Tag: Harry Dinkle

You Get Too Much You Get Too High

Link to today’s strip.

So, more of this crap.  My God this stuff is boring; it makes me want to smother myself.  It looks like I’m not alone; given the crowd that takes up most of panel two, I’m starting to think ol’ Tom Batiuk is starting to bore himself.

Well, at least with today’s episode, we get an actual instance mention of an act of hazing, though hiding someone’s oxygen bottle seems like it might have fatal consequences.  Here, The Odious Dinkle tosses it off as a grim reminder that nothing ever changes, but Becky appears to be chuckling to herself.  Yeah, that’s what I’ll do to John.  I can hardly wait.

Neither can we, Becky.  Neither can we.

I’ve never been to band camp, but it sure looks like everyone has just been milling around aimlessly while The Odious Dinkle blathers away.  And now that he and Becky are both leaving, more aimless milling.  Aren’t there supposed to be rehearsals and marching routines and things like that?  This seems like a waste of time for everyone–which makes it a perfect mirror for Funky Winkerbean.

Prisoners of the Lost Universe

Link to today’s strip.

This is a good example of what I mentioned yesterday–the majority of “stories” in this strip are people complaining about something without being specific in their complaints.  “X stinks, man.”  “Yeah, X sure stinks.”  “Good, we agree that X stinks.  See you tomorrow.”  “Not if I’m lucky, you won’t!”  (smirk) (smirk)

If you look at the dialogue in this strip (sorry to make you read it again) you could replace the word “hazing” with anything, and nothing would change.  Smoking.  Drinking.  Farting.  Reading comic books.  Reading Funky Winkerbean.  Try it; it actually makes the strip enjoyable.  Is Tom Batiuk crediting his readers with already knowing what “hazing” is, or does he just not care?

Well, let’s see, here’s a strip with Becky and Dinkle chatting.  I left it blank what they’re chatting about…time to turn on the news!  Say, this story about hazing sounds good!

Today, Dinkle throws out “Stockholm Syndrome” with no clarification and again, it could be that Tom Batiuk credits his readers with enough intelligence to know what Stockholm Syndrome is…or it could just be the case that he threw it in, knowing it would make him sound smart.

It doesn’t really seem appropriate for a story vague chat about “hazing” though–while there have been some recent horrible stories about hazing, in those cases the hazee didn’t immediately turn around and defend those who had wronged him.  Nope, in the case I heard about, police and the courts got involved and the ending was not pretty.

I would say that particular incident might have started as hazing, but quickly turned into abuse, and abuse is another matter entirely that I don’t think anyone would find defensible (or funny).  I should note that I’ve never experienced hazing from either end, but from what I understand it’s supposed to be a good-natured trial by fire endured to enter some club or another.  You would never know what hazing is if you relied on this strip.  Or Stockholm Syndrome for that matter.

We could see the effects of this hazing on a student (in a conversation with Becky), or actually see the hazing in question.  But I’m going to put my money on “No, we won’t.”  The rest of the week will be like today:

Two people having a nothing conversation.   Has Tom Batiuk been held prisoner by the forces of mediocrity so long that he now believes them to be his only friends, his guiding lights?

Art-wise, it’s eerie how Becky almost morphs into the gal in the second panel.  Same height, nearly same expression, just further left in the pane.  It’s such an odd thing to look at that it has to be deliberate.  I assume that he just doesn’t scribble stuff down and be done for the day, but I may be mistaken!

You Can’t Spell “Dinkle” without “DIE”

Link to today’s strip.

Greetings, folks, BChasm back for another stint.  Thanks to HeyItsDave for a splendid performance.  And here we go–

Oh good, we’re about to be lectured about how awful hazing is,  without being shown (or told about) any of it, so the week will be two people discussing something without defining it.  And before you ask, I have not peeked ahead; it’s just the way these things are always dealt with.  Hazing, bullying, class rings, Hollywood, Crazy Harry’s Happy Dance…you name it, and Tom Batiuk will tell you how bad it is without a single word “why.”

I cannot imagine why Batiuk keeps bringing back Dinkle.  I know that he personally loves the character and thinks he’s a font of wisdom and humor, but he is neither.  And Batiuk can’t be using him as a sop to the folks who read Act I; the character has been turned into something repellent, second only to the odious Les.  I suppose, like Les, it’s tempting to think of him as a defiant middle finger thrust at his critics, but man what a waste of energy.

The good part of today’s strip is panel three–it looks like age has finally caught up with Harry Dinkle and he’s about to dissolve away before our very eyes.

I’m kidding of course; even if that were to happen, we’d only hear about it through other people discussing it, and we’d never see a single frame for ourselves.  By Grabthar’s Hammer, what a moment to cherish.

 

 

Dinkle….SAVES things.

Peer through this window into Dinkle’s wizzled soul.

Holy crap, Dinkle saves stuff. And he feels comfortable enough with this creepy habit that he willingly shows Lefty one of his collections. This one seems innocent enough – tufts of grass from each years’ band camp – but will he ever show her his other collections? The ones kept in that special room behind the hidden door in the basement? The ones lined neatly up on narrow little shelves lining the walls…tiny jars holding little trophies and mementos of past achievements and heartbreaks…

Look! Here are sets of false teeth, taken from the nightstands of women at Bedside Manor who received “special music lessons.” And those jars near the door with all of Hallie’s nail trimmings from when she was just a baby. There are many, many others…Harry had access to the locker rooms at Westview High for so very long, and even now he visits from time to time, to see if there is anything else he might want to…collect.

Old Tyme Rock ‘N Roll

Well, I guess today’s strip provides some semblance of continuity to Morton Winkerbean’s uh… dream (I guess that’s what it is) of being a “rock star”, lining up with Thursday’s strip about drugs and groupies and whatnot. That does seem like an odd dream for a nursing home resident, even today as the stars of the rock ‘n roll era approach nursing home resident age. Still, it actually kinda makes sense that a wannabe rock star would name his son “Funky”.

This also lines up relatively well with the Mort we first met back in 2011, still not fully lucid and irritating the folks around him with bad dad jokes. Today’s Mort is less somber and churlish than the on we saw at Christmas five years back, but we’ve only ever seen him like that around Funky. Perhaps we can chalk that up to Mort simply not liking his son… another reason he might have named him “Funky”.