I like this doctor. “Yeah, he’ll just have to wear this thing for a couple of nights, I don’t know how many exactly, whenever he feels like taking it off, whatever. Oh, and he only needs to wear it at night, he can take it off during the way, who cares.”.
Funky sure has had some wild mood swings this week. The first two panels he looks like he’s lost the will to live, then in the third he’s popping up and yelling out a pirate impersonation.
Cataractastrophe
This is an odd strip. I guess the joke is “Funky isn’t feeling anything because he’s been ‘sedated’, even though sedation and anesthetization aren’t the same thing, if he’s freaking out and yelling he sure doesn’t seem sedated”, but I don’t get why he’d be dead set on having to feel something before he goes in for surgery anyway. Shouldn’t be relieved that he can’t feel anything before he has a knife inevitably poke out his eye?
I like to think of this as Funky just admitting that he’s dead inside and has no emotions anymore, because I’m very tired at the lame attempts at humor and very much want this strip to jump back into overblown melodrama. At least that was slightly entertaining.
Cataraction
That seems like some fast acting “sedative” if the nurse thinks it would be affecting Funky’s sense of humor as she’s injecting him with it. Where has she been all week? This whole cataract storyline seems to be nothing but Funky making one joke after another only to have someone say he’s not funny. It’s also kind of funny when you read the week in context, how it goes from Funky being nervous and anxious to “Hey! Here’s a cow joke for literally no reason at all!”.
I’m pretty sure she should be giving him anesthesia and not a sedative, too.
Pink Cataract
Today’s strip is a good example of why you should try and make sure your art and writing convey the same tone and mood. The writing makes it seem like Funky is supposed be cracking wise and attempting and failing to be funny. But his expression in second panel totally contradicts that. He just looks weary and exhausted, to the point where I would assume the original dialogue was “Why? I’m not going to live to see it.”.
And the nurse’s expressions throughout this strip are more “I’ll pray for you, since you’re trapped in a nightmare hell marriage” and less “Oy, your husband has a lame sense of humor”.
Cataract Ranch
So now we’re back to “Funky’s Body is Failing, Chapter 43”. Is that supposed to be Corey in the first panel? I hope so, because it’s legitimately hilarious that he’d have no clue that his dad is about to have surgery. Years ago, somebody must have told Batiuk that the way to get readers up to speed on what’s happening in your story is to have one character ask another what’s happening, because he sure does it a lot, and it’s super awkward every time.
Oh, and Funky is still nervous, in case you didn’t know. I really don’t know why Batiuk thinks “someone is nervous about surgery” is comedy gold, but he does.