A Sundered Sunday’s Sundry

Link to today’s strip.

As usual, Sunday’s offering was not available for preview.  As I said last week, Sunday strips tend to be outside the continuity of the previous (or upcoming) week, so who knows what we’ll get?  I’m going to guess “band camp.”  It’s been a long while since we enjoyed one of those.   …many, many years in fact.  I’m sure we were presented one within the last year, though.

I doubt we’ll get a continuation of the “Flash Museum” arc, as Saturday showed both Pete and Dullard leaving the place.  I suppose they could babble and babble about the stuff they’ve seen for six panels–it would not come as a surprise.

Note that I said “the stuff they’ve seen.”  We sure as Hell didn’t get to see much of it.  Jay Garrick’s hat, about half of Captain Cold, a distant picture of Gorilla Grodd, and some boomerangs.   Someone who had never heard of the Flash, reading that story…would still never have heard of the Flash.  On Wednesday, this person would learn that a comic book is involved, and on Thursday he’d hear about “Flash villain(s).”  Though whether or not “Flash villain” is a villain opposing the Flash, or a type of villain, he would not know.  Also, is the Flash a person, or an organization like SHIELD?  For being such a big Flash fan, Tom Batiuk doesn’t seem to be able to say much about the man himself.

As Charles mentioned yesterday, Mr. Batiuk seems to have some peculiar ideas about Hollywood, and I’ve long suspected that the entire strip is just Mr. Batiuk saying, “This is my universe, and I can make it work however I want.  Comic books are the most revered art-form.  Anyone who works on a movie is paid enormous amounts of money, but they constantly daydream about what they really want to do–work on comic books.  Females are there to see that the man is supported in all things, unless it’s Funky, because screw him.”

Speaking of money, I’ve occasionally ordered DVDs from Warner Bros online store, so they send me periodic emails about other things.    One of them is a life-size statue of Wonder Woman, made out of some kind of foam and looking pretty realistic.  In order to get one of those, prepare to have $1300 dollars on hand.  Pete’s “dolly” looks less and less like an indulgence and more like an illness.

UPDATE:  Well, today’s offering did involve the flash, though not the one people were nattering on about last week.  The art in this one has a nice sense of space, flows well and looks pretty nice, though the two images of Dinkle do what in film school is called “crossing the axis.”  It’s something you’re not supposed to do, as it tends to subliminally confuse audiences.

The one thing I really want to mention is that image of Funky.  He has now become indistinguishable from his father, which makes that last panel pretty…disturbing.

Well, I see the light at the end of the tunnel is growing dim, so time for me to climb out of the pit before it fades entirely.  Please welcome your new dungeon master, DavidO!  Let’s all look forward to tomorrow, when, uh, a thing, er, might happen…or might not, but as always…um…[slinks away awkwardly]

Burn, baby, burn!

Link to what Bats hath wrought.

Wow. An entire week of Starbuck Jones and every bit of it has been peripheral to the actions of Funky Winkerbean regular cast members. I have to take back all the nasty things I’ve said about the writing in this strip – it’s obvious that Tom Batiuk is a genius – he’s managed to bring about a whole new comic (Starbuck Jones) while keeping the science fiction out and revolving the story entirely around the residents of his beloved Westview Ohio. Truly he is a master of his craft. Though I have to say that it would have been nice if there had been just a teeny bit of Mason Jarr hamming it up, or Marianne Winters’ cute little implied butt. No matter, there are still a few years to go until Bats gets that Lifetime Doodler Award or whatever, so I guess there’s plenty of time to inflict entertain us with the continuing interweaving of Funky Winkerbean and Starbuck Jones.

Oh, yeah, and before I forget – my wish was granted, too!

Mason, please, for the love of all that is holy, have Holly do her her Flaming Baton act.

— Me.

One last thing…we joke about this movie being “straight to cell phone” bad, but c’mon. We all know how bad it’s really going to be.

 

And…that’s it for my turn in the barrel. Beckoningchasm will be here tomorrow with some more high-quality snark, and I’ll be back in the comment section ruining T-Bat’s artwork.