Tag: Rana

I Predict Band Turkeys

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So, of course Adeela and Rana are friends.  All Muslims know each other, after all.  Since Rana is apparently getting her Master’s in Education, what is Adeela studying, that they’d have the same classes, and that she’d also share a class with Wally?  Unless they just met in a Muslim student group.  Which, if this school has one, you’d think Wally wouldn’t have gone six years or more without being near a Muslim.

And what is it with people in this strip never referring to anyone by name?  Crankshaft is always “that cranky bus driver”, and Adeela only refers to Wally as “a goofy guy”, and not “Wally”, “the vet”, or anything else that would make sense.  I mean, you know a guy named “Wally Winkerbean”, and can’t ever remember or mention a name as silly as that?

Becky Gives It One Thumb Up

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Given the fact that this is Rana’s first appearance in this strip in years, and she hasn’t been mentioned at all since, I don’t think her going to “teach in Afghanistan” would make much of a difference at all.  If this was Act 2, this would no doubt foreshadow an upcoming Very Serious Storyline.  But this is just Batiuk being cheap and thinking just saying a character is going to teach girls in Afghanistan is Edgy and Relevant and Important, because I’d be incredibly shocked if this strip ever shows that.  Or ever shows her again at all, honestly.  And if she does she’ll probably just be teaching at Westview with no mention of Afghanistan.  And then I’d be impressed that Batiuk even remembered she was supposed to be a teacher.

Adeela sure is fitting in well in Westview, sitting quietly and smiling while the male in her life talks about what interests him.

. . . And So, It Drags On

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I don’t know why, but it still amazes me how Batiuk will spend an entire week on boring, inconsequential stuff like Adeela and Wally sitting in a library, and then just completely skip over what a character who’s been missing for years like Rana has been doing with an “. . . and so”.  I mean, what led up to that sentence?  “I was disgusted by the decadence of western civilization, and so . . .”.  “I’ve been spending a lot of time on ISIS message boards, and so . . .”.  “I found out the actor who played Moon Mile Meek was a Muslim, and so . . .”.

I like how casual Batiuk depicts personal religious conversation and completely changing your worldview and lifestyle.  He makes it sound like how you choose your sports team.  ” . . . And so I became a Patriots fan.  After all, it was the team of my family.”.  I don’t really think this is how people work, usually.  “Well, I was adopted as a baby and don’t really have any memories of my birth family, but I’m assuming they were Muslim, so I’ll become Muslim too.”.

Oh, yeah, and apparently Wally has zero idea what’s going on in his daughter’s life, which is just amazing.  Although not at all remarkable.

Pinned Up Sleeves-Banned in Afghanistan

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“Yeah, believe it or not, things used to happen in my life, back in the day!  Now what passes for excitement in my life is the exciting tale of ‘Sitting a Table Away From A Muslim Woman!’.  Also, notice how I emphasized that she’s my adopted daughter, and not my real or ‘bio’ daughter.  In case you were wondering how a normal average American like me could have such a foreign looking daughter.  But yeah, we adopted her and that was pretty much the end of me taking an interest in her life, obviously.”

Wouldn’t you think this had already come up between Wally and Adeela?  Like, at the very least that he’d worked for an NGO in Afghanistan, and not just been there as a soldier?  I mean, I think she’d be interested to know that a member of Wally’s family was literally from her country.

You know Wally honestly used to be one of the characters in this strip I halfway liked, if only because he actually grew and developed through dealing with his PTSD and getting back into a normal life.  And damn if Batiuk hasn’t made him super unlikeable in a really short time.  At this rate I bet the next arc is going to reveal how Buddy (who looks like a totally different dog in this strip) is actually a raging anti-Semite.

 

It’s Funny Because Two People Are Talking At Once, I Guess

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Wow, this is shocking.  I mean, what’s shocking is that Wally actually remembers Rana’s name.  This is one of the many, many reasons why Batiuk is a terrible writer.  If he’s trying to create relatable characters, having a father and daughter who apparently still live in the same town not have any clue at all what’s going on in each other’s lives to this point is not the way to do it.  I kind of think this is the result of Batiuk explaining this plot to the artist, who, halfway through, reminded him “Wait, doesn’t Wally have a Muslim daughter?”.  Batiuk probably laughed it off, of course Wally doesn’t, I’m the writer, shut up and draw.  Then the artist pulled up a strip showing Rana, and Batiuk decided to just cram her in at the last minute like this, who cares if it makes both characters look like uncaring morons and realistically should render this whole arc pointless.  It’s a whole lot weirder for Wally to react to one Muslim woman wearing a hijab when his own daughter is a Muslim woman wearing a hijab.