Tag: crossovers

Too early for flapjacks?

Oh, did you come here for Funky Winkerbean snark? Sorry, but today’s strip is a John Darling comic, presumably part of a JD revival that few will get and surely fewer asked for.

Yep, this is “Phil The Forecaster”, weatherman for Channel One.
JD5-14-79

Well, former weatherman for Channel One now, apparently… Back in the JD and early Act I FW days, Phil was the subject of a running gag where, get this, his forecasts were always wrong!!! And everyone made fun of him for it! Ha Ha! Oh man, can you believe it? A TV weatherman getting the forecast wrong… Brilliance.

Anyways, Phil just got fired.

We turned left at Montoni’s

The joke in today’s strip appeared in Sumerian cuneiform. It likely dates back even further in oral tradition, as seen in the following paleontologist reconstruction:

Tilmily and Amtrilia

Of course back then, the trilobite’s twin didn’t step all over the punchline like Emily is doing today. And this “teachers are great” business? Hoy, Centerville schools must be in shambles.

Is Nate worried as all get out about what these two think of the school or what? Students moving TO Westview really is the rarest of rare cases, I guess, and he really is terrified of losing them. I don’t think Emily and Amelia’s mother cares half as much about their first day of school as Nate seems to.

Sortwhere is this going?

The red blue carpet tour continues in today’s strip. The Westview hive mind has fully taken control of Emily and Amelia now, as they both smirk at Nate’s anti-joke and don’t seem to even consider fleeing at the very sight of Les.

Given that Nate has shown the sisters “The Bleat” (which is really more min comm than mass comm) in addition to the band, can we assume that, like the band, Les’ video journalism fiefdom is failed levy-proof?
Of course we can! The last time Les didn’t get what he wanted, I could still watch UPN on my analog television.

By the way, I’m still wondering where the news desk that Cindy and Channel 1 donated went. “The Bleat” clearly isn’t using it. It’s rare that TB makes a plot point and then ignores it or forgets about it later…

Enrolled Up Sleeve

As the first students to move TO Westview in decades, Emily and Amelia are receiving the red carpet treatment from the WHS staff. See today’s strip, where Principal Nate personally escorts them to Lefty’s band room to get them involved in the school’s only extracurricular activity. Nate was so excited to be showing new students around that he didn’t even check to see if Dinkle was lurking, waiting to make Crankshaft look good by comparison, before bursting into the band room.

Strip #4 with Emily and Amelia, and we’re almost kinda sorta getting some insight on their personalities. Emily, the “cup-is-half-full” one, wears pink and plays the flute. Amelia wears black turtlenecks, “shreds” a “pretty mean” “guitar”, and says so while standing in a sassy half-akimbo pose (or whatever that’s called).
I haven’t seen character traits summed up this succinctly since the third season theme song of Sister Sister.

They say this Crankshaft is a bad driver… (shut your mouth)

HEAR YE! HEAR YE! TODAY’S STRIP IS PART OF A CRANKSHAFT CROSSOVER! HE IS EXPLICITY MENTIONED BY NAME AND SOME CHARACTERS EXPLAIN THEIR RELATIONSHIP TO HIM AND HOW THEY KNOW OF HIS ANTICS SO THERE WILL BE NO CONFUSION ABOUT THIS BEING A CRANKSHAFT CROSSOVER!

When meeting someone for the first time, it is common to expand further on a topic in which you discover that you share knowledge. Even so, a crotchety troll of a school bus driver (who neither of you has ever actually met, by the way) would seem to be a topic of conversation that that both parties would want to avoid. Indeed, I intend to teach my children to go out of their way to avoid discussing religion, politics, and Crankshaft in unfamiliar company.