He may be the only Westviewian who’s not enthralled with comic books. But for someone who dreaded high school gym class, Les is…not uninterested in sports. He plays tennis (but only against easily defeated, out-of-shape opponents like Bull and Funky). He’s not real good swinging a bat (except in his mind), but he raised a basketball phenom, and we know he watches hoops on TV with his current wife. Never pictured him as a football fan, though. But Les being Les, he and St. Lisa saw no mere game, but rather “a model for dealing with and overcoming adversity“. Assuming he’s watching the Cleveland Browns, like everyone else in Batiuk’s realm, that actually begins to make sense.
Pen-dejo
During last month’s online unveiling of his poster for the Ohioana Book Festival, the subject of Batiuk’s famous year-in-advance lead time came up. When asked if readers could expect to see his characters affected by the current pandemic, Batiuk admitted that he’d been “writing around” the subject, hoping (as we all do) that the crisis would soon run its course. Yet today’s strip is one of those rare instances where Batiuk’s year-old content winds up being almost timely. The Moores were quarantined before quarantine was cool. Citizens weren’t wearing surgical masks back then, even during “a really bad flu season.” But if Les was so germ conscious about sharing a pen, you’d think he’d carry around his own.
Watching the Detective
He’s made appearances in just two strips since last December 4, but the appearance of Les on a Monday signals that our week has been ruined. Especially when we see him in a bookstore setting. At least we’ve been spared a punny name: this bookstore is simply called “BOOKSTORE.” Maybe someone reading this who’s familiar with publishing can tell me: do authors go around still signing a book that was published over ten years ago? And given the target demographic for Les’ dreary memoir, it’s a pretty safe bet that everyone in the room “got the reference ” to Dick Tracy.
We All Scream
J.J. O’Malley
February 26, 2021 at 11:43 pm
I can’t believe I’m writing this, but I almost want there to be a complete tour of the new and “improved” Chateau Winkerbean tomorrow, just so our six days of sloughing through (apparently) one very repetitive day-long conversation won’t have totally been in vain.
Hate to spoil it for ya, J.J., but I have a feeling that today’s strip is about as close as we’re gonna get to seeing the actual reno in progress. Throwaway panel 1 is a lovingly detailed rendering of a gutted kitchen, chock full of the kind of details–the orange extension cord, discarded sheetrock and wood, exposed studs and electrical–that have me thinking Batty snapped some reference pix during the real-life reno of his own kitchen that inspired this arc.
Also in panel 1, to the left of the FW text, we see Holly’s profile, which tells us that they’re sitting in a room that’s just off the kitchen. Which makes me wonder how she could forget that the ice cream and everything else has been moved to another location.
Write What You (Ren-)Know
All good things must come to an end; so too must all excruciatingly dull things like this week’s reno convo. As Funky Winkerbean has pivoted from “depicting contemporary issues affecting young adults” etc. etc., we see more situations that are likely drawn from what’s been happening in Batiuk’s life the last couple years. Having one’s home renovated actually does hold some comic potential, and this arc got off to a promising start Sunday, where we saw Funky and Holly interacting with the contractor at their house. It might have been kinda fun to see the job actually being done, and maybe have Holly finding ways to continually and inadvertently drive up the price tag, adding to her husband’s consterenation. Instead, the rest of the week’s been taken up with these two commiserating.
