. (Meta version: Batiuk needs a new reason to put his favorite character into the strip.)
– Montoni’s is one of Les’ many irrational attachments about Lisa. Remember him wanting to buy the sign at auction because it was outside their apartment window?
– He’s enough of a dickhead to take his friend’s restaurant, after making no effort to help him save it when he could have.
– Funky is enough of a dickhead to deserve this.
– The PBM outwitted Funky, every time, even though any idiot could have easily caught him.
– You think Tom Batiuk is going to let Pete and Mindy be the savior of Montoni’s, even if they are doing all the work?
I’m calling it right now: it’s Les.
I’d think it’s
Eric “Mooch” Myers (Mindy’s former boyfriend)
Heather “Chien” Parks
Linda Bushka
Darin Fairgood
Owen Miller
Wally Winkerbean
Matt Miller
Jared Posey
Jeff Murdoch
Skyler Fairgood
Michael Montoni (Tony Montoni’s father)
or Cody Fletcher (I dont think Cody canonically has a surname so i headcanon that Cody’s surname is “Fletcher”)
I really don’t think Batiuk’s decided that there’s anyone in that costume. Hell, the costume itself is the person, like Les and his yellow shirt. Either he’ll go full silent partner and never be seen or Batiuk will have this idiot wearing 60 pizza boxes regularly just standing around as if it’s the most natural thing in the world.
I completely agree with @Charles 100%. Attempting to guess the identity of the Pizza Box Monster is pointless. We all share the same curiosity about who the Pizza Box Monster is, but when has Batiuk ever given us the answers we wanted?
Me too. It’s that “no theory of mind” thing again. Batiuk never thought about who the PBM is, and has no idea the audience would want to know. To him, it’s not important to the story. It’s all just a mechanism to put Pete in charge of Montoni’s, and put Montoni’s into Crankshaft. Once that’s done, the story will end.
It’s John Darling’s murder all over again. All Batiuk wanted to do was kill the strip. He never put any thought into who the murderer was, because it wasn’t important to what he cared about. When he needed something for Les to be a super-writery writer about, he had to come up with a perpetrator. Plantman was shoehorned into being the killer despite him having no motive.
Watch it be Chester.
the PBM is a lean figure
while Chester isn’t
This is a train wreck of underdeveloped stories. Mindy doesn’t get her marriage proposal after being de facto engaged for years, then recoils with horror when Pete says the words “marriage” and “kids.” This gets dropped because Pete wants to walk away from the comic books that are the emotional center of this world, and take over a pizza restaurant that was auctioned down to the studs a year ago. And his partner is the goddam Pizza Box Monster, a never-identified person who Funky was terrified of for a never-identified reason.
It should be an intriguing detail that PBM had the money and the desire to keep the restaurant going, while Funky was avoiding him and going out of business. But since no one ever suffered as a result of the closure or has even been seen since then – and the store re-opened anyway to get new cars to drive to Dinkle’s Christmas Messiah – this has no impact. And Timemop is “nudging” everything anyway. The story defeats itself at every turn.
ALL of TB’s stories defeat themselves at every turn. That’s the absolutely unhinged, bonkers, wackadoo thing — that the same guy who, completely straight-faced, wrote this:
I stopped [breaking the fourth wall] 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.
is the same guy who will dangle insanely tantalizing elements like “a talking, sharpshooting alcoholic chimpanzee killed the girlfriend of the 40s silent movie star” and “an Afghan warlord is working in an Ohio suburb” and “the highest-paid comix author and screenwriter wants to reopen a gutted, failed pizzeria because it’ll pay for his family with the girl he never proposed to,” etc.
ANY ONE of those premises, or even a fraction thereof, could be the basis for an entire long-running comic strip.
ZANZIBAR — a murderous chimp got away with it because his movie star owner took the fall and went to jail. Now Zanzibar’s free to break out the expensive booze — and wait till you see what happens when the world finds out he can talk!
KHAHN — An Afghan warlord joins forces with the returned GI whose life he saved during the war — and when he gets recruited as the star batter of the Toledo Mudhens, the gut-busting, culture-clash laughs never stop!
But I don’t think Bats even realizes that he’s zooming past the most outlandish, intriguing ideas at 110 mph, only to arrive with great fanfare at a puddle-strewn empty lot where nothing interesting has ever happened.
“the highest-paid comix author and screenwriter wants to reopen a gutted, failed pizzeria because it’ll pay for his family with the girl he never proposed to,”
On the plus side, (yeah) it’s nice that it’s Mopey and not Mason buying another property 2500 miles away from where he lives, or Chester buying another property for no reason whatsoever, to immediately hand it over to whoever Batiuk thinks should run the place. At least this acknowledges that Mopey would have some agency after all the absurd success Batiuk’s thrown at him over the last 16 years.
The fact that this whole thing involves Pete really puzzles me. I’m trying to figure out if TB has just gone so far off the rails that it makes sense to him that Pete would be the best character for this or if he is getting some type of minimal guidance from the syndicate that Crankshaft can’t just morph into FW and that every story arc must involve some well-established Crankshaft character.
I only think the latter because the ONLY reason that I can fathom that makes sense for Pete and Mindy to be ones to to reopen Montoni’s is that Mindy is a well-established Crankshaft character and that such a connection must be somehow required.
None of the others in the long long long list of characters who make much more sense have this connection. A big no for Wally and Rachel, the most obvious candidates and, frankly, who TB should have had taking over the restaurant from a retiring Funky at the end of last year because there was not really any reason the place had to close (unless the reason was to set up this story, which… good grief). Ditto for Jessica and Durwood or Adeela, Lefty and DSH, Crazy and Donna, or *shudder* even Les and Cayla… all folks that make oodles more sense as heirs to Montoni’s than PETE.
And I say Pete and not “Pete and Mindy” because Mindy, despite a history as a Montoni’s employee and an ostensible place in this couple, is ultimately superfluous to the reopening of Montoni’s. It’s Pete’s idea and Pete’s alone to do this, because that’s how TB writes (or doesn’t) for women and because this couple remains incredibly under baked, even by Batiukverse standards.
I doubt that the syndicate is micromanaging TB to the extent of being concerned whether there is an established Crankshaft character in the storyline.
I mean, just last month (9/30), they allowed a strip which established that Ed caused the death of one of his co-workers by intentionally driving slowly to the hospital to get as many cars backed up behind him as possible.
If the syndicate doesn’t care about the title character crossing the moral event horizon, they aren’t going to object to a storyline involving characters going into the pizza business just because the people involved are relatively new to the strip.
I think the PBM will be Summer.
She would have to be the beneficiary of Les’ life insurance policy to afford that kind of investment. Unless of course, she has already written that history of Westview best seller. Or unless Timemop has advanced her funds from her granddaughter’s book that hasn’t been written yet. Any of those would make about as much sense as this week’s story.
You’re applying logic and common sense in your analysis. And you’re also applying common story-telling tropes! Oh my heavens, please see me after class.
Gotta give Mindy a little credit today though. She has a perfectly reasonable response of “Are you serious??” I hope her next move is pulling the boxes off of PBM and unmasking him/her like a Scooby-Doo villain.
Nothing gets the blog active like Crankshaft getting so crazy that we’re back to daily posts, eh?
The real game now is wondering how many weeks this story goes in what likely is trying to be significant to the status quo (or at least as notable as the Valentine theater shenanigans). Like how much of the journey of Montoni’s dubious reopening are we going to see before the big grand day?
or at least as notable as the Valentine theater shenanigans
But that was 6 months ago! Nothing happened! Are you implying that the Montoni’s plot will also go–
I’ve got to give Batiuk credit for building a little intrigue here. We’re all wondering where this is going to go. Having Pete walk away from his comic book career to save Montoni’s, and bringing Pizza Box Monster out of retirement too? A refreshing twist. I still think PBM/silent partner is going to be Les, which would fulfill the prophecy of Batiuk always choosing the most boring solution. But it’s good while it lasts.
Notice that she only objects to PBM being Pete’s sugar daddy. It’s chilling with a Scooby Doo villain, not sinking savings into something retroactively run into the ground that angers her. Let that sink in.
My bet: Another week of this insanity, because Tom’s Law Of Comics means every arc ends after 3 weeks. And on 11/4 it will be the PBM taking off its head, with them startled! “IT’S—IT’S YOU!” with an offpanel cutaway not showing who it is, so he can drag it out months later. Maybe before Middling can yell “You’re—my father—JOHN DARL—!” Or someone else who will make you go “Uh-Huh” and then go read a good comic.
Who will win in the end, Duck of Death? WE SHALL SEE. We…shall…(falls asleep)
Which would mean Jessica Fairgood introducing her parents thus:
“This is my mother, Jan, and this is my father John Darling, who wasn’t murdered.”
It’s how Mr. Inspector Bucket with Sir Leicester Dedlock, Baronet, would do it.
So choose your Dickens:
Should we think of Tiny Tim, who did not die, to whom Scrooge was as a second father?
Or should we think of Little Nell, whose death scene, according to Oscar Wilde, it would take a heart of stone to read without crying from laughter?
Exit before Mr. Bumble says that I am a greater ass than the law, or Mr. Grimwig once again threatens to eat his head.
Very amusing choice, but you got one thing wrong, AS.
It’s “…this is my father, John Darlingwhowasmurdered, who wasn’t murdered.”
Your Grease:
Mea culpa.
The example of Joe Friday with “the Virgin Connie Swail” in the 1987 “Dragnet’ should have occurred to me.
“You’re… my father…”
“Nah, I’m Mitchell Knox. I’m just wearing the flesh of your father, John Darling Who Was Murdered, as a mask. You wouldn’t believe how much I had to shell out to get his skin from the coroner. Also, would you like to see some autopsy photos? Wait, I wasn’t supposed to mention those, forget I said that.”
“You gotta admit… he looks the part!” said Pete.
“I suppose so,” mused Mindy. “He looks the part of a man with a large amount of money he’s looking to invest — not in stocks, not in real estate, not in precious metals, art, or even comics, but in a restaurant. He looks like he’d choose to do that right at this moment, when food, fuel and real estate prices are skyrocketing and working class wages are stagnant, so discretionary income for eating out is slashed to the bone.
He does look the part — the part of someone who would take an enormous bankroll and give it to a writer who’s never even worked a day at a restaurant but wants to reopen a pizzeria that failed under experienced ownership. And he wants to give you carte blanche with that money; he specifically wants to be a silent partner, meaning that he won’t oversee the operation of the restaurant.
Yes, Pete, he does look the part. He looks like a clown, an ignöramus, a fool, a damned idiót, and an all-round cutesy, self-congratulatory aśshole. The perfect partner for you.
I’ll mail you the tiger. See you in the funny papers.”
“You know, they call them the funny papers, but that doesn’t mean they have to be funny. You see…”
“Shut up, Skunky.”
Anonymous Sparrow,
I did say the PBM had to hurry, but no one predicted this. No one can predict TB choices. They make no sense in a universe that is “this close” from reality.
I am almost finished with *Dubliners*. Next, I will read, “A Movable Feast” by Hemingway. Then I will tackle and try the beast known as Ulysses.
Do you suppose TB actually tried to read the book, and that led to the book club week?
You might appreciate this next part. As I had mentioned before, I had read short stories by Shirley Jackson. Both authors had their own take on short stories. Jackson did not place her characters in the same universe. Totally stood alone by themselves. They were all well defined characters that seemed real in spite of the gothic twist at the end. I thought many of her characters could have benefited from a second story.
Despite the difficulties in publishing, Joyce invents a world that could easily have a crossover between stories 5 and 11 as an example. Like Jackson, you feel you know these Irish, and believe you are having a pint with them. They are depicted as a very poor country, which I do not dispute, but everyone can buy rounds, leave to another pub, and do the same. Joyce writes a tough world with grand actors.
This might interest you, also. I found the magazine that had the article on radio westerns. Because of the article, (good writer by the way!) I will check out Gunsmoke with William Conrad, and see if I can listen to it on YouTube. I have listened to an episode of *the Six Shooter* with James Stewart as Britt Ponset. It was where a church needed a new roof and Britt asks a crook to strong arm his friends to raise the money. The film, “the Goodfellas” shows the more realistic downside to such a request.
Finally in Dubliners, the story ‘Clay’, Maria sings from an opera, a selection called “I Dreamt I Dwelt in Marble Halls” I downloaded the version by Enya in Shepherd Moons, called Marble Halls. Beautiful melody.
I just had an incredibly stupid thought. Since stupid thoughts are ironically the most likely to be correct, I thought I’d share it here.
Is it possible that Tom Batiuk is not only wrapping up his cartooning career, but also planning to put money into Luigi’s in Akron, where he’s been a VIP for decades?
Are you implying that Tom would try to open a restaurant in today’s economy? That would mean that he’d have to be incredibly stu–
(insert “Oh, Right” guy graphic I used earlier)
Re: Sunday’s Crankshaft:
I’m starting to think that, as the wise BJr6K suggests, there really is no mystery. This whole thing is so underdeveloped that it wouldn’t surprise me if the PBM disappeared again without another mention after this week.
PBM is introduced to Mindy and blathers:
I had a tradition of showing up here at monotony’s every Halloween… and knowing it would be closed this Halloween really bummed me out! So I just figured, ‘What the heck! I’ll show up anyway!”
I think these words, again, are Batty’s, being put into the mouth of the character. He killed off Montoni’s but wanted to use the PBM, so what the heck, he’d have him show up anyway. Annnnd … script done!
I truly don’t think he thinks about these things for long enough to even realize how many, many questions this raises. And if he does, he waves them out of his brain with a hearty “it’s called writing!”
We also learn that apparently, the PBM is really the “Pizza Monster,” no “Box.” And that he has managed to don a pair of white gloves since we saw him yesterday.
Yeah, I bet Monday morning we’re right back to Crankshaft’s bowling team.
And if you thought there might be some clues on Batiuk’s blog, there aren’t. Four posts since last week. Three John Darling strips, and one called “winter prep” but is mostly about how much he likes comic books.
I truly don’t think he thinks about these things for long enough
Cut him a break! He only wrote it 11 months ago! You can’t expect perfection unless he sits on it for 11.5 months!
Yeah, the gloves. Why? I guess so we can’t rule out the PBM being Black. His rich tapestry of Black characters such as Cayla, and…umm… Was the Reading Rainbow Guy a character? Tom saw that show once.
I notice that CK has unceremoniously dumped The Bemusing Spider-Man. No loss. It was supposed to run repeats for 6 months after Stan Lee and his brother Larry stopped doing it, which I’m gonna guess they probably really weren’t, being as old as Crank. It’s been reruns for like 4 years. It ended partly through one of its dumber plots, where MJ is filming at the top of the Empire State Building in exactly the way movies are never filmed. I doubt they’ve had a lot of complaints.
I myself have stopped reading The Baffling Dick Tracy. Apartment 3G in its death throes was more coherent. Like the Funkyverse, the art is GREAT, and the writing is toilet. What even was that last arc about Barefoot Sunglasses Lady even about? Every day there was a new plot…”development,” I guess you could call it generously. I’ve raised kittens with longer attention spans than the writer.
Just sayin’–Still plenty of time for GC to unceremoniously put CS on the curb with the rest of the trash!
I was gonna say that we already saw Caucasian hands on Saturday before the gloves apparently were swiftly put on mid-conversation, so the character can’t be black.
But there’s precedent for black people turning white in Westview — hi, Caucayla! — so who’s to say the PM didn’t turn from white to black between panels? (Princ’pal Nate?) Or perhaps a white trans woman with a distinctly male voice? (Rolanda, that you in there?)
I very much want to believe it’s Cliff Anger. He’s got showbiz in his blood! Maybe he’s chosen to retire from the entertainment PR firm he founded with Vera Nash when he was 95, to return to showbiz at the frisky age of 100! Hey, if George Burns could do it….
Son of Stuck Funky 
Gee Bill, you said you’d be entertained, and yet your comments at the site don’t really say that at all.
I think even Bill underestimated how stupid the PBM appearing this year would be…
(shrugs) “It’s a living.”
Hey, remember when Mindy was all smug about being proposed to?
Oh, if only the Pizza Box Monster was Mooch Myers. He’s come to exact revenge on his ex-girlfriend Mindy and his ex-best friend Pete by ingratiating himself to Pete while in disguise and then setting fire to Montoni’s during the grand re-opening… laughing maniacally as the ex-es who crossed him burn before realizing in horror that the fire is spreading beyond Montoni’s. Thus begins THE BURNINGS.
Hey, it wouldn’t be the first time Mooch set fire to a Westview institution, nor would it be the first time a costumed Batiukverse character reappeared after a long hiatus and set fire to Montoni’s.
Never have I been sorrier to be right.
Is this upending the PBM canon, such as it is? Are we gonna find out who is in that ferkakte getup? Will this be forgotten tomorrow? Does Batty know what a “silent partner” is in the restaurant biz — someone who puts up money and shares in the profits, but doesn’t participate in running the business?
Anyone have a prediction about who is in that costume (assuming this thread continues)? I’m afraid to guess because I hate being right.
I’ll say it: Batton Thomas.
Kevin, wearing stilts.
Zanzibar, also wearing stilts. (We can only hope.)
Kevin, standing on Zanzibar’s shoulders. (Or vice versa.)
Frankie. (Again, we can only hope.)
Mitchell Knox.
Timemop.
That guy who hung around the Komix Korner and actually bought Atomik Komix, even though he thought they sucked (which, to be fair, they do).
The ghost of the ghost of Phil Holt. (If you come back to life, does your ghost become undead? Lots of room for philosophical questions here!)
The ghost of the ghost of Tony Montoni. (Why WAS he a ghost, anyway?)
Sadie Summers.
Chien.
Rolanda.
One of the Gay Prom Dudes.
The other Gay Prom Dude.
Mystery Gay Prom Attendee. (This could be really efficient, Batiuk could use one strip to reveal the answer to TWO mysteries that no one cares about!)
Peter Mossman.
Marianne Winters’ Academy Award.
Man, coming up with stupid answers to this is a lot more fun than the comic itself, that’s for sure.
It’s going to be the water-cooled Maxim machine gun hall monitor Les used that turned out decades later to be a cardboard cutout.
The entertaining thing about PBM is that we never found out who it was. So, of course, Tom’s gotta ruin that. The Force: was it better as a vague energy field, or when it was midi-chlorians? Was the series better pre- or post-JarJar?
Since Daveykins was recently mentioned here, did you know he wrote a novel–yes, a full novel–about Peter Pan (who was Davey)? His explanation on how Pan could fly was not pixie dust or large quantities of meth, but that his blood was filled with keratin. “That’s what feathers are made of!”I thought “His blood is made of fingernails?!</i?" Why not have him just drink jet fuel?
After today’s reveal, Pizza Box Monster simply has to be Les.
– He’s already been seen in Crankshaft.
– Because Lisa’s Story such a global media phenomenon, it’s plausible that he has enough money to start a restaurant.
– CBH’s breakdown of possible suspects did not eliminate Les.
– He has nothing better to do with his time. (Meta version: Batiuk needs a new reason to put his favorite character into the strip.)
– Montoni’s is one of Les’ many irrational attachments about Lisa. Remember him wanting to buy the sign at auction because it was outside their apartment window?
– He’s enough of a dickhead to take his friend’s restaurant, after making no effort to help him save it when he could have.
– Funky is enough of a dickhead to deserve this.
– The PBM outwitted Funky, every time, even though any idiot could have easily caught him.
– You think Tom Batiuk is going to let Pete and Mindy be the savior of Montoni’s, even if they are doing all the work?
I’m calling it right now: it’s Les.
I’d think it’s
Eric “Mooch” Myers (Mindy’s former boyfriend)
Heather “Chien” Parks
Linda Bushka
Darin Fairgood
Owen Miller
Wally Winkerbean
Matt Miller
Jared Posey
Jeff Murdoch
Skyler Fairgood
Michael Montoni (Tony Montoni’s father)
or Cody Fletcher (I dont think Cody canonically has a surname so i headcanon that Cody’s surname is “Fletcher”)
I really don’t think Batiuk’s decided that there’s anyone in that costume. Hell, the costume itself is the person, like Les and his yellow shirt. Either he’ll go full silent partner and never be seen or Batiuk will have this idiot wearing 60 pizza boxes regularly just standing around as if it’s the most natural thing in the world.
I completely agree with @Charles 100%. Attempting to guess the identity of the Pizza Box Monster is pointless. We all share the same curiosity about who the Pizza Box Monster is, but when has Batiuk ever given us the answers we wanted?
Me too. It’s that “no theory of mind” thing again. Batiuk never thought about who the PBM is, and has no idea the audience would want to know. To him, it’s not important to the story. It’s all just a mechanism to put Pete in charge of Montoni’s, and put Montoni’s into Crankshaft. Once that’s done, the story will end.
It’s John Darling’s murder all over again. All Batiuk wanted to do was kill the strip. He never put any thought into who the murderer was, because it wasn’t important to what he cared about. When he needed something for Les to be a super-writery writer about, he had to come up with a perpetrator. Plantman was shoehorned into being the killer despite him having no motive.
Watch it be Chester.
the PBM is a lean figure
while Chester isn’t
This is a train wreck of underdeveloped stories. Mindy doesn’t get her marriage proposal after being de facto engaged for years, then recoils with horror when Pete says the words “marriage” and “kids.” This gets dropped because Pete wants to walk away from the comic books that are the emotional center of this world, and take over a pizza restaurant that was auctioned down to the studs a year ago. And his partner is the goddam Pizza Box Monster, a never-identified person who Funky was terrified of for a never-identified reason.
It should be an intriguing detail that PBM had the money and the desire to keep the restaurant going, while Funky was avoiding him and going out of business. But since no one ever suffered as a result of the closure or has even been seen since then – and the store re-opened anyway to get new cars to drive to Dinkle’s Christmas Messiah – this has no impact. And Timemop is “nudging” everything anyway. The story defeats itself at every turn.
ALL of TB’s stories defeat themselves at every turn. That’s the absolutely unhinged, bonkers, wackadoo thing — that the same guy who, completely straight-faced, wrote this:
is the same guy who will dangle insanely tantalizing elements like “a talking, sharpshooting alcoholic chimpanzee killed the girlfriend of the 40s silent movie star” and “an Afghan warlord is working in an Ohio suburb” and “the highest-paid comix author and screenwriter wants to reopen a gutted, failed pizzeria because it’ll pay for his family with the girl he never proposed to,” etc.
ANY ONE of those premises, or even a fraction thereof, could be the basis for an entire long-running comic strip.
ZANZIBAR — a murderous chimp got away with it because his movie star owner took the fall and went to jail. Now Zanzibar’s free to break out the expensive booze — and wait till you see what happens when the world finds out he can talk!
KHAHN — An Afghan warlord joins forces with the returned GI whose life he saved during the war — and when he gets recruited as the star batter of the Toledo Mudhens, the gut-busting, culture-clash laughs never stop!
But I don’t think Bats even realizes that he’s zooming past the most outlandish, intriguing ideas at 110 mph, only to arrive with great fanfare at a puddle-strewn empty lot where nothing interesting has ever happened.
“the highest-paid comix author and screenwriter wants to reopen a gutted, failed pizzeria because it’ll pay for his family with the girl he never proposed to,”
On the plus side, (yeah) it’s nice that it’s Mopey and not Mason buying another property 2500 miles away from where he lives, or Chester buying another property for no reason whatsoever, to immediately hand it over to whoever Batiuk thinks should run the place. At least this acknowledges that Mopey would have some agency after all the absurd success Batiuk’s thrown at him over the last 16 years.
The fact that this whole thing involves Pete really puzzles me. I’m trying to figure out if TB has just gone so far off the rails that it makes sense to him that Pete would be the best character for this or if he is getting some type of minimal guidance from the syndicate that Crankshaft can’t just morph into FW and that every story arc must involve some well-established Crankshaft character.
I only think the latter because the ONLY reason that I can fathom that makes sense for Pete and Mindy to be ones to to reopen Montoni’s is that Mindy is a well-established Crankshaft character and that such a connection must be somehow required.
None of the others in the long long long list of characters who make much more sense have this connection. A big no for Wally and Rachel, the most obvious candidates and, frankly, who TB should have had taking over the restaurant from a retiring Funky at the end of last year because there was not really any reason the place had to close (unless the reason was to set up this story, which… good grief). Ditto for Jessica and Durwood or Adeela, Lefty and DSH, Crazy and Donna, or *shudder* even Les and Cayla… all folks that make oodles more sense as heirs to Montoni’s than PETE.
And I say Pete and not “Pete and Mindy” because Mindy, despite a history as a Montoni’s employee and an ostensible place in this couple, is ultimately superfluous to the reopening of Montoni’s. It’s Pete’s idea and Pete’s alone to do this, because that’s how TB writes (or doesn’t) for women and because this couple remains incredibly under baked, even by Batiukverse standards.
I doubt that the syndicate is micromanaging TB to the extent of being concerned whether there is an established Crankshaft character in the storyline.
I mean, just last month (9/30), they allowed a strip which established that Ed caused the death of one of his co-workers by intentionally driving slowly to the hospital to get as many cars backed up behind him as possible.
If the syndicate doesn’t care about the title character crossing the moral event horizon, they aren’t going to object to a storyline involving characters going into the pizza business just because the people involved are relatively new to the strip.
I think the PBM will be Summer.
She would have to be the beneficiary of Les’ life insurance policy to afford that kind of investment. Unless of course, she has already written that history of Westview best seller. Or unless Timemop has advanced her funds from her granddaughter’s book that hasn’t been written yet. Any of those would make about as much sense as this week’s story.
You’re applying logic and common sense in your analysis. And you’re also applying common story-telling tropes! Oh my heavens, please see me after class.
Gotta give Mindy a little credit today though. She has a perfectly reasonable response of “Are you serious??” I hope her next move is pulling the boxes off of PBM and unmasking him/her like a Scooby-Doo villain.
Nothing gets the blog active like Crankshaft getting so crazy that we’re back to daily posts, eh?
The real game now is wondering how many weeks this story goes in what likely is trying to be significant to the status quo (or at least as notable as the Valentine theater shenanigans). Like how much of the journey of Montoni’s dubious reopening are we going to see before the big grand day?
or at least as notable as the Valentine theater shenanigans
But that was 6 months ago! Nothing happened! Are you implying that the Montoni’s plot will also go–
I’ve got to give Batiuk credit for building a little intrigue here. We’re all wondering where this is going to go. Having Pete walk away from his comic book career to save Montoni’s, and bringing Pizza Box Monster out of retirement too? A refreshing twist. I still think PBM/silent partner is going to be Les, which would fulfill the prophecy of Batiuk always choosing the most boring solution. But it’s good while it lasts.
Notice that she only objects to PBM being Pete’s sugar daddy. It’s chilling with a Scooby Doo villain, not sinking savings into something retroactively run into the ground that angers her. Let that sink in.
My bet: Another week of this insanity, because Tom’s Law Of Comics means every arc ends after 3 weeks. And on 11/4 it will be the PBM taking off its head, with them startled! “IT’S—IT’S YOU!” with an offpanel cutaway not showing who it is, so he can drag it out months later. Maybe before Middling can yell “You’re—my father—JOHN DARL—!” Or someone else who will make you go “Uh-Huh” and then go read a good comic.
Who will win in the end, Duck of Death? WE SHALL SEE. We…shall…(falls asleep)
Which would mean Jessica Fairgood introducing her parents thus:
“This is my mother, Jan, and this is my father John Darling, who wasn’t murdered.”
It’s how Mr. Inspector Bucket with Sir Leicester Dedlock, Baronet, would do it.
So choose your Dickens:
Should we think of Tiny Tim, who did not die, to whom Scrooge was as a second father?
Or should we think of Little Nell, whose death scene, according to Oscar Wilde, it would take a heart of stone to read without crying from laughter?
Exit before Mr. Bumble says that I am a greater ass than the law, or Mr. Grimwig once again threatens to eat his head.
Very amusing choice, but you got one thing wrong, AS.
It’s “…this is my father, John Darlingwhowasmurdered, who wasn’t murdered.”
Your Grease:
Mea culpa.
The example of Joe Friday with “the Virgin Connie Swail” in the 1987 “Dragnet’ should have occurred to me.
“You’re… my father…”
“Nah, I’m Mitchell Knox. I’m just wearing the flesh of your father, John Darling Who Was Murdered, as a mask. You wouldn’t believe how much I had to shell out to get his skin from the coroner. Also, would you like to see some autopsy photos? Wait, I wasn’t supposed to mention those, forget I said that.”
“You gotta admit… he looks the part!” said Pete.
“I suppose so,” mused Mindy. “He looks the part of a man with a large amount of money he’s looking to invest — not in stocks, not in real estate, not in precious metals, art, or even comics, but in a restaurant. He looks like he’d choose to do that right at this moment, when food, fuel and real estate prices are skyrocketing and working class wages are stagnant, so discretionary income for eating out is slashed to the bone.
He does look the part — the part of someone who would take an enormous bankroll and give it to a writer who’s never even worked a day at a restaurant but wants to reopen a pizzeria that failed under experienced ownership. And he wants to give you carte blanche with that money; he specifically wants to be a silent partner, meaning that he won’t oversee the operation of the restaurant.
Yes, Pete, he does look the part. He looks like a clown, an ignöramus, a fool, a damned idiót, and an all-round cutesy, self-congratulatory aśshole. The perfect partner for you.
I’ll mail you the tiger. See you in the funny papers.”
“You know, they call them the funny papers, but that doesn’t mean they have to be funny. You see…”
“Shut up, Skunky.”
Anonymous Sparrow,
I did say the PBM had to hurry, but no one predicted this. No one can predict TB choices. They make no sense in a universe that is “this close” from reality.
I am almost finished with *Dubliners*. Next, I will read, “A Movable Feast” by Hemingway. Then I will tackle and try the beast known as Ulysses.
Do you suppose TB actually tried to read the book, and that led to the book club week?
You might appreciate this next part. As I had mentioned before, I had read short stories by Shirley Jackson. Both authors had their own take on short stories. Jackson did not place her characters in the same universe. Totally stood alone by themselves. They were all well defined characters that seemed real in spite of the gothic twist at the end. I thought many of her characters could have benefited from a second story.
Despite the difficulties in publishing, Joyce invents a world that could easily have a crossover between stories 5 and 11 as an example. Like Jackson, you feel you know these Irish, and believe you are having a pint with them. They are depicted as a very poor country, which I do not dispute, but everyone can buy rounds, leave to another pub, and do the same. Joyce writes a tough world with grand actors.
This might interest you, also. I found the magazine that had the article on radio westerns. Because of the article, (good writer by the way!) I will check out Gunsmoke with William Conrad, and see if I can listen to it on YouTube. I have listened to an episode of *the Six Shooter* with James Stewart as Britt Ponset. It was where a church needed a new roof and Britt asks a crook to strong arm his friends to raise the money. The film, “the Goodfellas” shows the more realistic downside to such a request.
Finally in Dubliners, the story ‘Clay’, Maria sings from an opera, a selection called “I Dreamt I Dwelt in Marble Halls” I downloaded the version by Enya in Shepherd Moons, called Marble Halls. Beautiful melody.
I just had an incredibly stupid thought. Since stupid thoughts are ironically the most likely to be correct, I thought I’d share it here.
Is it possible that Tom Batiuk is not only wrapping up his cartooning career, but also planning to put money into Luigi’s in Akron, where he’s been a VIP for decades?
Are you implying that Tom would try to open a restaurant in today’s economy? That would mean that he’d have to be incredibly stu–
(insert “Oh, Right” guy graphic I used earlier)
Re: Sunday’s Crankshaft:
I’m starting to think that, as the wise BJr6K suggests, there really is no mystery. This whole thing is so underdeveloped that it wouldn’t surprise me if the PBM disappeared again without another mention after this week.
PBM is introduced to Mindy and blathers:
I think these words, again, are Batty’s, being put into the mouth of the character. He killed off Montoni’s but wanted to use the PBM, so what the heck, he’d have him show up anyway. Annnnd … script done!
I truly don’t think he thinks about these things for long enough to even realize how many, many questions this raises. And if he does, he waves them out of his brain with a hearty “it’s called writing!”
We also learn that apparently, the PBM is really the “Pizza Monster,” no “Box.” And that he has managed to don a pair of white gloves since we saw him yesterday.
Yeah, I bet Monday morning we’re right back to Crankshaft’s bowling team.
And if you thought there might be some clues on Batiuk’s blog, there aren’t. Four posts since last week. Three John Darling strips, and one called “winter prep” but is mostly about how much he likes comic books.
I truly don’t think he thinks about these things for long enough
Cut him a break! He only wrote it 11 months ago! You can’t expect perfection unless he sits on it for 11.5 months!
Yeah, the gloves. Why? I guess so we can’t rule out the P
BM being Black. His rich tapestry of Black characters such as Cayla, and…umm… Was the Reading Rainbow Guy a character? Tom saw that show once.I notice that CK has unceremoniously dumped The Bemusing Spider-Man. No loss. It was supposed to run repeats for 6 months after Stan Lee and his brother Larry stopped doing it, which I’m gonna guess they probably really weren’t, being as old as Crank. It’s been reruns for like 4 years. It ended partly through one of its dumber plots, where MJ is filming at the top of the Empire State Building in exactly the way movies are never filmed. I doubt they’ve had a lot of complaints.
I myself have stopped reading The Baffling Dick Tracy. Apartment 3G in its death throes was more coherent. Like the Funkyverse, the art is GREAT, and the writing is toilet. What even was that last arc about Barefoot Sunglasses Lady even about? Every day there was a new plot…”development,” I guess you could call it generously. I’ve raised kittens with longer attention spans than the writer.
Just sayin’–Still plenty of time for GC to unceremoniously put CS on the curb with the rest of the trash!
I was gonna say that we already saw Caucasian hands on Saturday before the gloves apparently were swiftly put on mid-conversation, so the character can’t be black.
But there’s precedent for black people turning white in Westview — hi, Caucayla! — so who’s to say the PM didn’t turn from white to black between panels? (Princ’pal Nate?) Or perhaps a white trans woman with a distinctly male voice? (Rolanda, that you in there?)
I very much want to believe it’s Cliff Anger. He’s got showbiz in his blood! Maybe he’s chosen to retire from the entertainment PR firm he founded with Vera Nash when he was 95, to return to showbiz at the frisky age of 100! Hey, if George Burns could do it….