Memento of a Murder

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Is it just me, or does it seem a little weird that Jessica is apparently only now thinking that she wants a souvenir of the John Darling show? I feel like she would’ve maybe thought of this sometime before, just because she lost her dad at such a young age. Or that it maybe would have occurred to her in the dozens or hundreds of hours she spent creating the documentary about him. I mean, she had to have watched some footage of him when she made that, I would think. But it took stumbling across random reruns of the show to make her think about wanting a piece of the set or his chair or something.

Tears of a Darling

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I guess Jessica and her mom just both simultaneously discovered John Darling was being aired again, without either one of them mentioning it to the other (except for Jessica, right now). As much as I hate Batiuk’s writing when he’s putting his characters through melodrama and misery, I think he’s even worse when he’s going for “touching”/”poignant”. It’s been years since Jessica’s mom was shown in this strip, so just cutting to her silently tearing up is cheap and not really earned, in my opinion. And honestly I feel like the average newspaper reader has no clue about the background here.
I feel like we’re going to be seeing the phrase “‘John Darling’ show” a ton during this arc. After reading “Jessica’s father, John Darling, who was murdered” so many times, I really wonder why the John Darling strips have to have such repetitive dialogue.

Darling All Day

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Wow, it is always intimidating to follow up the amazing CBH! If Kent State University wants to start offering courses on “The History of Funky Winkerbean” I know who should teach it. Not for long, sadly, since that would probably mean the school was about to go out of business, but it would still be the right choice.

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Trust Fall

Way to set the tone, jackass. As if the crossed arms and manspreading weren’t off-putting enough: Funky has to respond sarcastically to Seminar Guy’s innocuous icebreaker inquiry. It’s not like this guy showed up at their front door at dinnertime to pitch financial services. Loretta and Leroy–I mean, Holly and Funky–showed up at his seminar, sat in the front row, and are drinking his coffee. Is it asking too much to have them just sit and listen?

Future Schlock

“Hey Siri. Look up ‘futurians’ on Wikipedia.” I’m still tuckered out from researching Charlton Comics, a franchise which a surprising number of you were familiar with. Wikipedia has not one but three “futurians” articles. Let’s leave aside the New Zealand sci-fi punk band by that name. TB’s musical tastes are certainly varied, but I doubt that’s who he’s cribbing here.

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