Les’ yellow shirt – Page 49 – Son of Stuck Funky

I Think We're All Brazos on this Bus

“…I tell ya, wives: even in death they continue to nag, amiright?” Tsk. With his projector on the fritz, Les resorts to a little standup technique to engage his fans.

This strip appears to be little more than a shout out to Brazos Bookstore, a popular independent bookstore a few blocks north of Rice University (and 20 miles from the Brazos River) that hosted TB’s tour stop in Houston.

billytheskink
December 7, 2010 at 10:54 am

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A big tip o’ the SoSF coonskin for that bit of info, Billy! I had assumed that it was some kind of a play on the name Amazon (the Amazon and Brazos are both rivers, and both names have z‘s) or maybe the name of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. But sho’ nuff, TB has borrowed from real life. Compare the “exterior shot” from today’s strip with the one from Brazos Bookstore’s website: it’s the same place, with a couple TB touches, like changing the color of the building and transforming the car that’s parked outside to one of his trademark generic minivans!

Help-Les

technicaldifficulty — Click to view larger

Les can’t figure out why the laptop isn’t synching with the projector. I can’t figure out what is going on with the guy’s head in the third row: the poor man seems to be suffering from some hideous, tumorous facial deformity. To compliment his increasingly slack and haphazard “writing”, TB has been playing fast and loose when it comes to drawing characters that are even remotely lifelike. In recent weeks we’ve been treated to a Mr. Incredible look-alike at the book signing, a goofy band-turkey customer, and numerous characters with impossibly tiny hands.

Houston? We Have a Problem

In case we didn’t pick up from last week’s strips that Les’ fame extends beyond Westview, Ohio, Keisha helpfully hammers home the point that this book tour is national, bitches. Summer’s glee over her father’s long-overdue success triggers a face-morph: not only do her beady little eyes light up, but her eyebrows suddenly thicken, her chin recedes, and she manifests an overbite. This startling transformation is lost on Cody and Owen as they pass by in the background, seemingly joined at the hip. Meanwhile, deep in the heart of Houston, Texas, Les struggles with getting his laptop hooked up to a projector. Where’s his “wife Mike” when Les needs him?

What the hell is Les doing in Houston, anyway? Yesterday he was in New York, on the set of the Today show, and Saturday he was calling Cayla from San Diego (there were palm trees in the background, so he sure wasn’t calling from NYC). Batiuk seemed to be hinting at a plotline involving John Darling’s widow Jan, a producer for Today, getting him booked on the show. Appearing on national TV would be a major milestone in an author’s career, but The Creator spends one day on it…SMDH (shaking my damn head)…

It's Exhausting

He’s self-effacing when he should be confident, and smug when he should be humble. The Les Moore Book Tour rolls on. His li’l Chia Pet back home offers Les some encouragement: “…it’s your destiny.” Yeah, right.

Mo-Les-ted

He’s handling the adulation just a little better now, folks: this time he remembered to say “thank you”… before saying something dickish and conceited. So smitten with Les is this fangirl that she’s oblivious to the tubby, leering guy standing inches behind her playing pocket pool…