Author Archives: comicbookharriet

by | September 18, 2018 · 11:36 pm

Woman-upmanship

Link to Today’s Comic.

Oooh, that is some next level pouting going on in panel two. I can’t wait for an in depth story examining Pete’s and Mindy’s characters, their relationship, and the universal conflict between ego and charitable love. I just know Batiuk will really dig into Pete’s psyche, his insecurities, and use the weakness he’s intentionally built into his character to display the uncomfortable truth to all of us that the joy we get from outshining our peers will always be at war with the joy we get from seeing our friends succeed.

I mean, this can’t just be a few strips of mild petty annoyance on Pete’s part, only to be blandly brushed aside with a weak platitude and immediately ignored to be followed up by something even more passive…right? RIGHT?!

Mindy in panel one looks uncomfortably like some kind of Japanese caricature. And let us never ever get an up-the-nostril shot of Chester ever again, okay?

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by | September 17, 2018 · 11:23 pm

Chimp Change

Link to Today’s Comic.

See this. This is really depressing in light of yesterday. Yesterday Burchett drew two really fun panels, and showed us that he can do better. Today he couldn’t even manage to phone it in. He had to drunk dial it. I imagine him splayed across his drafting desk, bottle of scotch in one hand, pen in the other, resting his head directly on the desk while scratching this out with one eye open. Or more likely, he doodled it with a stylus on his smart phone in fifteen minutes while on the can, and emailed it directly to the colorist.

Either way, a Charger Chimp sounds like some kind of stupid portable multi-port wireless device battery pack that would be advertised on TV very early in the morning. Use it in your car! Use it on a plane! Any place want, any device you want, your little charging pocket buddy is there for you. Buy the Charger Chimp today! Only $19.99 plus shipping and handling. But wait! There’s MORE!!!!

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by | September 17, 2018 · 12:12 am

Simian Simulacrum

Link to Today’s Comic.

Comic Book Harriet back again for another ride on The Carousel of Death (and Comics) known as Funky Winkerbean. And like all carousels we’ve been on a trip up and down, around and around, only to come right back to where we were before.

Mopey Pete and Durren have quit their old jobs, moved halfway across the country, got a new boss, and started an entirely new comics venture, only to write “Starbuck Jones But This Time He’s a Monkey.”

At least Burchett got to draw two panels of exciting detailed comic book action. I especially like the face of the guy getting a haymaker in panel two, and the Abe Sapien/Murloc love child in panel three. For a brief moment, he actually got to be an artist producing art again. Like a rotting tree producing a single delicious apple even though it’s dead inside.

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by | July 22, 2018 · 12:58 am

A Big Pick-Me-Up.

Link to Today’s Comic.

Once again stayed up late waiting for Sunday’s strip to drop. Les and Cayla are in LA, getting picked up by the world’s worst Uber. Mason has always been portrayed as a dingbat. I would not feel safe with him behind the wheel of a Hummer/Hearse Hybrid during LA rush hour.

It seems that ‘Comic-Con’ this year was completely summed up in one panel of nerdery last Sunday. The awards show might as well have been a poorly attended wedding reception for all the excitement and industry flavor we got.

I’m pretty flabbergasted by it, really. We did get plenty of tone deaf ‘nerdy’ humor last year, and the year of the great Holly Winkerbean Starbuck Hunt. But the idea that Batiuk would have nothing more to say during a Comic Con, that he’s both out of new ideas and not interested in recycling his old ones, it’s not like him. It’s almost worrying. Lack of interest in activities that you once enjoyed is a classic hallmark of depression. Can someone check on him?

Well it has certainly been an interesting couple weeks at the helm. I interpret this awards quickie as TommyBats realizing that while the IRL ‘Lisa’s Story’ was nominated for a Pulitzer, the ‘in-universe’ book has never been similarly rewarded. The Eisner nomination, but not win, is a way of giving his opus similar accolades both within his world and without.

Beckoning Chasm is up tomorrow, to see us through the sights of LA. If Cayla is impressed with Union Station, wait till she sees the Scientology Building.

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by | July 21, 2018 · 1:36 am

Pity Party for Two.

Link to Today’s Comic.

It seems that Darin and Jess weren’t in yesterday’s strip because Darin stomped out in a huff after not getting his coveted award. After all, and Eisner has been the lifelong dream of this business major who only fell into storyboarding after a friend suggested it offhand.

Tommy Bats seems hesitant to put this bitterness in the mouth of Les, sainted as he is by association. He’s lately split his author avatar in two. The younger Darin can be the raw id of jealousy, anger, and pride. Les is the older and ‘wiser’ superego so his response to defeat is depression, self-pity, and fatalism.

The Han Solo joke is so throwaway, the ghost of a reminder this was supposed to be Batiuk’s Comic-Con tie in strip for the year.

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by | July 20, 2018 · 12:40 am

Sloppy Second Place.

Link to Today’s Comic.

So Tom at least realized that is would be beyond crass to have ‘Lisa’s Story’ WIN the award. We’ve learned something about the lines he will and wont cross.

But when you thought the plotline couldn’t get any weirder or more half-assed, we don’t get to see the announcing of the award, or the immediate reaction. We jump from before the award being announced to some time following later.

I would hate to be Tom’s wife, the man has trouble experiencing a climax. Everything is foreplay to him, followed by a blackout and then an awkward denouement. Since his massive Atomic Komix startup saga tapered off even his foreplay has been perfunctory. Perhaps we are entering the era of endless quickies, shorter and shorter storylines eventually turning the strip back into the one shot comic it once was.

Panel One: Cayla hands her ‘Honey’ divorce papers.
Panel Two: Les drinks while being insulted by an imaginary cat.
Panel Three: Les asks out an attractive woman at a book fair.

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by | July 19, 2018 · 12:29 am

Whistling Dicksie

Link to Today’s Comic.

Well Darin and Jess are already drunk, and are hanging all over each other like two kids necking at the back of the old Valentine Theatre. Jess has lost a finger. In fact all the hands are extra hideous today. And Cayla is missing a neck. What a treat!

Les has absolutely no grounds to be ashamed of a friend making a scene, but it’s nice to see him miserable anyway.

Something I had never really noticed until I was examining the last panel is how the Funkyverse house art style generally doesn’t include lip tint. Normally it doesn’t stand out. But Jess today, with fully detailed lips, really should have them colored nice and pink or red, as would befit a lady at an awards show. instead she has a terrifying flesh colored pucker on her face, like she has an asshole for a mouth.

Cayla has an asshole for a mouth too. But his name is Les.

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