Tag: Dinkle

The Great Gig In The (Sigh)

Link To Today’s Strip

You know how sometimes a rarely-seen FW character will suddenly re-appear and you’re all like “wow, long time since we’ve seen him/her!” and it seems all novel and fresh for half a second but then within a day or two (tops) you’re already violently sick and tired of that seldom-seen character? Yep, Harriet.

On the other hand, you have (ugh) Dinkle, who’s around way, way, way too frequently. Once every six or seven years would be plenty. Unfortunately for everyone else, BatYam feels otherwise. This arc is exactly like digging out your driveway after a heavy wet snow and watching the snowplow roar by as it buries your driveway once more. In some ways it’s even worse than that, as snow doesn’t typically cackle.

Coming next week: in keeping with Funkyverse tradition, Dinkle dies while playing the organ. Commenters on SoSF are ecstatic, at least until Ghost Dinkle visits Becky for the very first (but not last) time. “Harry’s Story…The Other Marching Shoe“.

Has Harry Ever Been Experienced? Well, Has He?

Link To The Thing

Now that you mention it I can’t recall ever seeing Dinkle actually playing a musical instrument. Surely he has and I’m just blotting it out for obvious reasons, but isn’t he really more of a conductor of sorts? Or am I just remembering his entire ten thousand year character arc all wrong?

Look how angry he is in panel two, as if these old biddies would know who the hell Harry Dinkle is. Where the hell did he learn how to play a big church organ anyhow? In the Army or something? It’s all so stupid and implausible. He couldn’t even create a backstory here, where we learn that Dinkle’s dad Hinkel used to play the organ at his old church and young Harry used to tag along or whatever. He’s just the “music guy” and BatHam’s go-to whenever “music” is somehow involved, like Les and smugness or Boy Lisa and blandness.

Total Organ Failure

Link To Today’s On Time Strip

No, she passed away while playing racquetball, you clod. This one is rather grim and depressing, even by FW standards. They just refuse to let that poor old dead organist rest. Oh well, at least her death resulted in a humorous anecdote for everyone else, so her hundred and twenty years on this planet were well worth it. Maybe next week the pastor will die during a funeral service, with hilarious consequences of course.

I get this reference, because G and C are music notes, right? Sigh. It’s not Batiuk’s worst gag ever, but still, the old lady dying sort of takes the edge off, for lack of a better term. In a FW context it’s nothing but to an outsider I suppose it’d seem rather dark, which is probably one reason why hardly anyone reads it.

Infernal Organs

Link To The Thing

Organ, organ, organ…it’s like he’s making sausage here or something. “Our current organist wants to stop playing the organ and the previous organist died.”

“Shhh! You’ll scare off the organist and we’ll still need someone to play the organ as our new organist!”

“So, Mr. Dinkle, will you take over as our organist and play organ music on the organ?”

The way he just consistently beats selected words or phrases into the ground just drives me nuts. It’s really hacky too, it reads like dialog a child would write just to pad the word count on a homework assignment. I’m sure my fellow SoSF contributors would agree, there are times when you just can’t believe you’re typing “band mattress” or “Xaxian” or “Lisa’s Story” again. By the end of this week I’ll be able to type “organist” in a millisecond, which will never, ever come in handy again.

Harry Dinkle – Male Organ Player

Link To Today’s Thing

Get ready for a shitload of organ puns, folks. I’ve been trying to work “skin flute” into a Dinkle arc post title for years. Maybe this is the one. Fingers crossed.

Anyhow, why the f*ck was that flashback necessary? It’s not like he’s applying for a real job here. And man, that’s some really crappy flashback art in panels one and two, that doesn’t look like Old Dinkle at all. It looks more like Ed McMahon trying to channel Elvis.

It’s already Tuesday and he still hasn’t even finished climbing the stairs. When I think of “most hated” FW characters I always overlook Dinkle for some reason, then he re-appears and I remember all too well that he’s right there, heroically battling for the place and show spot behind Les-retariat, who’s already lapped the field twice. I never really minded Old Dinkle but New Old Dinkle is like fingernails on a chalkboard, with his wry cackle and endless reserve of crappy band gags. He was better when he was a weird marching band fascist, as Act III Dinkle has no redeeming qualities whatsoever.