Dry Drowning

Today’s strip is finally up.

I was desperately hoping that my return to the writer’s helm after months of this meandering nonsense would be the magical talisman to break this unending inanity. I was there when this plot started in February, and maybe now it could end.

No such luck. Pete is plodding along on his Cosmic Treadmill…using awful word association to come up with cut-rate characters. I’m sure that the Floodlight, or the Floodmaster, or Floody McFlooderson the World’s Wettest Woman, will be nothing more than a name, a costume, a gimmick, and an even worse arch nemesis with drought powers. No Batman or Captain America levels of backstory, built in angst, creeds, and psychological insight. Just a stupid idea, personified.

Floods of biblical proportions can’t drown shallow characters. They’re hollow and insubstantial rising to the top and clinging together in a choking mat of garbage.

Yes I am comparing TomBat’s idea of ‘comicbook characters’ with the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

Bored Of The Lame

Link To Today’s Disappointment

Snore. LOTL is back but to no avail, as Pete is more focused than ever before and (zzzzzzz). Only in FW could a character merely doing his job (his dream job, no less) instead of aimlessly loafing, daydreaming and goofing off be considered noteworthy. I hope the Lord Of Anything Else visits a certain noted Ohioian comic strip writer soon, although the Lord Of Being Careful What You Wish For is tapping me on the shoulder right now too.

Anyhow, the Lord Of SoSF Snark can kick all their asses without breaking a sweat. Coming on Monday…the return of Comic Book Harriet, who, like the rest of us, is quite anxious to see if this AK arc will ever end.

Working For The Weak End

Link To The Thing We All Hate

I’d like to take a moment to thank TFH, our contributors and our loyal readers for standing tall during this ponderous and plodding time. He’s obviously trying to break our collective will here and the stand you’ve all taken during this extremely tedious time will never be forgotten. If Monday rolls around and Funky is jogging or something it’ll be like emerging into daylight after some sort of long protracted siege of dullness or a really boring natural disaster of some kind.

And speaking of time that’ll never be forgotten, I must have fallen into a lengthy coma and missed several months of strips, as AK is apparently already up and running and brimming with treadmill inspired brilliance. He crammed several seconds of story into the first eleven and a half weeks of this thing and now suddenly, completely out of nowhere, everything has abruptly lurched forward in the most boring way possible. I mean maybe I’m wrong and this was just the most productive day in the history of new comic book companies but given the characters we’re talking about here that seems very unlikely.

I just really want Pete, Boy Lisa, Chester and AK to go away for a while…a long while. I usually complain when he just abandons story threads and never resolves them but in this case I’m genuinely rooting for it to happen.

 

Don’t Treadmill On Me

Link To Today’s Plodding Installment

As BatLoad’s interest in his latest “offbeat” comic book fantasy begins to wane, he’s resorting to old comic book fantasy gags to grudgingly haul another pointless week to the Saturday finish line. This arc is the comic strip equivalent of dragging a soggy ruined carpet out of the basement. In today’s time-bending installment the ol’ Eaton building is a dynamic hub of activity with all sorts of whimsical subcontractors and comic book memorabilia delivery people buzzing around like worker bees. Things sure do move fast once every eleven weeks in the Funkyverse.

“Hello, Pete Reynolds? This is Bob over at Pre-Cog Shipping and Delivery…anticipating and meeting your shipping and delivery needs before you knew you had any since 1979. Just wanted to let you know your movie prop and treadmill are on their way to the location you’ll be working at and we’ll be billing you with your Visa card, the number, expiration date and three-digit security code of which we already know. It doesn’t appear that you’ll have any imminent issues or concerns, so have a great day!”

Anyway, it’s Boy Lisa’s stupid treadmill, not Pete’s, so when and where he used it to “think” is (sigh) yet another never-to-be-solved Batom anomaly, like Becky’s mom or the Food Film truck scam or what year it’s supposed to be. It’s best not to think about it too much, but it’s tough when he gives you so precious little else to focus on.

 

 

Prop Komix

Link To Today’s

Sigh. Once again BatDerp is playing fast and loose with the very fabric of time itself. Just like how Pete and Boy Lisa are not “young kids just starting out” and how everyone was massively influenced by pop culture artifacts from twenty years before they were born, suddenly the Dimmer Twins are having things delivered to the building they didn’t even know existed until “today”…whenever that is. It isn’t just stupid, it’s completely impossible.

Then there’s the always contrary Chester. By day he’s founding new comic book companies out of a deep and total love for those old-time Batom Comics of yore and by night he’s a sleazy Batom Comics obsessed scumbag willing to deal with all sorts of comic book lowlifes to acquire his ill-gotten memorabilia. He can’t possibly exist but there he is.

And Holtron…sigh. Sentient being? Old piece of garbage? Well…what day is it? Tomorrow it could be a coffee machine, a paper shredder or a cartoon dog and I’d still shrug indifferently and so would you.