Tag: Batom Comics

Did he haggle more than the average building-buyer?

Pete, Pete, Pete… When you agree to take a job for a madman, you don’t question him. One can only hope that is the lesson learned in tomorrow’s strip. In today’s strip, however, nothing so interesting is happening. Nothing interesting at all is happening.

What is happening:
– Chester is excited that he bought a building, which might not be as impressive an accomplishment as it sounds if this structure is located in certain parts of Cleveland.
– Pete and Durwood are both too dense to realize that the Batom Comics fanboy who has just hired them is totally going to make them work in this dilapidated, asbestos-ridden structure.
– This story arc is no closer to its greatly-desired conclusion.

What’s Eaton You Two?

Today’s strip takes place in the morning? The morning after Pete and Durwood’s night trip to Marianne Winters’ jumping off point? No wonder Durwood’s eyelids are so heavy and Pete… well Pete has the same bags under his eyes that he always has. Bet he had to gate check those on the red-eye flight to Cleveland, no way they would fit in the overhead bins.

Buckle up for the seventh consecutive week (!!!) of this Atomic Comics story arc. I’m pretty sure George H. W. Bush was president when this thing began. Looks like we’ll be in the wallowing in Batom Comics nostalgia phase of the story this week. Goody goody…

We Can Be Zeroes Just For One Day

Link To Today’s Strip

Yes, because these NEWFANGLED COMIC BOOKS TODAY always insist on blurring the lines between heroes and villains with their complicated dark, grim and gritty characters and (zzzzzzzzzzz). Five full weeks to introduce the premise and he’s already repeating it…some things never change. That look Pete & Boy Lisa are exchanging seems to represent “skepticism”, although it could just be shitty artwork. There’s just no way of knowing until next Tuesday when he (most likely) finally stops rehashing the premise.

I mean hey, if Chester wants to squander his fortune on comic book nostalgia that’s his business but honestly this entire “plan” seems quite squirrely to me. But hey, sure, go against the grain and sell comic books no one likes because if Starbuck Jones is any indication these “Atomic Comics” will be worth a mint thirty or fifty or seventy years from now, pretty much exactly when Skyler will be awash in his own comic book nostalgia, yearning for the days when he’d hide in the attic with his phablet reading digital copies of his favorite Atomic Comic titles, like “Meek Moon Mile” or “Space Penis” with a few fat-free granola cookies and a glass of almond milk on the side. If he’s really lucky he’ll find his old SJ decoder SD card too, but one thing at a time for now please.

How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Tom

Link To Today’s Strip

So, after five weeks of plodding ponderous dialog and endless time-wasting the premise is at long last revealed and…believe it or not…it involves comic (sigh) books…again. Chester wants to resurrect the “spirit” of those wonderful old Batom Comics of yesteryear. Bored listless employees, a fabled comic book artist working children’s birthday parties to make ends meet, an annoying cigar-chomping boss…yep, when Batom Comics folded it left a huge gaping void in the industry all right, a void only Pete and his faithful sidekick Boy Lisa can fill. If he’s looking for two boring nerds who daydream and skip work a lot, he totally nailed it.

“Batom”…”atom”…”ic”…sure Chester, makes sense to me. I suppose it’s better than “Bamto Comics” or “Tobam Occmis”…albeit not by a whole lot though. I can see the headlines now…

“Atomic Bomb – Hagglemore Bankrupted By Idiotic Dream, Drinking Heavily”

“Atomic Waste – Unsold Comic Books Worthless As Pulp & Do Not Degrade, Placing Strain On Local Landfills”

“Atomic Pile – Atomic Comics Creditors At Critical Mass As Hagglemore Sighted In Caymans”

“Atomic Fallout – Starbuck Sequels On Hiatus After Creative Team Leaves For Stupid New Gig, Hundreds Left Unemployed, Future Of Franchise In Doubt”

Yes siree, it’s a can’t-miss proposition. Everywhere you go these days all you hear are “these kids today” sighing to themselves over the comic book racks, sadly lamenting how today’s comic books are totally worthless when compared to the old-timey Golden Age comic books they can’t possibly remember. If you don’t believe me just visit your local megaplex and see the throngs of kids ignoring the latest superhero flicks, there’s all the proof you need. Kids today aren’t that much different than their parents were, they just want to sit in the attic with their vape pens and energy drinks and bags of flakka and read some good old fashioned comic books just like dear old dad used to do before the comic book industry sold them out and destroyed their dreams back in 1940 or 1960 or 1980 or thereabouts. By golly, Chester just wants to bring that “spirit” back and judging by the reaction from “young” Pete and Darin he’s really on to something here. “Cool”…”sweet”…he really captures the way the kids speak nowadays, doesn’t he?

Grim And Bear It

Link To Today’s Strip

Ha ha ha ha. TOM BATIUK, of all people, is doing an arc about how Chester dislikes “grim and gritty” comic book titles. What balls. After turning his once-lighthearted and humor-based comic strip into a litany of death, cancer, amputation and an endless cavalcade of human misery, he’s doing a “story” centering around how “dark” modern comic books are. Two words…”f*ck” and “you”, Tom. I’ve never seen a comic book where the lead character’s parents roundly reject her as she agonizingly dies of cancer, nor have I ever seen one where a trombone prodigy loses her arm in a car accident or one where the once-happy-go-lucky titular character drinks himself into thoughts of suicide either. Leave it to Tombat to inadvertently insult himself in his own strip. What a maroon.

So why did this require a cross-country trip? They couldn’t have had this discussion over the phone? So basically BatNard wasted five entire weeks on this just so he could work a few fictional Batom Comics “props” into the artwork for his own amusement. The self-indulgence is off the scale here and nearly approaches “Lisa’s Story” degrees of head-up-own-assed-ness.