Cory – Page 7 – Son of Stuck Funky

Driving Me Backwards

Gad, the pacing in this damned strip…”glacial” isn’t the word for it, since glaciers manage to move a few inches per year. This is like trying to put together a jigsaw puzzle, except you have to wake up a really old caretaker to hand you each piece, one at a time. And in the end, the resultant picture is not worth the effort.

Let’s recap: We have a date, Wally’s off with Adeela, I’m mad, Wally and Adeela are driving….

Tomorrow, I expect them to impart that Wally and Adeela are driving a car, and they’re not on the golf course starting wildfires.

Credit where it’s due: Rocky’s been drawn nicely, especially panel three.

Here’s what Brian Eno had to say, back in the day.

John Foxx had some thoughts as well.

Heads You Lose

Link to today’s strip.

Today’s content just repeats yesterday’s–imagine that–Rachel getting more and more miffed by unexplained behavior by Wally. As newagepalimpsest pointed out yesterday, this would be a typical scenario in an Archie comic.

But Archie’s creators never succumbed to the Pulitzer’s siren call. So, its stories could still be fun and somewhat relatable. Here? I’m surprised that Rachel’s expression isn’t one of sheer terror. Imagine, being abandoned by Wally.

She must have to hire a backhoe to find her self-esteem.

Me, on the other hand, what I’m struck by is Rachel’s head in panel three. What the heck? Is she auditioning to be part of the Peanuts gang? She wants to be the Little Red Haired Girl?

I’d be interested to know how this took place. Ayers drew her with her head sunk down, looking all irked, and Batiuk said “It looks like she doesn’t have a neck. Make her head bigger.”

“That’ll just make it worse.”

[A long pause] “…you like getting paid, don’t you?”

Where’s Wally?

Link to today’s strip.

Remember the “Where’s Waldo?” books? Those were fun, because in addition to searching for the titular striped-shirt guy, there were lots of amusing details scattered here and there in the crowds. Parallel series “Where’s Wally?” on the other hand, featured dull clods, blind alleys, unfunny non-sequiturs plus the added fear that if you touched the page, you just might have a finger wet with cat pee.

Today, I get that we’re supposed to find Wally’s behavior suspicious, but let’s be honest–Wally is a clod who can’t make a sandwich without getting his head caught in a jar. He’s never going to have to fight off the females. As I recall, Rachel basically threw herself at him, over and over, until she finally clung. As a manager, he can’t be bothered to tell his employees where he’s going for the afternoon. I get that this is the author manipulating things to create suspense, but…it ain’t working.

The most interesting aspect of this is the time of day. I gather it’s sometime in the afternoon, as Cory notes. What is Rachel doing there? I figured she had to rush out of class yesterday to go home, put on some makeup, get out the nice dress and so on for the “date night.” But I guess she just shows up and that’s when the “date” starts?

On the plus side, Rachel is drawn rather well in today’s episode. It makes a nice change from the weeks of deteriorating artwork we’ve witnessed lately.

In The Garage

Link To Today’s Strip

“Cars”? You might be able to squeeze ONE Batiukmobile in that garage, but plural? No f*cking way. I can’t tell if that’s supposed to be sepia-toned Cory or Funky or what, nor can I tell how it relates in any way to the premise here, or why this wasn’t just a one-paneler, but at least it’s already Thursday which means this is hopefully almost over.

That’s a pretty decent house by Westviewian standards, definitely a home befitting the local pizza kingpin. Nice size, nice lawn, nice garage…it’s certainly better than Moore Manor, with its dead trees and weird detached office. Chester’s place is nicer, but than again he IS a renowned comic book collector and all. I’ve always wanted Batiuk to do a map of Westview and the surrounding area so I can see where everything is in relation to everything else, as this fascinates me to no end. Given his obvious refusal to put anything more than significantly less than the bare minimum into this thing, I assume I’ll be waiting for that for some time.

Grave Concerns

Link To Today’s Strip

Impending climactic doom, neglected old gravesites hiding the bones of dead friends…Happy Holidays from your friends at Funky Winkerbean and King Features! Man, this Melinda sure is a barrel of laughs. You already know how I feel (and vice versa) regarding Author Guy’s reliance on adorable old coot humor so I won’t go into that again, but they’ve been popping up like mushrooms in the strip for the last few years. Cliff, Vera, Phil Holt, New And Improved Morty, his pals at the home and now Melinda. The average age of the characters in FW must be up around seventy or eighty by now. Even if it were funny (and it isn’t) it’d still be weird, especially when you realize he already has another comic strip that’s jam-packed with zany and depressing old coots. Which is already one too many.