Preach On!

I woke up this morning with bold plans for a massive deep dive to go up tonight.

After all, I just needed to unload some soybeans into the grain bins for my dad, and check some cows.

HA

HA HA

My neighbor ended up needing help chopping silage. So I was out until the moon was high in the sky. On the upside, I got to listen to the Yankees LOSE in extra innings on the radio.

On the downside. No carefully planned and researched post.

I will say, in retrospect, the entire book burnings arc was awfully written, awfully plotted, looked awful, made no sense, and dragged on forever.

I’m so glad we got it.

I was starting to worry that in Batiuk’s lazy golden years he’d moved beyond such tone deaf prestige nonsense. I was starting to wonder if we were doomed to nothing but author avatars blathering on nostalgically at other author avatars, broken up by perfunctory and spiritless Crankshaft curmudgeony.

The comments were great, the discussions were great, the slapfights glorious to witness.

Most of all, it warms my blackened nitpicking heart to see Batiuk feebly climb atop his rickety dead horse and go tilting at yet one more dilapidated windmill.

Happy Fall!

Banana Jr. 6000 promises more courtroom drama soon!

 

36 thoughts on “Preach On!”

  1. Hey, did you see his “Busy Writing” blog post, with the carefully curated photo of his “work space”, with all of his favorite stuff on display? LOL. Sure, Tom, “writing”…whatever you say.

    1. I’m busy looking through his work space photo for Lisa stuff like it’s a Where’s Waldo game.

          2. Haha, not a Magic Eye. That image is from the final pages of The Great Waldo Search, where you have to find the real Waldo in this crowd of doppelgängers… identifiable only by his missing shoe and exposed striped sock.

      2. “Time to buckle down and write. First things first, Let me arrange everything that’s ever inspired me on my work table, thusly. There. Now, on to my latest masterpiece! Crankshaft needs his glasses replaced. OK, let’s see, premise, check. Now, rehash, rehash, rehash, rehash, wry remark, eye roll, and…done! Another year in the can!”

    2. Batty has his Inkpot Award from the San Diego Comic-Con buried on the back of that table in front of the window. I know quite a few people receive one, but Batty should show a little more appreciation.

      TB: Pfft, it’s not a Pulitzer. (dismissive wave)

      What’s up with all the comic books and remote controls? No wonder his writing is so sloppy, he’s too preoccupied reading comic books and watching TV.

      Where’s the white cocoa mug?

      I’m somewhat disappointed to see his studio on the ground floor. The way he always refers to his home as the “Comics Castle” I expected his studio to be somewhere high up in the ramparts. 😂

  2. I feel cheated because he’s too ossified to remember a ready-made antagonist: Roberta.

  3. Ronald Reagan famously said, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are ‘I’m from the government and I’m here to help.’”

    The six most terrifying words are, of course, found on TB’s blog. “No posts this week. Busy writing.”

    So good to see you back, CBH. Your posts and comments are always missed when the cows and soybeans call you away.

    I agree: It’s great that TB still has grandiose ambitions. I don’t think this arc was as satisfyingly bad as his past attempts, though. Maybe it’s because of Davis. You can’t show anything happening if you’re limited to clip art; you’re doomed to panel after panel of people standing around kibitzing. No great “USA!” panel… no twisted hate-face of a generic strawman… no forlorn Lisa, head hung low, lecturing us all as a murderer is executed.

    Just a bunch of generic drivel in dialogue balloons.

    Has TB lost the ability to scale the heights of ambitious pomposity? Is he doomed forevermore to wander the foothills of lethargic mundanity?

    One thing he hasn’t lost, Xenu be thanked, is the ability to generate puff pieces out of nothing but sheer chutzpah. The gulf between what is breathlessly reported by some poor stringer and what is eventually printed grows ever more hilariously vast.

    1. Well, no worries here – this whole story refuses to let “the government” have any role whatsoever. Les refused to follow school board mandates. Nate refused to punish him or report him for doing so. The alleged protestors started two malicious, potentially deadly fires rather than report Les to the school board. Lillian refused to call the police, preferring to read the protestors a passage from the book. The “anti-protestors” also insisted on solving the problem their way, by showing up and existing, which helped somehow. There were two dozen people involved by the end, and not one of them would call the agency that had the power to give them what they want.

      This is like some kind of “sovereign citizen” fantasy, where you pretend that the government doesn’t exist, and take whatever unilateral action you want to.

      1. It’s coming from the same stupid place as Les thinking that he can get people to a hospital faster than trained professionals who can tell the doctors what to expect.

  4. As a lifelong Indians fan, it makes me happy that you took pleasure in the Yankees losing. 🙂❤️

    1. I’m a Tigers fan, so I’m bummed we aren’t playing in this series. But whoever is playing the Yankees, I’m a fan of them. Unless it ends up Yankees vs. Dodgers, then all I can hope for is somehow the series getting canceled.

    2. My dad was a Mets fan, so they’re my default team, too. The Yankees losing will always be a source of joy.

    3. It was an awesome game. I was loudly reacting alone in a pitch black tractor. Stuff like that that has me listening to postseason baseball for teams I haven’t followed all year.

      I’m born a Cubs fan, but also have a really soft spot for the Royals since their 2014 Post Season run was my gateway into actual baseball fandom.

      And following the butt clenchingly amazing 2016 World Series, I’ve always wanted to see the Indians/Guardians take the ring.

      Despite Anthony Rizzo being an all around great guy, I just can’t cheer for the Yankees. It’s like cheering for Palpatine to nuke a Tooka orphanage.

      Like MopMan, I’m cheering Guardians and Mets over Yankees and Dodgers. If it’s Yankees vs Dodgers for the World Series…I doubt I’ll bother tuning in, no matter how much Shohei Ohtani is the Buddist Style reincarnation of Babe Ruth crossed with Willie Mays.

      1. The phrase that I like to state is that rooting for the Yankees is like going to a casino and rooting for the house.

        If you’re born and raised there, that’s another thing.

        1. I work with a lot of east coast-based employees, so it’s all Go Mets/Go Yankees, especially from a revenue driven standpoint. Naturally, they’re all hoping for a Subway series. One of my co-workers is a long-suffering Mets fan so I’ll pull for them on his behalf. Plus I loved Gary Carter, and he was a Met! My husband is pulling for the Dodgers because he likes Ohtani and the rest.

          1. Born, raised, and still somehow living in NYC. Don’t care at all about the Yankees, the Mets, or any sports, and never have. However, my better half, back in the late 70s, rooted for the Mets and won a hundred bucks from the Daily News in a contest.

            The challenge: Write a limerick about the hoped-for Subway Series. The winning entry:

            At present, you may think I’m jokin’

            But this prophesy can’t go unspoken

            On World Series day,

            Only two teams will play

            And the distance between them — A token!

          2. Not-so-fun fact: my grandmother’s final resting place is right next to that of Gary Carter.

    1. Holy damn, I haven’t seen a Chick Tract in 20 years!
    2. Krankenschaaften really only wants to put super glue in his trees because he knows it’s highly flammable… Remember Hitchcock’s “The Birds”? Well, replace all those birds with fire and you’ll get an idea of his vision for the whole town. Everyone shall be purged in his endless hellfires!!

  7. Today’s Funky Crankerbean (Welcome Back, Ed)

    The Daily Bleak

    Local Fat Bastard In Red Cap Tries Supergluing Leaves Onto Tree

    Most of what Crankshaft does sounds like they come straight from The Onion

  8. CBH, thank you for sharing the farm pics. Suburbanites like me can’t fully appreciate the farm life.

  9. Crankshaft 2024/10/18:

    Me (at workplace): Hello, tech support. I need a new monitor. It fell over and broke.

    Tech Support: Again? You’ve got to stop reading Tom Batiuk sideways strips.

    1. Be Ware of Eve Hill,
      Ray,
      ComicBookHarriet,

      One post…3 addressees:
      1. BWOEH…I have to stop taking your replies into the (ahem!) restroom. I laughed so hard, I fell off the seat. Hurt my back, broke the seat, and can’t go into work tomorrow. [and this entire comment is in Magic Eye!]
      2. Ray….I am a lifelong KCRoyals fan. A perfect year in sports season is the Oakland Raiders (wherever they are playing) to lose every game; and the NYYankees to lose every game.
      My favorite memory is Al Michaels bemoaning George Brett’s home run smashing Goose Gossage in 1980.
      3. CBH…Oh, tell me you have an International Harvester 2 + 2 Tractor that pivots in the center!
      It’s the most beautiful machine that ever turned soil. {I just edjimikated urban BWOEH. It’s soil, baby. It is soil.}

  10. The thinking behind this week’s strips:

    “Heh, better see what those nit-pickers over at SoSF are saying…what’s this? Banana Jr predicted my third week of Skip-Batton chatter! Well, I’ll show them! Time to pull out a week of generics. Where’s that bunch about raking leaves I had made a few years ago? They’ll be perfect. Let’s see them predict that.”

    1. Somehow the Garfield font (complete with lack of ending punctuation) works really well here.

  12. In the midst of the Burnings arc, I picked up Rachelle Bergstein’s book The Genius of Judy, How Judy Blume Rewrote Childhood for All of Us from our local library. Part biography and part social commentary, I recommend it for anyone here who read Blume’s books as a kid/teen, or who wants additional perspective on censorship and the culture that influenced opposition to her writings. I’ve always had a basic understanding of why her books were challenged (not that I agreed-I LOVED her books), but I never really thought about the bigger cultural picture. I grew up as women’s roles both in and outside of the home were dramatically shifting, but in the 1970s I was really too young to understand or appreciate was happening. Blume was definitely a voice for change for women, both in her personal life and in her literature. A good read…

    1. Mela,
      I always enjoy your posts.
      I learned about Judy Blume when I took a Children’s Literature class in college. Best class I ever took. I have read several of her books. I enjoyed them. I did not like her older teen focused work, but her pre-ad and adolescent books were engaging. I thought the book, *Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret* was my favorite book of hers.

      1. I appreciate your kind words! “Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret” and “Forever” were the major titles for me and for a lot of gals in that era!

  13. I see GoComics has classic CrankShaft finally on their website. Does anyone know why they do not include the Sunday Comic until January 7, 2018?
    Did TB not do Sundays for CS until then?
    I will thank you ahead of time.

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