ComicBookHarriet

Cover Up Fallout.

After being silently cowed yesterday, Mindy today has completely disappeared. We can only hope that she stomped out of the building in a righteous huff, deleted Pete’s number from her phone, and re-uploaded Tinder and Linked In.

Kudos to everyone yesterday that pointed out that Pete has totally written kid sidekicks before, with no mention of his apparently crippling phobia of pubescent partners in crime fighting. Maybe since that time he has unconsciously internalized The Seduction of the Innocent, and now sees all comic team-ups through goggles of pederasty.

Holtron sighting in the background today. Like they realized they couldn’t fit the Cosmic Treadmill in every panel. The extra background detail almost makes up for Darin’s terrible three-fingered hand in panel one.

I can hear in my head the tone of voice that Darin is using in panel 3. It’s sad, disappointed, and only barely curious.

20-1 odds on there being a sideways Comic Cover tomorrow. With a repeat of this joke in a panel at the bottom.

There’s No Thumb Big Enough For This.

Link to Today’s Comic.

Count on Batiuk to take a relate-able peeve, hatred for kid sidekicks, and present it in such a way that we all feel both offended and annoyed.

I’m a Transformer’s fan, I know how bad the little kid sidekick can be. I’ve lived through Daniel Witwicky for Primus’ sake. One of my best friends couldn’t enjoy Reboot, (the greatest cartoon of all time, I said it, fight me,) because Enzo grated on her nerves like jalapeno sandpaper. Her unbearable pain was hilarious to witness, and gives me a model of how this could have been presented better.

But TommyBats decided to frame the innocuous punchline in a box of unfortunate implications, by turning Pete into the most overbearing mansplainer since Mark Trail. If Chester had just come up with the sidekick on his own, then Pete could have complained without the specter of mysoginy haunting the exchange.

Interesting to see that Mindy has not only been rendered a silent object by Pete’s temper tantrum, she’s beginning to fracture into some kind of Cubist, Surrealist monstrosity.

Patronizing Pathos

Link to Today’s Comic.

Yesterday when I joked about Batiuk doing this as a serious storyline, I was kidding. I really genuinely thought that the glare from Pete was going to be the beginning and end of it. And as bland and easy as that would have been, it would have been better than this.

This is, without a doubt, the most deeply uncomfortable strip I’ve seen Batty put out in YEARS. I’m not usually one that trumpets the ‘Batty is a blatant misogynist’ line, but I am reassessing my opinions of it.

No wonder Burchett is half-assing this… I would half-ass this as a form of silent yet visual protest.

I am genuinely curious if the fallout of this will be Mindy being cowed then educated by the power of SRS BIDNESS comic books, or Pete being put back in his place with cheap heavy-handed feminist patronizing. I could see it go either way.

I am very eagerly awaiting all of you Stuckfunkians tearing this strip to pieces in the comments.

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?

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!!!!