Welcome nitpickers, and snarkers, and funkers of all ages to the First Annual Crankshaft Awards! In honor of our surviving strip, its surviving protagonist, and the dedicated team of dedicated cartoonists that put Crankshaft together, I have created the following award to hand out.
In this piece, I tried to capture the essence of Crankshaft in 2023. Thus, I spent about ten minutes using art I stole off of Google scribbling this together in MS Paint and called it good enough.
For 2023 was the year that things were copied, pasted, and scribbled hastily together, from timelines to storylines to panels. A year of rehashed proposals, resurrected businesses, and returned souvenirs. A year of Dinkshafts and Mopey Petes.
Many Funky Winkerbean characters made their presence known this year. Like J. Bruce Ismay slinking around the decks of the Carpathia, not every mainstay of the former crew went down with the old ship, and instead muscled themselves onto the remaining Funkyverse vessel. But who stood out among the survivors?
Your nominees for Outstanding Appearance By A Funky Winkerbean Character, 2023.
1.) Harry Dinkle
2. ) Crazy Harry Klinghorn
3.) Dead Skunk Head John Howard
4.) Mopey Pete Roberts Reynolds
5.) Darin Fairgood
6) Jess Fairgood
7.) Masone Jarree
8.) Cindy Summers Jarree
9.) Funky Winkerbean
10.) Holly Winkerbean
11.) Pizza Monster
You out in voterland may have wondered, ‘What does Outstanding mean?’
I don’t know! It was up to you guys to decide. Was it outstanding of Mopey Pete to climb the ranks into the top ten for both appearances and lines spoken? Was it outstanding of Funky to reappear spouting fake reassurances and crying real tears? Did some of you think it was outstanding of Cindy to only show up twice and speak once? Or outstanding of Darin to turn into a silent, spinner rack delivery service? It was an outstanding example of not getting in the way, certainly.
Well, you’ve all decided.
The Outstanding Appearance by a Funky Winkerbean Character for 2023 is…
The Pizza Monster!
Can’t say I’m too surprised he ran away with this win. His three Halloween appearances in Funky Winkerbean proper became such a dumb highlight of each year. And even I had a little grin and chuckle at seeing him in the crowd during the Christmas 2022 LOST finale. This boxy boy(?) has truly wedged his way into my heart.
Funky Winkerbean himself will have to be content with a distant second place.
See ya tomorrow for Day 2!
Son of Stuck Funky 
Yay, Pizza Monster! He was my vote, too.
Please, Pizza Monster, come up to accept your statute, and then give it to the nearest Les Moore, because he clearly deserves it for all he’s done. (That goes for the rest of the “winners”, so we don’t have to repeat this joke every time. Although we still might anyway.)
Pizza Monster was the obvious choice. The other characters are just smug, self-entitled pricks getting everything they want handed to them. (Even though Les didn’t appear at all this year.)
PBM’s new role as Montoni’s silent partner/freelance mascot was so weird, that it inadvertently captured elements of when the Funkyverse was good. It reminded me of Crazy Harry playing pizza on a record player and getting actual music. Funky Winkerbean used to be surreal and fun, and it embraced those traits. Then Tom Batiuk got that Pulitzer nomination…
“claps with the most bored and dead-inside expression in my face”
yay PBM
(The PBM suddenly shows up)
The PBM: B̸̢͖̙̜͊̈́̅̚Ľ̵̢͇̩͖̭̹̮Ơ̶̟̬̜͍̰̲̤̜̤͇̱͗́̔͑̿̕̕O̵̦͑̾́̾̀͊̄̿͒͊̀̌̕D̶̝̖̟̱̞̹͖̲̪̜͍̙̬̘̃͛̊̒̽̍͗͐̀̓͛̉̎͘͠ ̵̘̲̽̿̐̔̄̋̾͠M̷̢̼̫̲̞̍̊̓̐̌̌̅̚͘͝͝U̷̡̹̫̘͍̲͕͓̪̥̲̘͚̔̔̃̈́͊͋̅̆̈́͐̽̽ͅṢ̴̛̖̹͈̠̞̞̈́̇͛̾̒͊̋̑͐̐̚ͅŢ̶̛̣̤̤̙͑͛͑̓̏̈̌̋̓͑̀͐̊ ̶̨̮̗̖͈̙͓̇͌̎͐̑̓̐͠B̵̼̻̺̫̪͇͇̰̣̮̯̰̾̃͐ͅE̷̡̡̺͈̟̜̰̮̙͔̼̭͖͚͒͌́̏̊ ̶̨̧̛̺̟͈̥̫̻͙͍̭͓̟̿̀́̂̾̓͑̿̎̀͘͝S̵͙̥̀͑͋̽̀́̃͑P̷̛͍̼̫̠̭̝̾͆͗̈́̓̔̓̍̕̕̕̚̚͜͝İ̸̡̹̙̤̝̳͒̄̂̾̓͒̐́̇̆̎͑́͌Ĺ̵̛̻͔̰̦̈́̽̀̋͛̿̃͜͝͠Ļ̸͍͖͇͎̐̆̋͌̓̃͝͝Ḛ̴̩̳̤̳̾̏͗̐͛͛̽͋̌̾̑̈͋͘͜͠D̷̳͍̬̖̏̌̒̆̀͋̚̕ ̸̛̩͈̾̽̄̉̎͜Ȃ̸̩̭̥̳̖͆̏͊̽̄̽̾L̵̛̬̯̰̙͎̲̹̇̚͜Ḻ̸̙̀̂͊̚̕ͅ ̴̼̥̼̖̼̦̆̈́́̀̔̈́͒͊́̂́͛̎́̓O̶̠̍̋̾V̸̹͖̺̙͓̪͓̣͒̆͒̾́̇̂̒̽̔̊͘̚E̵̜͕̤̳̗̹̦͓̫̣̬͓̥̦͒́͌̓͠R̶̛̜͖͈̼͖̄̋̀̀̋̂̓̉̊͑̈́̄͜͜ ̸͙̳̬̥̜̓ͅM̴̡̗̖̲̌̿͂͑̏̋̓̎̏̔͋͑̀̏̄Ó̷̢͇̭̹̻̥̏̍̌͂́̋̀̎͝N̷͍̣̹̪̹͇̐͛̓̽̈̓T̴̡̨̰͈̟̭͊́͂̎̄́̐͊̏͒̚͜O̸̡̨͈̗̬̹̰̜̜̗̤̪̎̐̆̀̌̓͌͊͘N̶̗̝̪͎̎̀̔̅Ĭ̴̞̞͇̭͓͕̣̆̑̐̏͝ͅ’̷̭̍̌̎͗͒͗͌̅̌͛̈́͜S̶̨̡͉̙̗̝̞̺͉̫͆̐̈́͗̑̓͆̾͗͊̚̕͜!̷̩̱̻͙͆
PBM was well-deserved, though looking at all the recent years of Komic Korner shenanigans I can’t help but feel an honorary mention goes to their K-2S0 statue. Just stands out as a lesser-known movie character being given such prominence in this fictional shop compared to the Iron Man statue (and when you dig into the facts is amusing as yet another thing Batiuk borrows from reality as his local-haunt shop in NE Ohio has the same statue), sticks out like a sore thumb if people didn’t catch or forgot about that element of the Rogue One movie (though maybe his limelight will come again when the next season of Andor drops).
The real K-2S0 would also get very tired of the comic complaining that Jeff indulges in with today’s Funkyshaft. Rambling on how today’s heroes are worse than the villains? I haven’t kept up with the forums but that just reeks of 90s antihero rants, the current status quo (or what it was 11 months ago) wasn’t that bad off as far as I know.
Not just a 90s antihero rant, but a repeat of a 2010s rant about 90s antiheroes! This is a repeat of Sunday, January 24, 2010, where Crazy Harry calls Speedball “deeply disturbed and borderline psychotic.”
Sadly, you can’t read the comments anymore (not even on web.archive.org). Because the CC commenters roasted Batiuk. And just yesterday, somebody said “I don’t think Tom Batiuk should be throwing stones on comic books getting all grimdark.”
Batiuk’s reused art and jokes are bad enough; now even his hypocritical, outdated comic book rants are in reruns.
There are some good comments today on GoComics. It seems many readers can see how hypocritical Batty is with his rants.
Sadistic glee? That’s a perfect description of Act II Funky Winkerbean.
For those that enjoyed Crankshaft as a lite gag a day strip, they must really be disappointed with the way things are now.
Today’s superheroes? TODAY’S SUPERHEROES, TOM?
My brother in Cyborg Superman, there are grandparents out there younger than gritty superheroes with anger issues.
It never ceases to baffle me the cognitive dissonance between hating the CCA forcing comics into kiddy jail in the 50’s AND simultaneously wishing that comics were forever stuck in that same kiddy jail.
There was a joke on the Fairly Oddparents cartoon where Timmy met 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, and 2000s versions of “The Crimson Chin” superhero. (The 10s hadn’t happened yet.). And they were all distinctly different.
Batiuk isn’t capable of this kind of knowledgeable, light-hearted jab.
“Such sadistic glee!”
AHH–HAHHAHAHA! Oh shit yeah I’m going to get fired from this page for screaming “Such sadistic glee!” every day I’ll bet! Seriously, while “WHERE’S FATHER?!” is insanier, this is “My dude Tom, do you find yourself wiping foam from the corners of your mouth a lot?”
But the absolute poetry of: “Such sadistic glee!” Half a haiku!
Such sadistic glee!
I love Flash 123, see?
Sorry, gotta pee.
Such sadistic glee
Crankshaft derives from his job
So where is Crankshaft?
Keesterman’s mailbox
Would quiver in fear, but it’s
A fuckin’ mailbox.
Lena’s brownies, like
bowling gutterballs so hard,
We hates it, Baggins!
I have been awake
For like 20 hours today–
Does it show that much?
What we have here is the same sort of whining infant who howled in rage because the bad people on television pointed out how absurd putting on a costume to punch Frank Gorshin and Cesar Romero would actually have to be. Don’t let the man find the article that states that what makes Batman beloved as a fictional character would terrify him if there actually were a real-life man in a costume wailing on muggers. He’d explode in a burst of denial.
Don’t tell him about the Sam Raimi classic “Darkman.” If Batman were real, he’d be like that–completely psychotic. “LOOK AT THE DANCING FREAK!” In most movies, you’d laugh at that scene. Here, it’s a gut punch, because you realize the man he was is dead. This is all he is now.
The sheer futility of what Batman is doing is what drives the character. He can never punch Joker in the teeth hard enough to bring his parents back and it’s highly likely that they’d actively disapprove of his haunting the night and using nifty equipment to pound on the mentally ill. If he could move past his parents getting blasted because Daddy was too cheap to pay for a valet, he’d be better off. As it stands, he’s turning himself into a freak.
Which is similar to what Tom Batiuk doesn’t realize about Les. Much like Batman, Lisa’s death, and Les’ inability to move past it, is his defining trait. But where Batman seeks vengeance and to protect others, Les seeks fame and ego-stroking. He has all the emotional baggage of Batman, but none of the noble motives. Batman is also hard-working and skilled, while Les is lazy and self-entitled.
Because it would require Les to do something he fears doing: making a decision. Delusion or fantasy or not, it wouldn’t be like Les to warn his past self of what was facing Lisa. That would require actually doing something about a problem instead of morosely standing around letting bad things happen. Learned helplessness is not noble. Fighting a losing war is.
I think what Les does is “learned learned helplessness.” You’re right that he can’t make a decision, but he also knows how to leverage this in his favor. Because he’s also a manipulator par excellence.
Les’ gambit is to spin himself as the poor little victim of whatever just happened, which he can’t possibly do anything about by himself. Next thing you know, you’re doing it for him. Or he’s otherwise gotten something he wanted.
He could have just read Lisa’s diary. But by pretending he was too emotionally fragile to do it (which nobody dared question), he manipulated Summer into reading her own mother’s rape account.
He could have just said “no” to the Lisa movie. But by passively accepting Mason Jarre’s proposal, he got himself into position to oversee it, and tried to undermine the project at every turn.
He could have told Cayla he wasn’t ready for a relationship, which he clearly still isn’t to this day. But by making that half-assed proposal that was more about Lisa than Cayla, he obtained a replacement to fulfill Lisa’s wifely duties, and also be his sounding board for all his Lisa-related emotional problems.
He could have taken responsibility for the Lisa’s Legacy money being stolen, because he was in charge of the cash box. But by having a complete meltdown over it, he got Funky to replace the missing money out of his own pocket.
He could have paid his respects to Bull Bushka. But by bringing up his ancient bullying, and ignoring the great lengths Bull went to in adulthood to atone for that, he made the funeral all about himself.
I could go on.
Today’s Funky Crankerbean
(suddenly a guy busts down the door of the Komix Korner, and uses his eye-beams to cut down everyone in it)
Homelander: The only man in the sky is me.
(Billy butcher then shows up)
Butcher: About time you (Homelander) showed up, you overgrown cunt.
(Butcher’s eyes start glowing yellow)
“Sadistic Glee” is pretty much what Frederic Wertham was protesting against. As my fellow snarkers have very ably pointed out, it’s laughable that Mister “Comics Aren’t Just Kid Stuff, They’re Serious Art” turns out to hate it when superheroes are the least bit realistic. Or when stories are complex and reflect real life. Or when they have any message other than lukewarm do-gooderism.
And yet in his Flash Fridays, he was denigrating Cary Bates for NOT following the “darker” trends of the 80s, and instead writing more in the style of the comics Batiuk loves from the 50s and 60s.
It’s like the man can’t be happy with comics unless they’re either from his own childhood, or he’s writing them himself. Naaahhhh, that couldn’t be it.
Haha, “other customers”. DSH decided to be a comedian today.
Dead Skunk Head John Howard and Mason Jaree aren’t represented in the pie chart. Does that mean they didn’t receive any votes? AHH–HAHHAHAHA!
(Forming an L on my forehead with my right thumb and index finger) LOOOOOOOOOSERS!!!
Dang, that’s what I get for not checking Batiuk’s blog every day. (Can you blame me, though?) I missed a new Flash Fridays! And, well… if “sadistic glee” didn’t tell you how self-unaware Batiuk can be…
https://tombatiuk.com/komix-thoughts/flash-fridays-the-flash-322-june-1983/
Endless subplots, no sense of an overarching story, and bullheaded consistency? Yep, That’s Our Tom!™
I mean… if it’s just a text page, it’s not a splash page, really by definition. So it shouldn’t be called one. (Of course, the real reason for these recap pages is because a lot of comics nowadays are “written for the trade”, i.e., they’re designed to be only part of a larger story that can be collected in a trade paperback format. Recap pages make it easier to not include that, since anyone reading the trade would likely have just read the previous part, and thus don’t need the recap, whereas trying to do the recap in the story itself always read as awkward, but was necessary for the reader who may have missed an issue or didn’t remember what they read a month ago.)
As for that “pictures and words” comment… tell me Tom, who was it that spent an entire week (twice!) on someone silently opening an envelope? Or had their title character wordlessly walking around an empty house, or a character walking around town visiting locations that only had meaning to YOU, but not the character and certainly not the reader? And who helped inspire the term “word zeppelins”, due to cramming so much text into a panel that there might as well not have been any pictures at all?
Just one last quote:
Yep, how ludicrous. Not like the stark realism of, say, a football team winning a game by throwing the ball to the friggin’ mascot (I’m sure that’s a PERFECTLY legal play). Or a Talking Murder Chimp (or a 40s silent film star, for that matter). Or a hospital that misdiagnoses a patient with terminal cancer as being in remission, and then DOESN’T get sued into the ground. Or an actress giving away her Academy Award (against Academy rules, and after announcing she’s going to do so on international television) to the schmoe who wrote the book the movie was based on. Or time-travelling janitors. Or the very phrase “Your ability to detect patterns will allow you to write a book that connects matters of ordinary small-town households to matters of immense consequence. What you write about sparks others to build on it to create a science of behavioral-patterened algorithms that will one day allow us to recognize humanity as our nation!”. Or… eh, you get the idea, we could go on for days like this. (But, hey, feel free to pile on with your own examples.)
New blog post today. TB acknowledges a lot of things we’ve speculated about:
It’s a rather sad spectacle, isn’t it? Books with illustrations, waiting for inscriptions, of which I suspect there were few. No photos of anyone interacting with him, or anything being sold.
Have no fear, though — he included his famous random, poorly framed, contextless photos of whatever caught his eye on the convention floor, such as band uniforms and brass instruments.
He proudly says he’s just recycling Harry Dinkle’s greatest hit (“football fields are for band practice”) and reapplying it to whatever the new situation is. But it doesn’t make sense in the new contexts at all. (Especially in its worst iteration, when some rando who’d somehow been chatting with Harriet as the Rose Parade marched past at full blast and then said he wanted to walk across the parade-filled street, and Harriet, with her scary Muppet smile, brayed, “Colorado Boulevards are for Rose Parades!” I don’t think a FW has ever made me feel so stabby.)
It’s especially weird in a church context. Yelling that everyone participating in a religious ceremony should shut up because “churches are for choir practice!” is nonsensical. It worked in the high school context because departments often do butt heads over resources. But no one in a church would assert that choir practice is more important than ceremonies or worship, and suggesting such a thing is probably borderline sacreligious.
It could, of course, have been funny if TB had followed that thread — what happens when a random paid church functionary who’s not even in the congregation says, in effect, that he’s more important than God? But, of course, to TB there is no “thread” or “premise.”
Just do the old stunt, say the catchphrase, wait for applause. That’s all there is or ever will be.
Dinkle is the mascot, not the actual product.
Pointy-Haired Boss was the face of Dilbert. But if you buy a Dilbert book, the strip is still mainly about the workplace, and PHB is still the main antagonist. Dinkle only appears in the Funkyverse anymore to recycle his old catchphrases. Which, as you said, are now very inappropriate.
To be fair, maybe Batiuk can’t re-sell the Dinkle-specific books because they were made by an actual publisher, and may be out of print now. But the presence of that stupid Lisa book on his vending table reveals the bait-and-switch. He puts up a huge banner of Dinkle, to sell a bunch of compilations Dinkle barely appears in, and a comprehensive book about Lisa. It’s honestly kind of insulting.
And he goes to this thing every single year, like it’s the opening day of baseball season? Okay, he’s a cute little aside to an industry convention. But who needs him there 30 years in a row? Especially if he’s going to act like this?
I don’t understand the point about the Rose Parade. I’m pretty sure that with floats and marching bands proceeding down the street, the police don’t want random spectators walking from one side of the street to the other. On New Year’s Day, Colorado Boulevard really is for the Rose Parade.
I think that point was that Dinkle calls the shots. Even in a situation where he’s a mere band member taking direction from others. And where enforcing traffic laws is clearly the police’s job. Because he’s the World’s Greatest Band Director!
“Colorado Boulevards” plural? “Rose Parades” plural? There are numerous Colorado Boulevards in the US. Are they all for Rose Parades?
Plus, no one can chat over the sound of a massive parade passing right in front of them. And no one would think to casually cross the street as they are being held by the barricades along the parade route and a huge parade blocks their path.
It makes no sense grammatically or in any other way, but Batiuk jammed it in because he had to remind us yet again that once upon a time, decades ago, people liked this catchphrase, and he’s gonna MAKE it relevant again, even if the rules of logic and English grammar have to die to make it happen.
Or, to put it another way, Son of Stuck Funkies are for Drakes of Life!
It’s like he’s trying to make a Snowclone but doesn’t know how.
*his table shows only the most recent Funky Winkerbean collections, and the big Dead Lisa book.*
Yes, almost as if he HAD a book planned for the conference, full of Dinkley might, named “Drums Along Tom’s Failed Bottom Line”, but no one would publish it. What an odd coincidence!
Some very rough, extremely speculative math:
A booth at the OMEA convention, based on some info from previous conferences, will run you at least $1200.
Tom’s hardcover FW volumes retail at $45. If he gets ’em at a 50% author discount, he’s paying $22.50. For ease and convenience, let’s call it $20.
The little handwritten sign in one of the photos seems to indicate that at OMEA, one book will sell for $35, two for $60. (A nice reduction in price from buying it online!)
If he sells only single volumes, let’s say he’ll make $15 a book. We’re being generous, but why not?
At these rates, he’d have to sell 80 books to break even. Maybe 85, to cover gas and lunch.
That’s….not impossible? I mean, there are 9,000-10,000 people expected to attend overall, and it’s an environment where there are people who’ve known TB for years — maybe casually, but they still annually hang out with the guy and chat. Some of them (the older ones) will have fond memories of the strip’s early years. Some of them may even purchase an annual FW volume, having followed the strip. Maybe the genuinely like it, or maybe it’s more of a ‘he’s a friend’ kind of obligation.
I admit it’s also quite possible the sales figures are in the single digits. 85 *does* seem steep considering the quality of the work….
This Zits book from 2021 is ranked about #170,000 in the Books category. According to this calculator, that works out to about one copy a day. (It says 2 a day and 30 a month, so clearly there’s some rounding error.) Let’s say it’s 1 a day. The softcovers are a lot cheaper than FW books ($20 discounted to $12.29), so let’s say Zits grosses about $350 per book per month. They publish a book about once a year, and have about 20 books total. So let’s conservatively say $5000 a month in gross sales.
All without lifting a finger.
Batiuk has to pay $1200 just to get his store open, spend an entire week on-site, and do all the work of schlepping his inventory around like some schmuck with a vanity press deal. As if Disturb’d were still living in a van, selling their own CDs, and booking their own shows at dingy beer clubs.
TB’s real expenses are his ego-driven needs to use that damned university press, and print much higher-quality books than his material calls for. Hard-cover Funky Winkerbean with attractive leather slipcase is like putting a Ferrari engine in a Dodge Dart.
Even if the OMEA has 10,000 attendees, they’re not the right attendees. It’s an industry convention for teachers, not Akron Comic-Con. People go to OMEA for career reasons: to learn, network, and perform. He probably pushes a few copies of this year’s compilation on people who are too shy to walk away. But the high price turns away anyone who might buy it on a whim. The number of copies on his table (maybe 10 total) betrays that his sales numbers aren’t anywhere near enough to break even. Akron Comic-Con only has 500 attendees, and he goes to that every year.
But I don’t think profit is his motivation anyway. Keeping with the ego theme, I suspect he’s there just to sit at the table and act like a super-famous writer. And do “research” for his many book-signing arcs.
Oh, I completely agree that it’s an ego-driven extravagance that can’t possibly be justified financially. Even giving Batiuk all the breaks in the calculations, the very best possible outcome (which seems very, very unlikely) is break-even.
Kent State can’t be making a mint off this either. Maybe they do well with library sales?
All I know about university presses is that they need to sell whatever they print. Batiuk probably buys a lot of copies himself, to schlep them at his book signings. It also showcases a Kent State alum. And Batiuk’s status as a syndicated cartoonist carries a little prestige, at least until newspaper comics die out completely. So it’s probably not a bad deal for them.
There’s no way they’d keep publishing volume after volume if it didn’t turn some kind of profit, or at very least break even for them.
Unless we find out that the publisher is a relative….
I have a feeling that Harry L. Dinkle would be extremely racist towards everyone, and that he was fired during the time jump between Act II and Act III because of that
To be fair, I don’t think Dinkle’s racist. But he is abusive to the point that he’d be instantly fired from any job he got in this century.
Batiuk has no clue how badly Dinkle’s shtick has aged. Incidents like with Jon Waters have shone a light on how abusive band culture can be. And the general tone of high school toward students is a lot softer and more accepting than it was in the 1980s.
There are laws against most of what Dinkle does. And members of the clergy are required to report his behavior.
His naming of Dinkle deserves a copy-paste:
Because proofreading is for chumps.
Part 2 of awards should go up sometime tomorrow! KISS KISS!
RE: Friday 2/9’s ‘Shaft:
The “Death of the Justice League” comic that has everyone’s knickers in a twist is a real book: issue 75 of the most recent JL series, released in…April of 2022? And DSH John, Jfff, and Crazy are talking it up like it’s some new release? When Batiuk wrote this week’s in-depth expose on the state of modern comics, did he forget that it wouldn’t see print for a year?
Also, the whole “trivia death” theme in comics has been done to…well, done a lot since X-Man Jean Grey first bit the dust over four decades ago. Nearly every DC or Marvel hero has kicked the bucket, shuffled off this mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin’ choir invisible since then (Remember the media frenzy over 1993’s “Death of Superman” storyline, which had neophytes buying multiple copies of polybagged “memorial issues” they thought would pay for their retirements?) and come back…including the aformentioned Justice Leaguers. Why is TB beating this…er, sickly horse?
Also also, no one cares that you snuck in a Funko Pops reference in today’s strip, Batiuk. Stop trying to make Funky/Crankshaft Funko Pops happen. It’s not going to happen.
“And pro wrestling is totally fake!” We know, Tom, we just don’t give a shit.
And this guy wonders why he didn’t get hired by Marvel or DC as a writer? The reason for the false lead covers and “alternate universes” he hates so much is to tell more compelling stories than a single continuity would allow. The Joker can’t die permanently, because Batman would have no nemesis, and it would bring closure to his backstory. And Batiuk routinely demonstrates that he doesn’t understand this, what with the neverending existence of Dead Lisa, and his more recent plan to stick an apocalyptic ending in the middle of his “realistic” comic strip.
No nemesis? What about the Cavalier, Crazy Quilt, Killer Moth, the Calendar Man, the Polka-Dot Man, or the Ten-Eyed Man (who had optic nerves grafted into his fingertips)?
Condiment King doesn’t count. He was a hypnotized comedian in the animated series, not a true villain.
“the Ten-Eyed Man (who had optic nerves grafted into his fingertips)?”
I’ll bet he really regretted every time he went to Taco Bell.
I’ll always believe Batiuk missed out on a huge business opportunity when he failed to market a Les Moore stress doll. Complete with removable head and limbs.
Also, how about Les Moore, Harry Dinkle, Ed Crankshaft, and Mopey Pete chew toys for dogs?
or a video game where you can beat the everloving shit out of Crankshaft, Lillian The Lizard, Dick Facey and Dinkle
You missed the best one: the Lisa chew toy. It’s wordplay!
That’s true. Lisa was Batiuk’s favorite “chew toy,” but according to your TV Tropes, isn’t Dead St. Lisa more of a “Butt-Monkey”? Because people really didn’t care what happened to her? How would you classify poor Wally Winkerbean?
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ButtMonkey
Anybody know how to create a hyperlink with the presence these new WordPress reply box thingamajigs?
Is the thingamajigs appearance seemingly random for other folks? Sometimes they’re there. Sometimes they’re not for me.
No reply again?! Either there’s a one-reply limit when conversing with me, or people don’t have their notifications turned on.
Oh, well, cue Genesis.
LOL! I’m guessing that most people don’t have it set to see replies to their comments. It’s kinda an obscure feature depending on when they first started posting and what email they used.
As for me, I see a little linky button, but have no idea if it makes hyperlinks work like they used to because I’m a computer dumdum.
Hi Comic Book Harriet!
I tried posting the Genesis video while logged into my WordPress account. The link to the video looked like it just going to appear as a clickable link. I wanted to imbed the video itself into my comment, so I used my other email with a different browser. Posting videos the old way.
Because I’m using two different email addresses, it’s kind of odd being notified about receiving a reply from myself.
The link in the reply to @Banana Jr. 6000 above was created using the icon that looks like a chain link. I just don’t know if I can imbed a link within text anymore.
Oh, well. Thanks for the reply.
How would you classify poor Wally Winkerbean?
He would classify as a “Cosmic Plaything”
Today’s Funky Crankerbean:
I can’t believe I’m saying this but i miss Crankshaft and Lillian McKenzie-
(csroberto gets hit in the nuts by a bag of nickels and then makes the Family Guy death pose)
(Csroberto2854 then walks to the Komix Korner, where John and Jeff are rambling on how superheroes nowadays are edgier and more ruthless than they were in the Silver age. I try to look at a copy of The Amazing Spider-Man Issue 121, aka “The Night Gwen Stacy Died”, but John shrieks at me)
John: TOUCH THE BOOKS AND YOUR LIFE IS FUCKING OVER!!
What are you going to do? try to run and kill me? You’re far, far more out of shape than I am (I’m 5’9” and weigh 153 lbs, I think John is 5’10” and 268 lbs)
(John tries to strangle me but his heart explodes and keels over dead)
Also Today’s Funky Crankerbean:
John: Have I ever told you about the Silver age comic where the Flash became fat? And also this comic book series “The Boys” by Garth Ennis!
(Batton Thomas, Jeff and Fred Fairgood start retching)
Mitch: John, if Batiuk saw “The Boys”, he would have a heart attack.
John: So would my homophobic mother-in-law, Roberta Blackburn.
I like how the spoiler Jff is spouting off in today’s strip is the exact opposite of the spoiler that TB himself wouldn’t shut up about from his own work back in 2007…