Before I came to SoSF, I was a contributor to a college sports blog, where I also ran a play-money betting contest. So I speak the language of odds and vigorish and parlays. Tapping into that experience will be my latest approach to dealing with the Batton Death March. I love playful betting!
Since Tom Batiuk is snarking himself so hard there’s no reason for us to bother anymore, I’m setting up a little contest! Make predictions about the next installment of the Batton Thomas interview. (Because we all know there’s going to be another installment.) Score points if your prediction is correct. Choose from 20 different bets!
Make choices, and score a total number of points based on the difficulty of the prediction. -1 point for any incorrect choice. Make a comment listing your choices, and the bet number for each. After each week ends, I’ll tally the sore. If you want to review previous weeks, I’ve been keeping the Compleat Batton Thomas post updated.
RULES: All bets are for the entire week. Sunday strips count, if they feature Batton Thomas. Each panel counts as a separate mention. (So if Skip smirks in two different panels of the same strip, that counts as two smirks for bet #A7.) The house (i.e., me) judges all bets.
General
G1. When will the next week of the Batton Death March begin?
April 27, May 4, May 11, May 18, May 25 (1 point each), June (2 points), later in 2026 (3 points), not at all in 2026 (10,000 points)
G2. Will Skip start the week by making a comment about “continuing the interview”?
Yes or No (1 point each)
G3. Where will they meet?
Montoni’s (.5 point), Batton’s studio, Centerview Sentinel offices, Dale Evans, Komix Korner (1 point each), a location from Tom Batiuk’s personal life (1.5 points), none of these (2 points). 10 points for a specific new location which you name.
G4. What recording device will Skip use?
None (1 point), pen and paper (2 points), cell phone (0.5 points), other (3 points)
Artwork
A1. How many times will this image be used?
Not at all (2.5 points), once (0.1 point), two or more times (2.5 points). Mirrored versions, smaller versions, and slightly edited versions of the image count.
A2. Will there be a word balloon that is more than half the size of the panel?
Yes, No (1 point each), More Than One (4 points)
A3. How many flashback images will there be?
None (2 points), Only One (.5 points), More Than One (1 point)
A4. Will a flashback image include a real person?
Yes, No (1 point each), More Than One (1.5 points). 5 points for any real person you can name.
A5. Will there be a sideways strip?
Yes, No (1 point each), More Than One (5 points)
A6. What early Tom Batiuk artwork will appear?
None (0.5 points), his childhood drawings (1.5 points), pre-Funky Winkerbean work such as Rapping Around (2 points), Funky Winkerbean art (2.5 points), childhood drawings by someone else (5 points)
A7. How many times will Skip smirk?
1 point per smirk, but your guess has to be exactly right. 10,000 points if you predict zero smirks and are correct.
A8. What intellectual property will be appropriated?
DC or Marvel characters (.1 point), characters from other comic strips (.5 points) someone else’s artwork, but you can name the person (2 points).
Subject Matter
M1. Will Batton mention comic books?
No (2 points), Only Once (.1 points), More Than Once (2 points)
M2. In which of the following ways will comic books appear?
Batton failing to get a job at DC or Marvel (.1 point), a comic book cover Batton had no stated role in creating (.1 points), a comic book cover Batton helped create (.2 points), collectible value (.3 points), writing for comic books (.5 points).
M3. Will Batton quote someone?
Yes (1.5 points), No (.5 points). 10 points if you can name them specifically,
M4. Who will Batton name-drop?
5 points for anyone you can name specifically. 10 points if that person hasn’t appeared yet.
M5. Who will Batton bash?
5 points for anyone you can name specifically. 10 points if that person hasn’t appeared yet.
M6. Will Batton act like a complete jackass at some point?
Yes (.0001 points), No (10000 points)
M7. Will Batton talk about doing actual work on Three O’Clock High or The Wrinkles?
Yes (.0001 points), No (10000 points)
M8. How many of the seven deadly sins will Batton commit?
One point for each, but you have to get it exactly right
Roll Your Own!
If you want to make a bet on something other than the above, post it in your comment, and I’ll offer a payout.
Josh Fruhlinger’s April Fool’s Day post at Comics Curmudgeon included this remark:
This is just another example of (the main characters of Intelligent Life) responding to any cultural reference they recognize with a sort of Pavlovian noise of general approval.
Which got me to wondering: is this blog just Pavlovian noises of general disapproval? Are we just throwing red meat at people who enjoy that particular flavor of red meat? Are we no better than the clucking, smirking, comic book-addicted clones of the Funkyverse, who stand around agreeing with each other that all Tom Batiuk’s personal tastes are really neat-o?
I think we are better. And I’ll tell you why.
If you pay $5 to go to a live show, a social contract emerges. You, the ticket-buyer, have an expectation that you will be entertained. You trust the venue to arrange a series of skilled performers that are worth $5 of your money, and two hours of your time. If they don’t deliver, you will be dissatisfied, and advise others not to visit.
The venue probably has expectations of you as well. They may have a dress code; rules about what substances you’re allowed to consume (or possibly required to consume, in the form of a two-drink minimum); and that you don’t disrupt the show to an unacceptable degree.
In comedy clubs, heckling is a part of the show, but there are well-understood standards about what’s too far. I’ve also known comedy clubs to forbid the use of certain words and subject matter. Because there’s a social contract between comedians and clubs as well: break our rules, and we’ll ruin your reputation.
Now think about newspaper comics. There’s a social contract here as well. If we turn to the comics page, then we, the readers, have the right to expect that the cartoonists have made a reasonable attempt to entertain us. We don’t pay that $5 cover charge, but we do invest a little time every day. But when we open the funny pages, what do we see? Roots country music. One man indulging his sexual fetishes. Incoherent sports drama. A parody of an 87-year-old movie. Millennial-bashing, raised to the level of gaslighting. NASCAR jokes that wouldn’t be good enough for a children’s joke book. Whatever Judge Parker is nowadays.
Who the hell is the target audience for any of that?
And I’m not even including strips like Beetle Bailey, Blondie, Curtis, Doonesbury, Garfield,Hagar The Horrible, Herb and Jamaal, Hi and Lois, the aforementioned Intelligent Life, and the many Z-grade Far Side clones. I’m not even including other strips I’m usually critical of: Luann, Mary Worth,and Pluggers. All these strips at least try to honor the social contract of being worth 10 seconds of your time. Though the word “try” is doing a lot of work here.
Now to Funky Winkerbean. It has three clearly defined eras: Act I, when it was a solid satire of high school life; Act II, when it shifted to drama but was still worth following; and Act III, when it became a self-indulgent shitshow about book signings, comic book covers, and multi-month self-interviews.
Who the hell is the target audience for any of those things?
I suspect most of us followed this pattern: liked Funky Winkerbean in Act I, tolerated it in Act II, and were disgusted by it in Act III. The social contract broke down in stages. It went from something that was pretty good, to something that was at least worth 10 seconds a day, to something that angers us so much that we spend a lot more seconds a day hating it.
And now Crankshaft seems to be trying to makepeople hate it.
Yes! This story is actually continuing! It’s not an April Fool’s prank, I promise you!
BAILIFF: All rise for the Honorable Collis D. Smizer.
JUDGE: As you were. Next up is the much-delayed case 53766673, the Village Booksmith fire. Now, Mr. Moore, do you have proper counsel?
MR. BREEF: I am Amicus Breef, from the law firm of Westview Community College Discount Legal Services. I will be representing the defendant, Les Moore.
JUDGE: Very good. Welcome, Mr. Breef. Our previous session ended in the middle of cross examination. Mr. Flaherty, would you like to continue?
CONTINUED CROSS EXAMINATION
(Les Moore, having duly been sworn in, testifies as follows:)
PROSECUTOR: At the time, you yourself noted that Myers was seeking attention. Correct?
LES: Yes.
PROSECUTOR: I believe this is also why you started the Village Booksmith fire. You saw an opportunity to be the hero again, taking a bold stand against a non-existent enemy of literature. And you took full advantage of it.
LES: I would never put my own friends at risk.
PROSECUTOR: But you did. You already testified that you put Lillian McKenzie at risk, despite her being uncomfortable with this whole situation, when safer options were available. You also had Pete Roberts-Reynolds and Mindy Murdoch help you. Plus bookstore employees Amelia and Emily Matthews. You certainly didn’t mind putting any of them at risk! You let these people – your three friends, and two underage girls – worry about a threat that they thought was real. Eric Myers may have been your student, but it seems you learned a lot from him as well.
LES: Well, that’s what it means to be a teacher.
PROSECUTOR (ignoring Les): Which is also why the fire was laughably small. You didn’t want anyone to get hurt, or even for Lillian to suffer much property damage. Which is why you started the fire at the very bottom of the building’s wooden stairs, when copies of Fahrenheit 451, the supposed target of all this, were upstairs. And you knew that, because you just moved them up those stairs yourself!
This fire was so far away from the books that it couldn’t possibly have reached them. And, it was easily visible from the outside, so it would be seen and put out quickly. All of this is consistent with your motive of wanting to set a fire without actually burning anything.
On top of all that, creosote oil is a wood preservative, as well as a fire accelerant. Which would explain your choice of this unorthodox arson catalyst. You might as well have applied fire-resistant wood sealant to Lillian’s staircase before you set it on fire. Do you deny any of this?
LES: You’re proven nothing.
PROSECUTOR: And what of Lillian herself? She flat-out told you she didn’t feel safe, when you were the one she should have been afraid of all along! And you knew that! An elderly single woman who —
JUDGE: Mr. Breef, all the evidence has already been presented, and provided to you. Are you suggesting there is a need to subpoena new evidence?
MR. BREEF: Umm…
JUDGE: Overruled. Lack of relevance. The counselor may continue.
PROSECUTOR: Mr. Moore, this document was given to you during discovery, as was all the other evidence, when you were effectively pro se. It was also given to Mr. Breef as soon as he notified my office that he was your new counsel. We have the electronic records to prove this exchange took place. So I will ask you again, Mr. Moore: will you please tell the court what items were purchased in this receipt? You are under oath.
LES: Ummmm, creosote oil, and a copy of the book Lisa’s Story.
LES: But so what? Anybody could have bought those things.
PROSECUTOR: “A” copy of Lisa’s Story? Can you double-check the quantity?
LES: Uh, three.
PROSECUTOR: Three?
LES: Hundred.
LILLIAN (from the audience): Hey!
PROSECUTOR (in full “the defendant is full of shit and I’m about to prove it” mode): Now, who on earth needs to buy 300 copies of the same book? Other than the man who wrote that book, and does frequent public signings of that book?
LES: Maybe the buyer wanted to read it more than once?
(No one laughs.)
LILLIAN: You bastard!
JUDGE: Order! Ms. McKenzie, no more outbursts, or I will ask you to leave.
(Lillian sits down.)
PROSECUTOR: Can you also tell me the quantity of the creosote oil?
LES: 20 liters.
PROSECUTOR: And who is the purchaser on this invoice?
LES (scanning the document): Well, I can already see it’s not me, it’s the…
LES: Lisa’s Legacy Foundation.
PROSECUTOR: And are you the director of the Lisa’s Legacy Foundation?
LES: Yes.
PROSECUTOR (blatantly hamming it up now): Why does a charitable organization need creosote oil at all? Much less 20 liters of it?
LES: Is it too late to change my plea?
April fools! It really wasn’t a prank.I let this story sit way too long, and I thought it would be a nice surprise to finally deliver the goods. My re-telling of The Burnings will resume on a more regular basis soon. Really. Also, last year’s prank was going to be hard to top.
Recently, the comic strip Luann has been irritating me almost as much as the Batton Death March, which begins its 11th week today. Luann‘s tedious story arc is about a “Career Paths” class, which seems to be the only class the title character is taking in her 27th semester of junior college.
I decided to improve both stories, by crashing them into each other.
Text that appears in the standard Crankshaft or Luann font is unedited from the original strip, except for minor rewording, and sometimes being paired with different artwork.
Warning: The parody story text contains lots of foul language.
This is Part 2 of our deep dive into Max and Hannah. Part 1 is here.
Max and Hannah bought the Valentine Theater from Ralph Meckler in 2016. October 10, 2016 was their first week of ownership. It was a disjointed mix of them fixing up the place up, receiving their first customers (Jeff, Pam, and Ed) and Max being tired from the stress of working two jobs.
Citing burnout, Max quits his job at Channel 1 on January 12, 2017 to run the theater full-time. Both Pam and Ed Crankshaft point out that Channel 1 is paying the better part of his salary (even though Max gripes about being underpaid), so this may be an unwise move. Nobody ever points out that Hannah has been working the same two jobs, and is not depicted as being fatigued, despite her having the more physically demanding Channel 1 job of camera operator.
I never noticed it until now, but women are much expected to be much tougher than men in the Funkyverse.
Again, I was a broadcast journalism major in the 1990s, so trust me on this: those live TV-grade cameras are heavy. But Max is the one who’s falling asleep on the job, Peppermint Patty style.
On January 25, 2018 during a blizzard, Ed Crankshaft brings a busload of school children to the Valentine, who have to spend the night there. The incident gets positive coverage in the Centerville Sentinel, back when it still published news stories. July 26 is another round of Pam and Jeff helping to spruce up the theater.
On March 31, 2019, Jeff visits an apartment and says “I appreciate you two having me over for dinner,” implying that Max and Hannah are now living together. This apartment building isn’t the same one Max moved into in 2008. It’s probably another real-life building Tom Batiuk and his wife lived in at some point.
June 3, 2019 is almost identical to last week’s arc. Hannah and Max go to Pam and Jeff’s house with a major announcement: they’ve decided to incorporate! Which, combined with the last week’s strips, and the “we’re buying the Valentine” announcement from 2016, means they bait-and-switched a marriage announcement three different times. And I guess they never incorporated either, because incorporation was a declined option on March 6, 2026.
But it doesn’t end there. In October 2019, they invite Pam and Jeff to the theater with yet another surprise: Hannah is pregnant!
There’s teasing a big reveal, and then there’s just being jerks. When it’s the fourth time you’ve done this, and you order custom printed balloons before you’ll tell your own mother what’s going on, you’re just being jerks. Smirk your heads off, you smug bastards.
That story ends on October 20, 2019:
And we have the answer to the question many of you have been asking! Yes, Max and Hannah having a child out of wedlock is established Funkyverse lore. As Pam explained it at the time, they wanted to “focus on more important stuff.” Given the bizarre priorities of Funkyverse characters, you’re welcome to guess what those might be. Lord knows Tom Batiuk doesn’t tell us.
On February 10, 2020, Ed Crankshaft and Mary Marzipan show up for a Butter Brinkel marathon during a blizzard, necessitating a second overnight stay. This was also the very beginning of the real-life global pandemic. Why do people in this town insist on going to shows during life-threatening conditions, like COVID and blizzards? Remember Dinkle’s “Christmas Messiah” near the end of Funky Winkerbean?
It is during this second overnight stay that Hannah gives birth to Mitch. Infamously, Ed Crankshaft helps with the delivery. Which may be the most unrealistic thing in the history of the Funkyverse. I’m not a woman, but I think that if Ed Crankshaft offered to help me give birth, my immediate reaction would be DO NOT LET THAT MAN ANYWHERE NEAR MY HOO-HAH FOR ANY REASON.
Especially if he’s going to make that face about it.
Mitch is first seen and heard on February 27, 2020. Jeff “covers for” Max at the theater for a week while they adjust to parenthood. On July 27, the Valentine is showing The Phantom Empire. Max takes Mitch to the theater “because it’s never too soon to introduce a child to culture.” Even though that child is five months old, and his irregular aging hadn’t started yet.
May 9, 2021 is the first sign of trouble at the Valentine. Max tells Hannah not to bother disinfecting the seats, because “their draw was an older audience that doesn’t want to go out to a movie theater now.” By May 21, a strip club is interested in buying the place. Here’s my version of that story:
“Why was there placenta on my seat?” may be my favorite sentence I’ve ever written for this blog.
On May 27, Pam and Jeff visit. Max calls them “the biggest crowd we’ve had since we re-opened.” They’re the biggest crowd we’ve ever seen, even before COVID, other than the night Ed brought a busload of school children.
They start vacating the theater. On June 4, Pam offers to let Max, Hannah, and Mitch move into the apartment over the garage. Oh well, at least it’s not the apartment over Montoni’s for a change. This move happens in September 2021. January 17, 2022 is the first time we see Max, Hannah, and Mitch around Pam and Jeff’s house. They would start appearing as background characters at that location, much like when Max was staying there between his 2006 graduation and 2008.
On August 1, 2022, Max and Hannah go back to Channel 1. This is what 17-month-old Mitch looks like now:
Apparently they were playing Jumanji, and Mitch aged ten years while he was trapped in the game board. That’s quite a screw-up, even by Crankshaft’s standards.
Amazingly, Channel 1 hands them their old jobs back. One wonders what happened to the cameraman and director of yesterday’s show, roles that must have been filled by someone. Which is another highly unrealistic depiction of media jobs. Max and Hannah are about as replaceable than fast food workers. Year after year, universities are still cranking out dozens more journalism graduates than there will ever be jobs for again. Not to mention the scores of self-made content creators thanks to YouTube, and affordable consumer-grade video production tools. So Channel 1 would have plenty of qualified applicants on file.
August 2022 saw the ransomware attack on Channel 1. It was Hannah who had the brilliant idea to air old John Darling episodes, since they were stored on physical tapes that weren’t held hostage by the ransomware. This kept Channel 1 on the air without having to pay the ransom of…
August 31, 2022.
Next month, a Deus Ex Comic Books arrives to save Max and Hannah from their own passive idiocy.
Mason got all his money from making the Starbuck Jones movie, so this qualifies as a Deus Ex Comic Books.
It’s Mason Jarre and Cindy Summers! Note that the Valentine livery and movie theater entrance is still up, even though it closed down a year ago, and a strip club existed there in the interim. Timemop must have been a regular.
Mason immediately offers to buy the building from unlicensed guest character Lois Flagston from Hi & Lois, looking like a deranged psycho the entire time.
What, me worry?
Ed Crankshaft happens to wander by during this conversation. Like most American small towns, Westview/Centerville has no concept of privacy, so they discuss this celebrity couple’s financial business right in front of this complete stranger. Ed conveniently mentions that his grandson and his wife once ran the theater, so Mason wants to take them to dinner. Of course, they go to Montoni’s. Mason tells Max and Hannah he wants them to run and manage the theater “based on their experience there.”
Which is even more ludicrous than them being re-hired at Channel 1. At least they were competent Channel 1 employees, which is more than can be said for their management skills. They’re the ones who ran the Valentine into the ground with their endless Phantom Empire screenings, and insistence on remaining open during blizzards. Once again, the story acts like they’re the only two people on earth who could possibly do this job.
On October 1, they get their first paycheck from Mason. Of course, it’s gigantic.
And the Funkyverse business cycle is complete!
Be from the remote outskirts of Cleveland.
Have Tom Batiuk-approved opinions on How To Do Media Things Correctly.
Find a rich person who shares those opinions.
Wait for the rich person to throw money at you to manage it for them. Because rich people have zero interest in ever making a profit, or in hiring people with any useful skills.
Mason became to the Valentine Theater what Chester Hagglemore was to Atomix Komix, what Pink Productions was to Lisa’s Story, and what Mordor Financial was to the Centerview Sentinel. They’re the faceless entities that exist solely to swallow huge losses, so Batiuk’s beknighted small-town yokels can have mainstream media careers with complete creative control. And, of course, be paid big money themselves.
In spite of their new-found tax bracket, December 2022 shows Max and Hannah are… still working at the TV station?
Despite getting huge paychecks from Mason Jarre to do their dream job, and a Channel 1 paycheck on top of that, they were never seen moving back to an apartment. And they continued to make walk-on appearances in household stories. Which implies that they’re still mooching off Pam and Jeff to this day.
In 2023, Skip Rawlings shows up to ask about the theater’s reopening, which happens in May 2023. His interviewing skills weren’t any better then. The next month, Mason flies in for the grand re-opening. And we all know what the main attraction is!
This may be the most Funkyverse panel ever created. Especially if you don’t know who’s asking the question.
The pandering continues. Mason also wants to premier Starbuck Jones III: The Rise Of The Disney Lawsuits Bandelorians at the Valentine. And he wants to meet with Harry Dinkle, because he wants to use Claude Barlow music in the movie.
Which is mind-bendingly stupid, but isn’t worth any further deconstruction. Because Max and Hannah were never constructed in the first place.
Max and Hannah are the same as Atomik Komix. And Les Moore. And Lillian McKenzie. And Skip Rawlings. And Mason Jarre. And Harry Dinkle. And Batton Thomas. They exist to fuel stories about small town people who run a media empire the way Tom Batiuk thinks it should be run, and be handed ego tongue baths and piles of money for it.
Despite this couple’s obvious purpose as story enablers, Tom Batiuk has decided that their marital status was a loose end that needed to be tied up. He made a similar decision that near the end of Funky Winkerbean, that Cory Winkerbean and Rocky Rhodes needed to put a ring on it.
But that was justifiable in the context of Funky Winkerbean ending. Weddings are a great excuse to get all the characters in one place, so we can see them one last time. As stupid as that arc was, it was also the final appearance of characters like Keisha Williams, Maddie Klinghorn, and Rocky and Cory themselves. That’s not the case this time, though.
Son of Stuck Funky 