Tag: Linda

Brownie Pointless

The squick continues in today’s strip…

Good grief Linda, you two aren’t even done moving all of Bull’s junk to the car and you’re trying to set up a date?! Also, “buying you A lunch”?! Who talks like that? And the worst part, you take Buck to Montoni’s! I’m pretty sure taking someone in the throes of CTE-dementia to Montoni’s is at least a misdemeanor. It certainly should be.

Buck, pick another topic. Linda has already heard all about “those privileged @#*%!!” from… oy, Brownie Point. She would know more if Crazy hadn’t stolen Bull’s DVD of Westview’s game against them… but that’s no reason to fill her in. She was married to a guy who reminisced in excess about his high school football career for 30 years, so she’s probably heard enough… eh, scratch that. Maybe listening to high school football stories is her thing.

De Jock Vu

Today’s strip takes us back in time to Sunday, I think. Yep, TB is repeating himself all of two days later… eh, he’s done worse.

Well, not much worse, because Buck hitting on Linda (and insulting the entire canine species) is some of squickiest squick we’ve seen TB hatch in a good long while. How else are we supposed to read “a little attention and a job to do”? This is not cute or endearing, it’s gross. Buck looking kinda like Dennis Hastert does the strip no favors either. Just awful all the way around.

Habakbuck

Aaaaaaaaaaaaand… we’re still watching Buck and Linda wade through Bull’s sports junk in today’s strip? Of course we are. This is post-40th anniversary Funky Winkerbean we’re looking at, expectations are for fools.

Oh hi, I’m billytheskink, and speaking of anniversaries… I’m proud to be the one to take you all through the 10th anniversary of this here groundbreaking blog. I will, however, profess nothing but lament that we must be subjected to the maudlin nonexistence of a story arc that is surely coming this week.

So Buck has the same problem with hoarding sports memorabilia that Bull had? That sounds like a trite but reasonable “men, amirite” bit until you consider that Bull followed his high school football career with a 4 year college career, an NFL training camp invite, assistant and head football coaching jobs at Westview High School, a head girl’s basketball coaching job at WHS, a rescinded offer to coach a college football team, and championships won in both high school football and girl’s basketball. As far as we know, Buck’s football career ended when he walked off the field at Big Walnut Tech for the last time. Bull has an excuse to have collected a bunch of junk from his decades-long career in sports. What’s Buck’s excuse?

All Bucked Up

Link To Sunday’s Strip

Thanks for the expository dialog, Linda! Apparently lugging Bull’s old garbage to the dump WHS Sports Hall Of Fame makes up for concussing him all those times. In my opinion Bull is the clear loser in that deal, which is certainly no surprise. I really wish he’d stop dragging this out, but then again dragging things out is kind of what BatBrain does, much to everyone’s disgust. And how come Buck is all wry and cheerful while Bull was all unpredictable and squirrely? It’s like HIS CTE comes and goes. Sigh.

Stay tuned for billytheskink AND SoSF’s 10th anniversary! If only time went as slowly in real life as it does in the Funkyverse.

Burn It All Down

Link to today’s strip.

Well, my wish from yesterday wasn’t granted, and we’re back with the Mope Set.  As before, I don’t know what to make of this; I wish I’d had the arc where Funky misses the winning basketball shot, because that’s easily explainable as Tom Batiuk’s utter hatred of his title character.

Then this would be relevant:

(Larger and more satisfying version here.)

In today’s case–well, is it true that fewer high school kids are going out for football?  I have no way of knowing either way.  My impression is that sports are always popular for students.  If the numbers are falling, one thing I do know is that it’s NOT because the kids read a powerful anti-CTE story in Funky Winkerbean.

And the last two panels, again, make me wonder if we should be concerned about Batiuk’s mental state.   Much as I disdain his work, I have no animus against the man himself.  May he live long and prosper.  But what on earth is Buck talking about?  How does cancelling the football season mean that the band “wins”?  Aren’t they tied in great measure tied to one another?  Yes, there are other band activities, like the odd concert and student assemblies and so on, but the main display of the band is at sporting events.

And please tolerate a dumb question from a non-sporto, but it’s March.  Isn’t the football season already over?

As for Linda’s curtain line, does Tom Batiuk know what “Pyrrhic victory” means?  It’s when you win a war, but at such great cost to your side that it might as well be a defeat.  Trying to spin the logic here, she means no football games means, um, no band half-time shows, but, uh…there’ll be other occasional activities for the band (which the football team wouldn’t have).  So the band has marginally more stuff to do.  But there may be so few of said activities…uh, lemme think.  I guess she means that the school might consider cancelling the band as well?  Is that it?

Why would she care?  A) She’s retired.  Other than retirement pay, the school is in her past.  (Of course high school never really goes away in Funky Winkerbean, but still.)  B) She never had any interaction with the band that I can recall.  If the school cancelled football and band, why would she care either way?

In order to really have that line work, the band members would have to be actively persuading students not to join the football team.  Which is not what they spoke about.  And neither Linda nor Buck would know anything about such a scheme.  (And that kind of scheme would make a very interesting storyline, honestly…which is why we’ll never see it.  Damn.)

I keep bashing my head against this strip, trying to figure out the logic or sense behind it, and all I get is a headache.  I think Funky Winkerbean is giving me CTE.