A good comics writer can keep the reader off-balance with any number of literary and/or visual devices. TB accomplishes it by employing lax, slipshod storytelling and draughtsmanship. I assume that’s Nate’s wife, and not Cayla from a hairstyle ago plus glasses. We were able to establish that Mr. Blackburn appeared in earlier Funky Winkerbean strips; can any of you FW scholars tell me when, if ever, we’ve been introduced to Mrs. Nate Green? I mean before today?
Tag: Nate
Cojones Grown
Well, today’s strip is just so epic that I’m gonna invoke “fair use” and reproduce it here. Today’s our payoff, snarkers, our “ending earned”; here’s where it all comes together. Why did TB dredge up not just Roberta, but her limp dishrag of a husband? Why did Nate, instead of dealing with Roberta in his office one-on-one, assemble “every student, teacher, and parent volunteer“? Why, it was all setup in order to provide old, fat, evil Roberta’s very public dénouement, at the hands of the aforementioned wimp husband, no less.
In all honesty, panel 3 had me confused for a moment: I didn’t get why Summer was gasping “Dad?” while Dad was standing way behind her. Then I noticed the highlights in her hair were not blue, but brown, and realized I was looking at Becky. Please, please let her startled expression not be due to Dad finally asserting himself, but rather because she’s just witnessed her father being shanked by her berserk, hateful mother.
The Prom-ulgator
Epicus Doomus
May 16, 2012 at 12:37 am
Is that f*cking Les standing there behind Nate in panel two?Jeffcoat Wayne
May 16, 2012 at 1:01 pm
I believe that’s both Les and Cayla standing off to the side behind Nate. How fun!
Yep, Lord and Lady Douchebag have a place of honor behind Nate, and Summer beams her approval as he wraps up his sermon. If “the long and short of it” is that the SSC is allowed to attend in accordance with the school’s rules, why the hell didn’t Nate just tell Roberta that when she blew into his office? Oh, right: this is a month-long prestige arc.
promulgate (ˈprɒm(ə)lgeɪt), verb: promote or make widely known (an idea or cause)
Intolerably
Charles
May 16, 2012 at 1:59 pm
Actually, Nate going all Rules-Lawyer on this is actually pretty cowardly of TB. But we already knew that. And his lecturing the children as if they weren’t already in support of what he’s arguing is a narrative failure.
Nate continues to “tell it like it is”. In classic TB “tell-don’t-show” style, the principal states that intolerance exists “inside this building as well.” But the only objection we’ve seen to the SSC (same-sex couple, if you’re just joining us) has come from perennial Puritan Roberta and the mob of anonymous adults outside the building. Wouldn’t it make for a more compelling story to portray at least a few students as less than accepting? Instead, Batiuk unwisely casts this as an old-fogeys-vs-the-kids conflict.
By the Book
Weird way to approach the whole gay prom issue, Nate. Start with a little passive-agressiveness towards the student body, waving the Westview High Student Handbook and asking “Remember this?” ‘Cause, y’know, those high school kids get their hands on that handbook and memorize it cover to cover, lest they run afoul of “the rules”.
Meanwhile in Kentucky, a real-life same-sex couple was denied entrance to the senior prom at Lexington Catholic High School:
Hope Decker, 18, a senior, and sophomore Tiffany Wright, 16, had already gotten their dresses for the event, but Friday afternoon they were told by school administrators they could not attend as a couple because of the church’s stance on same-sex relationships…When the couple tried to enter the school’s gymnasium, where the prom was held, they were turned away, so Wright said they held their own prom in the school’s parking lot.
Son of Stuck Funky 
