Better late than never, CBS This Morning. As the gay prom arc draws to an end, here’s a profile of you-know-who. Basically the standard TB interview that we’ve seen over and over again (“the weight of substantial ideas”) but notable for some footage of Luigi’s of Akron, the real-world inspiration for Montoni’s. Also worth watching just to hear the reporters try to say “Funky Winkerbean”.
Author: TFHackett
The Envelope? Puh-LEEZE!
Jinx Bushka is not only the one-woman prom committee; she’s also the official emcee of Westview High. She gets to do cool things like give the morning announcements to her fellow students via closed-circuit TV. As the most controversial senior prom in WHS history draws to a close, it’s Jinx’s job to announce the Prom King and…King? Isn’t the suspense just killing you?
Let’s hope this wraps up tomorrow…the whole envelope-opening cliffhanger aspect of today’s strip has me worried that we may be in for another “The Week in Funky Winkerbean” (from Dean’s Comic Booth):
Talk to the Hand
You were wondering what could be even more gutless than inventing a disposable, nameless same-sex prom couple as a vehicle for “addressing” gay rights? How about icing the cake by having another anonymous student (seen by us only as a fluttering, disembodied hand) confidentially coming out to Nate to thank him for making today better? TB’s shoulder must still need an ice pack a year later after he dislocated it with this epic self-back-pat.
Charles
May 22, 2012 at 3:06 pm
[W]hat is the deal with Batiuk showing high schoolers with significantly receding hairlines?
That’s no high schooler! It’s today’s special celebrity guest star, Tom Hanks!
Reply to Toby
Below is my email to commenter “Toby”, who took exception to the negative comments. Toby’s comments can be read here, here and here.
Hi Toby,
Hope you don’t mind me emailing you directly, but I wanted to respond to your comments on Son of Stuck Funky, and if I post my response there, you probably won’t see it.
You said:
Wow! What a lot of nit-picking haters comment on this thread! If you all dislike the strip so much, why do you bother reading it?
A valid question. Not all the regulars at SoSF dislike the strip. Many, myself included, are longtime fans who take issue with how over 40 years (!), Funky Winkerbean has become an unfunny, self-serious soap opera.
Mr. Batiuk deserves serious credit for addressing the same-sex couple at the prom issue, regardless of how he develops his characters.
That’s debatable. The same-sex couple consisted of two hitherto-unforeseen characters about whom we know absolutely nothing except they want to go to the prom together. Batiuk didn’t even give these characters names. We saw them buy their tickets, nosey old Roberta witnessed the ticket sale and launched a protest, and principal Nate held an assembly, where he stated that there was nothing in the student handbook prohibiting same-sex couples from attending prom. Some defense.
By placing the issue in a nationally syndicate strip, Mr. B. does those kids a major service and THAT is the important aspect of this matter…
I hate to sound cynical, but Mr. B. also garnered a ton of press for himself (and for his just-published collection, The Complete Funky Winkerbean Vol. I). Meanwhile, he creates two cardboard “gay characters” who probably will never be seen again. He also (today and tomorrow) has another, closeted student thank the principal for making things “better” . The student speaks to principal Nate while obscured the whole time by scenery. In this way Batiuk scores himself some bonus points without taking a chance by “outing” an established character.
…one that seems to have gone right over the heads of the “oh this is all so ten minutes ago” phoney sophisticates who have been negatively commenting.
I have been running Son of Stuck Funky for over two years, and was a regular commenter on the blog that preceded it. I know and like the readers of my blog, and the vast majority are indeed sophisticated, especially regarding popular culture. Many of them recall that cartoonist Lynn Johnston featured an openly gay teenage character (nearly twenty years, not “ten minutes” ago) and handled the matter much more artfully than Batiuk could ever hope to do.
The vast majority of my readers are thoughtful, tolerant people. Some of my readers happen to be gay. What they are not is “phoney”.
Batiuk has been hyping Funky Winkerbean’s gay prom storyline since last year, and garnered plenty of attention, as he did with his Pulitzer-nominated breast cancer story. All my readers did was rightfully call “bullshit” where they saw it on his handling of a topic that deserves more thoughtful, less shallow treatment.
Sorry you didn’t enjoy your visit to SoSF. By the way, I doubt anyone really thought you were Tom Batiuk posting under a pseudonym, but it was just too good to resist. Anyway, you’re welcome to visit again and comment any time you like.
Thanks and best regards from a fellow Jerseyan.
TFHackett
Son of Stuck Funky
If These Walls Could Talk
Nate’s prom night reverie is interrupted by what appears to be a talking castle.
More TB News
So Marvel Comics is jumping on the “Boys in the Band” -wagon, gay-marrying superhero Northstar to his non-super partner. The Washington Post sought out Tom Batiuk for comment, since he’s a cartoonist and a comix fanboy. He offers up basically the same talking points he’s given everyone else since before Promagaydon:
“I think I’ve created a space for myself” to deal with serious issues, Batiuk tells Comic Riffs. “It’s not such a big deal for myself as some other strips. It’s been incremental … that I can grab my readers’ hand and [say]: ‘Let’s come over here.”
What really makes the Post piece noteworthy, though, is this illustration:
…it depicts an alternate reality in which actual confrontation takes place! This would have been so much better than the way it went down. Note the dude holding the “It’s Our Prom” sign: where’d he come from? My guess is that Batiuk inserted him into the tableau lest non-readers assume that the same-sex couple is Summer and Keisha. The “real” gay couple (and they don’t even match; are they sure they’re gay?) stand meekly behind their fellow students as Roberta gives them the evil eye, and Mr. Blackburn silently rolls tape.
Son of Stuck Funky 
